Red Sox Lock Up Rick Porcello
Beating the rest of the league to the punch with a large contract extension for Rick Porcello when much better players await in free agency is not going to garner excitement or plaudits, but the Red Sox are anticipating an expensive free agent market in 2016 and providing themselves a safety net. Boston resorted to Plan B before they knew if Plan A would work, but the Red Sox can still implement Plan A and sign a big-name free agent while simultaneously providing depth for their rotation. Five years and $95 million is a lot of money for a player without a world-beating track record, but Porcello has been good and reliable and he is still just 26 years old. This contract is not all that surprising as Mike Petriello predicted a similar contract in February.
Last year, three pitchers signed extensions just a year away from free agency and one of them is apt for Porcello. Clayton Kershaw’s seven-year, $215 million contract is way too big, Charlie Morton’s three-year, $21 million contract is too light, but Homer Bailey’s six-year, $105 million contract (with an option for a seventh year) is right in the same range as Porcello. Bailey was two years older and only twice pitched over 150 innings while Porcello has exceeded that mark in six straight seasons. Bailey was coming off the better season, with around four wins in 2013, but he also received more money with greater risk of injury. According to Jeff Zimmerman’s disabled list projections, Porcello is the second most likely starter to make it through the season without a stint on the disabled list.
Even if we treat Bailey as an outlier for an extension, last year’s free agent class has a pretty close contract to Porcello’s: James Shields, who signed for four years and $72 million with the Padres. Shields has the better track record, but he’s headed into his decline years while Porcello is headed into his mid-20s. While Shields’ deal ends when he’s 36, the Red Sox have only committed to Porcello up to age-30.
Porcello has been consistently above average, topping two wins in each of the last four seasons. His 2.7 WAR from last year ranked 28th in the American League, but his 5.5 WAR over the last two years is 17th, and his 8.1 fWAR over the past three seasons ranks 14th in the AL during that time. Through his Age-25 season, Porcello has pitched 1073 1/3 innings after debuting as a 20-year-old in 2009. If not for a rough period in 2010 when he was sent down to the minors for a few weeks, Porcello would have been eligible for free agency after last season. Over the past 20 years, only 11 pitchers have pitched more than 900 innings through their Age-25 season like Porcello and had a WAR above two in their Age-25 season. Clayton Kershaw, Madison Bumgarner, Felix Hernandez and Matt Cain have yet to play through their Age-30 seasons, leaving six players for future comparison.
The group has met with varying level of success since turning 26. Here are there WAR numbers through their Age-25 seasons as well as between 26-30 years of age.
| pre-26 WAR | 26-30 WAR | Difference | |
|---|---|---|---|
| CC Sabathia | 21.3 | 31.3 | 10.0 |
| Jon Garland | 8.9 | 11.1 | 2.2 |
| Javier Vazquez | 18.3 | 20.3 | 2.0 |
| Mark Buehrle | 16.8 | 16.8 | 0.0 |
| Carlos Zambrano | 18.9 | 12.5 | -6.4 |
| Ismael Valdes | 17.0 | 4.7 | -12.3 |
Four of the six players either did just as well or improved during their late 20s, while Mark Buehrle managed to put up the exact same WAR through his Age-25 season as between the ages of 26 and 30 (from 31-35, he put up a 13.4 WAR). Zambrano was decent in his late 20s and only Ismael Valdes fell off a cliff. Six players is a small sample size, but it does nothing to change the expectations for Porcello to keep pitching as well as he has been. The new contract insulates Boston from a breakout, but given the pitchers available to Boston after the season ends, there are some questions whether Boston was better off waiting.
Including Porcello in this group, here are the statistics over the last three years of the potential free agents next winter.
| IP | K% | BB% | ERA | FIP | WAR | Age | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| David Price | 646.0 | 24.3 % | 4.8 % | 3.05 | 2.94 | 15.7 | 29 |
| Zack Greinke | 592.1 | 23.1 % | 5.9 % | 2.96 | 3.10 | 12.7 | 31 |
| Jordan Zimmermann | 608.2 | 20.1% | 4.5% | 2.96 | 3.18 | 12.4 | 29 |
| Johnny Cueto | 521.1 | 22.1 % | 6.3 % | 2.54 | 3.35 | 10 | 29 |
| Mat Latos | 522.1 | 20.7 % | 6.9 % | 3.31 | 3.51 | 9.5 | 27 |
| Doug Fister | 534.1 | 17.8 % | 4.7 % | 3.22 | 3.51 | 8.8 | 31 |
| Rick Porcello | 558.0 | 16.0 % | 5.4 % | 4.08 | 3.70 | 8.1 | 26 |
Zimmermann, Greinke, Price, and Cueto all stand out above Porcello, and — depending on their seasons — Latos and Fister could find themselves more desirable free agents than Porcello as well. Signing Porcello does not foreclose Boston’s options next winter, but it does give them insurance if they miss out on any of the above players. Price, Zimmerman, and Greinke could all sign with their current teams at prices close to what Jon Lester and Max Scherzer received last summer, and a few of those players might not make it to free agency. Boston has incredible resources, but simply hoping to outbid the Los Angeles Dodgers is not a very good plan. Boston is no longer on an island with the Yankees in terms of payroll. In addition to the Dodgers, Tigers, and Nationals, the Cubs and Yankees figure to spend big again going forward. Right now, it looks like there are a lot of starting pitchers available in the offseason, but there is still scarcity given the number of potential suitors.
Boston is still searching for an ace, and paying more than $20 million per year after this season might feel like an overpay for a pitcher who has not shown the ability to anchor a rotation, but baseball is often a game with limited options. Boston cannot negotiate with other free agents right now, and letting Porcello get to free agency puts him in a pool with pitchers expected to receive guarantees over $100 million. Porcello might have been the low cost alternative in six months, but with his age and injury-free history that low-cost might have been six more years and $120 million as opposed to four more years and $83 million. With an option on Clay Buchholz for 2016 and Wade Miley already signed to an extension, the Red Sox can enter 2016 with a stable front three, but have the option of moving those three back one spot if they sign a major free agent after the season.
Boston is taking a risk, both on Porcello remaining the pitcher he is, and that the market does not fall flat next winter. With Boston’s resources, both of those risks are worth taking and can be easily mitigated in the future. While not likely, even if the market does fall this winter, that still benefits Boston because they can then sign one of the better pitchers available to stabilize the staff and add to the potent offense they already have. With Porcello’s young age and clean injury history, he is likely to remain productive throughout his contract. Ninety-five million dollars is a big number for Plan B when Plan A has yet to fail, but the numbers are only going to get bigger and going with Plan B early prevents the potential desperation of operating without that safety net in the offseason.
Craig Edwards can be found on twitter @craigjedwards.
“Boston cannot negotiate with other free agents right now, and letting Porcello get to free agency puts him in a pool with pitchers expected to receive guarantees over $100 million. Porcello might have been the low cost alternative in six months, but with his age and injury-free history that low-cost might have been six more years and $120 million as opposed to four more years and $83 million.”
This could be the TLDR.
I’m okay with it. It’s a lot of money for Porcello, but salaries have gone bonkers over the past few seasons (and I’ve seen plenty of evidence that owners are actually being stingy relative to cash flows of years past, and that even more money could flood the FA market if an enterprising owner or two wanted it). And he’s only 26; injury free pitchers at that age, as pointed out here, do have a good track record of not falling off a cliff. Better a slight overpay on a 4 year deal than a massive one on a 7. Ask the Tigers.
I thought something like this might happen, but I am mainly surprised that it happened now instead of mid-season at some point. I would want to see the guy pitch for a couple of months to collect some extra notes on him. I doubt he would have cost significantly more in June than today.
I wonder if they tried to offer a longer deal with lower AAV – the Homer Bailey contract, essentially, which would have made more sense to me given Porcello’s age.
It’s entirely plausible that the contract was offer and turned down, in which case I have nothing to add. But I would raise an eyebrow if that wasn’t on the table before this contract was signed.
Over 20 million a year for the LOW COST option is crazy
Annual salary is not the only factor of cost. Particularly with pitchers, the term of the guaranteed salary is very important.
A 4-year guarantee to a 26 year old is definitely low-cost compared to the alternatives.
Still, that doesn’t make this deal a bargain by any measure.
Sure, the extension is only 4 more years. But the Red Sox are making a 5 year commitment to the health and effectiveness of Porcello.
I’m still shocked by the price tag. There are a lot of factors that make this sensible for the Red Sox: his age, his durability (he’s never been on the DL), continued steep salary inflation, and the promise of his advanced stats over the last few years. I’m not sure I buy all of those factors.
He’s young, but don’t pitchers supposedly peak at 23 or something? And I wouldn’t count on the durability of any pitcher; throwing a baseball is basically a game of Russian roulette on the elbow. And the salary inflation can’t continue like this forever.
My reaction as a Sox fan: Oh well, $82.5M isn’t going to cripple Boston Red Sox Baseball Club LP no matter what. We’ll see, maybe he’ll earn it this season.
I look at it as locking down a “safe” pitcher in Porcello, even at a perhaps high price, is better than needing to get in a bidding war this offseason. Having Buch, Miley, and now Porcello means the Sox can walk away this winter when prices get too high. Without that 3rd SP, they might be forced to significantly overpay.
The game now makes $8 billion/season, and the combined payrolls of all players are only 40% of that. In the late 90s they were in the high 50s, percentage-wise. Driven by monster TV deals, revenues have shot up while payrolls have basically stabilized.
The exception is for high-end SP, where Kershaw and Scherzer are leading the way with $30m+ AAVs. That kind of benchmark leaves some room for a mid-rotation pitcher like Porcello to earn $20m/year. I imagine the Sox are paying a slight premium to keep the years short, an arrangement which is attractive to Porcello because he can seek another deal at the still-reasonable age of 30.
Eyeballing last year’s leaderboards, 3war/200ip seems to be a decent approximation of the minimum qualifications to be a “#2 SP”. 2war/200ip seems to be a decent approximation of the minimum standard for “SP”.
Porcello’S WAR/200ip the past few years (2.6, 3.2, 3.1) seems best described as “good #3 / borderline #2”. If $21m is the new price for that kind of pitcher, we’ve moved into a new stratosphere of player salary and we need to redefine other contracts appropriately.
The other choice is that Boston sees significant untapped upside left in Porcello….which given his age might be right, but given his high floor / low upside toolset might not.
I’m kinda stumped trying to figure out how proven championship leadoff hitter center fielder Ellsbury wasn’t worth $20m/yr, while much more limited players porcelllo/hanley/panda are.
well Porcello is 26, so there’s that…Ellsbury also missed significant time in the years leading up to his free agency, which is probably the biggest factor.
i meant to say 2war/200ip seems a decent approx for minimum qualification for #3 SP.
You need to stop looking at it as $/year. The Red Sox are only paying Porcello until he’s 30, meaning there probably won’t be much decline if any, whereas Ellsbury wanted a deal into his mid-late 30s. Not to mention all the research that showed Ellsbury’s skillset doesn’t really age well, and how injury prone he’s been. Porcello is about as close to a sure thing as a SP gets, and if he provides 3 WAR for the next 5 years at 20 mil, I will be more than happy with that.
why would anyone stop looking at $/yr? thats a strange statement.
and is porcello really a sure thing? last year was the first year ever he pitched more than 182 innings or got his era above league average. i mean i like porcello and believe in his fip based war i pointed to above….but “as close to a sure thing as there is” sounds like a lot of hyperbole, no?
You were comparing 2 players who couldn’t possibly be more different based solely on their $/year. If they were both looking for 1 year deals, obviously Ellsbury would be worth more money, but there was a lot more at play than just 1 year for each player.
And again, “about as close to a sure thing as a SP gets”. Please use my actual quote if you’re going to quote me. Starters as a whole are not a sure thing, but Porcello is as consistent as a SP can be. 6 straight years of 150 IP, and he’s been worth about 2.7 WAR each of the last 3 years.
Tough to have a good ERA as a ground ball pitcher with both Miguel Cabrera and Prince Fielder in the infield. Not too surprising last year his ERA improved with better (although not close to elite) defense.
“why would anyone stop looking at $/yr? thats a strange statement.”
Because its only half of the equation. Are you saying there is equal investment/risk in 4/80 contract as a 7/140? The AAV is the same, but the investment is far higher, which makes the risk more. Also, players as they age tend to get more injuries or eroding skills, so having a contract end at age 30 is far better than 34 or 37 (Ellsbury’s age at conclusion of his contract).
No. 2.5-3.5WAR/200IP is a prototypical #3. A 2 is ~3.5-4.5WAR/200IP, and a 1 is 4.5+WAR/200IP.
This isn’t just me talking out of my ass. By Kiley, a 4 starter is a 50 FV, which means 2 WAR/200 IP.
all due respect to Kiley, but the numbers don’t really back that up.
Last year if we look at all SP who threw at least around 100+ip, almost exactly 30 put up 4+war/200ip, 60 at 3+, and 90 at 2+. and that excludes a whole bunch of guys who put up a 2+war/200 in 10-15 starts and 50-100ip.
This is a new salary strata. True prime aces get $30 million a year now, while solid #2/3 get 15-20 prime, and this will only keep increasing throughout the next 5 years. Given a market rate of something around 7-7.5/WAR (the calculator on this site hasn’t been updated in 3 years as staff will regularly point out) in 5 years the market rate will likely be between 9-10/WAR, growing incrementally. So Porcello would need to deliver around 9.5-10 total WAR during the 4 extension years for this to be market value, which is a very reasonable expectation.
The numbers you’re using are completely unrelated to the definition of an ace.
There are 10-12 aces at any given time in the MLB. And being an ace is about an established level of performance.
Last year, 11 players had 4.5 or more FIP-WAR, and 13 players had 4.5 or more RA9-WAR.
Over the last 2 years, 10 players have 9 or more FIP-WAR, and 11 players have 9 or more RA9-WAR.
Over the last 3 years, 10 players have 13 or more FIP-WAR, and 12 players have 13 or more RA9-WAR.
So, yeah. 4.5 WAR is the perfect cutoff for an ace.
I don’t think it’s that Ellsbury wasn’t worth $20MM (21.1 actually) but that is was for 7 years, ending when he is 37. He has a serious injury history and needs speed to be worth the money, so assuming a normal decline, he likely has at least a couple useless years at the end.
I recognize Hanley has an injury history as well, but his contract was 4 years at $22MM, ending when he is 35. Likewise with Sandoval, 5 years, 17.6 to 18.6, ending when he is 32. I’m not saying neither of them will have useless years near the end, but they will be much younger than Ellsbury at the end with skills that should age slightly better (since Hanley doesn’t really run any more now), making them lower risk overall.
Also, Ellsbury may be a “proven championship leadoff center fielder” but he has more seasons with a wRC+ below 100 than he does above.
maybe. but i guess i don’t see much difference in handing $20m/yr to ellsbury until he’s 36 than handing $20m/yr to hanley until age 35. and i think ellsbury projects as the more valuable player.
I would not expect Ellsbury to continue to be a good defensive center fielder when he is 36, and a lot of his value comes from defense. Hanley is 24% better than Ellsbury, offensively, for their careers and one would expect that to continue as they age. Once defense is a wash, Hanley remains more valuable. That’s my rationale at least. The Panda signing I didn’t love, but at least it’s over when he’s 32 instead of 36.
2 years of inflation happened as well. Add maybe 10-20% to Ellsbury’s value to reflect the context Hanley signed in.
one year of inflation you mean.
Athletic players decline more slowly than non-athletic players do.
Although, I do agree that the Ellsbury deal was absolutely idiotic for the Yankees. Definitely better than that hilarious Sandoval deal, but probably worse than the Hanley deal.
This is a HUGE overpay. Porcello is a number 3 starter at best, to give him 20 million a year is crazy.
Thanks for that thoughtful analysis.
…it’s not wrong, though.
Porcello’s been pretty much the same pitcher as Ervin Santana over the last four years (Porcello with 10 fWAR and 7.5 RA9WAR, Santana with 10 RA9WAR and 7.5 fWAR), and Santana just got 4/$55m.
Even accounting for the difference in age, and expected improvement from Porcello, I wouldn’t have gone above 4/$70m
For reference, he’s been worth the same fWAR and 3 fewer RA9-WAR than Kimbrel over the last three years, and everyone spent yesterday slagging Preller for paying 4/$68.5 for Kimbrel.
Yeah, but Santana is 32. Do you really think his age 32-36 will be worth more than 70% of Porcello’s age 26-30 seasons?
They also have a little bit different skillsets and Porcello doesn’t have a glaring below replacement level year that increases his variance substantially.
Love this deal. Sox are locking up what are (ex ante) probably the best years for Porcello. They could have signed him for a longer deal for a lower AAV, but instead they’re taking the prime years, and letting him go after that. I’ll take the 26 year old “number 2 or number 3 starter” with room to improve over the 31 year old “number 1 starter” who’s in his decline phase every time.
And this still leaves the Sox with plenty of flexibility to trade for and sign an ace (or two or three) this season and in the coming offseason. When guys like Betts and Xander are anchoring your lineup for the foreseeable future (and maybe guys like Owens and Rodriguez and Barnes are your 3-5 SPs for the next 5 years), you have plenty of salary flexibility.
Yeah I agree, this is an awesome deal for the Sox. I think a lot of people are looking at this deal generically and not realizing the financial flexibility Boston has. For a small market team this deal would be bad, but I think it’s perfect for the Sox. So much less risk from Porcello over this deal than any of the other FA starters.
Pitchers don’t age the same way that hitters do. I’d agree that they’re most likely getting the best years if they sign a hitter at his age. I don’t see why Porcello would suddenly get a boost in performance over the next few years though. Until he actually takes that leap forward, I look at him for what he’s been over the last few years – about 2.5 to 3 WAR, and a pitcher whose ERA is pretty consistently above his FIP/xFIP (last year was the first time since 2009 that his ERA was lower than either his FIP or his xFIP).
I wouldn’t say these are necessarily his best years (27-30) but when durability is a driver of big pitching contracts, he’ll have “less mileage” now then he will later. Add that they were able to limit it to a 4 yr deal PLUS being a GB pitcher is a plus when half his starts will be at Fenway, and a slight overpay is justifiable.
Throw in that he’s been very consistent (even if not great) and the Sox are pitching-thin enough and prob wanted to avoid another Lester-type situation, so this kind if makes sense. They also figure that they prob got Miley to sign to a team-friendly deal, which might balance this off a bit.
They may have their sights set of Fister as a GB guy, but they can’t depend on being able to sign him when other teams will be chasing.
I think the deal only makes sense if Boston believes free agent prices are going to explode in the off-season. Unless Porcello throws up a Cy Young-caliber season in 2015, he was probably not going to get a deal longer than 4 years on the market. Teams have gotten smarter about going any longer with pitchers below the ace level.
http://www.fangraphs.com/blogs/rick-porcellos-upcoming-enormous-payday/
No they haven’t. Bailey, who is always hurt, got 6 just last year and is a year and a half older. Lester got 6 this year and is 5 years older, and despite his reputation, put up 3 straight Porcello-like seasons prior to his 2014 comeback. Shields got 4, but only because he is 7 years older than Porcello.
Bailey, Shields, and Lester have all shown the ability to be 4-5+ war pitchers.
Porcello never has.
And like he stated above they’ve all been less consistent and are older (much older for Lester and Shields), and Bailey has injury history. Porcello is the safest pitcher of the group.
That’s a bit of a misstatement – Bailey has one 4 win season, and 4 where he had 1.5 to 1.9. Lester has 4 excellent years with 4.2 to 5.6 wins and three Porcello-esque seasons with 2.6 to 3.5 wins, including 3 straight before last year in which many people thought he was done being elite. Shields has been the most consistent of the four, but his days of 4-5 win seasons are likely behind him at 33.
It’s hard to see a big upside for Porcello until I think of what Doug Fister did with less.
Let me out! Let me out!!!!!
Rick Porcello? $21M? What in the name of Sweet Lorraine is going on?
The praise and criticism for this deal both seem overly strong to me.
I don’t see much upside in the contract at all for Boston. Yes, Porcello could breakout and become a 4-5 WAR pitcher – but you really have to squint to make that seem *probable* as opposed to merely possible in the same way it’s possible for almost any pitcher under 30 to figure it out. He’s young relative to the market of pitchers with his service time, but he’s not young developmentally. Looks like a reliable 3 WAR arm and not much more.
By the same token, I also don’t see much downside risk. Most of the negative reaction seems not to be about Porcello being a bad pitcher, but folks in denial that baseball’s market value has inflated so much that 3 WAR arms gets $20M/year. Well, they do. It’s not really a matter of opinion. They just do. Better pitchers get even more than that, both in salary and in length of the guarantee.
So if you want to get Porcello’s free agent years, this is about what they cost. Is it wise to buy them if you’re Boston? Looking at that rotation, it seems like it would be. They still don’t have a top guy, but this helps build a higher floor for the uncertainty and volatility of prospects and reclamation projects.
There’s a temptation to stamp every transaction with big bold red letters GOOD or BAD. It makes for less interesting conversation, I guess, but this deal just seems fine to me.
Well said. When you have a fair number of people on both sides of the fence (“$20M per year for THAT?? What in the crap is going on?!” crowd versus the “AWESOME extension, what a deal the Sox got!” crowd) then that may be an indication that it’s a pretty fairly priced deal for all parties. (Even if that measured response doesn’t generate nearly the same apoplexy.)
Porcello only isn’t already a 4 WAR pitcher if you use FIP instead of ERA – which is a terrible idea for groundball pitchers w/ low K rates. Porcello has the profile of a guy who consistently outperforms his FIP.
That’s the shallow.
The deep is that he’s a groundball pitcher, and detroit’s defense is abysmal. Boston’s is very good, with elite defense in CF,RF,2B,1B,3B (pretty much everywhere but short and left). They also have drastically better catching (both defensive and in pitch handling) than detroit. This is exactly the sort of player you’d expect to see a large jump with.
Considering age, and the defense, the current value of a win – we’re looking at 12WAR over the next 5 years to break even – I’d say less than 10% chance the Sox lose money. Greater than 50% chance that excess value on the contract exceeds 20%. There’s TONS of upside here and very little downside.
I think you’re confused. Porcello has consistently underperformed his FIP and fWAR is based on FIP, which means that his WAR totals look better than the value he has actually provided to Detroit. In reality Porcello has been a sub-2 win above replacement pitcher, but we think he should be worth ~2.7 WAR annually based on his peripherals. So if moving to a new team with a much better defense gets his ERA closer to his FIP, then he now becomes that ~2.7 WAR pitcher in reality rather than in theory. That means the Red Sox are paying over $7.5 million per win above replacement.
Hm. But when using bWAR, he STILL averaged 2.6 WAR over the last three seasons, and he had 4.0 bWAR last season. That’s not FIP-based, is it?
So, he may actually beat that with better defense behind him (though he does make quite a few errors himself).
I like the deal; that is, I think it is perfectly reasonable.
It is an expenditure Boston can afford because of their enormous resources, but if Kansas City had made this same move then everyone would rightly be killing them for it. The extension is an overpay barring unexpected improvement from Porcello, but it brings some cost certainty and Porcello is one of the safest starters to invest in, safe obviously being a relative term with regard to pitchers.
Yeah…Pablo Sandoval is not “elite” defensively. He’s average to above average, with a 0 DRS/year, a 1 TZ/year, and a 2.2 UZR/150 on his career.
Do you mean “elite relative to body-mass based expectations”?
I think what he meant was that Sandoval was elite in 2011 when the narrative was written, and he stopped paying attention after that.
Yup. It’s pretty much the exact same thing that the Padres did yesterday. Sox fans are just more vocal and numerous than Pads fans.
Its crazier to me that they would get outbid on Lester and then turn and spend nearly that same AAV on a pitcher who is clearly inferior, and hasn’t thrown a single inning for them.
Please compare Lester’s and Porcello’s ages and years asked for, and then edit your comment.
Quick counter-points:
1) Age difference
2) Length of contract
3) $30 million signing bonus (so the same AAV is bit misleading)
4) Most free agents haven’t “thrown a single inning” for the team they sign with.
5) Why isn’t the opposite of pitching for the team true? You seem to think pitching for Sox will give them special knowledge about Porcello…but it doesn’t seem that you’re willing to say the Sox had special knowledge about Lester that might have made them think he wasn’t worth more.
They didn’t spend nearly the same AAV. Lester got 26M, Porcello get 20.5M – Lester got 25% more, over a signifanlty longer period, at a significantly older age.
THe chances of the Lester contract turning out positive are very low. The chances of the Porcello contract turning out negative are very low. That’s the point.
And what are the chances of the Porcello contract turning out positive?
I’d say “very low” personally. He’s a good, not great pitcher. That’s what he is.
Is it an awful, end of the world deal? No, but they’re paying him a little about market rate for what he produces. So everyone who is saying this is an AWESOME deal I do not understand. Signing a pitcher to an extension that pays him market value or a little above is not cause to throw a party. Just because wins cost a certain amount on the free-agent market doesn’t mean teams should run around signing everybody to market rate extensions.
#Bestteamgetsbetter is all you need to know.
I liked the ‘smart’ baseball move of trading a redundant outfielder for a 1 year ‘cheap’ rental. I’d rather see the organization develop some pitchers (which is basically what we gave up by trading Lester) rather than throwing $95 million over 5 years to a guy who posted the 40th best WAR in the league last year (150 innings min).
I guess the threshold of being a $20 million dollar player is just getting much, much lower.
Ervin Santana 4yrs, $54m
Rick Porcello 4yrs, $83m
So seems they paid Porcello an extra $10m to stay with the team – the whole team is structured today for that 5 year window he’s signed for. Better to spend an extra $10m over 4yrs than have sucky pitchers for all 5 seasons of the window…
Porcello sucks and $20 mil per year is ridiculous, I don’t care if he’s 26.
I could have gone to ESPN for that analysis lol
If you think this was some kind of great signing for the Red Sox then the Royals signing Vargas last year was highway robbery.
If you think the only possible positions here are “this was a great singing” and “this is a ridiculous signing”, you probably watch too much TV.
The deal doesn’t make sense to me unless the Red Sox believe that there is a decent chance that Porcello morphs into the second coming of Kevin Brown (albeit at a younger age than Brown did). More likely the upside is that he can deliver Derek Lowe-type performance for 3 years.
The downsides are pretty clear. The Red Sox have quite a bit of depth among position players and a good farm system. Separate and apart from the risk of injury (Porcello threw 200 innings for the first time last year and was put in the pen at the end of the year and was not effective), the Red Sox have lost committed themselves to quite an extent in circumstances where it does not seem necessary.
20.5 for friggin Porcello?..These guys have gone nuts!!..
I’m going to be quick here since I noticed a Mookie Betts article that needs to be read.
this is easy:
Porcello is a ground ball pitcher. Fielder, Cabrerra, Peralta and flotsam defensive range sucked. Napoli, Sandoval, Bogearts, & Pedroia is good. Sox get his his prime years. A healthy Porcello will have much better #s with the Sox.
Good deal for both player and team, WIN/WIN folks.
Fielder was only on the team for two of his six years and Peralta was actually a very good defender at short. He also saw a lot of Brandon Inge, Adam Everett, and Ramon Santiago behind him, all of whom were good defenders. His fWAR already attempts to subtract out the defense – it doesn’t make sense to account for it again and think Porcello will be better than he has been.
I don’t see the upside. His K rate has been consistently bad (2013 is a clear outlier in terms of Ks and velocity). His walk rate and home run rates can’t go much lower. And his BABIP last year (.298) can’t realistically go much lower, writer.
He’s a 2.5WAR pitcher. I mean, that’s fine, and there something to be said for youth, but let’s not pretend like three is any sick thing add pitcher durability.
They are paying market rate (or more) for a guy with very little possible upside and not much downside. Meh.
Yuck. Writing on my phone clearly not a good idea. Please excuse all the horrible typos.
The only reason this absurd extension isn’t being roundly panned by all is because Boston did it.
They’ve severely jammed up their rotation going forward. Same thing they’ve done with the OF. The Red Sox have been making easily defensible individual moves, but overall they aren’t constructing their roster very effectively. Next year will see Buchholz, Miley, Kelly, and Porcello making up four fifths of the rotation. This gives them room to add one starting pitcher through free agency, and no room to promote one of the young guys on the farm. The A’s and the Rays regularly snag capable young arms from other organizations (Hahn, Pomeranz, Odorizzi ect…) and I just don’t think the Red Sox front office is that savvy. They don’t seem to be anyways.
You are vastly more optimistic than me if you see Kelly being a significant part of the SP staff after this year. I don’t generally have high hopes for a guy with a consistent FIP/xFIP of 4 moving from an NL club to the AL East (even with the recent lower-offense AL East), particularly in Fenway. I’m betting that if they have a good arm waiting in the minors, Kelly will be moved to RP or sent packing pretty quickly.
You need 10 starting pitchers (5 at the ML level and 5 in the minors) capable of making a start at the Major League level to survive a season.
Deep depth, build from the bottom up. Get to know it.
each of those individual moves might be just as easily criticizable as defensible. i’m not sure there’s one major trade or signing they’ve made the past two seasons that doesn’t have the distinct possibility of looking real bad in the end.
Their return on Lester looks awful right now. Just saying.
An analysis on a contract without a single $/WAR calculation. Only on Fan Graphs. Cause that would show the contract is a bad one, and this is Boston, so we can’t have that. When has anyone got an extension 1 year from FA at the 7.6 million/WAR range. This is a guy who does not get a lot of K’s and leaving the weak hitting Central for the first time, and his eagerness to lock up security rather than test the market reminds me of Josh Beckett, and we all know how that ended up.
1. “Only on Fan Graphs.”? You mean the site that has an almost slavish adoration of WAR? They used to be getting their bell rung for using WAR too much, without sufficient context or adjustments (e.g., the Matt Cain controversy). Now they’re getting it rung for not mentioning it in one article? They clearly cannot win.
2. I think that other Fangraphs articles estimated the $/WAR as being around $7m. This being a shorter contract, it seems pretty market-rate, except for bearing the risk of him getting injured this season (hence why I am surprised they didn’t extend him mid-season).
3. “Reminds me of Josh Beckett” You mean the Josh Beckett who put up three 4+ WAR seasons over his 27-30 year seasons? (the final one being lost to injury) I would love that outcome. Unfortunately, I don’t see Porcello as being nearly the pitcher that Beckett was.
maybe he means that only fangraphs would ignore its signature contract signing evaluator only when it makes a certain team look bad.