Contract Crowdsourcing 2020-21: Ballot 8 of 10

by
October 23, 2020

Free agency begins five days after the end of the World Series. As in other recent offseasons, FanGraphs is once again facilitating a contract-crowdsourcing project, the idea being to harness the wisdom of the crowd to better understand and project the 2020-21 free-agent market.

This year, we’ve added a few new features to the ballots based on reader feedback. You now have the option to indicate that a player will only receive a minor-league contract, or won’t receive one at all. We’ve elected to show averages from the 2017-2019 seasons so that this year’s shortened slate doesn’t skew the numbers, but we’ve also included 2020 stats as a point of recent reference. 2020 salary figures represent players’ pre-pandemic contract amounts. Statistics are prorated to full season where noted; the projected WAR figures are from the first cut of the 2021 Steamer600 projections.

Below are ballots for seven of this year’s free agents — in this case, another group of starting pitchers.





 

Meg is the managing editor of FanGraphs and the co-host of Effectively Wild. Prior to joining FanGraphs, her work appeared at Baseball Prospectus, Lookout Landing, and Just A Bit Outside. You can follow her on twitter @megrowler.

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sadtrombonemember
3 years ago

One year contracts for everybody!

1
fjtorres
3 years ago
Reply to  sadtrombone

Even Kluber?

0
sadtrombonemember
3 years ago
Reply to  fjtorres

He’s in the top tier of the one-year buy low candidates for the rotation, and I count 17 teams that might be interested in Kluber/Paxton/Richards/Ray, so I don’t think it’s going to be a bargain-basement deal. But I can’t see anyone giving him more than a one-year deal at this point. He’s barely pitched.

Really, I think all of these guys are going to get major league deals. They’re all coming off years where they are either too injured to pitch well, they pitched absolutely terribly after being good before, or had a good run over about 30 innings but you can’t trust it.

Kluber, Paxton, Richards, and Ray probably lead the pack
with Odorizzi, Smyly, Happ, Quintana, Hill, Brett Anderson, Minor, Hamels, and DeSclafani next,
and then Porcello, Shoemaker, Fiers, Lester, Arrieta, and Anibal Sanchez at the bottom.

But I think it’s all one-year, MLB deals in the single digits.

Samardjiza, Zimmerman, Milone, Chatwood, Teheran, Wood, and Chacin are probably getting MilB deals.

0
Doug Lampertmember
3 years ago
Reply to  sadtrombone

Pretty much, Kluber I think they’ll pick up the option. It’s marginally cheaper than a qualifying offer. Unfortunately, “Pick up the option” is not a vote option, so I called it 1 year at 18m.

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bluerum29
3 years ago
Reply to  sadtrombone

I gave Odorizzi and Ray 2 year deals. Ray is younger and Odorizzi seems like a safe bet. So many question marks with others

0
sadhulkmember
3 years ago
Reply to  bluerum29

It’s so hard to know how much missing this year for mostly unconcerning reasons will matter for Odorizzi or Stroman, who are two of the strongest and most consistent starters available. Ray looked pretty broken this year, I think he’s more of a one year deal.

0