The Dodgers Rotation Is Risky, Expensive, and Fantastic
Anecdotally speaking, Clayton Kershaw makes any rotation look good. Empirically speaking, that also appears to be the case. Consider: according to the depth-chart projections at this site, the Dodgers currently possess the best rotation in major-league baseball. The San Diego Padres, meanwhile, have the worst. If one were to move Kershaw from LA to San Diego, the Dodgers would rank only 15th in the majors; the Padres would improve to sixth-best overall.
With Kershaw, the Dodgers have gotten a massive head start when it comes to outpacing the rest of MLB rotations. Despite contending with frequent injury problems over the last five season, the Dodgers have spent their way to one of the top-five rotations in baseball thanks to Clayton Kershaw plus a near-endless supply of arms. This season is unlikely to be any different.
Back in 2014, the Dodgers had a mostly healthy rotation, with Kershaw, Zack Greinke, Hyun-Jin Ryu, Dan Haren, and Josh Beckett all recording at least 20 starts. The first four members of that group took the mound in 117 of the team’s games that season. Beckett added another 20, while seven other pitchers split the remaining 25 starts. That offseason, however, Beckett retired. The Dodgers paid Dan Haren to pitch for Miami, trading both him and Dee Gordon to the Marlins in a deal that ultimately netted them Howie Kendrick. To replace those two spots, the team signed Brandon McCarthy to a four-year deal and took a $10 million flyer on Brett Anderson. McCarthy and Ryu got hurt, Anderson pitched quite well, and the team ended up using 16 starters — or, essentially 13 different pitchers to fill out the final two rotation spots.
The chart below illustrates how many starters each major-league team used in 2015.
Led by Kershaw and Greinke, the 17.7 WAR produced by the Dodgers rotation represented the third-highest mark in the majors — this, despite the club having been compelled to use more starters than any other team in the league. Including the $40 million the team spent to acquire Alex Wood — including the signing bonus of Hector Olivera and the money added by Mike Morse and Bronson Arroyo — as well as the 15 cents for every dollar that went to the luxury tax, the Dodgers spent roughly $150 million to record those 17.7 wins, a pretty inefficient $8.8 million per WAR.
The Dodgers took the same route last year, as well. With McCarthy and Ryu still on the books, but Greinke gone, the team went out and signed Scott Kazmir and Kenta Maeda, while also retaining Anderson via the qualifying offer. That plan worked about as well as the year before, with Maeda pitching well, McCarthy, Ryu, and Anderson mostly injured and Scott Kazmir pitching neither particularly well or often. The Dodgers again finished near the top of MLB in number of starters.
Again, most of the teams close to the Dodgers were bad. Again, the team was pretty inefficient when it comes to the money aspect. And again, the Dodger starters were quite good, a 16.4 WAR landing them fourth in baseball. The team ended up trading for Bud Norris and Rich Hill in order to get through the season. Including the roughly 13 cents per dollar that went toward the luxury tax, as well as the $20 million posting fee for Maeda, the Dodgers spent around $132 million for that pitching staff. That comes to $8 million per WAR, meaning that, again, the Dodgers essentially paid free-agent prices for their entire staff.
Those efficiency calculations get even wilder when you exclude Clayton Kershaw. He’s been responsible for 15.1 of the 34.1 WAR the Dodgers rotation has produced over the last two seasons, and even though the team is paying him in excess of $30 million per year, that only comes out to around $5 million per WAR. To surround Kershaw with a decent enough staff to rate as one of the top rotations in baseball, the Dodgers have spent more than $200 million for the remaining 19 wins, or around $11 million per WAR over the last two years.
Over the last two seasons, Clayton Kershaw leads the Dodgers in starts, but Brett Anderson — the same Brett Anderson who just signed with Chicago for $3.5 million guaranteed — is second on the Dodgers in starts. Zack Greinke, who didn’t make a start for the Dodgers last season, is tied for third with his replacement, Kenta Maeda. Mike Bolsinger, now with the Blue Jays, is fifth, followed by Scott Kazmir and Alex Wood, neither of whom has topped the 140-inning mark. And now the club has conceded some of its depth, trading away right-handed prospect Jose De Leon.
If you’re wondering if the team is going to attempt the same strategy again, the answer yes. Per Bill Shaikin:
The Dodgers project Clayton Kershaw, Rich Hill, Kenta Maeda and Urias as their top four starters, with Scott Kazmir, Alex Wood, Brandon McCarthy, Hyun-Jin Ryu, Ross Stripling, Carlos Frias and [Brock] Stewart also available.
Right now, that group is projected for more than 21 WAR, tops in baseball, but you might note that there’s considerable risk present here. Hill is 37 years old and his 110.1 innings from last season represent the most he’s recorded in a decade. Maeda signed an unusual incentive-based contract due to injury concerns of his own despite a promising first season. Urias is just 20 years old, even if he does raise the team’s ceiling by a good amount. The rest haven’t proven they can stay healthy or effective for any length of time, but it hardly matters if Kershaw is Kershaw.
If Kershaw hits his 7.7 WAR in 218 innings, the rest of the team only needs to meet half of their relatively modest projections for the Dodgers, once again, to have a top-five rotation. This rotation is going to be slightly cheaper and slightly more cost efficient, closer to $110 million in salaries including Maeda’s incentives and some luxury tax money. With Kershaw at the front, though, the team can slap together average pieces and be in good shape. Even with Kershaw’s abbreviated season, he still topped the majors in WAR. If the Dodgers suffer the same types of troubles they have had the past few seasons — and their risk-filled rotation suggests they will — they can still go outside the organization if need be. As long as Kershaw is around, this rotation will be fantastic. If he’s not around, the team will need some injury luck on the pitching staff or the team’s position players to play as expected. The Dodgers are going to be fine, probably a lot better than fine. If you had to choose between Kershaw or money, you’d probably choose Kershaw. The Dodgers already have both.
Craig Edwards can be found on twitter @craigjedwards.
I really love our rotation in 2017 but health is the key. If eveyone is healthy Dodgers rotation is top 3 in the whole leauge
If everyone is healthy it is #1. Everyone won’t be healthy though, guaranteed. The question is how unhealthy. If 4 of the 5 of Hill, Wood, Urias, Maeda, and McCarthy are healthy, Kershaw is mostly healthy, then that could be the best rotation in baseball. If only 2 of the five (combined, so maybe 4 of them pitch 1/2 season) and they have to go to their depth, then it might still be top-5. That’s basically what happened last year and they were top-5.
When ~50% of your rotation’s value is contributed by one pitcher, that’s the definition of risk. Chance is not your friend in this situation.
I mean, the guy missed 2 months with an injury and still puts up 6.5 WAR. Sure, it’s not certain that he will be 100% healthy, but the risk he misses time is different from the risk that he is something less than an ace.
It has that upside, you’re right. What good does it do when Kershaw is replaced by an imposter every October? Until he gets that right, their ceiling is that of the Braves and 14 consecutive titles. They’re already at 5, but at least the Braves won the series once. The playoffs are kryptonite for Superman, for whatever reason. A ridiculously talented pitcher that comes along once in a generation, yet for some strange reason has been miserable when the season ends.
You are judging too much on kershaws poor performances and ignoring the good ones. Kershaw has had multiple gems in ocotber but you choose to ignore that
You’re right; he does. But I’m not ignoring them, only stating a fact; his post-season performance has not come close to his regular season.
Not only are they good, they can be a very entertaining starting staff to watch, what with Kershaw, Hill, Urias, Maeda, and Wood all with their unique styles. Those five, with Kasmir, Stewart, McCarthy, Stripling and Ryu a potential second rotation in reserve should get them through the season in good shape. It’s time for the health fairies to shine on Chavez Ravine!
Given that they are disinclined to give up draft picks, trade good prospects, or pay big money long-term for pitchers, they’ve done a good job of putting together a rotation while preserving their long-term resources.
They’ve used the Andersons, Ryus, Kazmirs, etc. to contribute innings during playoff runs, while waiting for the young pitching to arrive.
I would also argue that their collective risk is reduced given the number of arms they have stockpiled. While they individually may pose an increased risk, they still won’t be forced to run out a quad A guy in the playoffs.
They won’t need a quad-A guy, but it hasn’t been anyone particularly good either, considering Clayton Kershaw has started on 3-days rest in all of the last four NLDS.
I agree, but I think it’s fair to say there was some particularly bad luck in that regard last year with injury. Urias is their guy, it’s fair to entrust him as a playoff starter (at least entering the season). Brock Stewart has the potential to become a playoff-caliber starter and if not, there’s a decent chance one of Wood, McCarthy, or Kazmir stays healthy enough to fulfill that role.
I’m interested to see what happens with Ryu. He was a solid 3rd starter in both 2013 and 2014 (3.6 & 3.8 fWAR) before losing the last two seasons to injury. Obviously, at this point, it’s impossible to project with any certainty, but there is a non-zero chance he contributes 2 or 3 wins as the fifth starter.
Well, I’d love to see Ryu resurrect his career. Being injured again almost immediately when he tried to pitch the past two years, combined with what looks like a remarkably poorly conditioned body, is not encouraging. I would be surprised if he contributes more than 100 innings during the remainder of his time with the Dodgers. There is a non-zero chance he contributes zero.
Fantastic work, Craig. Possibly your best yet.
Interesting article but I’m not sure the cumulative WAR approach is the best way to value a rotation because games are discrete units with binary results.
Extreme example: let’s say you have Super-Kershaw, a starter so good you’re guaranteed a win every time he pitches. He could have 20+ WAR by himself! But if the rest of the rotation is all replacement-level scrubs then the team would be big underdogs in something like 60% of their games. So the rotation would be great by WAR but the team would be in terrible shape.
All else equal, you’d rather have a more even WAR distribution than across your rotation, right?
It depends on just how bad the “scrubs” are. Replacement level is not really that bad.
Assuming an otherwise average team, swapping out a league-average SP for a replacement-level SP only reduces your chances of victory by about 6 percentage points, by the standard accounting.
With an average SP, an average team would go 16–16 in his 32 starts. They would go 14–18 with a replacement level starter. If we assume 4 such scrubs, with the other 34 games being pitched by Automatic Win Man, then our theoretical team wins 90 games.
To beat that with a balanced rotation, you’d need five 4-WAR starters. Which is pretty hard to get, but much more realistic than getting Automatic Win Man, who doesn’t exist. That’s the real problem with the “1 star plus scrubs” team construction. 🙂
Could you explain the math for losing 6% points?
I think that’s looking at the difference between 2 WAR – which is considered to be roughly a league average starting pitcher – and replacement level (0 WAR) as 2 wins over the full season’s worth of games that they start.