The Fascinating Jason Heyward Contract
On Friday, the Cubs won the bidding for Jason Heyward, convincing the outfielder to come to Chicago despite offers for more guaranteed money from the Nationals, the Cardinals, and reportedly one other team, perhaps the Angels. While Chicago’s offer of $184 million over eight years is certainly a substantial amount, he apparently could have taken $200 million guaranteed by going with one of the other offers. Instead he chose the Cubs, and along with putting him on baseball’s best team in 2016, the fascinating structure of the contract Chicago gave him may end up making this deal a big win for both sides.
The case for the contract being a big win for the Cubs is easy; Heyward is a very good player who will be paid like a decent one during his time in Chicago. To this point, Heyward has put up +28 WAR in six years in the majors; for the Cubs to break even on the total guaranteed money in this deal, Heyward would have to only put up about +20 WAR over the next eight years. This is essentially the kind of performance the Cubs are paying for with this deal.
| Year | Age | WAR | $/WAR | Est. Value |
| 2016 | 26 | 3.3 | $8.0 M | $26.4 M |
| 2017 | 27 | 3.5 | $8.4 M | $29.8 M |
| 2018 | 28 | 3.3 | $8.8 M | $29.1 M |
| 2019 | 29 | 3.0 | $9.3 M | $28.2 M |
| 2020 | 30 | 2.8 | $9.7 M | $27.2 M |
| 2021 | 31 | 2.0 | $10.2 M | $20.9 M |
| 2022 | 32 | 1.3 | $10.7 M | $13.9 M |
| 2023 | 33 | 0.5 | $11.3 M | $6.2 M |
| Totals | 19.9 | $181.9 M |
Value: $8M/WAR with 5.0% inflation
Aging Curve: +0.25 WAR/yr (18-27), -0.25 WAR/yr (28-30),-0.75 WAR/yr (31-37),-1 WAR/yr (> 37)
To get that number out of the contract estimating tool, I had to start Heyward at +3.3 WAR and choose the pessimistic aging curve, and that’s about as dim a view as one could possibly have of his overall value. Even if you eliminated 100% of his defensive value, projecting him as an average defensive right fielder going forward, he’d still project as a +3.5 WAR player, given his offensive production and quality baserunning. Forget regressing defensive value; for him to be worth only $184 million over the next eight years requires the type of analysis that concludes that defense is completely irrelevant beyond the position a player takes on the field.
Of course, that’s not a particularly rational belief, and every piece of available information suggests that Heyward adds a good amount of value in the field. Based on what they’re paying him, the Cubs are basically getting that value for free, and barring an injury, they’re very likely to come out with a significant bargain during the time Heyward is in Chicago. $23 million a year for a player of Heyward’s value is a very nice value, especially for a team in a competitive division, where the value of adding marginal wins is very high.
But, of course, this contract isn’t a straight eight year, $184 million commitment from both sides. That’s the amount the Cubs guaranteed Heyward as a floor, but because his representatives at Excel negotiated two opt-out clauses into the deal, the likely outcome is that he’s going to end up getting a much better deal than that over the long-term. It was long assumed that Heyward would get an opt-out clause in whatever contract he ended up signing — Excel has a history of getting them included for their clients, and Heyward is the kind of player where getting another crack at free agency has the most upside — with most speculation suggesting it would come halfway through the expected nine or ten year deal he would sign.
Instead, Heyward took a slightly shorter contract, and in doing so, moved up his chances to get back on the market. Since the Cubs gave him opt-outs after the 2018 and 2019 seasons, from his perspective, this is really a three year contract with a one year player option, followed by a four year player option after that. Assuming a normal payout structure with a slight increase in salaries over the life of the deal, this deal is probably going to end up paying Heyward something like $65 million over three years or $88 million over four years before he hits the free agent market again.
At that point, Heyward will probably not be as good of a player as he is now, as we shouldn’t expect him to retain all of his early-career defensive value, and he’s approaching the point where we shouldn’t expect the offense to improve dramatically. If he loses roughly half his defensive value over the next three years, he’d be looking at hitting the market again as a 29 year old who projected as about a +3.5 WAR player. The most recent comparison of a left-handed hitting corner outfielder with big platoon splits selling his decline phase was Shin-Soo Choo, and he got $130 million over seven years from the Rangers for his age 31-37 seasons. Heyward will be two years younger than Choo was when he landed his deal, and that point, there will have been five years of inflation in MLB since Choo’s deal was signed.
Choo’s deal is probably something like the floor for Heyward’s next contract — again, assuming he stays healthy, which is the primary variable in whether he’ll opt-out or not — and he’d probably only take that deal after the second option, as he’d probably prefer a one year, $23 million pillow contract by picking up his first option to try and have a better walk-year if his 2018 season wasn’t very good. So if we gave him the 7/$130M that Choo got and add that to the roughly $90 million that he’ll get from the Cubs in the first four years of the deal, that puts him right around 11/$220M.
But Choo’s deal is going to be ancient history by the time Heyward actually reaches free agency, and inflation is going to make it likely that he lands a much larger deal than Choo’s deal in a few years. When Choo signed his deal, teams were paying roughly $6 to $7 million per win; when Heyward is deciding whether to use his first opt-out or not, the market will probably be closer to $9 million per win. Here’s what a +3.5 WAR outfielder, selling his age-29 to age-35 seasons, would expect to get in that kind of market.
| Year | Age | WAR | $/WAR | Est. Value |
| 2019 | 29 | 3.5 | $9.0 M | $31.5 M |
| 2020 | 30 | 3.5 | $9.5 M | $33.1 M |
| 2021 | 31 | 3.0 | $9.9 M | $29.8 M |
| 2022 | 32 | 2.5 | $10.4 M | $26.0 M |
| 2023 | 33 | 2.0 | $10.9 M | $21.9 M |
| 2024 | 34 | 1.5 | $11.5 M | $17.2 M |
| 2025 | 35 | 1.0 | $12.1 M | $12.1 M |
| Totals | 17.0 | $171.6 M |
Value: $9M/WAR with 5.0% inflation
Aging Curve: +0.25 WAR/yr (18-27), 0 WAR/yr (28-30),-0.5 WAR/yr (31-37),-0.75 WAR/yr (> 37)
If he collects roughly $70 million before the first opt-out, then sees a market where his fair value is around 7/$170M, it’d probably be a pretty easy call for him to hit the market and reset his salaries. At that point, the contract would end up paying Heyward something like $240 million over ten years, or right in line with the mega-contracts that Albert Pujols and Robinson Cano commanded. And this is assuming Heyward declines from a roughly +5 WAR player now to a +3.5 WAR player over the next three years. A total payday of 10/$240M for Heyward isn’t even the optimistic scenario, as he’d probably be able to get another deal worth $200 million deal if he still projected as a +4 WAR player going into his age-29 season.
These opt-outs are why Heyward took only $184 million. As Eno noted after the David Price signing, the opt-out was probably worth something like $10-$15 million for Price, an older pitcher with a significantly higher chance of collapse. For Heyward, each opt-out is probably worth more, and by doubling up on the chances to hit the free agent market again while he’s still in his prime, he’s put himself in a position to end up with something like $250 million over his remaining productive years.
So, yes, the Cubs got a really good value by signing Heyward for 8/$184M, but given that he’s now got a floor of $184 million with a more likely outcome of something like $240 or $250 million, this deal should work out just fine for Heyward as well. He might have left a little bit of guaranteed money on the table, but getting the 2018 opt-out probably should outweigh the value of getting a few million more per year during the part of the contract that is likely to get voided anyway.
While opt-outs are always going to be player friendly clauses, this contract is a perfect example of how including an opt-out in a deal can make a contract a win for both sides. The Cubs get a really good player at a bargain price for the first three or four years of the deal, and as long as Heyward stays healthy, he’ll get another nice contract in a few years. For both the Cubs and Heyward, this is a win-win contract; the losers in this deal are the rest of the teams in the NL Central, who are going to have to figure out how to contend with a juggernaut for the foreseeable future.
Dave is the Managing Editor of FanGraphs.
…”the losers in this deal are the rest of the teams in the NL Central, who are going to have to figure out how to contend with a juggernaut for the foreseeable future.”
I wonder if part of the Pirates’ plan is to have more lefties in the rotation. Morton is out and Niese is in, and that money saved on Morton is going somewhere… perhaps Kazmir?
If you look at the splits, the Cubs and Cards both fare worse against lefties. If the Bucs do land Kazmir, their rotation to start the year would be four lefties and Cole. At the very least, I’m guessing that his struggles vs. lefties explain why they jettisoned Morton.
LOL at the pirates spending the money it will take to get Kazmir. They’ll probably sign Jerome Williams and call it an off-season.
Dave predicted 3/$42 million for Kazmir. Last year the Pirates signed Liriano for 3/$39.
Which was the pirate’s biggest contract ever handed out in free agency. And Liriano > Kazmir so I don’t see it as being likely at all that they’ll pony up 3 years and 42 mil for Kazmir.
Some Pirates magic would be great for Jerome Williams
Cubs should be fine vs. Lefties as their young righty core gets some more looks. All Cubs RHH rookies were better vs. RHP last year. They have been considering slider RHP their biggest weakness.
Or maybe those guys will have reverse splits.
I’m not sure if I buy into this Cubs juggernaut narrative that is taking hold. Is the gap between them and the cardinals and pirates really that large? Pirates, for example, seem to have some easy routes to upgrade (SP and 1B in particular) and some very good options in the minors to fill them about ready. Cardinals may already have outfield upgrades in place despite pessimistic protections. Cubs have caught up to them, certainty, but are they really that far beyond that they are the new NL Central juggernaut? Not convinced.
The Cubs have no pitching depth and only one starting pitcher on the right side of 30. They were extremely lucky with injuries last year and that luck can’t hold forever. That said, their line-up is going to be tremendous and they still have prospects to deal for pitching if they need them.
No pitching depth?
Arrieta, Lester, Lackey, Hendricks, Hammel is a very solid 5, and Warren is a very good 6th/swingman. Very few teams are that good 1-6.
And, hell, as a 7th guy in line, Travis Wood is no slouch either.
Travis Wood is every bit of a slouch, and Hammel can’t get past 100 innings without blowing a tire. Lackey’s got numbers to suggest he can’t be trusted–age, K rate, BB rate, FIP, probably more, if you want to look a tad harder.
Travis Wood is a slouch if he’s in your rotation, maybe. As the 7th guy on the depth chart, he’s far from it.
Hammel’s second half issues may or may not be real (last year he was pitching through a hamstring injury in the second half that didn’t help at all), but either way, his overall production is more than adequate as a 5th starter. I’m not sure where people get the impression that teams are lining up above average starters or something 1-5, but, particularly with the additions of Lackey and Warren, the Cubs are in very good shape 1-6.
The Cubs project as a ~99 win true talent team.
Yes, the gap is enormous. 51.6 2016 projected WAR vs. 40.3 for St. Louis and 39.5 for Pittsburgh. They are 2 standard deviations of WAR ahead in that division, barring injuries.
Sounds like the stuff they said about the 2015 Nationals
The Nationals weren’t even projecting as high as the Dodgers last year, IIRC. They may have been, but neither team was projecting higher than the low-mid 90’s, from what I recall. Projections and talking head predictions aren’t the same thing.
That said, St. Louis still should be expected to make some moves. I’m not sure what the Pirates are going to do to fill out the back of their rotation, but reports are they aren’t willing to spend even $10M in AAV there, so we’ll see how they fill that out. They do seem to have some pitching pixie dust.
The Nationals roster projected well because of their (on-paper) elite pitching and position players with injury histories.
The starters got hurt (Strasburg) or turned awful (Fister) and the position players got hurt (Rendon).
The Cubs don’t have a ton of guys with long injury histories and their team is extremely young. Injury risk is real for everyone, but this refrain “OH LOOK AT THE 2015 NATIONALS” isn’t an accurate comparison. And even if it was, a 2 standard deviation outcome happening once doesn’t mean that it is more likely to happen again.
Granted, you basically explained the Cardinals’ offense as well. Perlata, Carpenter, Holliday, Molina, that offensive core is old. Oh, and don’t forget that the STL rotation will be led by a 34-year-old who has blown out his elbow and Achilles. It’s then followed by 3 guys under 30 who didn’t make it through the season healthy.
Against the Pirates, I’d say it’s a ceiling matter. The PIT rotation might be a couple of years younger, on average, but it’s a lot of “blech” stuff. Niese and Locke? I’d take the higher-age Lackey and Hammel, and I hate Hammel. Their offense is a good OF and an infield of questions–Kang’s health, Harrison’s consistent ability, Mercer’s ability, Morse’s negative-WAR production.
Consider that FG has the Cubs 11 wins over the Cardinals and 12 wins over the Pirates. Whether you agree with projections entirely (I don’t blindly accept them, and can probably find several holes in those ones), those are massive win total differences. The WAR gap from the Cubs (1st) to the Cardinals (6th) is the same as from the Cardinals (6th) to roughly where the Orioles project (24th). The Pirates’ (9th) projection WAR gap would settle between the Padres (26th) and Brewers (27th).
Maybe you find the gap to be much smaller, but if you accept a premise that those numbers are reasonable, as yourself if there’s a big gap between the Cardinals and the Orioles. How about the Pirates and the Brewers?
Certainly the Cubs are going to be a very strong team in 2016 and beyond. But a “juggernaut” in NL Central (i.e. the team set up to consistently blow everyone away)? Steamer predicts a 10 WAR gap. But that is easily narrowed if you think about error bars. It could be just 10% over on the Cubs and 10% under on the Cardinals or Pirates or both and you have parity today. Long-term the Pirates and the Cubs both seem to be in good shape with a young quality core either in the majors or about to be there. The Cardinals I definitely take your point. But it’s the Cardinals… Just can’t see years in the wilderness subsumed by a Cubs “juggernaut” for them.
Seems like every year a new juggernaut is proclaimed (Dodgers in NL West, Nationals in NL East, for instance). And it doesn’t really shake out that way. Strong teams with a good chance of winning. But nothing like a team that ends up owning a division for years. Lots of parity in MLB these days…
There is absolutely no change whatsoever in how the Phillies are run.
Bill Giles put the ownership group together with people who think like him 35 years ago. Guess what? Bill Giles is still there. He took part in the hiring of MacPhail and Klentak both. He was at the press conference announcing the hiring of Klentak.
35 Years.
Jim Thome and Cliff Lee
That’s it.
35 Years.
Carlos Ruiz and Maikel Franco, the only two starting quality players signed out of Latin America. Ruiz was signed out of Panama for eight thousand dollars. Need that in numerical form? $8,000- Eight Stacks.
Maikel Franco was signed for $100,000- That’s one hundred thousand American dollars. One hundred Stacks.
The Red Sox paid $63 million to sign Yoan Moncada. The Phillies paid $108,000- to sign both Carlos Ruiz and Maikel Franco.
Two real free agents and two starting position players from Latin America signed for nothing.
The Phillies Way is unchanged. They will sit in the cellar until they collect enough free talent in the MLB Plantation Slave Auction held every June. These young slave/intern players will be exploited to the max by the Phillies bloodsucking ownership cabal. For seven years they will make these bloodsucking criminals massive profits. If a few become fan favorites and the crowds are still huge as they near free agency then they will be signed to short, team friendly deals. If any have slipped through their screening process and turn out to be normal players seeking long contracts they will be demonized and booted out the door.
The Phillies after telling lies to their fan base from 2012 onward finally admitted they were “rebuilding”. The truth of the matter is they are already planning their next rebuild as they conduct this one.
THAT is The Phillies Way.
Google: Kevin Maitan FREE_AEC
………
You say he left guaranteed money on the table but the opt out cancels out getting a couple million less per year…. that assumes the Cards and Nats didn’t give him an opt-out as well. Has this been confirmed? I’d be surprised if they both didn’t have one early on in the deal too.
He took a lower AAV to get the 2018 opt-out. My understanding is the other offers only included one, not two.
If the first opt-out was worth $10-15 million, how much was the second one worth?
Is the 2nd option really that valuable? If you don’t exercise the first option, it’s not all that likely you’ll want to exercise it the next year.
One extra year in which he might get hurt, and if I recall past posts accurately, Harper’s supposed to hit free agency the year of Heyward’s first optout. So Heyward might want to avoid that year (most eager bidder will aim for Harper instead, is the thinking).
If the earlier walk year was hampered by injuries or just a down year, he can wait and walk the next. He gets two bites at the “selling at my peak” apple. He’s only going to use, at most, one of them, but choosing the year in which it falls definitely has value.
Do you mean a lower AAV from the Cubs? Based on what has been reported it appears that the Cubs offered a higher AAV than the Cards and Nats.
So what you’re saying is that there is almost no chance of Heyward not opting out after either the 3rd or 4th year making this essentially a 3 year contract with 1 year player option. Yeah, that’s definitely a win for the Cubs with no risk of payouts for dead years or whatever it is they’re called.
There’s always a risk he’ll opt in, so to speak. Poop happens, be it an injury or the player just losing it. I’d think the latter is a low risk in Heyward’s case, but it does happen, and more often than you might think.
Heyward is young enough that there are no “dead money” years tacked on to the end of the contract. Cubs would have loved to sign him to this deal without an opt out as his last 3-4 years of the deal would still have big surplus value (rarely the case with older everyday players).
There is definitely a risk of paying for a non-productive player. If Heyward totally collapses and provides no value, he won’t opt out and the Cubs will be stuck paying him.
This would be equally true if they had signed him to a higher-value contract without an opt-out, only it would end up costing more. There’s always the risk of the player suddenly becoming bad at baseball… that’s just how free agency works.
The downside — and it’s a big downside — of the opt outs for the Cubs is that he DOES use them. You’re correct that if he doesn’t it’s six of one half dozen of the other. But if he does, the Cubs lose an asset that’s still only 29 years old and (presumably) playing well. The loss just in terms of what they could get for him in a trade is enormous.
Baseball Guy says: But if he does, the Cubs lose an asset that’s still only 29 years old
How can you lose an asset that you didn’t own to begin with? It sounds like he had at least one opt-out in the other offers he had. No one was going to own Heyman post-30 yrs of age. So the Cubs may have lost one year relative to what other offers had negotiated.
The Cubs are trading the 15M or more they are saving on the total contract by including the opt out (in the bad case scenario).
In a good case scenario, in exchange for limiting that downside, they are limiting the upside by allowing Heyward to opt out and provide $0 surplus after years 3 or 4.
Even if Heyward doesn’t opt out for some reason and the Cubs are stuck paying him twenty-some million a year for average or below average production, that’s not going to be a lot of money in 2020.
There is always the risk that his career goes the way of Grady Sizemore.
It’ll be 5 years come spring, but Wikipedia mentions the degenerative disc problem he was diagnosed with back then. Is that now considered cured, so to speak? Honest question, not trying to make any point by way of it. I just thought back problems never really went away for professional athletes. But you don’t see anything mentioned about it.
This is purely speculation on my part, but I believe the back issue is why his power never developed. If you watch Heyward during his rookie season, he had a much more violent swing. He created a buzz in spring training during the 2010 season with some of the moonshots he was launching. Fast forward a few years and his swing is noticeably more controlled. When he started experiencing back issues, I imagine that Heyward did the math and made adjustments accordingly.
plus the Cubs will get a pick when he rejects their qualifying offer. Opt outs can be team friendly in that respect as well.
There will (probably) be a new CBA and who knows if they’ll keep the QO in it.
While it is pretty clear Heyward left money on the table, these opt out clauses may serve him particularly well. Especially after seeing those ‘pessimistic’ projections he should be able to provide value to any team he plays for – even if his best defensive days are behind him (they surely are).
I imagine we’ll see his HR numbers go up in the Windy City. By the time he opts out, even teams that were hesitant to bank on elite defense will have strong interest in the 2019 (still only 29 year old) Heyward with a better HR rate.
No one will buy into a stadium-aided HR rate increase. MLB management’s beyond that now.
Are we assuming I’ll be fired in the next 3 years?
He (primarily LaRussa, of course) just values prospects much less than the rest of us. Any example of their not recognizing park effects?
The story out there is that he took less money to sign with the Cubs. That may not actually be true. If the Nats and Cards offered $200 over 9 or 10 years, their AAV is less than the Cubs’ $23 million per year. Since, as Dave pointed out, Heyward likely sees this really as a 3 year deal, he’s going to make $65 – $69 million over 3 years with the Cubs whereas he was looking at around $60 – $63 million w/ the Nats or Cards.
From the Cubs’ perspective as well, if Heyward opts out in 3 years, that’s when Bryce Harper becomes a free agent and the Cubs may be able to choose from re-signing Heyward or signing Harper. Both sides could benefit greatly if Heyward endds up making more money and the Cubs are able to get 3 really good years from Heyward and then replace him with Harper.
I’m not sure where it’s settled, but word was on Friday that the contract is front loaded in those first three/four years. I wouldn’t be shocked if this was something like $100m for the first four years, then $84m over the last four. This type of structure would also save the Cubs a few million annually at the same time that Russell, Bryant, etc stat becoming more expensive via either arbitration or long term deals.
Either way, agree that this is a really good deal for everyone and a great deal if Heyward stays in right.
99% Harper will be a Yankee or a Dodger.
It’s not really a three-year deal with player opt outs, as you say in the article. It’s an eight-year deal with player opt outs in years 3 and 4. Big difference in emphasis.
These deals are essentially player insurance, for which they are paying a premium. It would be interesting to analyze them in that light.
There is no practical difference in calling it an opt out versus calling it a player option. The fact that Heyward has to pick up the phone and call his agent in one instance but not the other is meaningless.
This was the exact structure of a deal that I’ve been speculating would land Heyward. Traditional deals don’t really make sense for either side because they are based around the assumption of a decline phase. No one was going to pay Jason Heyward $35 million per year annually so a short term contract with a chance to renegotiate early on made sense.
I was really pulling for the Angels to make this kind of an offer, but it seems they were more interested in getting Heyward to commit to the organization for just about the rest of his career. Why would he do that when he can play the field?
The Cubs get (a really good player at a bargain price) for the first three or four years of the deal
=> (a platoon player at an exorbitant price)
Career vs LHPs (1038 PA)
Jason Heyward – .230/.309/.351
Over the last 10 seasons (2006~2015), Heyward ranks 67th in wRC+ among 101 left-handed batters with at least 500 PAs.
http://www.fangraphs.com/leaders.aspx?pos=all&stats=bat&lg=all&qual=500&type=1&season=2015&month=57&season1=2006&ind=0&team=0&rost=0&age=0&filter=&players=0&sort=17,d&page=1_30
Let’s ignore his defensive value! I get the worry about this deal if Heyward can’t play center all that well. But if he stays in right, there’s little reason to believe his defensive value will tank in the first few years.
Heyward’s platoon splits on defense are even worse! He looks in the opposing dugout, sees the left arm of the pitcher, and freaks out while the ball flies past.
That seems to be what MLB teams are doing to an extent.
Yeah, but what are his defensive platoon splits against left-handed batters?
I say that in jest, but it occurs to me that an OFer might reasonably see the ball better off the bat (and thus get a better jump on defensive plays) for one handedness of hitter versus the other. Does anyone know if this is actually an issue?
That isn’t what a platoon player is.
Jason Kipnis has the exact same career wRC+ against lefties. Curtis Granderson, too. Moustakas and Hosmer are both similar. You’d be an idiot to platoon any of them.
I’m not a huge fan of Heyward’s offense, but come on. That’s a totally disingenuous cutoff date. You’re comparing him to guys like Jason Giambi. I know wRC+ takes care of era, but going back to 2006 is silly.
Setting it to 2008 puts him 55/85 (almost in the middle.
Setting to 2009 puts him at 50/78.
2010 makes him 43/67.
So he’s in the middle or bottom 2/5ths.
But only 20-25 guys are above 100, so the difference between Heyward’s 80+ wRC+ and the number 30 guy is pretty negligible.
Also, he’s the 21st best lefty vs. righties since 2008 of guys with more than 1000 PA against righties (out of 187).
So, yeah.
So basically Jason Heyward can decline significantly (and probably prematurely) in terms of production and STILL end up providing nearly equal or surplus value? Sounds like an excellent deal.
Ya, this is a steal for the Cubs. The majority doesn’t believe that because it is hard to get used to the idea that $184 million for someone who is not one of the best few players in the league could be a steal. But it is.
No, it’s because much of Heyward’s value is tied to his defensive prowess, and there’s a possibility he moves to center and loses 1/2 that defensive value.
Heyward’s offense isn’t worth 23 million a year. Adam Eaton and Heyward had nearly identical slash lines last year.
There isn’t as much belief in the defensive aspect of WAR, especially for a corner outfielder, as their is for the offensive aspect of it – that belief is backed up by the market’s opinion, clearly, as there are no “bargain” big free agents in baseball today.
There is a ton of risk attached to an 8 year contract, regardless of the fact that he’s 26. Heyward has been hurt before. Heyward hasn’t progressed much as a hitter. Heyward was abysmal for 2 months last year. Heyward can’t really hit lefties with consistency.
He’s an excellent baseball player, but clearly the market is a bit reluctant to pay Heyward like a 6 WAR player when so much of his WAR is tied into his corner outfield defense.
“Heyward’s offense isn’t worth 23 million a year. Adam Eaton and Heyward had nearly identical slash lines last year.”
Let us all know when Adam Eaton repeats last year’s performance for 6 years and then becomes a FA at 26 years old.
The past two years, and they are very close in age, Eaton and Heyward have had nearly identical offensive production.
Eaton – 300/362/401 +117 / 287/361/431 +118
Heyward – 271/351/384 +110 / 293/359/439 +121
You could actually argue Eaton has been a slightly more productive offensive player.
That’s why this contract looks so bad by standard terms; defensive metrics are too volatile, and I think many are reluctant give Heyward the defensive credit for Right Field that many metrics do.
But he doesn’t even have to be the 6 WAR player he’s been to be worth the contract, if he averages 3 WAR a year that’s around what he’s getting paid and I think most people would agree that’s a pretty low bar for him even if you aren’t fully convinced by defensive metrics.
This assumes that, in 2019, teams are still thinking and planning for the future the way they are currently, which isn’t necessarily the case. A lot can change in 3 years in the thinking of baseball strategy.
Personally, I think this is a deal Chicago is going to like in the short-term, but it may become a problem for them long-term. Just a hunch.
With the opt outs, it is important to know how much money he gets paid in each year. Is there a table for that?
Assuming a normal payout structure with a slight increase in salaries over the life of the deal”
The reason for making this assumption is what, so you can write this column which may be entirely wrong when the actual structure of the deal is released?
Well other than not writing, what choice did Dave have? Plus, it’s a fairly safe assumption. It seems unlikely that the deal is going to be heavily front loaded because then it becomes a foregone conclusion that Heyward opts out, barring a collapse in skill or injury.
Isn’t the obvious alternative choice simply to write the article with the opposite assumption? Or perhaps write an article that compares assumption A (normal structure) versus assumption B (front-loaded structure)? Or write an article on a different topic for today while waiting for the actual structure to be released?
He’s being nice, almost. There’s almost no chance at all it isn’t the way he described or close. If it is, new article! But that won’t change the fact that you’re a weirdo that lives in your parents’ basement.
Not sure about using Choo as a baseline.
He was a garbage defender with 150 RC+ in his walk year, while Heyward is an elite defender whose offense (while it may improve) has been around 120-125 RC+.
In short, teams were paying Choo for his bat, which we believe to be the skill with the longest lifespan. Meanwhile, Heyward’s market was set by his defense, baserunning and offense, almost in equal measures, along with potential.
At age 30, potential will be gone, his defense and baserunning will not survive the length of his next FA deal and perhaps his offense remains “merely” pretty good.
It strikes me that his next deal would very much resemble whatever Alex Gordon is going to get this year, which sounds more like 5/$90.
Given Heyward will be 2 years younger and inflation, how about 7/$140M.
Is this possibly another indication that teams’ proprietary metrics don’t value outfield defense as much as UZR and DRS?
Seems like we keep seeing data points that glove first OF’s with weak bats aren’t really all that highly valued by teams. Examples who come to mind from this offseason are Leonys Martin, Inciarte, and Peter Bourjos.
Heyward is obviously a different and much better player than that, because he’s a good though not elite hitter (118 wRC+ for his career, slightly above that in 2015). Heyward certainly signed a valuable contract, especially factoring in the value of the opt-outs, but the AAV still seems light for a 26 year old player who averaged 5.6 WAR over the past 2 seasons. That’s similarly valuable to a healthy Giancarlo Stanton, and wouldn’t Stanton blow away Heyward’s deal on the open market?
The final bidders for Heyward’s services included at least two front offices regarded as analytically savvy (the Cubs and Cardinals), which you’d think would have pushed Heyward’s contract to at or near their full valuation for his production. So, is it just that “dumb” front offices overpay for elite power hitters and top of the rotation starters, or are we missing something? To the original question, do teams think that OF defense is less valuable than publicly available metrics? Do they think it’s a more “fragile” skill that either generally ages poorly (which I thought was refuted by typical aging curves, unless they’re perhaps different for elite defense) or is more at risk of falling away due to injury (which is a different proposition than a typical aging curve)?
I think one thing to keep in mind is that a lot of huge contracts are decided on by the owners just as much or more as they are decided on by the actual baseball people. The owners are more likely to see 40 homers and want that then they are to see great defense.
However, I do think that defense-first players are less likely to age gracefully than a lot of people think. Obviously, the players that tend to age best are the ones that are good all around, but in the studies I’ve seen on aging curves, they don’t seem to take those people out when looking at speed and defense players. So you end up with players like Bonds getting lumped in with the speed and defense guys.
That said, I think that Heyward is a good enough hitter that it’s a moot point, and I think this is a nice contract for the Cubs.
I agree with that, and I wonder if survivor bias on some of the marginal speed and defense guys factors into it.
I’ve always struggled to understand how aging curves account for players who end up either retired or bench players, which seems to be the case for a fair number of the light-bat, speed and defense guys as they decline.
If defense is thought of (and is actually) as something that doesn’t age well, it makes sense to not pay for it. I thought Heyward would get 10/$240 million, but really I thought his age, pedigree, and above average offensive play were huge reasons why. I think the point has been made that Heyward is still a valuable player if you assume he is average defensively, which he obviously beats as of now.
If baseball insiders just don’t think defense is important, I would be shocked. And it is the GM’s responsibility to convince the owner the player is worth it.
It might not be that teams value defense less. Rather, they just realize that year to year correlation of defensive metrics is much, much less than that of offense, and thus a less predictable asset.
terrible comps…
Martin: was an atrocious batter in 15, demoted to AAA and basically told TEX execs to go f— themselves
Bourjos: was a negative value OF in 15
Inciarte: see “Stewart, Dave”
Ok, then let me include other examples.
Gerardo Parra was traded in mid-2014 and didn’t net a return that fit 1.5 years of control for the 3 WAR player he’d been over 2012-14 including UZR defensive value. (Incidentally, his defensive value has collapsed since then per UZR, which seems odd for a player who is still only 28.)
Craig Gentry didn’t bring much in return after 2013 with 1 year under team control coming off consecutive seasons when he’d been an over 3 WAR player including UZR defensive value.
Alternately, I’m open to examples where teams have meaningfully paid up for a lot of WAR from OF defense. Maybe I’m forgetting some, but I don’t recall any.
Parra: was a negative WAR 27yr old in 14 for ARI… while I agree that they should have gotten more for him, not sure this is indicative of anything real (he was bad at the plate and on the field in 2014.) Further, in 2015 he continued his trend of negative value on defense… so Parra not a good example.
Gentry: another part-time outfielder that was losing defensive and offensive value… I just don’t think these are good comps. Plus, Gentry netted a top 100 prospect in Choice (obviously didn’t end well for TEX tho.) Not a good comp.
Your comp list should have better quality players signing high AAV and long-term contracts… in that regard, there haven’t been a TON of outfielders as FAs, but Ellsbury (2013), Bourn (2012) and Upton (2012) come to mind. And also Heyward is a great data point… with Gordon as well.
Fwiw, I think you could posit your statement for many one-dimensional players. Power-only 1B, glove-only 2B… I think your conclusion may be that front offices are realizing that diversity of skillset is more valuable than soaking up one of the 25 roster spots with one skill at one position…
Parra wasn’t a negative defensively in ’15. You’re assuming that the attempts to measure his defense were valuable.
Fair points.
Part of my initial idea was to try to isolate guys who derived most of their value from defense. The thought was twofold: (i) try to limit the variables a bit and (ii) we have plenty of examples that a 2-3 WAR player who is an above league average hitter can get a FA contract (or trade return) in line with what WAR says we should expect.
You’ve convinced me that’s probably not the best approach.
Bourn’s an interesting case that I think demonstrates my intended point. He’d averaged 4.8 WAR in the 3 years prior to his FA contract (bolstered by 6.2 WAR in his walk year, but at least 3.8 WAR each year) with much of his value from defense – never above a 104 wRC+. Going by that, his contract looks light even accounting for inflation since he signed in the 2012 offseason. He got $48 million over 4 years as a 30 year old.
He has, of course, since then underperformed that contract. I’m focused less on the hindsight of how’s he performed than how the contract related to performance at the time, though, and that contract clearly says that either (i) clubs saw him as considerably less than a 4.5 WAR player or (ii) they were thinking he’d age much worse than 0.5 WAR decline per year. I don’t recall to what degree injuries have been a factor for him, but WAR (including UZR defense) suggested that he was a bargain at the time.
Ellsbury got a much bigger contract than Bourn as a 30 year old one year later, as he signed for 7 years / $153 million. I’m not sure how teams valued him, as he’d put up 5.6 WAR in 2013 and averaged 5.4 WAR over the prior 3 years, but he’d done so with 1.2 WAR in an injury-plagued 2012 and 9.4 WAR in 2011. The 150 wRC+ in 2011 was an anomaly – though it did happen – and he’d cratered (though with an injury) in 2012 before a 112 wRC+ season in 2013.
Clearly a more valuable hitter than Bourn, though, with less of his value from defense. In 2013, he would have been a 4.5 WAR player even as a scratch defensive CF. Boras getting the Yankees to sign away a Red Sox player right after the Red Sox won the World Series certainly didn’t hurt his value either.
Those are some fair counterpoints, but all have caveats.
Perhaps Martin’s value fell off the table with one awful year of hitting, and I’ll admit that I wasn’t aware of that backstory of his problems with the team. Still he’s a 27 year old, who is not far removed from being a 3 WAR player in both 2013 and 2014 (if we accept UZR’s defensive value for him) and has 3 years of team control.
To believe that Bourjos was negative value in 2015, you have to believe that his defense cratered in 1 year. UZR isn’t considered reliable in small samples, and the Cardinals still brought him in as a late inning defensive replacement to play center field. He was waived, indicating that the Cardinals couldn’t get anything at all in trade for 1 inexpensive year of him.
As for Inciarte, I agree that Stewart doesn’t appear to be a very good GM. That said, I assume that he at least makes enough phone calls to get some idea of how other GM’s value his players.
Look, I hear you and probably mis-understood your original position… but I think most of what you are trying to use as examples just prove that you can’t be a terrible hitter and stick in the OF and this is especially true if your DEF is trending the wrong way.
Bourjos was 200 / 290 / 333 with a 70 wRC+ and there was a much better alternative. Martin was worse with a wRC+ of 50, flipped the bird to the TEX front office and still got something back.
Why do reporters even mention the amount of guaranteed money rather AAV? Not one of us would say that 9/190 is a better deal than 8/180. The only exception would be for a player who is unlikely to finish his contract, which obviously doesn’t apply here.
Drives me crazy too (“He took less money ($184M/8 vs. say, $200M/10) to play in Chicago!!!”). My only guess is that it’s because the casual sports fan public likes big numbers.
I like Big Butts.
Because there is a lot of historical evidence that players and their agents push for higher long-term guarantees at the expense of somewhat lower AAV’s.
For example, we don’t ever see teams and players agreeing to shorter-term, really high AAV deals that cover only a player’s peak years (like 3 year, $110 million sort of deals). Instead, contracts are longer-term deals that cover both peak years and anticipated decline years at a lower AAV.
Very happy that none of the commenters here have posted that the opt-out(s) in the deal are good for the Cubs (i.e. that the deal, with all other variables the same, is better for them with the opt-outs than without them).
If you really want to make your brain spin, go back and find the David Price post where (multiple!) people try to make the case that the opt-out is a positive thing for Boston (again, in a vacuum – with the same salaries, etc.).
Hey! You’re a smart guy! Have a cookie!
Does anyone have more color on the values used for aging curve? It seems overly aggressive to me.
I’m sure it is all backed up by data, is it really a reasonable assumption that a 30-year old 3-WAR player will be replacement level at 34?
The first table is the pessimistic aging curve, the 2nd is the average.
Pretty amazing that one of the scribes who shows up on MLB–I believe it was Ken Rosenthal–was puzzled at how this was not a lose-lose for the Cubs. You know, the Cubs lose if Heyward kicks ass and opts out to go elsewhere, and they lose if Heyward sucks and stays onboard to suck some more.
But really, the only way the Cubs really do lose if it Heyward has a Crawford Collapse, and that’s not terribly likely, especially since Heyward has a broader skill set and is three years younger. Even if he underperforms in year 3 and 4 and opts to stay, the Cubs are likely to get at least breakeven value on the deal.
I wouldn’t say it’s lose-lose, but the opt-outs definitely alter the risk-reward curve. There is a range of really great outcomes for the Cubs, where Heyward provides huge value for more than 3 years, that are off the table because if his performance remains really good, he’ll opt out. On the other hand, the downside of paying him for 8 years if he unexpectedly declines is still there. (Though the guaranteed dollars for those 8 years are presumably lower than they would be without the opt-outs, as part of the negotiating process for his contract.)
For the team, there’s also some non-zero cost to losing certainty in these long-term guarantees with relatively early player opt-outs.
After 2017, the Cubs won’t know whether they still have Heyward’s contract left on the books for 1 year, 2 years, or 6 years at $23 million per year. That’s real money, even for a high revenue team like the Cubs, and enough that it probably impacts their budgeting in taking on additional long-term payroll commitments after the 2017 season.
After 2017, they also won’t know whether they have Heyward as a player for 1 year, 2 years, or 6 years. That can influence decisions like whether to keep or trade outfield prospects.
In other words, one thing that teams have traditionally gotten from long-term contracts is at least the certainty that – barring injury – the player will be in the field for the length of the contract. Performance is also a risk, so he may not be providing good value for the contract, but at least it allows for some longer-term roster planning. Now, there’s the potential long-term obligation but without the long-term guarantee of having the player.
I’m not crying for the teams’ front offices – they are agreeing to these deals – but it does complicate roster and payroll planning.
The planning seems especially difficult if if any team starts stacking a bunch of these opt-out deals onto one roster, which would presumably be one of the high-revenue teams that’s active at the top of the free agent market. It’s one thing to think through these permutations with 1 player, but what if a team has 3 players who may each opt out over the next year or two, or may all stay as $20 million or more per year long-term commitments.
I’m kind of curious how far the opt-out trend will go, because we’ve now seen 3 big free agent contracts this year with opt-outs less than halfway into the potential contract length: Heyward (8 year guarantee, 3/4 year opt outs), Price (7 year guarantee, 3 year opt out), and Cueto (6 year guarantee, 2 year opt out).
Is there any psychology to the opt outs on the Cubs end?
I’m thinking, if I have straight 8 years, and I’m 2 years in, maybe I’m more inclined to get lazy. however, if I know I have a other possible pay day coming, maybe that keeps me motivated.
I know that athletes at this level are pretty much all intensely competitive and driven, but it seems logical.
Just want to note the implication that in 2023 your average 2 win free agent will be making $23m. It’s possible that inflation isn’t linear.
That’s a fair point.
Revenue has been coming into the game from some sources that might stop increasing as they have, particularly the combination of both big local cable deals and MLB’s online revenue really taking off.
The counter to that is that the total percent of revenue going to players has fallen since the early 2000’s, and history. A few years back, we also would have though it was crazy for middling FA starting pitchers to get multiple years at $15 million per year, but here we are.
You do raise the good point, though, that a contract like Heyward’s doesn’t just give him upside on his own performance, with downside protection if he falls off or is injured. It also gives him upside on a higher salary environment, with downside protection if salaries stop increasing.
So WAR will be worth $10 million in 2021, when Trout is seeking a new contract? Is he really going to get $80-90 million a year? At that rate, a long-term contract would bust half a $billion easily, maybe reach three-quarters.
The main point I got from this article is that 8 years 184 million is just a decent contract in todays MLB hahaha. Flat growth in player salaries has to be coming sooner or later. Going to create interesting dynamics with cost to fans. There seems to be a sports bubble in general. Look at ESPN.
I keep Soler Power, who along side Baby Bull will be rockin’ and rollin’. Cubs have the best roster in the last decade and are set for a couple rings.
Good time to be a Cubs fan. Bad time to be anybody else in the NL Central. Cards had one of the worst offseasons in a while, and the Pirates don’t have the payroll flexibility to do anything else.
The contract looks to be more BACKLOADED with the 2016 salary only at 15 million and 2017 at 21 million, this makes the OPT out better for cubs (not in total, but does mitigate risk of Cubs paying more for the better years before he opts out).
Heyward will get $78M before the opt out. $58M salary in the first three years and a $20M signing bonus.
My understanding is that the signing bonus is mostly deferred money- guaranteed but not paid out until later in the contract.
I guess my point is- isn’t terms of the per year pay- he is paid about 6 million less in the first year than he is in the next 3 years since in year one he is only getting 15 million.
The signing bonus can be looked at as being paid out throughout the length of the contract whichever length Heyward chooses.
Is it possible that Theo/Hoyer made the opt-out in 2018 so that the Cubs could pursue Harper? If Heyward’s been great for 3 years and wants to earn more, there would be a large amount of salary relief, new TV contract, stadium income, etc., waiting for Bryce to become a Cub. The Yankees and Dodgers will always be threats to sign any big free agent, but the Cubs should be mentioned as another big market team with deep, deep pockets. If the core of the team improves the way many think they should, Harper may find their situation more attractive then NY or LA.
Just a thought…