Ronald Acuna, Willie Calhoun, and Service-Time Manipulations
(Photo: Arturo Pardavila III)
Three years ago, Kris Bryant ranked as the best prospect in baseball. Then 23 years old, Bryant had brutalized minor-league pitching the year before and destroyed the competition in spring training with nine homers and 17 total hits in 44 plate appearances. Despite a clubhouse that now included Jon Lester and manager Joe Maddon among others — part of the Cubs’ signal to the world they were ready to compete — Bryant was easily one of the best 25 players in the organization, probably among the top five, and eventually proved during the season he was Chicago’s best position player.
And yet, the Cubs opted not to start the season with Kris Bryant on the roster. Once Bryant had spent enough days at Triple-A to extend his team control by a year — to become a free agent after the 2021 season instead of the 2020 campaign — the future MVP received a callup to the majors.
Bryant is still the most famous and most obvious case of a team’s effort to manipulate player service time to the potential detriment of the on-field product, but it happened before Bryant, has happened since Bryant, and is likely to keep happening. This season, there are several prominent players who might be kept off their major-league rosters for a time so that the team might save money and gain control of the player for an extra season.
For those unfamiliar with how service time works in these instances, here it is briefly. Players achieve free agency once they have six years of service time. Although the season lasts 187 days, a player is considered to have played a full season if he appears on an MLB roster or disabled list for 172 days. In any season where a player hits the 172-day threshold, that counts as one season of service time. If a player belongs to the roster for fewer than 172 days, he must combine those days with days from another campaign to reach the official “full season” mark.
Kris Bryant’s case is a useful example of this work. In 2015, he was on the roster for 171 days. That time counts only as a partial season. In the last two years, Bryant has been on the roster for more than 180 days each year, and each of those seasons count as one year of service time. At the end of the 2020 season, Bryant will have five seasons and 171 days of service, one day short of the six seasons necessary for free agency. As a result, he will need to play in 2021 to become a free agent. An extended discussion of service time appears in the FanGraphs glossary.
Around this time of year, you might also hear about Super Two status and a player being held back in the minors so that he won’t attain it. That process is slightly more complicated — and, again, you can read more about it in the glossary — but it’s different in that (a) there’s no specific date for avoiding it and (b) it has nothing to do with a player’s eligibility for free agency. Rather, it relates only to the year in which a player is able to participate in arbitration. If you hear about teams holding down players in the minors until mid-June or so, that is to delay arbitration but does not change when a player will hit free agency. They always need six full seasons.
This year, there are a handful of players who are perhaps worthy of a major-league job but who might be held down for a while to gain an extra year of free agency. We’ll start with the most unlikely.
Shohei Ohtani
All of baseball didn’t spend time courting Ohtani and selling him on their organizations so he could spend time in the minors. He is clearly one of the best pitchers in the Angels organization — and he is the best according to our Depth Chart projections. Given the millions that Ohtani already sacrificed to come over to the United States and play professionally, starting Ohtani in the minors would be an insult to him and to the game of baseball. The Angels are trying to contend this year, and doing anything other than putting Ohtani on the roster is bad for the sport. It isn’t likely, but it is a subject thathas been brought up, so it is at least worth addressing.
Ronald Acuna
The Braves’ 20-year-old phenom ranked second on this year’s FanGraphs Top-100 list behind only Ohtani. Acuna began the 2017 season without an at-bat above Low-A but tore through three levels with a .325/.374/.522 batting line and has continued to hit well during spring training. Of the players projected to receive playing time for the Braves this season, only two are projected to record an average batting line or better. The first is Freddie Freeman, Atlanta’s star first baseman. The second is Acuna.
In the outfield, where Acuna plays, Ender Inciarte is a solid player, but every other outfielder is replacement level. Nick Markakis takes up one outfield spot due to his salary and tenure, but there is another spot free for Acuna. Atlanta hasn’t indicated any desire to win this season — noted, for example, by their absence of offseason moves — which means they will likely keep Acuna in the minors in order to manipulate his service time and keep him away from free agency for an extra year.
Willie Calhoun
Calhoun, acquired by the Rangers last summer for Yu Darvish, already has some major-league service time, having spent 20 days in Texas last September. That doesn’t mean the Rangers can’t keep him in the minors long enough to ensure he doesn’t hit 172 days of service time between this year and last, however. He’s projected to produce a batting line 10% above league average, which would make him the Rangers’ third-best hitter behind the ageless Adrian Beltre and slugging Joey Gallo. He’s already been sent to minor-league camp this spring. The Rangers reasons for sending Calhoun — to work on his defense — are suspicious, as Eno Sarris suggested recently for the Athletic.
While the Rangers have some well-known players, ownership dropped payroll in Texas about $35 million from last year. The team doesn’t look like it is trying hard to compete this season, especially with the lack of upgrades in their rotation. Keeping Calhoun in the minors for more than a month to make sure he has less than 172 days of service time between this year and last would help confirm any suspicions that the Rangers are in a transition year.
Keeping players in the minors for reasons other than their ability to play in the majors is an ugly part of the game, but it is part of the system to which the players and owners have agreed. Most Cubs fans are probably happy that Kris Bryant won’t reach free agency until after 2021, putting public sentiment on the owners’ side. These are baseball decisions in the sense that a team is choosing to value a year of production in six years over a couple weeks of production now. These are not baseball decisions in terms of present competitiveness, however, because it requires a team to actively hurt their current on-field product. The combination, while currently unavoidable, is unfortunate.
Craig Edwards can be found on twitter @craigjedwards.
The Yankees have Andujar trying out 1B now as Greg Bird insurance, so that’s another reason to leave him in AAA.
The stated reason the Cubs sent Bryant to AAA was to work on his outfield defense. This may be a similar cover story.
If Andujar didn’t have a game with 2 first-pitch fastball HR this year, nobody would even be talking about him. And if you want to quote his spring stats, he has a .270 OBP. He’s also got 250 plate appearances total above AA. There is no real argument about sending him to AAA to start the season.
Andujar needs a ton of work on his defense. He’s got all the tools, but he’s an error machine.
There’s a non-zero chance he has to play corner outfield or 1B, which would be a shame but just because you have a cannon arm doesn’t mean it always clicks.
This is something baseball needs to fix way more than the timing of free agent signings. Opening Day is a time for baseball to shine, and fans love new shiny things. The slow trickle of rookies in late April-June is not exciting. Having Jason Heyward hit a monster home run on opening day is exciting. To fix it: just make it seven years. Any year you are in the majors counts. It’s not like guys coming up and down are going to end up costing a lot anyways. And the bargain for the players should be arbitration after 3 seasons. If you haven’t played that much, again, you would not be getting that much in arbitration anyway.
The only downside to this would be guys not getting called up late in the season. But honestly, if a team needs a guy because they are trying to win, they will sacrifice that 7th year. If a team sucks, well then there really won’t be much excitement about bringing a guy up for a few weeks in September anyway. Your stud prospects don’t generally come up that way anyway because they are all off the 40-man roster.
“To fix it: just make it seven years”
Why not make it ten years? Why not just get rid of free agency altogether?
They need to cut service time to four years or less. J. T. Realmuto was worth 3.6 bWAR last year. According to the WAR formulas used here he was worth somewhere between $23.4 million and $32.4 million, yet when Realmuto asked for $3.5 million he __lost__ and was given just $2.9 million.
Or, Alternatively they could start up the minimum salary to xxx (1mil? 1.5mil?) which would help all lower end players before arb (and during arb too) and do what the poster suggested above – any time in the big leagues counts as 1 year of ‘service’ towards free agency.
I absolutely agree with raising the minimum salary. If the players could also get that out of this deal, then great. I’d think the players would have to give up a little something more to get a meaningful raise for min. salary players.
Minimum salary should be $4 million per year. That gives every team a floor and makes owners who tank for draft picks pay for those picks.
I’m sorry, I was thinking about something that could actually happen (there is give and take on both sides). Please continue to live in your fantasy land.
So you want the small market teams to lose their good players even earlier?
Not trying to be argumentative – that’s a real question. I think that it’s more equitable for good younger players to make more money, but that’s going to be the result.
Yes, that’s fine with me. I’m sick and tired of listening to the bellyaching of the Small Marketeers.
No matter how much revenue sharing goes to Bob Nutting in Pittsburgh the Pirates payroll stays at the bottom of the game while more zeros are added to Nutting’s bank account balance.
If the fans of small market teams don’t like their payroll then rise up and drive out the bloodsucker and demand an owner who wants to pay to win.
I’m with ChiefWah00. They need to make service time shorter, not longer. I’m with you on the 1 day=1 year thing ( I would exclude September from that part, though).
I think solutions should be to get the players to free agency quicker, not formalize the way the teams are being shady.
Regardless of whether you make it 7 years or 4 years or 2 years or whatever, there will still be an incentive for clubs to game the system, as long as the years of club control are cheaper than free agency.
Well if 1 day=1 year than the only way to game the system would be to keep a player in the minors – which doesn’t help the team at all.
Make free agency based on a player’s age instead of service time.
If every player was granted free agency after his age-27 (or whatever) season, regardless of whether he debuted as a 19-year old like Bryce Harper or a 24-year old like Aaron Judge, there’d be no incentive to keep a player down when they’re clearly ready.
That’s actually not a crazy idea, in theory. One unintended consequence is that it really incentivizes teams to get players up earlier – so we may see the overall level of play decrease. Also teams would lean more towards drafting and signing younger players who can reach the majors earlier. It would really upend the entire minor league development process. Still, an interesting idea worth discussing.
I think to make this fair it would have to be an “earlier of” situation where its either 6 years of service time or 27 years old – whichever happens first – so that young phenoms like harper and acuna aren’t punished
This is true to a certain extent, but fans don’t get nearly as bent out of shape about a guy not getting a late season call up as they do about the early season bullshit. If you just make it any seven years, and arbitration after 3, then you are giving something to both sides and creating incentives to have your best young players start the season on the ML roster.
The deal you’re talking about (7 years w/ arb after 3) doesn’t really do anything for the players. If that were the rule when Kris Bryant was coming up he would have gained all of 8 game checks from it. His arbitration would have happened the same exact way.
So I’ll ask…Why on earth would the players agree to this deal?
The only players that are hurt by my structure are those that start in the big leagues opening day (technically, those that accrue 172+ days for six seasons). Right now, that list is small and becoming smaller. My way would have only gotten Bryant to the big leagues two weeks faster, so it wouldn’t have helped him much (as you say, just an extra two weeks of big league min. salary pay). But it really helps guys that are now held back until after the Super-2 deadline (because they either get called up sooner, or if they don’t they still get arbitration after 3 years instead of 4). It also really helps guys that start their careers having a tough time staying in the majors, since each year you appear in the majors counts.
Also , theoretically, the 7th year (which is now the 6th year) should produce higher salaries because you are going through arbitration for the 4th time, but of course the parameters of arbitration would have to be meted out as well.
I don’t see a way the players agree to this. For every player it helps I bet it hurts just as many. A player that is borderline ready is getting held down the full year almost every time. So it’s just more minor league time and paychecks for that player.
I think the owners would have to give up a whole hell of a lot more than a few dudes getting arbitration earlier to get a full extra year of control.
I have argued that the service time requirement for a year of service should align with the non-waiver trade deadline. That prevents September call-ups from burning a year of service time, but would likely cut down significantly on the amount of service time manipulation that goes on. Teams are already receiving up to 5 years of minor league control and 6 years of major league control. (Far longer than any other North American Professional Sports League) It seems obscene to me that they are allowed game the system to claim an additional year.
I think the simplest solution is to say 31 days of service = 1 year.
If a guy is ready (like Acuna) right away, you can bring him up on Opening Day with no real incentive not to.
If a guy is almost ready, or might be ready (like Willie Calhoun), you can send him to the minors for however long it takes for you to be confident that he is ready.
If a guy isn’t ready all year, you can still bring him up on September 1st without burning a year of service time.
If a player is ready in June but the team decides to hold him down until September 1st to get the extra year of service time, so be it. A team even in semi-contention would be giving up a lot of potential wins to do that. A bad team might do it whereas now they might be willing to bring him up in June. That’s the tradeoff, I suppose.
The players would probably have to give something up, but not something huge. The issue is that this probably only affects the cream of the crop of prospects, so I don’t know if the other players would want to give up anything for this. And more importantly, it only helps players that aren’t even in the union yet (minor leaguers being held down).
Surprised to see the negative reaction to an honest idea… oh wait, no I am not.
My feelings aren’t hurt. Honestly, I also wish for more player-friendly status. I was trying to propose something realistic.
As you mentioned, the service time and arbitration issues are different. I just think a system that encourages teams to make non-optimal lineup decisions for two weeks to start the season is absurd. Why not:
– Add a year to team control over players (this is de facto there already because teams get an ‘extra year’s from service time hijinks)
– Make the system agnostic to when in the year you are called up, an appearance on the ML roster anytime in the year counts as a full year, with the exception of players called up in September.
Heck, maybe put in a waiver for ’emergency starter’ that you can use under limited conditions to fill in for an injured pitcher.
We are mostly on the same page, but I don’t see why there should be exceptions. If you are coming up, it is because you deserve it and the team thinks it needs you to win. Sure, maybe that means that a team keeps going back to the same emergency AAAA guy because they’ve already burned him, but if I’m the players, I’d rather hold teams responsible and not let them get major league time for minor league prices. You are still talking about seven seasons without having any say of where you play, and that is after going through the minors, so it is really generally a lot longer. That is a long time!
Well, the September exception I like because the minor league season is over and, particularly for teams that are out of contention, you can bring up some guys to just let them get experience. So why not let these guys get some exposure, otherwise with the system I described above September callups are basically over.
I kind of threw in the last bit about emergency starters just because my brain was going down the ‘let’s think of unintended consequences’ path, and maybe there are some weird incentives to try to go to bullpen days (and overtax your ML guys) instead of calling someone up for a spot start. I will admit though that particular point was probably half baked 🙂
There aren’t really a lot of top prospect Sept. call ups anyway. For guys that are not likely to be stars, a team is less likely to care that much about service time. Also, anyone that has already been in MLB could come back up.
But I wouldn’t mind some sort of exception for Sept. as long as it did not extend to the playoffs. If you play in the playoffs it counts as a year.
How about this:
-Do away with Super Two, so everyone hits arbitration after 3 seasons and FA at 6;
-Whichever year you exhaust your rookie eligibility (based on the standards for the BBWAA RoY award: 130 career AB, 50 IP, or 45 pre-September days on the 25-man roster) counts as year 1;
-Once year 1 has been established, further years are accrued with even just a single appearance in a major league game (no matter when that game is, even September).
And the owners just give this away for what reason?
This comes in exchange for removing Super Two. Presumably the players who are good enough that a team would look at their potential services 6 years from now, with anything more than a vanishingly small weight compared to present production, must have some high upside. If the player lives up to those expectations at all, they can expect to find themselves at the upper end of the arb scale, so the team’s benefit is they only have to pay those larger-than-normal arb salaries for 3 years instead of 4.
There could also be a minimum standard for arb bids, probably pegged to a certain percentage of the QO: for example, you could have a player going into Arb1, but if the team wanted to make use of the salary arbitration system, their bid would have to be no lower than, let’s say, 20% of the QO (so $3.5M by this year’s standard). If the player wasn’t good enough to justify that large of a bid, the alternative is to release him to FA early, where some other team would be able to offer a deal like 2/5 or whatever. Then the minimum would increase to something like 35% for Arb2 players and 50% for Arb3. Whatever the numbers are, that would have to be a separate negotiation (the owners clearly wouldn’t throw that in on top of everything else just to lose S2), but the people at the negotiating table can be the ones hammering out the details for that.
The “Super 2” system is broken because the clubs are basically given an incentive to keep their best player in the minors for a couple weeks to gain another year of pre-arb money.
The fix is either making Super 2 requirements around a half season (which no team would do), base it solely on playing time regardless of roster time, or give teams only 2 years pre-arb anyway (and five altogether) which might help with FA’s being unsigned because teams get their best years at a bargain (a year earlier FA might help). Something is bound to change soon in the CBA. Union might be striking if it doesn’t.
The Super 2 cut off line is usually mid June, so it already is what you’re suggesting. This article is about the seventh year of team control. Bryant was Super 2.
I wish the Braves and Acuna would agree to a Starling Marte-type contract. The current situation is unseemly.
Projections are opinions, not set-in-stone truth. If one doesn’t buy that the projection is accurate, the entire argument for Calhoun falls apart. It’s a classic begging the question situation. Small sample size as it may be, Calhoun’s performance this spring (and last September) has not exactly made this a difficult decision.
If you buy the projection, 110 wRC+ isn’t really that good given that he is a slow runner and awful on defense. I don’t think there is a single evaluator who believes that he would be nearly average on defense (roughly -2 to -3 UZR/150 in LF, taking into account positional adjustment) and on the bases. With 110 wRC+, he’s maybe a 1 WAR player over a full season (e.g. Mark Trumbo, 2015).
Fangraphs scouting believes he’s a DH-only player, and the DH in Texas is taken by Choo. He’s an awful defender with all of 43 professional starts in LF. Even with zero service time concerns, there are all sorts of reasons to keep him in the minors. If anything, having Calhoun in the starting lineup would be a sign that Texas isn’t trying hard to compete.
I agree on Calhoun. Why is the stated reason that they are sending him to the minors to work on his defense seem suspect at all? He is the one prospect right now is most notorious for being horrible at defense.
I personally agree with you, especially in the case of Calhoun who is learning a completely different position and thus could use the reps at the MiLB level. The same case could have been made for Bryant who was kept down to get OF reps.
I do think there is a flip side of this argument though. Because Calhoun is a DH-only prospect, the likelihood of him remaining a positive value player 6 or 7 years down the line is very slim so why not get the best out of him while you can? Many a Calhoun-like player has been non-tendered before ever even reaching his 3rd arb year.
And realistically, is getting MiLB reps in the OF any different than getting MLB reps in the OF? I think he’d learn more getting MLB instruction than he ever would. If you aren’t competing anyway, might as well throw the guy into the fire and see if he can figure it out. If he can’t, you can always send him back down and get the same service time result.
I believe they are looking to confirm whether he in fact cannot play defense at any position. The most likely scenario is that they do call up Calhoun but raise the white flag on him in the field and move Choo back instead. Or maybe he shows himself passable enough that they’re willing to stick him in LF and pray – if he’s even a -10 defender, that may be enough for Texas to decide that they’re willing to live with it.
As for MiLB reps vs MLB reps, the obvious difference is that it doesn’t really matter how many of those flyballs fall in Triple-A, but they matter at the MLB level. Which is why having Calhoun in the starting lineup would be a sign that Texas isn’t trying hard to compete.
Good piece. This would be less damaging if there wasn’t the extended cost-controlled period that MLB teams have over their pre-FA players. You get an essentially automatic 7 years of control, and if you have also held them back long enough to delay arbitration, that’s potentially tens of millions of dollars in value. Combine this with the changing market for 30+ FA, (and the QO, where applicable) and you reduce earnings potential in both the early and later years.
I don’t know how you can change this before the new CBA is negotiated, but one possible solution is to put a combination of service years/age into the equation. Maybe FA is the earlier of six service years, or when the player turns 29, so long as he has at least 5 service years. And maybe you can’t offer a QO to any player 30 or older.
I don’t blame the teams at all for doing this — it is permitted by the CBA and is in their best interests. MLBPA needs to fix it. They need to make it more consistent, and adjust the rule, as some other commenters have stated. I think they somehow need the owners to agree to fewer years of control — 4 or 5 have been suggested. If not that, they need to figure out some other way to pay young, productive players more.
Not only do I not blame the teams, if I was a fan of the Braves, I’d be absolutely furious if Acuna starts the season with them.
Just as a draft lottery could make “tanking” almost obsolete, the undesirable behavior of keeping some of the best players off the field could be mostly mitigated with randomization. A player could get awarded a year of service at a proportion tied to the number of days played (perhaps with some exclusion for September call ups, 26th men or “spot starters”, and any other “weird” cases). If a player “loses” the year of service drawing, the days carry forward to the next year so that they are not worse off. Acuna would likely be playing in Atlanta’s opener if holding him down two weeks meant he would be awarded a year of service about 90% of the time anyway.
This would require a trustworthy random drawing or using a published random number like a state lottery result, but it would largely eliminate these arbitrary cutoffs that lead to roster decisions that on some level harm the player, the team and the fans.
‘Just as a draft lottery could make “tanking” almost obsolete’
Nope. NBA’s tanking is far from obsolete.
I am not sure how closely competitive balance or the relative value of draft position in the NBA correlates to those aspects of MLB. There is far more luck in an MLB regular season and in the MLB draft than in the NBA, so it is likely that a “nudge” in the form of a draft lottery would be enough to discourage blatant tanking.
I don’t see either side much liking the idea of all or nothing on the service time. Everyone involved likes to be able to know where they stand.
The one I really feel for here is Brent Honeywell. By all accounts, he could have helped TB last year, but because of the way they need to operate, they left him down all season. Then this year, everyone kind of agreed that he’d get sent down to start the season, and called up sometime after the Super 2 “deadline”. Now he needs TJ surgery, so still no service time, and when he comes back (even if all goes perfectly with rehab) he’ll certainly be sent down to manage his workload or whatever in 2019 and only called up (if at all) much later in the year.
If he was in camp with the big league team I think he has to go on the MLB DL, which means he’s would get service time (and paid the ML minimum) while he’s out.
Is that right? I don’t know if that’s right. But if it is, then I still kind of feel bad for him, but for more conventional reasons.
I saw most of Willie Calhoun’s major league at-bats last season and I am not even remotely surprised that he has been sent down. He is way too slow to hit so many ground balls, and he definitely doesn’t have a position. Calling it service time manipulation is unfair. Yeah, I know the GB% was a small sample size. But I saw the at-bats. He beats the ball into the ground.
If the Rangers weren’t stuck with Choo maybe sending Calhoun down would seem like service time manipulation. Assuming they have to pay Choo anyway, I would rather have Choo on the opening day roster than Calhoun. Hopefully by the ASB Calhoun will change my mind.
Willie Calhoun is a home run hitting slugger. His minor league numbers prove it. In no way is he “questionable”. True he can’t field, but he is a big time hitter. When he gets called up (and he will) he will be a real good hitter right away.
So if you were Texas, and you knew Calhoun has to DH, would you cut (and still pay) Choo instead of sending Calhoun down?
The Rangers need OBP. Calhoun is not an OBP guy. If he were going to be a 2nd baseman, 20-25 home runs and a .270/.330 looks okay. It doesn’t look so great for a DH. His lack of speed is likely to cause some BABIP issues as well. If his average drops at all, what is the difference between him and some of the unemployed guys who are still waiting for contracts?
He is young. I think he is a great hitter. I just don’t think he is as ready as everyone else seems to think he is.
I would not cut Choo. I would accept Calhoun’s poor defence because he is a really good hitter. Honestly, when he comes back up he will still be a poor defensive outfielder. They have better coaches in the major leagues for defence, for hitting etc etc.
I don’t think his bat can make up for his defense yet. Even if his GB% goes back to his normal, he has a crazy high IFFB%. Either way, he needs more luck than most players to have a good BABIP. His ceiling is high but his floor is really low.
I don’t think the guy sucks. I just think there is no evidence that the Rangers are manipulating the situation. And it’s a little bit irresponsible to accuse them of it.
Fangraphs is usually really objective about players. But sometimes isn’t as objective about management and ownership. Everybody loves to hate the rich guys.
How high do you draft Acuna? Especially in a dynasty league he seems to have top 30 or so value given his 5 tool potential. If we’re close to 100% certain that he will be called up in mid-April I feel like he is worth a top 50 pick.
My fantasy: – a true free market system – where after a club invests in development – all teams are given a set annual budget of some portion revenue (40%-50%?) and players compensation is distributed fairly among ALL players – veteran or rookies – retroactive by WAR. A portion of proceeds set aside by MLB for “DL insurance.” You still will have players gravitating toward bigger markets with endorsement/ancillary benefits, but making every team competitive for every player would not only benefit the market for players, it would remove the painful problem of under compensated players in their early years.
Then we can talk about management representation reform
‘Of the players projected to receive playing time for the Braves this season, only two are projected to record an average batting line or better. The first is Freddie Freeman, Atlanta’s star first baseman. The second is Acuna.’
Albies is chopped liver??? I would expect Inciarte to grade out average at the plate at least as well.
Is there no way to contract around this problem? Could the Braves and Acuna both agree to start free agency the same year (I think his first free agent year will be 2025) as if he was in the minors for April?
Braves get: good PR by having Acuna on the team for opening day/some increase in team performance in April
Acuna gets: major league salary for April, extra ROY stats
I think all that needs to happen is that Acuna needs to agree to arbitration in 2024 right now and then the Braves lose nothing by bringing him up.
I don’t think the MLBPA would ever allow that.
Bad precedent.
Kris Bryant the most famous? What about Ryan Braun in 2007? Brought up late May and still won RoY. Arguably the Astros did the same thing with Springer and Correa.
Bryce Harper stayed down until the end of April, which is particularly notable right now because it means this upcoming season is his “year 6” instead of “year 7”.
This is a very un-Fangraphsy article. And Craig, wow, lots of conclusion selectivity here. How are you comfortable making a blanket statement that Acuna starting the season in the minors is blatant service time manipulation? The Acuna and situation and Bryant situation are not very similar. Acuna is 20. He has maybe 650 ABs total in full-season ball? Atlanta rushed him through three levels, advancing Acuna faster than any player since Andrew Jones. It’s not at all unreasonable to think that it might be in the player’s best interest to see a league a couple times before advancing to the next level. This gives the league the opportunity to adjust to the player and see if the player can adjust back. It’s not in anyone’s best interest to rush Acuna before he’s ready and then have to send him back down. Maybe Acuna IS ready (though if he is, it’s nearly unprecedented for the amount of experience he has), but how do you KNOW, big guy?
You are suggesting that service time manipulation doesn’t occur? Or that it’s not applicable to Acuna?
We all know Acuna is ready now. Get real. He is an easy major league regular……today !!
I think you meant Gleyber Torres is the 12th best prospect in baseball not Miguel Andujar.
Interesting article, I’m curious how the union will navigate this as it increasingly becomes the norm to manipulate service time.
yep. andujar was 14th.
Ugly? Unfortunate?
That seems a more apt description for what this site has become.
dont blame teams, blame the rule. Teams are forced to make the best of the rules.
Every year we talk about this over and over. Every year the articles are from the player’s perspective. Just once I’d like to see a writer acknowledge that it is damn smart from the club’s point of view to control the service time of a player. You do that, and you free up money to spend on talent in the free agent market, or provide extra capital to extend players, and to take on salary in trade later in the year at the deadline. To criticize the team for manuevering WITHIN THE RULES strikes me as disingenious, and perhaps motivated by an agenda.
I’m not a ‘players” guy, or an “owners” guy. I recognize that players are the talent, and as such, I believe that they ought to be earning a fair split of baseball revenue. To that end, I want the owners to open up the books so we can see what’s under the hood, and the players association can bargain to make that proper split happen. On the other side, I recognize that this is a business, so I want it to be profitable, because I love this game, and want it to continue for a long time. Let’s understand who is risking their own capital (hint: it’s not the players), and that sound financial management requires that there is a return on that capital that is at least somewhat competitive with the “market”, whatever that is defined as.
So, if you you have a problem with service time manipulation, that’s fine, but the blame doesn’t fall squarely on the owners. The CBA is the problem, and while the author admits this, it is in the contaxt of calling the manuevering “ugly”. So work to change that the next time around, rather than casting smart moves in a negative moral light.
Now re:Otani, given that he’s given up 15 earned runs in 8.1 innings in the spring, the Angels may actually have no choice but to start him in the minors.
Yup. Who’d have thunk it ?? He is a disaster at pitching and hitting so far. He does not deserve to start in the majors. But his talent is real. Once he comes back up, I’m confident he will be quite good. But yes, he deserves to be sent down for a little bit. That is the difference. Kyle Tucker, Ronald Acuna, Scott Kingery etc do NOT deserve to be sent to the minors.
All teams should do this. Teams need to get the max value out of the players before they hit free agency.
Why is Fangraphs so pro-player? You can’t read an article without the said article being slanted towards the players. Players can be replaced and are all the time. The game is bigger than the players. The owners are the keepers of the game. The players don’t care about the game. They care about getting paid. I read in here all the time how such and such a player is underpaid, but no one wants to discuss the awful Andrew Jones’ contract, or the horrible Pujols contract, or the disgusting Miggy contract. This offseason has encouraged me greatly. The owners are finally wising up.