Found some facts in this article at the Contra Costa Times. Why it wasn't carried in the Merc, which is a sister publication to the Times and they appear to be sharing writers too, I don't know, just a pain since I subscribe to the Merc. I had to find this via a rumor site on Fox Sports.
Marcopolo had it basically right, Bonds will have $5.8M deferred to 2008, and any incentives he hits will be deferred to 2009 (up to $4.2M). So take another $0.8M off the 2008 available budget (though I assumed $500K per young player so it might all even out).
Also, the article noted that the Giants that their budget will stay at "$95M for the foreseeable future." And, nice to get confirmation of this, but Magowan said "increased revenues from MLB Advanced Media, the new television deal and the sale of the Montreal Expos allowed the club to boost its budget." MLBAM is their name for their internet operations, covering their TV and other media products via the internet plus the on-line store. I had read about the new TV deal but only from other posters and not from one of the well-known baseball sites I frequent (not that I read each and every post, so perhaps they did post it, but I just haven't read it anywhere until today), so I didn't want to count that in unless I heard a credible source for this news. I probably missed the news at The Hardball Times, they run a regular column on the Business of Baseball by a member of SABR's Business of Baseball Committee.
Lastly, the article noted that Benitez wants a trade and, if he is healthy in spring training, could rejoin the Marlins, with the Marlins giving us $1-2M PLUS, amazingly enough, Yusmeiro Petit, who is a very promising young pitcher that they got, I think, from the Red Sox in their big trade. That would be a SUPER trade for us, getting rid of a cancer, getting some money back, plus a top prospect who would probably be at or near the top of our prospect list (though I'm not sure if his IP makes him not a rookie anymore, but he's still unproven, though very, very promising; I had him on my fantasy league last season and he was a good reliever for the Marlins, over all). He would definitely be worth paying most of Benitez's salary, better than signing any prospect for that much bonus money.
OK, this is the last item. Looking at the article, Zito was quoted saying, "Oakland fans, if you guys are bored while the A's are out of town, come on over," Zito said Wednesday. "I think we've got some seats for you." Why just the days the A's are out of town? True, usually when the A's are out of town, the Giants are playing at home, and vice-versa, but why not have the A's fans come to SF when they are both at home? :^)
Thursday, January 04, 2007
Zito's Contract Might Be Economical
As regular readers know, I don't care for the length and size of Barry Zito's contract, though I think his signing is great for the Giants over the next 2-4 years. Looking at his contract structure, it struck me how reasonable it was in the first couple of seasons, so I got the idea that it would be interesting to compare Zito's contract year by year versus the going market rate for a middle rotation starter, like Meche and Padilla this same off-season: both got contracts averaging $11M per season.
Talking 'Bout My Calculations
What I wanted to do was to look at Zito's contract in a number of different situations. Assumptions I'll use are that a middle rotation pitcher this off-season gets $11M and then I will grow that under a number of different scenarios.
First, if the 10% growth that a number of saber-sites says is the inflation rate normally for salaries hold up over the 8 years the contract runs (you'll soon see why I say 8 and not 7), then as long as Zito is even a middle rotation pitcher, the Giants will pick up his option, he would have to be Russ Ortiz bad for them not to pick it up (all figures in millions of dollars):
Data - 2007 - 2008 - 2009 - 2010 - 2011 - 2012 - 2013 - 2014
Zito - 10.0 - 14.5 - 18.5 - 18.5 - 18.5 - 19.0 - 20.0 - 18.0
Avg. - 11.0 - 12.1 - 13.3 - 14.6 - 16.1 - 17.7 - 19.5 - 21.4
Z/Avg - 91% - 120% - 139% - 126% - 115% - 107% - 103% - 84%
As one can see, the Giants overpay by a fair amount in years 2 through 5, but the other years are actually pretty economical with a big "IF": if he can be at least a middle rotation starter in years 6 to 8.
Next, I check out what happens when salaries rise 20% for 2008, but continue at 10% afterward (all figures in millions of dollars):
Data - 2007 - 2008 - 2009 - 2010 - 2011 - 2012 - 2013 - 2014
Zito - 10.0 - 14.5 - 18.5 - 18.5 - 18.5 - 19.0 - 20.0 - 18.0
Avg. - 11.0 - 13.2 - 14.5 - 16.0 - 17.6 - 19.3 - 21.3 - 23.4
Z/Avg - 91% - 110% - 127% - 116% - 105% - 98.3% - 94% - 77%
As one can see, the Giants now "only" overpay by a fair amount in years 3 and 4, but the other years are actually pretty economical, again with a big "IF": if he can be at least a middle rotation starter in the other years, particularly years 6 to 8.
Most interesting to me is when the inflation makes Zito appear to be a steal, with a 30% increase for 2008 but 10% afterward (all figures in millions of dollars):
Data - 2007 - 2008 - 2009 - 2010 - 2011 - 2012 - 2013 - 2014
Zito - 10.0 - 14.5 - 18.5 - 18.5 - 18.5 - 19.0 - 20.0 - 18.0
Avg. - 11.0 - 13.8 - 15.1 - 16.6 - 18.3 - 20.1 - 22.1 - 24.4
Z/Avg - 91% - 106% - 122% - 111% - 101% - 94.4% - 90% - 74%
In this scenario, the Giants really only overpays in the third year. Zito is only being paid a middle rotation (#3) salary (roughly, to me, 90-110%) in years 1, 2, 4, 5, 6, and 7, and would be paid like a back of the rotation starter (#4/#5) in year 8.
Giants Thoughts
The only way this contract appears to make sense is if the Giants anticipate another large rise in salaries in the next off-season for middle rotation guys like Meche, Padilla, and Lilly. In that last scenario, the Giants are paying for 1 #2 starter season, 6 #3 starter seasons, and 1 #4/5 starter season. I think it would be a reasonably good assumption that Zito will put in a #2 type season (ERA from 3.78 to 4.31) in the next few seasons and that he can probably put together another 3-4 #3 starter seasons (4.31 to 4.84). The question is whether he can stretch it out to 7-8 seasons at reasonable performance.
One thing I will investigate next is if the Giants is paying for a middle rotation guy, how much is he expected to garner over his contract? I'm now thinking, sum up his expected performances forecasted ahead, then compare it to what the Giants are paying for.
For example, say I'm using Win Saves Above Bench, like The Hardball Times did, and a #2 starter gets 8-10 WSAB and a #3 starter gets 5-7 WSAB and a #4 starter gets 2-4 WSAB. Lets call them 9, 6, and 3. In the third scenario above, that works out to 48 WSAB being paid for by the Giants over the lifetime of the contract, whereas the second scenario works out to 51 WSAB. So that is roughly 50 WSAB the Giants are paying for.
Zito was on KNBR Wednesday afternoon. As the new face of the Giants going forward (at least until Cain takes over :^), he knew he had to "press the flesh", that is, show up on the team's radio station and talk with the fan base and present himself to the masses. I did not hear the whole thing (had things to do), but I was particularly intrigued by one segment of the chat.
Basically, he painted himself out to be similar to Barry Bonds, always working out year round and having a physical regimen that is supposedly intense. He blamed his drop in the second half in 2006 (which I showed with his steep drop in DOM% in a previous post) to, get this, his fitness instructor took off for some reason, leaving Zito alone, so Zito just threw to keep in shape and he thinks that he threw too much during the off-season, resulting in his loss of arm strength late in the season and leading to his drop in performance. Having learned his lesson (plus getting a huge contract so maybe he can hire an instructor full-time), he vows to keep himself in tip-top shape this off-season without wearing out his arm by throwing too much during the off-season.
OT: Kirk Rueter
All the talk about #2 vs. #3 starters got me thinking about Kirk Rueter. I remember arguing on-line with other people that Rueter was a #2 starter and the way I did it was similar to what the Hardball Times author did: I took the top pitchers by ERA and ranked them, the first 16 were Aces #1's and the next 16 were #2's and Rueter fell in that bucket that season so I said that while Rueter may not pitch like a true #2, he certain performed like one. I was totally blasted for that one (A's fan at that).
Looking at his seasons, in 1997, his first full season here, his 3.45 ERA would have been #1 quality (obviously these numbers don't hold exactly through the years, as the runs scored environment has changed a bit since then, but they should be roughly good still). In 1998, he was a strong #3. In 1999, he was a poor #4. In 2000, he was a solid #2. In 2001, he was a strong #3. In 2002, he was a strong #1. In 2003, he was an average #3. In 2004, he was a poor #3. And in 2005, he was a good #5. That's 2 #1, 1 #2, 4 #3, 1 #4, and 1 #5. That is not too bad for a pitcher who is maligned by sabermetricians for his poor walks and strikeout stats and yet always seemed to pull a rabbit out of his hat. He had seven decent to very good seasons. That's seven more than most pitchers drafted.
Rueter's prime years were from age 26 to age 31. His career was over by 34, but didn't really start until he was 26. Glavine's prime years were from 25 to 32. He is still going strong at age 40, after starting his career at age 22, which happens to be the age Zito joined the majors too. However, he has been a different pitcher than Zito: he has never struck out that many people, unlike Zito, and his main strengths have been keeping his BB/9 under the key 3.0 mark and always keeping the longball in the park, with a HR/9 much under the key 1.0 mark for much of his career. Zito is pretty wild, walking too many, and giving up too many HRs.
Jamie Moyer's were from age 33 to 40. However, for him, it was hard to tell because he were at high offense parks like Boston and Baltimore and Texas before enjoying Seattle's homepark for his best seasons, and jumped around, unlike Rueter or Glavine, until he was with Seattle. And he was not a full-time starter (30+ starts) until he joined Seattle.
I've always like Rueter and thought he was ace-worthy when he took the mound, unlike when Livan or Russ Ortiz took the mound, when I would fear something would happen. Rueter always manned up and I admired him for that. Too bad his meager skills couldn't match his heart, else he would have been a sure HOFer.
Talking 'Bout My Calculations
What I wanted to do was to look at Zito's contract in a number of different situations. Assumptions I'll use are that a middle rotation pitcher this off-season gets $11M and then I will grow that under a number of different scenarios.
First, if the 10% growth that a number of saber-sites says is the inflation rate normally for salaries hold up over the 8 years the contract runs (you'll soon see why I say 8 and not 7), then as long as Zito is even a middle rotation pitcher, the Giants will pick up his option, he would have to be Russ Ortiz bad for them not to pick it up (all figures in millions of dollars):
Data - 2007 - 2008 - 2009 - 2010 - 2011 - 2012 - 2013 - 2014
Zito - 10.0 - 14.5 - 18.5 - 18.5 - 18.5 - 19.0 - 20.0 - 18.0
Avg. - 11.0 - 12.1 - 13.3 - 14.6 - 16.1 - 17.7 - 19.5 - 21.4
Z/Avg - 91% - 120% - 139% - 126% - 115% - 107% - 103% - 84%
As one can see, the Giants overpay by a fair amount in years 2 through 5, but the other years are actually pretty economical with a big "IF": if he can be at least a middle rotation starter in years 6 to 8.
Next, I check out what happens when salaries rise 20% for 2008, but continue at 10% afterward (all figures in millions of dollars):
Data - 2007 - 2008 - 2009 - 2010 - 2011 - 2012 - 2013 - 2014
Zito - 10.0 - 14.5 - 18.5 - 18.5 - 18.5 - 19.0 - 20.0 - 18.0
Avg. - 11.0 - 13.2 - 14.5 - 16.0 - 17.6 - 19.3 - 21.3 - 23.4
Z/Avg - 91% - 110% - 127% - 116% - 105% - 98.3% - 94% - 77%
As one can see, the Giants now "only" overpay by a fair amount in years 3 and 4, but the other years are actually pretty economical, again with a big "IF": if he can be at least a middle rotation starter in the other years, particularly years 6 to 8.
Most interesting to me is when the inflation makes Zito appear to be a steal, with a 30% increase for 2008 but 10% afterward (all figures in millions of dollars):
Data - 2007 - 2008 - 2009 - 2010 - 2011 - 2012 - 2013 - 2014
Zito - 10.0 - 14.5 - 18.5 - 18.5 - 18.5 - 19.0 - 20.0 - 18.0
Avg. - 11.0 - 13.8 - 15.1 - 16.6 - 18.3 - 20.1 - 22.1 - 24.4
Z/Avg - 91% - 106% - 122% - 111% - 101% - 94.4% - 90% - 74%
In this scenario, the Giants really only overpays in the third year. Zito is only being paid a middle rotation (#3) salary (roughly, to me, 90-110%) in years 1, 2, 4, 5, 6, and 7, and would be paid like a back of the rotation starter (#4/#5) in year 8.
Giants Thoughts
The only way this contract appears to make sense is if the Giants anticipate another large rise in salaries in the next off-season for middle rotation guys like Meche, Padilla, and Lilly. In that last scenario, the Giants are paying for 1 #2 starter season, 6 #3 starter seasons, and 1 #4/5 starter season. I think it would be a reasonably good assumption that Zito will put in a #2 type season (ERA from 3.78 to 4.31) in the next few seasons and that he can probably put together another 3-4 #3 starter seasons (4.31 to 4.84). The question is whether he can stretch it out to 7-8 seasons at reasonable performance.
One thing I will investigate next is if the Giants is paying for a middle rotation guy, how much
For example, say I'm using Win Saves Above Bench, like The Hardball Times did, and a #2 starter gets 8-10 WSAB and a #3 starter gets 5-7 WSAB and a #4 starter gets 2-4 WSAB. Lets call them 9, 6, and 3. In the third scenario above, that works out to 48 WSAB being paid for by the Giants over the lifetime of the contract, whereas the second scenario works out to 51 WSAB. So that is roughly 50 WSAB the Giants are paying for.
- If I project him out to be a #2 for the first 5 seasons (ERA from 3.78 to 4.31), which is not likely but is possible, that works out to 45 WSAB earned already, with 2-3 more seasons to go.
- More probable, I can see him being a #2 for three seasons (ages 29-31; prime physical years), which earns him 27 WSAB, then fading off to middle rotation or lower. 3 seasons of #3 pitching would get him another 18 WSAB for a total of 45 WSAB over 6 seasons. I can see this happening and he would essentially earn the money he would be paid for the whole 8 seasons. This is still high expectations, and while more probable, still seems to me to be a stretch for one to reasonably assume he would mean such expectations.
- That leaves him doing well in the short-term, poorly in the long-term.
Thus I don't see how Zito could perform well enough and long enough to justify this contract. Meanwhile, I can see him perform well enough in the short-term (3-4 years) and hopefully he can anchor the rotation while the young guys - Cain, Lowry, Lincecum, and Sanchez - mature and hopefully develop.
The Giants are basically paying him to be the bridge from the Bonds era to (hopefully) the Cain-Lincecum era. By then hopefully the cheap pitching that the Giants seem to be cultivating will be enough so that we could release him and not be too affected by the cash drain. Or better, he could pitch well enough that we can trade him and get other players and contracts in return, much like how the Rockies got rid of Hampton.
KNBR InterviewZito was on KNBR Wednesday afternoon. As the new face of the Giants going forward (at least until Cain takes over :^), he knew he had to "press the flesh", that is, show up on the team's radio station and talk with the fan base and present himself to the masses. I did not hear the whole thing (had things to do), but I was particularly intrigued by one segment of the chat.
Basically, he painted himself out to be similar to Barry Bonds, always working out year round and having a physical regimen that is supposedly intense. He blamed his drop in the second half in 2006 (which I showed with his steep drop in DOM% in a previous post) to, get this, his fitness instructor took off for some reason, leaving Zito alone, so Zito just threw to keep in shape and he thinks that he threw too much during the off-season, resulting in his loss of arm strength late in the season and leading to his drop in performance. Having learned his lesson (plus getting a huge contract so maybe he can hire an instructor full-time), he vows to keep himself in tip-top shape this off-season without wearing out his arm by throwing too much during the off-season.
OT: Kirk Rueter
All the talk about #2 vs. #3 starters got me thinking about Kirk Rueter. I remember arguing on-line with other people that Rueter was a #2 starter and the way I did it was similar to what the Hardball Times author did: I took the top pitchers by ERA and ranked them, the first 16 were Aces #1's and the next 16 were #2's and Rueter fell in that bucket that season so I said that while Rueter may not pitch like a true #2, he certain performed like one. I was totally blasted for that one (A's fan at that).
Looking at his seasons, in 1997, his first full season here, his 3.45 ERA would have been #1 quality (obviously these numbers don't hold exactly through the years, as the runs scored environment has changed a bit since then, but they should be roughly good still). In 1998, he was a strong #3. In 1999, he was a poor #4. In 2000, he was a solid #2. In 2001, he was a strong #3. In 2002, he was a strong #1. In 2003, he was an average #3. In 2004, he was a poor #3. And in 2005, he was a good #5. That's 2 #1, 1 #2, 4 #3, 1 #4, and 1 #5. That is not too bad for a pitcher who is maligned by sabermetricians for his poor walks and strikeout stats and yet always seemed to pull a rabbit out of his hat. He had seven decent to very good seasons. That's seven more than most pitchers drafted.
Rueter's prime years were from age 26 to age 31. His career was over by 34, but didn't really start until he was 26. Glavine's prime years were from 25 to 32. He is still going strong at age 40, after starting his career at age 22, which happens to be the age Zito joined the majors too. However, he has been a different pitcher than Zito: he has never struck out that many people, unlike Zito, and his main strengths have been keeping his BB/9 under the key 3.0 mark and always keeping the longball in the park, with a HR/9 much under the key 1.0 mark for much of his career. Zito is pretty wild, walking too many, and giving up too many HRs.
Jamie Moyer's were from age 33 to 40. However, for him, it was hard to tell because he were at high offense parks like Boston and Baltimore and Texas before enjoying Seattle's homepark for his best seasons, and jumped around, unlike Rueter or Glavine, until he was with Seattle. And he was not a full-time starter (30+ starts) until he joined Seattle.
I've always like Rueter and thought he was ace-worthy when he took the mound, unlike when Livan or Russ Ortiz took the mound, when I would fear something would happen. Rueter always manned up and I admired him for that. Too bad his meager skills couldn't match his heart, else he would have been a sure HOFer.
Wednesday, January 03, 2007
Quickee Zito Post: Could The Price Be Right?
Found an article that supports Zito getting $18M for 2007 (and of course he's being paid only $10M for 2007) and it was published on The Hardball Times. The author, Jeff Sackman (seems like a nice guy, wrote an e-mail to him with a question and he replied very nicely, unlike most newspaper reporters I've written to; of course, he's not a newspaper reporter...), analyzed how much pitchers this off-season have been getting per Win Share Above Bench (i.e. their way of saying above replacement level player) and found that the average pitcher, once outliers were tossed, got about $1.74M per average WSAB of their past three seasons or $2.02M per with all the pitchers. Based on that, Zito had a WSAB average of 9 the past three seasons, which works out to $16.2M without outliers, $18.9M with outliers (i.e. all starting pitchers).
Obviously, the Giants are within that range of per season salary, though perhaps a bit on the high side, but that hardly makes up for the length of the contract (as obviously the risks goes up greatly because you have to keep your fingers crossed that he's going to be not only healthy the whole 7 seasons, but that he's going to at least be a mid-rotation guy or better the whole time).
He then noted that whether paying that much would only make sense if the team thought that they were close enough that acquiring Zito would push them into the playoffs. Of course, many Giants fans don't think the Giants have a snowball's chance in LA of making the playoffs. I am currently not sure whether they will make the playoffs, but think that there is a good chance that they will at least be competing for the division title.
They have the makings of a playoff caliber starting rotation and potentially could have a very good top 4 starters in Cain, Zito, Lowry and Morris, if all pitch to their potential peak performance, plus I think their offense, while not stellar, is underrated by most.
Giants Offense Was Not All That Bad in 2006
According to Bill James Handbook, the Giants should have won 80 games had they been efficient with their wins, particularly their pitching, which pitched in bad luck in 2006 (they gave up 790 runs when they should have given up only 733). The bad news was that most teams were inefficient and the the 'Dres should have won 93 games, the D-gers 92 games, the Rockies 85 games, and the D-backs 83 games, putting the Giants last in the NL West, theoretically. Their runs scored was 10th out of 16 teams, so while they were not a good offense, they were at least average (9th had 749 runs and 8th had 758 runs, so they are not that far off from the median).
2007 Giants Offense Could be Better
And with the boost to the offense of Roberts over Finley/Bad Winn and Aurilia over 2006's 1Bs, plus Winn returning to his career norms and Bonds playing on healthy, plus improvements to the bench with Klesko, Frandsen and Linden, and Sweeney returning full time to his pinch-hitting role, I think the offense should be at least around the median again in terms of runs scored, offsetting any declines from Bonds, Durham, and maybe Vizquel (I think Molina will be a push against Matheny/Greene/Alfonzo).
And if Klesko returns to old form, I'll bet we will see him at 1B a lot, pushing Aurilia to 3B and Feliz to the bench, and that would be a boost to the lineup as well. Even if Klesko can hit as poorly as Feliz, it might be worth it to play Klesko/Aurilia over Aurilia/Feliz at least occassionally, to give Feliz a rest, as he clearly petered out last season from all the playing - he was not ready for a long season. That might even push Feliz to do better, as he knows he has to hit well to keep his spot in the lineup if Klesko is hitting at least as well as Feliz is, particuularly since he will be a free agent again next off-season.
Obviously, the Giants are within that range of per season salary, though perhaps a bit on the high side, but that hardly makes up for the length of the contract (as obviously the risks goes up greatly because you have to keep your fingers crossed that he's going to be not only healthy the whole 7 seasons, but that he's going to at least be a mid-rotation guy or better the whole time).
He then noted that whether paying that much would only make sense if the team thought that they were close enough that acquiring Zito would push them into the playoffs. Of course, many Giants fans don't think the Giants have a snowball's chance in LA of making the playoffs. I am currently not sure whether they will make the playoffs, but think that there is a good chance that they will at least be competing for the division title.
They have the makings of a playoff caliber starting rotation and potentially could have a very good top 4 starters in Cain, Zito, Lowry and Morris, if all pitch to their potential peak performance, plus I think their offense, while not stellar, is underrated by most.
Giants Offense Was Not All That Bad in 2006
According to Bill James Handbook, the Giants should have won 80 games had they been efficient with their wins, particularly their pitching, which pitched in bad luck in 2006 (they gave up 790 runs when they should have given up only 733). The bad news was that most teams were inefficient and the the 'Dres should have won 93 games, the D-gers 92 games, the Rockies 85 games, and the D-backs 83 games, putting the Giants last in the NL West, theoretically. Their runs scored was 10th out of 16 teams, so while they were not a good offense, they were at least average (9th had 749 runs and 8th had 758 runs, so they are not that far off from the median).
2007 Giants Offense Could be Better
And with the boost to the offense of Roberts over Finley/Bad Winn and Aurilia over 2006's 1Bs, plus Winn returning to his career norms and Bonds playing on healthy, plus improvements to the bench with Klesko, Frandsen and Linden, and Sweeney returning full time to his pinch-hitting role, I think the offense should be at least around the median again in terms of runs scored, offsetting any declines from Bonds, Durham, and maybe Vizquel (I think Molina will be a push against Matheny/Greene/Alfonzo).
And if Klesko returns to old form, I'll bet we will see him at 1B a lot, pushing Aurilia to 3B and Feliz to the bench, and that would be a boost to the lineup as well. Even if Klesko can hit as poorly as Feliz, it might be worth it to play Klesko/Aurilia over Aurilia/Feliz at least occassionally, to give Feliz a rest, as he clearly petered out last season from all the playing - he was not ready for a long season. That might even push Feliz to do better, as he knows he has to hit well to keep his spot in the lineup if Klesko is hitting at least as well as Feliz is, particuularly since he will be a free agent again next off-season.
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