What’s Fair for Dunn?
Adam Dunn raised some eyebrows last week when he declared the Chicago Cubs as his top choice. Dunn backed his preference by stating preferential financial details as “fair”. Could it be that Dunn is the rara avis of sluggers, the one willing to take less money than his counterparts to play for his top choice? During the season, Dunn’s former teammate Bronson Arroyo speculated Dunn would seek a nine-figure contract. Excuse Dunn’s cupidity, because those hopes were prior to the bottoming out of the market. What exactly would a fair deal for Dunn be?
The 29-year-old had a solid offensive season in 2008 and produced 29.7 wRAA. Not quite as good as 2007 (36.2), but it wasn’t because Dunn didn’t hit homeruns. In fact, Dunn has hit exactly 40 homeruns four straight seasons, and more than 40 five straight seasons. Instead, the drop in wOBA and slugging percentage seems to be tied with a .262 batting average on balls in play. Roughly 18% of batted balls were line drives, which suggests Dunn’s BABIP is a bit unlucky. Consider that if Dunn’s BABIP was simply .299 (using the somewhat tired .120 + LD% method of expected BABIP) he would’ve recorded 12 more hits with 318 non-homerun batted balls. Even if each of those were singles, Dunn’s slugging would have jumped more than 0.02 points.
Defensively Dunn is poor. Over the past three seasons Dunn has recorded UZRs of -11.1, -14.9, and -10.1 in left field. Dewan’s +/- has Dunn worth -58 plays since 2006, or -46.4 runs, an average of -15.5 runs per season. Somehow PMR put Dunn in the positive. Positioning? Fluke? Who knows. That still doesn’t save Dunn from a negative average. Call it -10.
Marcels doesn’t seem to like Dunn too much, a .383 wOBA and 20.5 wRAA. I can easily see Dunn outperforming that projection, and I’ll say 25 wRAA, which could be a wee pessimistic. Dunn seems like a safe bet to get around 650 plate appearances, and gives us the equation necessary for projecting Dunn’s WAR, between 2.6 and 2.8, depending on whether you use 22.5 or 20 runs.
I called it 2.7 WAR and figured Dunn will get around a four-year deal. Depending on how you feel about Dunn’s potential decline, I have Dunn worth roughly 45 million. Now, let’s see if 11.25 annually is “fair” to the Dunn camp.
As a Yankee fan, I would definitely prefer Dunn at 4/45 to Manny at 3/75, and I hope the Yankees think the same thing.
except that if the Yankees could shell out 25 per for a postion they are overflowing with, then maybe they should consider giving the same money to someone who will actually fill a position of need for them .
I’ll be shocked -SHOCKED!- if Dunn signs for ~$10M a year. Not that I disagree with you analysis, RJ.
Speaking ‘tired .120 + LD%’, have you read the article about BABIP over at THT from a few weeks ago? I emailed the link to Dave and Derek @ USSM because I thought it was really interesting. I can’t find it right now, but it’s worth checking out.
Oh, my grammar was awful there. Sorry about that.
Jason,
I’m familiar with the Bendix/Dutton paper, I just checked and they have him at a .286 “new xBABIP” which is a bit lower than the old method. Here’s the link to that piece for those wondering:
http://www.hardballtimes.com/main/article/batters-and-babip/
The Excel file is at the bottom.
Thanks, RJ.
I use a replacement level of 20 runs per 600 PA. Tango uses 22.5 runs per 700 PA. It’s really the same replacement level – I just prefer whole numbers and hardly anyone actually gets 700 PA, so I think mine is a little easier for people to grasp.
From 2006 to 2008, Dunn has posted WARs of 2.17, 3.42, and 2.04 in 655 PA per season. That’s an average of 2.35 WAR per 600 PA.
To get to 2.7 WAR, you’d have to believe that Dunn is not only going to defy aging, but he’s going to improve over his prior three year performance. Put me down as a skeptic on that one.
With an aging curve, I’d call Dunn a +2 win player for 2009. In this economic climate, he shouldn’t get more than about $9 million a year.
Makes sense. Thanks.
“Bronson Arroyo speculated Dunn would seek a six-figure contract.”
As in like $900,000? Or like $100,000,000 ( a 9 figure contract)?
I’m confused.
Oops. Fixed.
Lets say Dunn does end up in Chicago. Would it be smart to put any stock in his Wrigley Field stats? The sample size isn’t huge, but it’s not tiny either. In 217 AB’s(sixty games) he has hit .286/.419/.664. As good as he’s been in GAB, which admittedly is a better hitter’s park, could it be that he would be even better in Wrigley?
No – a player’s performance at a particular park (beyond his home park) is almost never meaningful. Park factors do a good job of helping us understand how a park treats a certain type of player, and the sample needed to believe that the player had a unique skill to outperform the park factor would require 1,000+ PA, and it takes an entire career for a visiting player to rack up that many PA at a road stadium. By the time we figured out if Dunn was better at Wrigley based on his road numbers, his career would be over.
Thanks. Do you know where I can find the numbers for how specific parks affect specific types of players? Such as how does Wrigley affect left handers, slap hitters or power hitters?
The current Hardball Times 2009 Annual has such an analysis, and as luck would have it, Dunn is the poster boy for the article.
For what it’s worth, Dunn’s RZR was third best among NL starting left fielders last year. (.899)
http://www.hardballtimes.com/thtstats/main/index.php?view=fielding&linesToDisplay=50&orderBy=zone_rating&direction=DESC&qual_filter=1&season_filter%5B%5D=2008&league_filter%5B%5D=2&pos_filter%5B%5D=7&Submit=Submit
This seems to fit the PMR results. However, Dunn had the lowest “out of zone” plays, which isn’t included in RZR.
RZR and the UZR published here on FanGraphs are based on the same dataset. UZR just is far more complete and analyzes the data better. There’s no real reason to use RZR anymore.