Author Archives: dpscansen

People who know me probably know that I love to ask questions. I think it is the single most important way to build relationships, because questions often get people talking. I’ve come to enjoy twitter for a couple reasons. First, it’s the quickest way to learn about breaking news in the world of sports. Secondly, it is a platform to spew quick thoughts that don’t require a post, and lastly, twitter provides an opportunity to have a conversation with people you probably never could have arranged to speak with. They have to be willing to reply of course, but surprisingly a lot of sports writers do respond, especially when posed with a question.

Last night, and again today, I was able to engage Dave Cameron in a twitter conversation. I was pleased to speak with Dave because I read USS Mariner regularly and although I agree with him on some things, I find myself disagreeing often, usually because I think he gets stuck in stats world and loses site of other aspects of the game. Below is the conversation/debate we had. I should mention that Dave Cameron really knows his stuff, far more than me, and I respect his opinion.

d_a_cameron David Cameron
Jack Cust is on the bench for the sixth time in the last 10 games. I’d bet he gets released before the All-Star break.

goodguyssports Dan Scansen
Fine by me. Roll your eyes but I’d rather watch Peguero than Cust looking at pitches all night. You disagree?

d_a_cameron David Cameron
The best hitters in baseball swing the least often.

goodguyssports Dan Scansen
Ya but when they do swing, they make things happen. Cust has a nice OBP but no future here. Pegeruo hacks but power is precious.

d_a_cameron David Cameron
Power is only useful if it comes from a player who can actually hit.

goodguyssports Dan Scansen
He can hit some, improving day by day, and his 5 HR in 30 games is a welcome sight in Seattle even if he strikes out 30%.

goodguyssports Dan Scansen
Besides, lots of power hitters strike out at that same rate (i.e. Nelson Cruz) I just think watching Peguero develop and provide some pop outweighs 3 more months of Cust.

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d_a_cameron David Cameron
The M’s have had five players post a BB% over 10% (min 50 PA) this year – 2 have been released, 1 optioned to AAA, and 1 has been benched.

goodguyssports Dan Scansen
So you’re saying M’s don’t value BB? Fine. Lhans, L-Rod, Milton, Cust are gone/benched because they hit .173, .167, .218, .214

d_a_cameron David Cameron
Not the M’s – Wedge. Also, people stopped using batting average to evaluate hitters about 20 years ago.

goodguyssports Dan Scansen
Wedge doesn’t value walks, or did those players just suck? I’d say the latter. Lots of hitting stats back this claim.

d_a_cameron David Cameron
There are a lot of sucky hitters on this roster. The only ones who have gotten tossed are the high walk guys.

goodguyssports Dan Scansen
M’s are 6th in AL in walks, not too worried. I know you’d prefer to see Cust play over Peguero, but of Bradley, L-Rod, Lhans, who would you have kept around?

d_a_cameron David Cameron
Was just making a point. It’s a problem that the manager thinks walks aren’t useful.

goodguyssports Dan Scansen
Fair enough but Wedge has been terrific w/ this team despite your line-up & BB gripes. Sorry there’s no sabermetric to show ya.

d_a_cameron David Cameron
The point of sabermetrics is to get people to think critically. Be willing to go beyond “team winning = manager good.”

goodguyssports Dan Scansen
I just think you need balance. Sabermetrics provides in-depth, critical info, but people play this game. Wedge = people pro.

d_a_cameron David Cameron
Heading to bed, but I’d just ask you to think why you believe that. Because someone said so? That shouldn’t be good enough.

goodguyssports Dan Scansen
Mike Salk has eluded to this, yes. But simply seeing Wak vs. Wedge, I see accountability, guys being called out. Refreshing.

goodguyssports Dan Scansen
Thanks for your time Dave, really do enjoy the blog and learning more about sabermetrics.

How is it possible that Franklin Gutierrez, Miguel Olivo, Jason Vargas, Brandon League, Dustin Ackley, Brendan Ryan, Jamey Wright, Adam Kennedy, Doug Fister, Aaron Laffey, David Pauley, Justin Smoak, and Michael Pineda will COMBINE to make LESS money than Jason Bay alone this year? Well, MLB contracts are a funny thing. Superstars will always be paid, and probably over-paid, but A-Rod and Pujols aren’t usually the bad contract culprits. Bad contracts are lousy players being paid like good players, good players being paid like superstars, and the worst, when lousy players are paid like superstars, which is quite a phenomenon. Any of these, in my opinion, qualifies as a bad contract.

I should mention that determining bad contracts can be easy, like in the case of Barry Zito, but sometimes it is quite subjective. For starters, some teams, including the Mariners, often are forced to over-pay for free agents, because it can be tough to lure big names to South Alaska. This has to be taken into account, and also, it’s easy to view a player’s salary for one year and call it an awful contract. For example, Torii Hunter and Ichiro are both making roughly $18,000,000 this year, and it does not appear that they will produce enough to justify that kind of dough. But you have to assess the deal in its entirety, not year by year. Both guys signed 5 year/$90 million deals back in ’08, and both guys were top 10 outfielders in the AL for the first 3 years of their deals. In the case of Ichiro, he’s played like a guy worthy of $20 million or more for the past 3 years, leading AL outfielders in batting average, 2nd in WAR, and 3rd in stolen bases. So in my mind, that kind of production is worth about $65-75 million, and I would expect him to easily produce at a clip worthy of the remaining $15-25 million due through 2012.

It isn’t an exact science, and sometimes you don’t know a bad contract until it expires, but a safe formula is to look at what a full contract pays a player, and if his production is only worthy of 50% or less of the deal, it’s a bad contract. For example, Chone Figgins will be paid $36 million from ’10-’13, and if I am to project his production, I can’t see it being worthy of even $18 million, thus it is a no good, bad, awful contract. It’s sunken cost my friends, and it sucks.

But bad contracts are a part of MLB, because the money is guaranteed, but the production is not. Teams try their darndest to avoid locking up players who don’t live up to their contract, and yet almost every team has a lousy contract, or two, or three. Everyone knows you have to pay for big time production, so you can’t hide like the Pirates and never throw money around. The key is to minimize these contract mistakes, which often effect wins and losses, because unless money is no obstacle like with the Yankees or Red Sox, it becomes difficult to cover your mistakes when a bunch of your payroll is tied up in sunken costs. This is a sticky situation the Mariners know all to well for the past 5 years—

2011: payroll: $94.62; bad contracts: $29.33 (Bradley, Figgins, Silva, Betancourt) = 31% bad $
2010: payroll: $91.14; bad contracts: $27.78 (Bradley, Figgins, Snell, Silva, Betancourt) = 30% bad $
2009: payroll: $98.9; bad contracts: $42.48 (Silva, Washburn, Batista, Johjima, Betancourt) = 43% bad $
2008: payroll: $117.66; bad contracts: $46.1 (Sexson, Washburn, Batista, Silva, Wilkerson) = 39% bad $
2007: payroll: $106.46; bad contracts: $49.83 (Sexson, Washburn, Weaver, Vidro, Batista, Ramirez) = 47% bad $

The good news going forward is that the only bad $ on the books past 2011, assuming Jack doesn’t ink someone to a bad contract, is the $18,000,000 still owed to Figgins through 2012-13. What this means is bad contracts should only eat up 10% of next years payroll, rather than 30-40% like the team has dealt with since 2007. This is a ratio the M’s can live with, and hopefully money well spent translates to contention on the field.

As for the teams whose future is littered with bad contracts, top 5, according to my subjective analysis, are the White Sox, Mets, Cubs, Angels, and Giants. We can whine about the Figgy deal all we want, but clearly things could be worse—

-Dan