Mets to Re-Sign Yoenis Cespedes
Well, here we go; the hot stove is starting to fire up.
Optimism growing in Mets camp they can get a deal done with Cespedes, sources say…
— Tim Brown (@TBrownYahoo) November 29, 2016
Sources: Cespedes back to #Mets.
— Ken Rosenthal (@Ken_Rosenthal) November 29, 2016
Sources: Cespedes deal expected to be four year, $110M.
— Ken Rosenthal (@Ken_Rosenthal) November 29, 2016
The Mets had been pretty interested in retaining Cespedes, and he seemed interested in sticking around, and it looks like both parties found a way to make it work even without waiting for the new terms of the CBA to be agreed upon.
At 4/$110M, Cespedes ends up effectively getting close to the deal everyone expected him to get last winter, when you factor in that he got $27.5 million for 2016 on his one-year deal. This is a little bit less than what our expected price was headed into the winter, as Cespedes settled on four years at a slightly higher AAV rather than pushing for a fifth year and getting the total guarantee up slightly. Here’s the blurb we included in our Top 50 free agent write-up, where Cespedes ranked #1 overall.
| Type | Years | AAV | Total |
|---|---|---|---|
| Dave Cameron | 5 | $24.5 M | $122.5 M |
| Avg Crowdsource | 5 | $24.0 M | $118.4 M |
| Median Crowdsource | 5 | $25.0 M | $125.0 M |
| Age | PA | BB% | K% | AVG | OBP | SLG | wOBA | wRC+ | Off | Def | WAR |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 31 | 595 | 7.3% | 21.1% | .272 | .330 | .494 | .346 | 116 | 12.4 | -2.2 | 3.0 |
A year after getting rejected by the league, Cespedes is considered by most to be the best player on the market this winter. He followed up his 2015 offensive breakout with another strong year in Queens, and while his defensive performance took a dive while playing through a quad injury, his recent power spike shouldn’t be viewed with as much skepticism as it was last year. Of course, he’s still built like a linebacker and lower-half injuries are the kinds of things you don’t want to see from a guy who relies on athleticism for a good chunk of his value. So there’s still risk here, which is why we all seem to agree that a five-year deal is the best fit here, even for the top player available.
Criag Edwards went through Cespedes’ comparisons a few weeks back and found him to be worth something in the range of $100 million or so, so this seems like a perfectly reasonable investment for the Mets. He’s a good player, and this is what good players go for these days.
The question, of course, is what the Mets do now with an overcrowded outfield. With Curtis Granderson and Jay Bruce under contract for significant money as corner outfield options, Michael Conforto around as a young player who should fit into a corner spot as well, and now Cespedes, the team is overflowing with left and right fielders. One or even two of those guys are probably leaving Queens now, so with Cespedes back in the fold, the Mets can figure out how to make their roster work again.
Dave is the Managing Editor of FanGraphs.
What a steal by Sandy.
the nats’ very existence and success is going to kill all my spirit
jr pls
Has the crowdsourcing/estimates been better so far this year, or am I just not remembering how close they were in years past?
Trade Bruce asap and make sure conforto plays every day. Grandy and Lagares should platoon in center.
Easy, now. I admired Grandy’s emergency CF work last year, but I’m not ready to start a 36-year-old with no arm for 120+ games in CF. If any current Met should platoon with Lagares, it’s Conforto. If you want to give Conforto some RF starts against southpaws (over Grandy), okay.
“Criag Edwards went through Cespedes’ comparisons a few weeks back and found him to be worth something in the range of $100 million or so, so this seems like a perfectly reasonable investment for the Mets. He’s a good player, and this is what good players go for these days.”
Through 5 years, sure – but that’s incredibly lazy analysis, Dave. Through 4 years, he projected him to be worth $81.3m – nearly $30m less than he actually got. Over $7m/year more seems less than “perfectly reasonable,” compared to what Craig found.
What you did is also ‘lazy analysis’. Did you bother to even read the whole article? Or did you just cherry pick which projection you wanted to use and ignore the second table in Craig’s analysis which would put a 4 year deal at $96M or a $3.5M/yr overpay.
A 3.5m.yr overpay is not that bad. What is that, 16% ?
Overpaying in a year where there are so few options is basically a given.
And NY prices means that their revenues are well above league average. If they don’t hit the luxury tax, a 16% overpay is a wash at worst.
It would be nice to see how the numbers break out by year. It would make a world of sense for the Mets to front load the deal while their young pitchers are still affordable and under team control. I love the deal now, but talk to me in three years when $30MM, 37 year old Cespedes prevents them from retaining one of their good arms.
Did you even bother to check Cespedes age? Or are you just bad at math?
Bad at typing, actually.
Fair
If you’re a Mets fan, today is a pretty…pretty…prrreettty good day
#Sexpedes
Using Steamer it’s maybe a slight overpay but not too bad
http://i.imgur.com/sSuhwFl.png
They are paying him like a ~12-win player and one good year (like a bit less than 2015) and he can hit 12-wins easily with a normal decline.
Also might be worth noting the no trade clause he got too, so the Mets probably would have paid him a little bit more.
Add comp pick value as well. Its a firm overpay.
Good move by Sandy. Just needs one or two more to make up for the Daniel Murphy/Justin Turner debacles. (If Mets had kept either Murphy or Turner, let alone both, they would have been WS winners last year, no question.) Bring Turner and Murphy home!
I don’t know if they had the arms to make it all the way last year. I really don’t.
Any thoughts about Wright platooning at first ?
Cespedes is a fat dumb hotdog who can’t walk/run/play CF and is the wrong side of 30. The nice part is they only signed him for 4 years.
Wouldn’t the Mets have been better served signing Fowler for 4/65-70?