Your 2020 Giants: Winter Meetings Thoughts

With the winter meeting in gear, the following news items got the gears rolling:

• Kevin Pillar was non-tendered (estimated $10M arbitration), among others
• Bumgarner reportedly wants to return to the Giants but they haven't contacted him yet
• Giants are reportedly the top bidder for Nicholas Castellanos at the moment 

[Note: had this basically written up before events of today, signing and trade; will post separately post Winter Meetings, for thoughts on impact]

ogc thoughts

Pillar Non-Tender

While Zaidi has declined to say what exactly he's doing, other than making the Giants better, move by move, the Pillar non-tender appears to be a sign that he's pursuing his rebuild with greater fervor this off-season.

Pillar was a popular player, though polarizing in his own way, because while he's entertaining, with his highlight catches, advanced stats shows that he does not provide much value offensively or defensively, and even regular stats (like he strikes out too much and don't get on base much) or eye-ball test (many say that the reason he makes those highlight catches is because others would make those plays easily).  Still, one WAR players are not dime a dozen yet, so $10M is roughly the right price per Matt Swartz's analysis at Fangraphs.  He was fairly valued.

But Zaidi let him go, noting that the Giants gave greater consideration to giving their younger players the opportunity to play, than over the value that Pillar might provide as a player (presumably he tried trading but most teams must have known that he was on the edge in terms of being non-tendered)., saying that it was not a financial decision to let Pillar go.  But with Yaz as the only clear starter (and he can play all 3 OF positions), and Duggar, Dickerson, Jaylin Davis, Slater, and Shaw in the mix (there has been some speculation that Dubon might be made a super utility player by being taught to play CF, and thus can play the OF and IF), we are in a similar situation as last season where there are huge question marks on who will be starting in the corner positions.

Another point I would add, which I did not see emphasized elsewhere, is that this move frees up $10M for Zaidi to spend on another player, whether free agent (Castellanos rumor), or, as he noted, possibly trading with another team to get their high contract player that they want to cast off, and in exchange, the Giants would get a good prospect in return.   These would be ways of shoring up (or bettering) the outfield for 2020, of improving the OF, even while letting go of Pillar.

Bumgarner Non-Interest

First, not too surprising to hear the report about Bumgarner, as he had already said during the season that he wants to return and again at the end, saying it's in the Giants hands now.  Not too surprised that he hasn't been contacted by the Giants, as it don't make sense whatever their intensions are.  Obviously, this makes total sense if they are not interested.  But if they are really interested, they need to play it cool in negotiations, so as not to overpay.  Zaidi says that he'll be contacting Bum's agents this week.

Signing Bum Makes Sense Long Term

Grant Brisbee wrote a nice article on The Athletic regarding how signing Bumgarner makes sense, from a number of different angles.  I recommend reading it to anyone.  The angle I want to discuss is the Barry Bonds example (not in the article, just my angle).

Ownership knew that it would be harder to compete in those last seasons of his, especially with his big contract, so they milked the publicity of having Barry in the lineup and, of course, his historic chase.  Basically, the Giants are in the same situation now, they need their historic links, like Bumgarner, to attract fans to the games, especially since there is no historic chase at the moment.

Because the fact is, as much as many Giants fans want to see 2021 as the start of the Next Gen competitiveness of the Giants, top prospects better than Bart and Ramos have failed to make an impact at the major league level.  We don't know for sure that the misery of losing won't continue beyond 2020, though both Bart and Ramos (and later Luciano) look like good odds of making it, reaching the majors is one thing, being good there is another.

As exciting as it was to have Pillar and Yaz brighten up the 2019 season and get fans engaged with the team, there's no guarantee that Zaidi can conjure up another bright spot like them in 2020 or beyond.  If he can continue that, the Giants will be good in no time, as adding talent annually will bring the cream to the top quickly, but we don't know that for sure based on one year in control of everything.

So, to me, it makes sense as a marketing ploy (much like signing both Barry's, Bonds and Zito), to sign Bumgarner to a long term contract.  But it makes sense in a number of other ways, as well.

Healthy as a Horse:  He's never had any type of arm or pitching motion injury, both his injuries were non-pitching related, suggesting that he can pitch for a long time.

Still Good:  While his season was down, he had 25 Game Scores of 50 plus (which historically resulted in wins more times than not) in 34 starts, which is 74% good starts, and 19 of 55 plus (which one SABR study defined as a win, which is similar to the concept of a DOM start in the PQS studies I've done in the past), which is 56% of his starts (or like 56% DOM, which is what a good pitcher does).  Plus, he had 7 in his first half, and 12 in his second half of starts, rising from 41% to 71%, ERA fell from 4.21 to 3.60, as his finger continued to heal from the break from the prior season, and he got back his good mechanics. 

Money is Fungible in-season:  While Bumgarner would add to the payroll now, as we have seen in prior seasons, money can be freed up with trades.  As I noted in my other post, Samardzija is actually a properly valued starting pitcher right now, productive, and about market price.  So teams who were hoping to get Cole Hamels at $20M for just a season might be interested in trading a lower level prospect (or better) to the Giants for Samardzija, who produced 2.9 bWAR in 2019 (Hamels produced 3.0 bWAR) and will be paid $19.8M in 2020 (and the Giants could throw in some money to get a better prospect).  He could veto the trade, like he did a couple of seasons ago, but it's pretty clear that the Giants are not going to be competitive in 2020 (see Pillar), so he'll likely accept if it is to a contender.  Maybe a return to Windy City, where the Cubs just lost Hamels to the Braves?

And Cueto could be tradeable by mid-season if he returns to prior goodness (which I expect, because most TJS recover and he never relied on velocity to pitch well, and some pitchers get a velocity boost from TJS, which helps with being good again), as he'll only have a season and a half contract left, which is very doable if he's back to his prior goodness.  The Reds appear to be building to contention, with their moves this off-season, perhaps a return to the Reds?

Major Contracts Are Gone In a Couple of Seasons:  And as Grant noted in his excellent article, once you get past the next couple of seasons, there are no more big contract outlays to clear out (I also noticed that as well, and was going to note anyway, but since he beat me to the punch... plus, it was a good article justifying keeping Madison, so I'm happy to reference it again, I've missed his writing so I'm glad he's at The Athletic), so signing Bumgarner would not be an anchor on any plans the Giants and Zaidi have for a couple years out, and, at worse, he could be the Zito of the Next Gen competitive Giants.

Sunk Costs and Other Misconcepts:  Lots of fans still consider the Zito contract a "sunk cost", not realizing that Zito actually provided a lot of value to the team in his role of steady, reliable 4th starter who could throw gems occasionally, plus the fact that these people misunderstand the financial concept of a sunk cost, which from the business book I bought and read on my own in high school noted, relates to the sunk cost for assets which has zero value going forward, whereas Zito was an average pitcher throughout most of his contract, once he got over himself and his big contract, at the start of the contract.

This is what I worry about with the emphasis of analytics.  Analytics make a lot of sense if you apply it with knowledge of how the business operations work.   But I see a lot of quoting of analytics without consideration of the context of what is actually happening.  Yes, Zito was horribly overpaid, but he was not of no value.  He was paid like an ace, but at least he performed like an average starting pitcher.  Especially as a robust and steady innings eater, which is of value where he was used by the Giants, in the 4th starting rotation spot, where many teams have trouble fielding a good 4th starter.

And Bumgarner is similar except that he is a better pitcher now than Zito was when the Giants signed him, and look to be about this good indefinitely, given his lack of pitching injury or even signs of physical problems (like Cain's cranky elbow, known since he was drafted, or Lincecum's slight stature).  And as I noted above, he seemed to have been searching for his old self in the first half of the season, then was back to his old dominance in the second half.  So we could be buying low by signing him.

Maybe the Giants Know the Above:  Perhaps the Giants already feel this way and is playing it cool because that is how you best negotiate.  It appears Bumgarner wants to return, but not at a discount.

So if the Giants were similarly interested, let Bum test the waters, get some bids in, and ask him to check back with them, and see if the Giants can beat that offer.  The Giants have lost many bids like this (Greg Maddux, that OF Houston signed about a dozen years ago, others), where they participate in the bidding, only for the player to chose the other team because of money or other factors (the Houston OF had a ranch in Texas), and they take the risk that other teams might overbid, but given the negatives that have been laid out about Bumgarner, plus the QO, this makes Bum happy knowing that this is the best he can get, and the Giants are happy, not overbidding for Bumgarner.

At least, I'm hoping this is what they are doing.  We might be bad for a long while, and if we are, at least we will have Bumgarner around still pitching for us.  And if not, and we are competitive soon, he can play a key role pitching in the middle of the rotation (and perhaps higher) for the Next Gen Giants.

Castellanos Rumor

Not sure how to feel about signing Nicholas Castellanos.  He would be a good bat to add to the lineup, and his defensive liability can be mitigated by the fact that right now it appears likely that Duggar is the CF, and he's very good defensively there (albeit fragile as collectible ceramic dolls) and can help cover for Castellanos' LF play.  He would be similar to the signing of Pence, also a good bat, so-so defensive profile (better defensively than Castellanos, but not as good a bat, it seems).

It's also a sign, if Zaidi gets him, that he is looking for the Giants to be competitive within two seasons, which is roughly when Bart and Ramos should have forced their way into the starting lineup.  Plus, if this is so, then it further justifies the idea of signing Bumgarner to a 5 year deal, in the $90-100M range (Bumgarner is reportedly looking for nine figures after the Wheeler signing at $24M per season).

But it is a little bittersweet to me to, a sunk cost feeling that the Giants could have drafted Castellanos (he was a name in that draft, which I believe was the Gary Brown pick, compared to a good hitter, maybe Longoria, would have to check) and had him all this time.  So I have a bit of opportunity missed given we could have had Castellanos already, and he's been so good that he's already a free agent at a young age, which is another reason to sign him, because his decline is not as imminent as other hitters on the market. 

But this is truly sunk cost, there is no value to not sign Castellanos, and for Zaidi, it would be a sign of all of the above:  if he signs this hitter or another expensive one like Castellanos, it means that he views the next competitive window to be coming soon, in 1-2 seasons, in which case, signing Bumgarner would augment such a scenario, and non-tendering Pillar enabled him to upgrade the OF.

[As noted above: had this basically written up before events of today, the signing and trade; will post separate post-Winter Meetings post, for outlining the moves made and provide my thoughts on impact of all the moves]