Nobody Really Wanted Corey Kluber
Since the start of the 2016 season, Corey Kluber has been baseball’s sixth-best pitcher by WAR. That’s despite making just seven starts last year. Even over the last three seasons, he’s still in the top 10 and just two years ago, his 5.5 WAR ranked eighth. One season lost to injury later, Corey Kluber’s trade value plummeted. Despite no strong trade offers, an indication of Kluber’s perceived low value around the league, Cleveland didn’t want to keep their former ace and dealt him for the best offer available to the Texas Rangers. Here’s the deal, as first reported by Ken Rosenthal.
Rangers Receive:
- RHP Corey Kluber
Indians Receive:
- RHP Emmanuel Clase
- OF Delino DeShields Jr.
To help frame Kluber’s talent as it stands right now, here are the righty’s ZiPS projections as supplied by Dan Szymborski:
| Year | W | L | ERA | G | GS | IP | H | HR | BB | SO | ERA+ | WAR |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2020 | 11 | 7 | 3.98 | 24 | 24 | 144.7 | 136 | 20 | 38 | 145 | 122 | 3.1 |
| 2021 | 10 | 7 | 4.07 | 21 | 21 | 128.3 | 123 | 18 | 34 | 125 | 120 | 2.7 |
Kluber will be 34 years old in April. Even before the 2019 season began, there were questions about his effectiveness. He posted that 5.5 WAR season is 2018, but his velocity and swinging strike dropped in 2019. His 2017 represented a career year, but going from a 34% strikeout rate that season to a 26% strikeout rate in 2018, along with slightly diminished velocity moving into his mid-30s, likely prevented Cleveland from trading him last offseason when no team was willing to blow them away. While it might have been reasonable to expect a slightly diminished Kluber in 2019, predicting he would be hit by a comebacker that would break his forearm is more of a fluke. An oblique injury during rehab meant that Kluber didn’t make it back to the majors, taking his on-field expectations and trade value to new lows.
If we were to look at Kluber’s value through the lens of the projections, the return for Kluber is light, but not unconscionably so. Emmanuel Clase is an exciting reliever. Ben Clemens wrote about him in August, after he threw this 101 mph cutter:
He is still just a reliever, though. He was graded as a 40+ FV player on our 2019 midseason update, and Eric Longenhagen told me he’ll probably be a 45 this offseason. Clase will be 22 years old in March and will be making the minimum salary through 2022. Generically, a prospect like Clase would be worth around $4 million or so in present value. Kluber’s projections minus his salary above provide a $16 million surplus in present value. We could be generous and assign Clase a bit of extra value for having already making the majors, making his success more likely, but we’ll probably still come up short relative to Kluber’s projected value.
There were reports that Cleveland had asked the Angels for Brandon Marsh, a 50 FV prospect who is in the top 100 on THE BOARD. Looking just through the prism of prospect surplus value, Marsh is too much to give up for Kluber based on Kluber’s expected performance. Cleveland perhaps should have gotten a little bit more objectively, but they were never going to get a haul dealing him this winter. Claiming Cleveland should have gotten more because Kluber’s trade value is high is question-begging. The question actually raised by this deal is if Kluber’s current trade value is so low, why on earth would Cleveland bother to deal him now? The answer likely isn’t a great one for Cleveland as an organization.
After consistently keeping payroll in the bottom quarter of major league teams for the early part of the decade, Cleveland jumped close to league average after making the World Series in 2016. Attendance rose by roughly 400,000 fans after the payroll increase and the team kept most of those gains in 2018 as payroll remained steady. Last offseason, the club dropped payroll by more than $20 million and failed to address glaring weaknesses in the outfield; attendance at Progressive Field dipped by 200,000 and Cleveland barely missed the playoffs. While the offseason isn’t complete, the team is down another $20 million-plus in payroll thus far.
What’s most bizarre about this Kluber trade is that if he weren’t already on Cleveland, the team would be an ideal landing spot for him. They are a small-market club with a good team trying to make the playoffs. Taking on a one-year commitment for $17.5 million and having an option for a second year at a similar cost for an ace one season removed from a very good season feels like a no-brainer. It’s a low-risk, high-reward deal that a team like Cleveland should be all over. Kluber might not pay dividends, but if he recaptures some of his prior form, it turns Cleveland from a good team into a great one. If he’s good, but Cleveland is not, then his trade value next season will be well above where it is right now. This deal says that either Cleveland has no faith in Kluber as a pitcher or that cutting payroll is more important than trying to win. Even if it is the former, there’s still arguably a chance that Kluber contributes next season. If it’s the latter, and last offseason fails to provide Cleveland with the benefit of the doubt, that’s just bad for baseball.
Of course, another ideal fit for Kluber is the Texas Rangers. Kluber’s salary goes up $1 million with the trade to $18.5 million, but that’s basically what Madison Bumgarner just received, except for five seasons. The team option is now a vesting one should Kluber get to 160 innings and doesn’t end the season on the injured list, though if that happens, the option would look like a good deal. The vesting option shouldn’t lower Kluber’s trade value as the innings requirement still serves to raise the floor of the deal by decreasing the chances of being stuck with two poor seasons. Texas isn’t good right now, but they have a rotation that doesn’t need Kluber, with Lance Lynn, Mike Minor, Kyle Gibson, and Jordan Lyles as their top four. They could have gotten another low-end starter and still had one of the better rotations in the game. That low-end starter might increase the team’s floor, but for a club trying to get back into contention in what should be a tough division, raising the ceiling might be more important.
The Rangers still have a lot of work to do on the position-player side, but they now have one of the 10-best pitching staffs in baseball. Giving up Clase and a near-replacement-level outfielder in Deshields is a hard move not to make. A lot of other teams might have been able to put together similar offers, but it is possible many systems, like the lower-level heavy Angels, just couldn’t match up with the 2020 value Cleveland was looking for. That helps explain why Texas might have been able to pull off this deal where other teams couldn’t, but it doesn’t do much to help understand why Cleveland made this deal at this time when Kluber’s value to them should have been much higher than what he returned in trade. What ended up being good for the Rangers also seems pretty bad for baseball.
Craig Edwards can be found on twitter @craigjedwards.
Respectfully, we don’t know if it was the best offer available. We only know it’s the best one that offered to clear 100% of the remaining money on the deal.
That makes is sound even worse, from Cleveland’s side. “Worse” as in “Money based”. This makes me think that whenever a deal in baseball doesn’t seem to make sense, perhaps a team is actually having an actual financial crisis? Is this trade the MLB equivalent of selling your wedding ring at a pawn shop? Not necessarily, but possibly.
Also, just a guess, but my guess is taking all of Kluber’s salary was a condition of any trade talk, with any team. This likely limited the player return. If all the teams know you really want (need) to trade a guy, teams talk… offers drop.
Some owners are there to make $, not win. period
Mr Cleveland Indians owner just profited bigly in this trade and can afford a new yacht.
If this is your perspective it would seem to cut against the other clubs who refused to pay Kluber’s whole salary just as much as it cuts against Cleveland.
The other teams could actually be spending a lot of money relative to their market size already. If the Blue Jays were asking them to eat money, yeah, but if the Brewers were offering a better package to eat some of the money, it’s not much of an indictment on them.
That’s where I’d love to know what the Jays were offering. Kluber makes a lot more sense than what they’ve picked up so far. Even if it’s a bridge to another starter 2 years from now.
Especially because they’re rumored to be in the hunt for Ryu enough to have peaked Boras’ interest. (At least enough that we’re not getting a repeat of the Blue Flu mockery).
Agreed – I think that the prospect return is proof that the Indians prioritized clearing out most or all of Kluber’s money. Purely prospect-wise it would be surprising if no one had offered better than a ‘minor league reliever + 4th outfielder’ package.
How much salary should Cleveland have eaten and how much better a return would they have gotten do you reckon? I mean this is perennial CY-contender Corey Kluber, not broken down David Price. And — unless the league is way higher on Clase (which may be possible) — Kluber just went for less than the Blue Jays got for 1.5 years of Marcus Stroman last July. The league suddenly sees Kluber as only slightly better than Price?
I actually think that the league is way higher on Clase than any of us would have guessed. I had been tracking him as an under-the-radar guy who could be the next shutdown closer. But realistically, if distracted sadtrombone could see it, then it probably wasn’t much of a secret. He’s got stuff. In the minors he ran huge strikeout numbers and good groundball rates. He did okay getting promoted directly from AA at age 21.
All that said, I agree with you that even with that, the return here is awfully light.
Right, so Cleveland sees Clase as an FV50- now that could blossom into a closer that could fetch an FV55 down the road. Meanwhile, they’re not optimistic on 34yo Kluber returning to CY-form, so they think it’s too big a gamble to hold him for something possibly better than the ASB. The rest of the league has a similar view as Cleveland, but the Rangers think it’s worth the risk. I was trying to think through why my White Sox didn’t offer Aaron Bummer, who’s better now than Clase, and the only explanation is that they are not optimistic about Kluber going forward either.
Keith Law is calling this a salary dump — in fairness, he has to make a judgment within an hour or two of a deal — and I think fans are jumping on that. Cleveland definitely wants to shed payroll but I think they view this more as a “challenge trade” than a salary dump. And as a “get something for Kluber now while we still can” trade. I’m surprised that Kluber’s stock has fallen so low, but a recently injured 34yo with declining velocity on all 3 of his pitches is not going to be in high demand — even one with Kluber’s record. Boston wouldn’t get very much for Chris Sale if they made him available now.
Even before he got hurt last year, Kluber’s xwOBA was about 50 points higher than it was in 2018. Other stats, like Sierra and xFIP, showed a similarly troubling decline. With that in mind, I’d commend Cleveland for getting much of anything for him.
You’re basing all of those numbers on less than 40 innings in 2019. While it may be indicative of a decline, that’s far from certain. The return is really light and I think Cleveland sold at the wrong time.
There’s no such thing as “60% chance of a decline” or “40% chance of a decline”. There’s only one outcome, and you base your decision-making on what you think that outcome is.
Why is Kluber not broken down and Price is? Kluber *was* a perennial Cy Young contender in the past (as was Price, granted), but his 2020 Steamer projections don’t look a lot better than Price’s: 4.1 FIP vs. 4.2.
I think a lot of people are remembering who Kluber used to be (the name value) and ignoring how poorly he pitched in 2019 before he got hurt. Also, probably ignoring just how valuable a league minimum RP who throws a 101 mph cutter with 6 years of control left can be.
Come on. You’re basing that on 35 innings with an unsustainably high BABIP and low LOB. Other than an increase in walks, his other numbers are in line with his previous years.
Does anybody know why Kluber walked so many guys last year? His Zone% was 7% lower than his career numbers which is huge. 35 IP isn’t a lot, but that’s like an extra ball an inning.
Back and knee issues altered his release point and his control was markedly worse. That combines with the declining velocity have lead to the declining performance in 2018 and early starts in 2019, If having most of the year off lead to improvement in these issues Texas got a steal. Time will tell.
Results were worse in a bunch of categories: https://baseballsavant.mlb.com/savant-player/corey-kluber-446372?stats=career-r-pitching-mlb
It is a small sample, but people were barreling him up and getting better launch angles. xWOBA was way up. K% was way down.
It’s certainly possible that Kluber has a good 2020 due to some combo of small sample noise in his 2019 results and a return to health in 2020. I just think a lot of fans are assuming 2019 was a blip and Kluber is likely to return to his old ways, while at the same time maybe understating the value of Clase a bit since he’s an unknown RP.
It’s not clear to me why people believe the Indians would prioritize clearing money over prospect value. Does that mean if the Indians had to pay, say, $3 million dollars for better prospects that are valued at $5 million more, they wouldn’t do that?
There’s evidence the Indians don’t want to pay for veterans, who are getting expensive. I haven’t seen any evidence the Indians wouldn’t pay for young, controllable, and promising prospects. In fact, their success in recent years would suggest they are somewhat savvy in collecting talent.
I guess I’m saying I don’t believe the Indians would pass up a better package, to save a few million dollars. They probably assessed value of prospects versus costs, and picked the best one.
See the rub is whether marching orders have changed. The Indians attracted minority ownership before their mini-splurge in salary years ago. That minority ownership as of this offseason is now the majority ownership of the Royals.
It’s hard to say whether this is free up salary to make a run at Lindor OR free up salary in general/soft rebuild. Which could mean a total blow up of the team.
We also don’t know the condition of his arm. If it’s more iffy than most believe, the move makes that much more sense for Cleveland.
The 40/45 FV on Clase seems low. No one doubts his elite stuff. Seems like his FV was pulled down by questionable command – and he’s put together multiple seasons of sub 2 BB/9 and a respectable stint at the big league level already.
On the low end he’s a usable reliever, on the high end he’s an ace reliever/closer. 6 years of control and bullpen upgrade for a declining starter due $35M.
his strikeout rates are low for a guy throwing 100 and a nasty cutter
That’s because his groundouts are high.
It suggests he can be good pitching high and pitching low.
Plus he has no significant split.
Don’t think anybody is saying Coase isn’t good…just that you would expect more.
Remember, you can have great control but bad command if you throw it in the zone but you’re not painting the corners. The limited tape I’ve seen of him and the BB and K rates suggest he’s a guy with a couple great pitches and good control but he can’t command them well. One video showing off his velocity for example showed the FB/Cutter at 100 mph but it was just about an inch or two down and in from being completely “middle-middle” and was like a 310 foot medium hit fly ball.
He’s like the Thor of relievers. Throws too much over the plate but his stuff is so great he can get away with it
They must love Clase (stating the obvious). I wonder if they consider him a candidate to start (in other words, they were looking for a great candidate to develop a third pitch). For example, his arsenal would benefit from being able to throw a credible changeup 10% of the time. Cleveland might be confident they can teach that.
Some people say he could be a top 5 rp. If that is the case, I can understand it. But as now I’d be hating this if I was an Indian fan.
I’m a Cleveland fan and yeah, I hate it.
I do like Clase but hell I’d take a slapdick middle IF guy who can contribute in 2020 because it’s clear they won’t sign anyone significant and I’m not a believer in Yu Chang.
I hate the value but the combo of Clase and Karinchak is gonna be fun to watch for years our of the pen
this is Cleveland after all who produces pitching like no one else!
The Cleveland formula seems to be taking good control pitchers and teaching them to throw (somewhat) harder. For Clase they’d have to take a hard thrower with some control and teach him command. Not quite the same thingm
Or they’ll teach Clase to throw even harder.
And his arm goes along with the ball?
You don’t know the future, but I guarantee the Indians are kicking themselves for whatever it is that they turned down prior.
Last year?
No doubt.
But tbey met ownership’s budget mandate through other means.
Though 20-10 hindsight says they should’ve moved Klubet abd Kept Brantley.
But who knew Civale would be contributing in 2019?
I think we may need to reconsider how we value elite reliever prospects. Kluber was widely shopped and clearly the Indians preferred Clase over what were likely more highly rated prospects. And this seems to now be an emerging trend.
At the deadline the Rays traded Jesus Sanchez, a top 50 prospect, for Nick Anderson (the two other players were minor and more or less equally interesting). Anderson only had 43 MLB inning with the Marlins and Clase only 23 MLB innings. I think the top 2-3 RP prospects in MiLB should be considered very valuable top 100 type prospects, which isn’t really the case right now.
Maybe just need to reconsider how we value players making league minimum.
And, beyond the financial piece of it, youth and fresh arms versus pitchers with a fair amount of mileage.
Also, teams that are contending can always add payroll in-season. Teams that aren’t sure will continue to subtract older players where they can because the fixed cost of a league minimum player is so low. If the Indians do contend, they can take on a half-season of a veteran contract rather than a full season – it is getting less expensive to buy contracts at the trade deadline from teams that are looking to subtract payroll. Ideally, the best use of dollars is to pay for assets at the time you know you need them, unless the cost (i.e. league minimum, pre-arb, etc.) is so low that you are better off to lock up the control. It’s a good *business* (P&L) decision even if it’s a bad/frustrating and disheartening baseball decision. I know that’s an unpopular comment that is going to get thumbsed-down… I’m not saying I like it, only that I think that payroll “optimization” seems to becoming more prevalent than simply adding or slashing.
Rays 40 man roster crunch contributed to that trade. I think they gained a future spot. I don’t think Sanchez was on the 40 but he was Rule 5 eligible. The Solak-Fairbanks trade between the Rangers and Rays also cleared a future spot, in a way. Though it is interesting that both trades featured relievers. Anyways, I’m not sure how analogous the trades are because of the roster crunch issue.
Even if everybody knew Cleveland was desperate to offload Kluber’s contract, is this the best deal that was out there? Seems crazy to me that there wouldn’t be better offers for a pitcher one year (and a freak injury) removed from being a consistent 5 win player, even if we are expecting him to decline. Is it more likely that Cleveland is really high on Clase or that Kluber’s trade value is really that low?
It’s probably a combination of both.
I was prepared to hate this deal until I started thinking more about Emmanuel Clase. I read that article Ben wrote, and I had previously flagged Clase as a potential stud reliever because he pairs excellent strikeout and ground ball rates, and the stuff is good enough that it doesn’t look like a fluke. I think there’s a real chance he’s a dominator in the bullpen. Like, a 2-win closer, which would probably be better than anyone they could get for Kluber even if they picked up some cash. But that’s his upside, and while I’m pretty high on him that’s quite a lot of projection for anyone.
So now I only kind of hate this deal for Cleveland. And that’s because (1) they decided they’d rather clear the money than get a better prospect and I’m pretty sure they’re not going to reinvest it (2) Delino deShields is involved at all. deShields is on the borderline of deserving a roster spot, a 1-win defensive replacement, short side of the platoon, and pinch runner. He’ll probably be worth his salary if you have the luxury of spending $3M or whatever he’ll cost on a guy with such a limited role, but Cleveland isn’t that team. I said earlier today that a lot of smart front offices seem to think that it’s a good idea to give small amounts of money to veterans who are very unlikely to succeed, and that this somehow is supposed to be better than giving big money to a player likely to succeed, but I strongly disagree. You’re still probably coming out worse for $/win, and you’re paying real money for a player that you could probably find in the Rule 5 draft. Could they not get anything else of value out of Texas? And is it too much to ask that a team like Cleveland not try to actively make themselves worse?
The issue with this deal isn’t Clase.
It’s Deshields.
The Indians have no shortage of good defehsive Outfielders who can’t hit.
And they shown no particular skill in turning marginal hitters into good ones!
It isn’t even impissible he gets cut in spring training…
Unless they saw something really back in his medicals (he has been having back issues since 2017) the deal smells.
I feel like this is the type of move that when a smart front office makes it (the A’s, Rays, Cleveland, etc) the commenters spend a lot of time trying to figure out what amazing thing is that lurks in DeShield’s profile that will turn him into an everyday player. I don’t doubt they do see something, but I think we’re probably looking for a ghost. DeShields will probably continue to be not very good, and Cleveland probably did not maximize their return here.
Maybe taking Deshields and his salary was the price of taking all of Kluber’s money?
After all, Deshields might be tradable to a team looking for a CF backup. Then they clear his salary, too. He’s not a fit in Cleveland but he is a useful piece…
As above, I think Texas threw DeShields into the bag at checkout. But, where it gets confusing is, Cleveland even had to pay of Kluber’s $1m reassignment fee.
They split it.
Yeah, thought I typed “half”. Obviously didn’t.
The Mets just got Marsinick who has the same profile with a little more pop in his bat for basically nothing. You can probably just sign Pillar for 1 year 2M. This was Kluber for Clase
In fact the Rays made just such a trade last year that also included Heredia from the Mariners. As a Rays fan, it was a bit of a head scratcher. And it turned out to be one too. Maybe the process is sound. If a guy hits (pun intended) in these trades 1/5 times, then it’s worth it, maybe even 1/10. It probably costs next to nothing to throw him in.
It’s’s funny, because compared to Heredia, DeShields is a pretty useful player. Heredia is like if DeShields was bad at defense. A complete zero.
Favorite part of the comment was impissible
Tablet autocorruption “feature” strikes again.
> And they shown no particular skill in turning marginal hitters into good ones!
They did exactly this with Jose Ramirez, Francisco Lindor and to a lesser extent Roberto Perez
How many outfielders in that list?
Lindor was a top pick, Ramirez made himself a hitter before Cleveland signed him for practically nothing, and Perez is the same he always was, with more ABs.
Name one poor hitter they made into a good one.
Especially in the OF.
Most of their output has been 4th OF types.
Last good ones they got were Sizemore and Brantley, both traded for. And Brantley took years to bloom.
They’ve shown no skill in finishing off hitters. All decade.
How does playing in the OF factor in? Either those players improved, or they didn’t.
And they didn’t.
The good ones stayed good, the ones with…issues, still have them.
But their OF has been a mess all decade.
Practically all their OF high picks have ended up as platoons or 4th OF. (The book is open on whether Naquin is a platoon player and he’s their most productive pick so far.)
As a Cleveland fan I completely agree. It’s about getting rid of salary and that won’t be reinvested. DDS to me looks like possible DFA fodder. Good defense and speed? They got Greg Allen and they’ve already got the Mike Trout of short side platoons in Luplow.
The only way this makes sense to me is if they have him play 2B which I’ve heard he’s done before. I’d prefer an MLB ready slapdick prospect
I have to assume DeShields is getting DFA’d out of Goodyear. Compares unfavorably to Allen given he’s due to make nearly 3 times more. I have to assume Texas wanted him in the deal, rather than Cleveland wanted him. Front office is too smart and Dolan is too cheap.
The thing about Clase tho is that it isn’t just about upfront WAR for Cleveland. They can’t afford to risk giving the going rate in free agency. The elite reliever’s are getting 12-18 million a year. So acquiring someone with five plus years of service time, especially when arbitration hasn’t met up with the market for relievers… Is particularly cost-effective.
On the other hand, I think the Rangers are the perfect team to take on Kluber. They have a bunch of money, they want to win now, and getting a guy who is a marginal improvement on Kolby Allard doesn’t move the needle. But Kluber has such a huge range of possible outcomes that he could be a massive upgrade on their rotation. I think if the Rangers land Josh Donaldson (and maybe someone to plug that hole in right field) they’re suddenly a real threat in the AL West. The Astros are still the strong favorite, but there are a lot of teams trying to make it interesting.
Steamer projects Clase as one of the better relievers in the game already. Not elite, but suitable for a high-leverage role. Pitchers like that seem to get around a $5-10 million AAV in free agency. I’m not sure exactly what value that would imply for Clase, but it’s presumably more than $6 million.
Also, it only makes sense to wait to deal Kluber if Cleveland is more confident than other teams are in his ability to bounce back. If they’re not, then by holding onto Kluber they are taking on the exact same risks that other teams are so wary of. Why would we assume that Kluber’s trade value will be any higher at the trade deadline than it is right now?
it’s not unusual for impact pitchers to be in higher demand at the trade deadline, when contenders feel more confident they’d be renting the ace for the potential playoff run too.
It blows me away that any honest contender couldn’t “beat” this offer for Kluber, but it’s entirely possible (likely) that the Indians value Clase very highly…
The flip side is that Clase is projected by the Fangraphs Depth Charts as a .4 WAR reliever. If you keep that flat, without providing any improvement as he moves toward his prime, that’s 2.4 WAR before he’s a free agent. At arb and pre-arb salaries, that’s worth $16 million or close to it. Put another way, a .4 WAR reliever is not easy to find and clubs pay an awful lot for that. Would I have made that trade if I were the Indians? No. Is it crazy? No.
Relievers are very volatile, it seems more likely that he breaks / gets bad than improves.
I don’t get why it is such a big surprise that owners want to make money, and set budgets for their teams. The Cleveland owner likely spent more than he wanted from 2016 through 2019 (especially 2017 and 2018). Cleveland had more money allocated to players than was in their budget. This move likely got them within their budget and got an interesting reliever.
Every team could have offered more than the Rangers offered. All these teams basically decided they didn’t have the budget…just like Cleveland.
Caveat: I’m not a fan of Cleveland. While I doubt Cleveland owner has been making much money the past 4 years versus teams of similar revenue, I don’t have a good grasp of how much money they make.
According to Forbes, Larry Dolan is worth $5.5B. If they had absolutely no income from baseball, investments, or any of their other holdings and ran a $200M payroll with $300M in other expenses, he would go bankrupt in 11 years at the age of 99, at which time he could sell the team which is reported to be worth $600M, divide that amongst his 6 children, and all of them would have enough money that neither they nor any of their children needed to work again. Obviously, none of these assumptions are accurate, but my guess is that if the Cleveland Indians lost $100M/year, his net worth would still be increasing.
Similar things can be said about every team in MLB from Miami to New York. It seems that only Hal Steinbrenner and Guggenheim Baseball Management have figured this out, and people would argue with me about Steinbrenner.
Yes, they have the right to spend their money any way they want. They choose to spend some of it (not even all that large a percentage) on a very public entertainment company in a very competitive field. It is perfectly reasonable for the consumers of that entertainment product to be dissatisfied with the product the owner is supplying to them and they are not being unreasonable when they say he could easily afford to try to make a much better product available to them.
Every team’s fans and the writers (like Szymborski) want their teams to spend more. “SPEND MORE, you cheapskate owner who’s making enough money on capital appreciation to buy a private jet every year!!”, they say. (WilliamsNYY complains about the Yankees spending even after they acquired Stanton a couple years ago. I think he’s good with Cole now.) Last year, only Keuchel and Kimbrel went unsigned. Keuchel was ok once he signed and Kimbrel was terrible.
So, exactly how much baseball quality are MLB fans being cheated out of? If overall spending went up, who would teams spend it on? Do fans want competitive parity where bad teams are spending more? Or do fans want near-playoff teams to spend more? Or both — and, to ask again, then to spend on whom exactly?
Or maybe the next wave in baseball quality isn’t in Payroll but in player development? Hmmm — shocking, I know.
His personal wealth has nothing to do with how much the Cleveland team makes. Fans and media are unreasonable when they don’t want the owner of a business to make money from that business.
Bullshit. A sports team is a vanity purchase. But with all the free money handed out by municipalities for stadiums, it has become a vanity purchase that also burdens the populace and makes the owner a lot of money.
If all they are interested in is profit, probably 28 owners could sell right now and net 9 figures in the deal.
Also, players are assets, not liabilities. Winning teams make more money than losing teams, but being cheap is easier and lower risk.
As rhdx says below, teams are assets that appreciate double-digit %’s annually and are uncorrelated with other asset classes. These aren’t vanity purchases. Cities also build parks, museums, and other amenities. Stadium tenants pay rent to the cities.
I appreciate if you’re a small government guy, but teams and cities are regarded by the cities as symbiotic and not parasitic relationships.
This is more garbage argument. Virtually every civically funded stadium in the last 20 years has not paid off for the government that paid for it, the clubs get sweetheart deals on the rent and usually make money off the stadium, concessions, parking, etc while the city goes deeper into debt. The stadiums prevent them from building schools, repairing roads, and taking care of other vital infrastructure that benefits people other than the owners of the teams. Read…anything…at field of schemes and you will find that these deals are usually corrupt and often approved without real public input these days.
Also, if the assets are appreciating by double digit percentage points, then the owners are making tens or even hundreds of millions of dollars a year which undercuts the argument that they lose money and have to cut payroll to make ends meet.
Cities do a lot of stupid things — like host the Olympics and give massive tax breaks to Hollywood studios to shoot movies in the cities. Supposedly, the city is paid back by the city’s enhanced prestige which maybe attracts F500 firms to locate their HQ’s there and more tourists spending money at local businesses. I am a small gov’t guy, so I’d rather cities just keep taxes low and appeal to business to locate there based on the quality of the local labor pool, infrastructure, low crime, and overall livability of the city.
But what does any of this have to do with increasing payroll? You still haven’t answered my questions about which teams — bad or good — and on who increased payroll would be spent on. There are 1200 players on ML rosters. I’d argue that maybe only 50 other players in Japan, S Korea, or DR/Cuba/Venezuela/Colombia could play in the ML’s and probably only 5 of those crack the 2 WAR barrier. MLB features the best players in the world.
So your complaint seems to be only about the distribution of spending, not total spending. Rants are fun and all, but make a coherent argument when you come here, ok?
I think fans would like to live in a world where sports teams are vanity purchases and owners are happy to piss away their personal fortunes on player salaries. But for the most part, that’s not really how it is. Rightly or wrongly, the vast majority of owners look at these teams as businesses and expect them to make money.
You are right, that’s not how it is, because virtually every team in MLB makes money every year. Lots of money. Not just in appreciating franchise value, but in cash as well.
Have you ever considered that maybe franchise values appreciate so much *because* they make money year in and year out?
People often treat operating profits and franchise appreciation as in independent variables – “Why do these owners need to make an annual profit when the franchise is appreciating in value so much”? – when in fact the ability to take annual profits is probably the key factor in why the franchises are worth so much more than they used to be.
Obviously, most baseball owners do not treat MLB teams as purely a vanity purchase no matter how much fans and the media portray them as such. Winning helps make money, but money only helps so much with winning. For instance, there is a team in Cleveland that has the most wins in the AL from 2013 through 2019 and people still complain about the product put on the field any team they try to get on a more Cleveland budget.
This is about the worst way to think of an investment or an asset as possible. The reason rich people are rich is that they don’t analyze any of their decisions like this.
“I’ve spent my life making good investment decisions so now I should make huge negative NPV decisions because I can afford to.”
Yeah, that’s why rich people buy Maseratis – because it’s a good investment decision.
Most people who are “I own a sports franchise” rich inherited their wealth. People with nine zeros after their net worth usually aren’t extraordinary as they are extraordinarily lucky.
These people also get public handouts. There should be some level of reinvestment needed, at least for teams who play in a city that has subsidized their stadium.
So they buy yachts, private planes, islands, and multimillion dollar homes on multiple continents, all as investments?
Dolan has actually been a good owner. Cleveland is a low revenue team and owners generally run teams in small markets as break even enterprises. They don’t want to write checks to supplement the team. Now, you could argue about if they should do this, but it’s hard to fault ownership in Cleveland which has put a good team together and increased payroll to league average a couple of years ago.
This is beautiful, though the franchise is actually valued at $1.2b right now, and that would presumably grow with 11 years of solid investment.
Ummmm….Forbes doesn’t list Larry Dolan as being worth 5.5 billñin dollars. It lists the Dolan Family, which includes Larry’s much richer brother Charles, as being worth $5.5 billion. Course that was back in 2015 so the family is probably richer now.
This source list Larry as being worth 1.5 billion. And much of that is tied up in the value of the Indians which obviously isn’t cash in hand that can be spent to support the team.
https://www.therichest.com/celebnetworth/celebrity-business/ceo/james-dolan-net-worth/
The Dolans claim they’re losing money and that may be somewhat true but that also considers capital reinvestment..
Plus, he’s already made a profit off the team by changed valuations and also owns sports time Ohio iirc and IDK if he counts that so he’s not strapped. Yeah he can use slight operating losses as an excuse but baseball isn’t a normal business in all reality and we should want owners who care the most about providing the best product rather than extracting the most product (tbf we should care about this in all business).
Dolan does care about the city but he definitely seems to care far more about keeping the team profitable for himself than providing the best product he can afford
The Dolans sold Sportstime Ohio(Now FoxSports Ohio) in 2013 so your information is just a little dated.They used that money for the Swisher and Bourn free agent signings.
The Indians estimated gross revenue for 2018 was 280 million dollars.Out of that they have to pay taxes and everything else that owning a ball club entails.
The first level of luxury tax (207m) is 75% of their gross revenue.
No one can run a sustainable business without positive cash flow,a major league payroll that takes up 45% of your gross revenue has got to be very near the break even point.
The equity value in the team the Dolans have accrued since 2000 is on par with what they would have received if they would have just invested the money(11.5%/year based on 765m dollar profit on a 325m dollar investment)so hardly the gold mine it is being portrayed as.
Plus ,you can’t spend equity,you can only borrow against it……like Art Modell did when he owned the Browns…err Ravens.
No other owners in baseball spend their personal wealth to make payroll why would you expect the Indians owners to?
The Indians have had a sustained run of success and spent money, yet attendance has dropped every season since 2017.
Good luck finding a buyer for that type of a franchise.
What no one has speculated on, and might very well be the case, is that most teams probably were given access to extensive medical records on Kluber and it’s quite possible they don’t look good? Just speculating…the one side is the Indians like Clase, the other side is the INdians dumping payroll, the third side is Kluber’s arm is more of a mess than we think.
Yup.
But it coukd be his back, not the arm.
Back troubles in 2017, 2018, and 2019 wasn’t too hot until he got hit.
They may not have wanted him back at that price but decided to execute the option to get something, anything, for him.
Ownership is cheap but the execs aren’t stupid.
Something else is going on.
Maybe money is tighter, again, or maybe they’re saving to go for a FA.
Dunno, would Donaldson sign for 3x$20M?l
Don’t think they’ll take Puig even on a pillow, but he probably would.
If they keep Lindor, they need another bat.
Kluber has also had troubles with both knees in the past.
This seems like a case where the Indians simply value Emmanuel Clase more than most other teams in the league. The Angels almost definitely offered one of Fletcher or Rengifo and some lower level guys. That’s a much better return by public standards but the Indians just really wanted Clase.
Any inside sources to the Angels’ offer?
There have been a ton of reports that Cleveland wanted Brandon Marsh. Seems like the Angels would have wanted Cleveland to pick up more salary for Marsh, and we don’t know what they might have countered with.
I’m not sure why people thought that they almost certainly offered Fletcher or Rengifo, but there have been a lot of comments in these sections suggesting that the Angels have to move one of Fletcher, Rengifo, or La Stella. I don’t really see that as a necessity, but it is also true that their dropoff from Marsh to the next prospect is pretty dramatic–Jordyn Adams and Jahmai Jones had bad years, and Soriano’s a long way away.
In recent years leaving Cleveland meant you are destined for something special. Brantley is doing well. Gomes and Asdrubal won rings. Ency had a plus year at the plate. Kluber could see a great 2020. The weather will be warmer. This will help his arm. Time will tell whether this move was a good one. If it was just to cut salary, then Dolan continues his reign as a cheap owner who doesn’t care about winning.
If they use the money to fill in the infield and outfield gaps, then we can say the move was a solid one. After all, the Tribe won 93 games last year without Kluber. All of the pitchers from 2019 are back with more experience and conditioning. The pitchers in the Minors are solid. But the need for offense is obvious. Last year’s lack of off-season moves cannot be repeated. We need sticks in the lineup!!!
Tbf, it took 6 stops (including 2 in DC) in 6 years before he got a ring and Gomes was awful last year
Branch Rickey used to say it was better to trade a player a year too early than a year too late. Gomes they moved just in time and it looks like they good good value.
Who is going to take Kluber’s spot in the rotation?
Depends on how good he turns out.
Today’s rotation is probably Clevinger/Bieber, Civale, Carrasco, Plesac/Plutko, Rodriguez, Nolan, and Moss.
Based on his early 2019, he might not even crack the rotaion.
Starters is not a concern.
The Bullpen, with Hand, Karinchak, and Clase at the back, and Wittgren, Perez, Cimber, and Wood (plus tbe Columbus express) in front, looks solid.
Infield needs a 2b/3b, outfield needs a corner unless they’re serious about putting Reyes out there to make room for Bradley. Center isn’t really a priority.
Moving Kluber is defensible, even rational, in baseball terms, if the money brings in a credible bat. Otherwise…
The debate is over the motive and the return.
Who are Nolan and Miss? I’d think McKenzie would be the next guy up with injuries.
The fact that Plutko finally went from below replacement starter to a passable 5 and the emergence of Civale and Plesac made Kluber expendable.
The debate is really whether or not DDS is just Greg Allen which he is but 2 years older.
Infield needs short term 2B but long term SS. The club (and myself) love Nolan Jones who will start with Columbus most likely and could even progress to being a September callup but likely debuts in 2021 with Ramirez going to 2B (although he could theoretically do SS if they trade lindor)
Oopsie.
Logan Jones and Scott Moss came in tbe Bauer trade and were pitchng at AAA and AA while Macenzie lost the whole year. They get first dibs and one of them could conceivably push Plutko to the pen.
Rodriguez tbey got in Gomes trade and he’s been riding tge Columbus shuttle all last year.
It would be a surprise if MacKenzie contributed in 2020.
Good if he bloomed but surprising because of the crowd ahead of him.
The rules on September call ups have changed dramatically. Expanding the regular season roster to 26 has pretty much eliminated the September call up scenario.
Yup.
The two extra spots will most likely go to injured major leaguers instead of rookies, even on bad teams.
No debate, really, DeShields is Allen but 2 years older, three times as expensive, and closer to his low ceiling.
This is pure speculation but it wouldn’t surprise me if the Kluber who shows up next spring is barely a shadow of his former self. Even an ephemeral image of his former talent level is worth a lot more than the Indians got in return.
Could happen. He also has more up side than probably any other pitcher in baseball.
I believe everyone thought Verlander was finished a few years ago too, and he had a much larger velocity dip than Kluber ever had. If Kluber was pitching hurt along with his terrible luck in 2019 and is again healthy, I don’t see why he would not have upside as all of his non-FB pitches are still good and one is deadly. It surprises me that more do not agree but baseball fans have short memories.
his velocity and command was down last year in a small sample. i know he starts off slow and all…
if he takes another step back in both areas, it could get really ugly
The Indians front office is pretty smart, if they would have gotten a better offer they would have taken it. I assume his medical is pretty bad and Cleveland doesn’t believe he can bounce back to a 3+ war pitcher.
Tough to say, effectively, “no other teams were very interested in Kluber but the Indians should have been.”
The Indians may well have different valuations on both Clase and Kluber than the ones used in this analysis, which could make it less about clearing payroll space than portrayed here and more about winning baseball games.
Really, it’s likely about both: clear the space and get what the Indians believe was the best deal available. Indians had a 93 win team without Kluber last season (with negative value from Kluber). They have a very promising rotation and have shown a real knack for developing SPs (Bieber, Clevinger, Civale, Plasec) as well as two existing bounce back candidates who were recently top of the rotation guys in Carrasco and Salazar… plus Triston McKenzie, Logan Allen, and Scott Moss in the high minors. Most likely case, how much marginal value does Kluber really have for them? There’s a chance he bounces back to be really good, sure, but is that any greater than the chance he would have failed to even secure a rotation spot in Cleveland? I can’t fault them for investing to improve its ‘pen long-term and saving $17.5 million over hoping to improve what is already a good rotation.
(It’s really, really hard to get on board with any valuation that has a 22 year old flame throwing RP who has already had half a season of MLB success and has 6 years of team control as only having $4m in value… he might project to have $4m in value in 2020 alone.)
It may have helped to give comps of guys like this who have flamed out and gone on to become something to give us a sense of that.
Salazar was cut loose.
Haven’t heard him coming back at all.
They weren’t happy with him hiding an injury until he got shelled.
So a few years ago the urgent question was Who the Hell is Corey Kluber? Whereas today, we are still not sure. I’ll be looking at the pitch data for sure. Somebody is wrong.
Cleveland made this deal because they think Clase is Hader and Kluber is 2018 Kyle Gibson. If they’re right, it works when you factor in salaries, and if you realize Brad Hand is kind of just a random dude with a closer job. Do I agree? Clases’s stuff is 99th percentile if you care what my eyes think. It might work. It probably won’t. Seems fair to me, if you don’t like Kluber’s future. But like everyone else, hard to believe this beats the best Angels offer.
Kluber and Miller both gave all they had to get Cleveland to game seven in 2016. Both had issues and declines over 17 and 18. Both had forgettable 2019s.
Miller showed some bounceback and its possiboe Kluber rebounds.
Texas can afford to hope on him, Cleveland didn’t need to.
It’s still a light return regardless of how good Clase turns out.
Trading low on Kluber for a 93 win team doesn’t make sense, especially when WSox have injected some serious talent, the Twins came off a .623 win% season, and Cleveland will be Bauer-less for 2020. Initially, this looks to be a reorg of payroll, at least enough to extend Lindor , however Lindor seems intent on hitting free agency (although that could just be negotiating posturing). The real question is would Kluber return the same package if Cleveland kept him for 2020 then dealt him in July if they weren’t in contention for a playoff spot? Blue Jays made a similar calculated risk with Donaldson in the winter of 2017, however they chose to hold and ended up getting nothing for Donaldson a year later. If Kluber remain healthy it’s easy to see a 3-4 WAR season and his 2021 vesting option becomes a valuable footnote in this deal.
What would Kluber bring if early 2020 is the same as early 2019?
Decisions aren’t made in a vacuum.
The Indians won 93 games without Kluber and Carrasco for 6 months ,an underwhelming outfield,a lousy season from Ramirez and Lindor missing a month and not really being healthy til June.
They patched together a soft tossing bull pen that was amazingly effective,but very likely unsustainable.
Coupled with Kluber being a calculated risk at his relatively modest salary,the emergence of Bieber,Plesac and Civale and the tantalizing nature of Clase’s cutter the deal does make sense from the Indians point of view.
From my point of view as a season ticket holder,I think the Rangers got an excellent bounce back candidate and the Indians got a very nice major league ready prospect and a worthless schlub in DeShields.The Indians also get some financial flexibility which I think they’ll put to good use.
The Tribe shopped Kluber at the winter meetings and this was the deal they liked best.Their front office certainly has information none of us are privy to and their past history earns them more than just the benefit of the doubt.
Still, I would have liked a lottery ticket maybe better than getting Deshields.
One HOPES they spend the Kluber savings on the big league roster.
And that they can make more out of DeShields than filling the 26th roster slot.
I don’t understand the concept of low risk high reward. Isn’t the risk high??
Low risk means he will very very likely have a Major League job for many years as at least a bench player. High reward means he has a shot at turning into a star.
High risk players are usually AAAA types. They may or may not keep a roster spot long term, but if they do golden. Often high strikeout guys with tons of power, most flame out because of to many Ks, but some turn into Joey Gallo. When they do we forget about the AAAA label. For example, Hunter Renfro may or may not have turned into a guy that will be kept long term. He still Ks a bit much! But, he is showing enough improvement on the Ks that he still has a major league job for now. But, no one will be shocked if he loses his job if he has another sub .300 on base percentage in 2020. Then again he could hit 40 home runs and on base .310 as well which his team would love! High risk!
On Kluber? It depends on who you’re talking about.
It’s the money and the team’s competitiveness:
Texas has ample unspent budget and aren’t a likely contender on paper. (Decent to good but the AL wildcard is a hard slog.) If Kluber recovers, the reward is high, tbey might get into the WC race for real. If he crashes, all they lose is money and a roster spot. That makes tbeir risk low.
Cleveland on the other hand is still a true contender but with budget issues and a deep rotation pipeline. Betting the money and the roster spot on Kluber is high risk for them. The reward? Uncertain. It doesn’t depend just on Kluber but also on whoever ends up winning the fifth slot in the rotation.
Better than Santa Claus for this AL-keeper league owner.
I picked up Clase last season when he came up. Of all the “potential” closers out there, I think he is the deal. We’ll see, and it will be good for Cleveland, too. They have some money to spend now.
I could be dead wrong, but I never thought Kluber was a team chemistry add.
It was so Mets not to do this kind of deal–repairing the biggest hole in the roster–and instead get two #6 starters in the context of a contender and call them “depth.”
Kluber from 2014 through 2018 was better all told than a guy name Jacob deGrom. The Mets haven’t gotten any better than they were at the start of 2019, and given the team’s overpeformance this past season, with Porcello and Wacha they probably only firmed up their hold on 84 wins. They needed volatility to contend, and Kluber offers a lot of that.
“Meaningful games in August” should be these Mets’ motto.