What Should the Pirates Do with Andrew McCutchen?
While the path to the decision took something of a circuitous route over the last couple of seasons, one of the least surprising developments of the weekend was the Pirates’ announcement that they would exercise Andrew McCutchen’s $14.5 million club option for 2018.
After an inexplicable 0.6 WAR campaign in 2016 and an ice-cold start to 2017, McCutchen finally figured things out and rebounded to finish the season with a .279/.363/.486 slash line and 3.7 WAR. If the status of McCutchen’s option was ever in doubt in May, he rendered it a non-issue with a massive June and July, resembling a legitimate superstar during that and other stretches.
According to Matt Swartz’s research, the cost of a win was $9 million from 2014 to -16. Steamer projects McCutchen to post a 3.1 WAR season. The outfielder could reasonably contribute close to $30 million in production, in other words. That’s considerable surplus value at the end of what has been one of the most club-friendly deals of the 21st century.
At the end of the seven years, McCutchen will have been paid $65 million. He has, meanwhile, already produced 32 wins in the first six years of the contract. McCutchen’s deal is perhaps one reason, one data point, why a number of young superstars are on track to enter free agency next offseason after having elected not to trade in maximum earning potential for security.
It’s not that decision, however, but the next one that’s going to be so fascinating for the Pirates.
McCuthen’s time with Pittsburgh was always likely to end in one of two ways: with McCutchen being traded — and the Pirates were reportedly near a deal to send him to the Nationals during last year’s winter meetings — or with McCutchen walking away as a free agent after his 2018 club option was exercised. It’s still likely to end in either one of those two ways.
A contract extension has always seemed like the least probable of outcomes, with Pirates general manager Neal Huntington often citing the club’s need to pay players for what they are going to do, not what they have done. McCutchen turned 31 in October and isn’t exactly aging gracefully, having suffered the greatest age-29 decline, among star players, in the game’s history.
So what should the Pirates do with McCutchen this winter? Should they try and move him, as they did a year ago, with his performance having rebounded in 2017? (Complicating matters is the fact that his expected replacement, outfield prospect Austin Meadows, has had trouble staying on the field and being productive when on it.)
Or should the Pirates play it out with McCutchen one last time?
Adding further intrigue is the place Pittsburgh occupies in the very, very early projected standings. As of today — and, yes, there’s an entire offseason to be played out — FanGraphs projects the Pirates to finish 82-80, third in the NL Central (nine games behind the Cubs), four games behind the Diamondbacks, and two games behind the Cardinals, for Wild Card spots.
At the moment, only six NL teams project to finish with winning records. The Pirates are that sixth team. While there are clear-cut division favorites in the East, Central, and West, the Wild Card field could be wide open.
The Pirates should have a competent rotation, with Gerrit Cole (3.8 WAR), Jameson Taillon (3.1), Ivan Nova (2.4), Chad Kuhl (2.0), all profiling as average or better according to the Steamer projections. Tyler Glasnow (1.5) is a wild card with upside behind them.
The bullpen has voids, but Felipe Rivero emerged as a weapon in 2017 and is an anchor around which the team can build.
Much of the position-player group returns, which is good and bad. On the one hand, they finished just 27th in WAR collectively last season (11.0). On the other, part of that poor showing was due to poor performances by Starling Marte and Gregory Polanco. The projections call for improvements from both players.
Still, McCutchen (122 wRC+) was the only member of the lineup to post a batting line north of 108 in 2017 and is pretty clearly the best hitter on the club. The Pirates have a plausible path toward contention, but it becomes less clear without McCutchen, who remains the foundation of the lineup. Huntington has already said the Pirates’ “best club” in 2018 would include McCutchen.
Just about everything went wrong for the Pirates a year ago, from Jung Ho Kang’s off-the-field situation to Marte’s PED suspension to Taillon’s cancer diagnosis and Francisco Cervelli’s recurring injuries.
But what if a few thing break the Pirates’ way?
McCutchen told MLB.com’s Adam Berry recently that, unlike the last two years, he’ll enter spring training feeling good about his swing.
“I feel great with where I am now,” McCutchen said in October. “I’m going to continue to stay right there and take that into the season. I haven’t been able to do that the past couple of years. It was more about, ‘I hope this is where I need to be.’ This time, it’s going to be different.”
After the early-season experiment to move his declining glove to right, McCutchen will likely be back in center field, where his glove remains a liability. Still, it allows the Pirates to arguably be better defensively by leaving Marte and Polanco alone in left and right.
Given that McCuchen would likely not provide the club with overwhelming return in a trade, given the internal paucity of replacement options, the Pirates ought to hang on to McCutchen and play it out with what remains of their top bat.
While the end is near for the McCutchen era in Pittsburgh, it deserves a farewell campaign. The Pirates ought to keep McCutchen around at least through June and see where they are. It’s not out of the realm of possibility that the Pirates and McCutchen have one more postseason push together. It’s worth exploring to see if it’s possible. If not? Then it’s time to say goodbye.
A Cleveland native, FanGraphs writer Travis Sawchik is the author of the New York Times bestselling book, Big Data Baseball. He also contributes to The Athletic Cleveland, and has written for the Pittsburgh Tribune-Review, among other outlets. Follow him on Twitter @Travis_Sawchik.
If McCutchen wants to spend his entire career in Pittsburgh, and is willing to take a hometown discount to do so, the Pirates should make that happen. It’s a big part of how ‘through thick and thin’ fans become ‘through thick and thin’ fans. And they’re the ones who put in the floor for a franchise’s value.
I mean, I never hear McCutchen himself say he’s gonna go to the highest bidder come 2019. Has he ever said that, and I’ve just missed it?
almost no one would say they’re going to the highest bidder.
‘Through thick and thin’ DOES NOT mean you sign an over-the-hill veteran and dig further into mediocrity with a low payroll.
It means you praise Cutch for his service, and extract any value you can from him. Then trust management to turn it around in 2020+ without complaining that they traded your favorite player away.
He gave them a hometown discount the first time around. And given how the team hasn’t really repaid that trust by investing in the team much, he’s under no obligation to stay.
Hasn’t he already done that with his last extension? He signed that coming off of a rookie of the year 5 win quality campaign followed up by a solidly above average year and then an actual 5+ win campaign. Even at the time it was generally accepted that he’d signed for below market price (on a bad team at that) and gave away 4 FA years. Even a favorable market deal after this year probably gets him 4 years at $72MM as a 3.5 win player (and likely more like 5 at $90-$100MM for those scrambling after losing out on Harper). Why is it always the player that’s asked to sacrifice millions for the sake of a billionaire’s pocketbook?
Have to figure that if he has a good first half the return will still be similar at the deadline.
Maybe… the market for even the best rental hitters at the deadline was close to nonexistent this year. The JD Martinez return doesn’t inspire.
Additionally, if I understand the current qualifying offer rules, if traded now McCutchen can be given a qualifying offer if he doesn’t fall off a cliff, which adds substantial team value to having him. If traded midseason, you’re getting a rental and nothing else.
You don’t plan to trade a star midseason, that’s what you do if the first half goes badly and you need a plan B.
What cowdisciple said.
The market for rental hitters can be very dependent on supply and demand, including the positional needs of contenders and how close their divisional and wild card races are.
Top-flight pitchers are closer to the dynamic that you’re talking about, as long as they stay healthy. Almost every contender can improve itself with a top of the rotation starter or shutdown late inning reliever, because they bump every other pitcher down the chain and essentially take innings from the worst pitchers currently on the acquiring team.
Top flight pitchers are also more valuable in the post-season because their usage rate spikes upward, unlike position players. The Dodgers acquired Darvish as a rental with a 14 game division lead at the end of July, for example. That rental was clearly more about the post-season than the regular season.
I think the pirates should keep him for another half season and then evaluate at the deadline. I mean his value is not sky high anyway with a year left and his decline and while his value would be a little higher now I think at this point it makes sense to try competing one last time and if you are out of it at the deadline you sell him and a lot of other guys to really go all in on the rebuild.
I think Kang’s status could play a role, with him the Bucs projection jumps to 85 wins and right in the WC.
I’d be surprised if Kang ever played in the big leagues again.
At some point, they have to pick a lane with Kang. The longer he’s out, the less likely he is to be back.
The Pirates are just not contenders anymore. They need to figure out a plan to cash in on their valuable assets who won’t be part of the next great Pirates team. I don’t know whether that’s now or at the deadline, but it seems very unlikely that Cole or McCutchen are going to be with them long-term.
I don’t necessarily think they have to tear the whole thing down, but they need to move their window a little bit into the future when they still have Marte and Polanco and Taillon and some combination of (hopefully) Josh Bell, Austin Meadows, Tyler Glasnow, and whoever they can get in trades can help them go for it. The win projections just don’t support going for it this year, although there’s nothing wrong with waiting to sell at the deadline.
Agreed. They’re not, and the longer they stay in this lie they’re spinning to themselves of simultaneously contending and rebuilding, the more damage they’re doing. Huntington really should have not had his contract renewed. He had some bright spots, but he’s really undone a lot of that in the last two years with inaction or head-scratching moves.
Part of the problem is that more NL teams are rebuilding than not and the Pirates have a solid, if unspectacular, roster. This is their window.
They don’t really have a ton of assets to move, assuming they want to keep the core you mentioned together, so punting Cole or Cutch now is playing to the middle. They’d be weaker today, when they get to face a lot of rebuilding teams, and whatever return they get would theoretically be arriving at the same time as their opposition’s players. Waiting until June? Sure. But to begin tearing things down now doesn’t make a ton of sense given their team and the league’s landscape.
“McCutchen will likely be back in center field, where his glove remains a liability.”
You’re probably right, but I don’t know how the Pirates can justify this. I get that McCutchen prefers playing center, but how about the other 24 guys on the team and the fans who want to see as many wins as possible?
I agree but I feel like Marte or Polanco could be injured at any moment. I like McCutchen being replaced with Meadows in CF. Keep Marte in LF which is like a 2nd CF and Polanco can be spelled against LHPs in RF which is easier with the Clemente wall.
They might look at the 1st few weeks of 2017 when the realigned OF looked like a train wreck with popflys dropping. Sure its SSS, but it was UGLY. Cutch was better in CF last year and its not like Marte has been good in CF or Polanco good in LF.
Is any player’s performance next year harder to project than Cutch’s? His 2016 crash, as the article notes, was historically bad. Then after a slow start this past year, he didn’t just turn it around, but for a couple of months or so was hitting better than he ever had. Followed by another slump.
His wRC+ by month in 2017:
April 94
May 76
June 211
July 179
August 57
Sept 120
To put that in perspective, Aaron Judge’s August wasn’t as bad as Cutch’s.
There’s a possibility Cutch tweaked his knee in Toronto in mid-August as he went in the tank immediately after leaving a game. He was slumping a bit in August at that point (only one extra base hit that month), but he was even worse after that. It almost seems that if anything is slightly off with him now either physically or mechanically, he’s a mess. But when both of those things are in order, he’s damn close to what he was.
Part of the reason to keep Cutch during the entire season would be place the QO on him next off-season. Any guesses on whether or not he turns it down?
I don’t know exactly which way is best, but I have to say, I like what the Royals did this year. There was only a mathematical possibility at the playoffs, but they’ll get picks for each of Hosmer/Moose/Cain in 2018, and I didn’t have to be entirely underwhelmed (either as a fan, or as a thoughtful fan) by the return on any trades, especially in light of the return for JD Martinez this year.
Depends on his trade value. A contender who wants short term value so they can bid for Harper, Machado, etc next winter should find Cutch valuable. If the Bucs can get a solid deal, they should trade him. But the Bucs would not suffer if they kept him. He is not expensive, and there is value in a happy fan base if they stay in the race.
I view Josh Bell as the likely replacement for Cutch at least next year. Not Meadows. Bell is bad at 1B, and in One’s small RD he might be no worse in terms of negative defense value. Marte at CF and Polanco in the huge LF.
Red Sox could use a DH who can handle OF a couple/few days each week. Hanley is a disaster – he swings for the fences at every pitch, to the point his helmet flies off his head every swing, but it is a sunk cost.
Sorry for the awful typos. My phone has an auto correct I can’t turn off. I meant “PNC’s small RF” not “One’s small RD”.
Keep him, flip at the deadline if the WC is too far off, organization is starved for some winning baseball, especially in october, and outside of the top 3 likely division champions, the wild card looks obtainable if things break right. And how much value would he really lose?
I couldn’t disagree stronger with the premise of this article. Let’s start with the overoptimistic FG projections for Glasnow, Polanco, Cole, and Nova. The last two would have, by FG WAR, easily their second best seasons. Counting on a full season of health from Polanco is asking for trouble, and he’s not all that great when he is healthy anyway. And Glasnow was such a disaster last year, there is really no way they can count on him for anything substantial. Same with Meadows, although his issues were more health related.
The bottom line is, Travis basically points to all that went wrong and said “that can’t happen again.” Hope isn’t a strategy. This team and organization went downhill fast because some guys got hurt and some guys stagnated. But the just as large problem was the refusal to spend any money and their decision to approach 2016 as a “bridge” year…right after winning 98 games.
They should start a fairly big rebuild…I’d be on board with trading Cutch, Cole, Harrison, and Rivero. They could rebuild a good bit of the system (which itself saw some big prospects fall flat this year) with added reinforcements. The best thing for Cutch is for him to be sent to a contender that needs him. He deserves better.