Yesterday, on the eve of MLB's Winter Meetings, the Washington Nationals dropped a bomb that left a smoking crater in the payroll plans of some MLB baseball teams. Ironically, Werth's contract is almost identical to the one for Barry Zito that Giants fans have chafed over for 4 long years and are likely to for at least 3 more even longer ones, 7 years/$126 million!
Although I am kind of glad to see someone finally outspend the Red Sox for a player they really wanted, this contract also makes me mad. Coupled with the earlier trade of San Diego icon Adrian Gonzalez to Boston, it makes me even madder. Something is very fishy in baseball! I can accept that the Yankees have more money to spend than any other team, and by a lot. What I don't understand is why a team in Boston with an ancient stadium seems to have almost as much jack to spend on players as the Yankees, but teams in other cities/metropolitan areas of comparable size apparently do not. Teams complain that they have to have new stadiums to get enough revenues to pay for players, but Boston has Fenway Park and San Diego has a stadium less than 10 years old!
Then, at team like the Nationals, who have claimed for years they can't afford top players suddenly drop $126 M on a guy like Werth. Now, don't get me wrong. Jayson Werth is an excellent ballplayer. He's put up 3 consecutive 5 WAR years which is pretty hard to do. Jayson Werth will very likely make the Nationals a better team, at least for the next 2-3 years. On the other hand, Jayson Werth is not a cornerstone player, IMO. I can understand giving a contract like that to a special player, one who has won an MVP or two and is likely to make the HOF someday. Jayson Werth is not going to win any MVP's and is not going to ever be in the HOF! Take that to the bank! Jayson Werth is a good player. He is not a great player, a special player, the kind you use up quarter or even a 5'th of your payroll on. That is completely ignoring the fact that the last 3 years of the this contract are likely to make Barry Zito's look good by comparison. Think Aaron Rowand here folks!
With a mountain of evidence out there that you don't have to sign contracts like this to build a winner, plus multiple examples of contracts like this one becoming total busts and millstones around the team's neck, you have to conclude that either owners are supremely stupid, or ownership of teams like the San Diego Padres are playing possum with their finances. I mean, Adrian Gonzalez is the type of player you would have to seriously consider giving a contract like this too. What he has accomplished in playing in the worst park for hitters in baseball, plus 18 other games per year in San Francisco and LA two other pitcher's parks, well, there just aren't many players out there capable of coming close to that kind of production!
I don't pretend to know all that much about the finances of MLB. It seems to be a fairly common belief that even the worst of teams in the worst of stadium situations have the jack for a $40 M payroll before they even sell one ticket or one beer or 1 hot dog! How then, can a team like the Padres, with a brand new stadium and decent attendance can't keep their star player, perhaps one of only 5 or 6 players in all of baseball capable of putting up that kind of production in that park and yet a team like the Nats can plunk down $126 M on Jayson Werth, who is good, but not half the player that Adrian Gonzalez is.
Whatever is is that's driving this insanity needs to be fixed in the next contract with the Player's Association.
PS: It's not at all hard to see why Scott Boras recommends that all of his clients go to free agency. There is always a team out there who will fork it over. The startling thing about the Werth contract is that Boras, who is notorious for not letting his clients sign until he has shopped every offer around at least twice, didn't even bother to ask if any other team wanted to match. He just told Jayson to go ahead and sign as quickly as he possibly could. Rumor has it that the Nats offer was 3 years longer and twice the total money than the second highest bidder.
PS2: The biggest losers in all this have to be the St Louis Cardinals. I mean, if Jayson Werth gets this much, and A Gone gets what it looks like he will get, what on earth will Albert Pujols' price be? Then again, I have totally stopped believing that any MLB team has any need to limit their payroll whatsoever. I mean, when the Cardinals signed Matt Holliday to that contract, which Werth's contract makes look like a steal, that had to tell you something. The Cardinals are sitting on some kind of stash and they aren't in exactly the largest market in baseball.
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The last couple of years it looked like salaries were coming back down to earth, but this blows that up and we're back to huge free agent dollars being thrown around.
ReplyDeleteI honestly think there was a small-market "tax" that was in play here. In order to get anyone to play for a team like the Nationals, you have to overpay them. Which is crap and penalizes small-market, low-revenue teams by making them pay more for the same player.
In any case, Werth is a damn good player who contributes both offensively and defensively and can play a position that has some defensive value (RF). He's been remarkably consistent with his wOBP the last 4 years -- his average wOBP is identical to Adam Dunn's over that timeframe, I believe -- but he actually plays defense.
The question, of course, is how he is going to age, as the contract covers his age 32-38 seasons.
I remember after a losing series in San Francisco, that Werth criticized AT&T ballpark for being too much pitching friendly.
ReplyDeleteI see Werth as a fly ball hitter and I have the impression that he's much more comfortable in a hitter friendly ballpark like Philadelphia one.
Could he adapt his hitting skills to a pitching park like Huff has been able to do in AT&T ? I am not sure.
Am I wrong? Do you know if Washington Park is more pitching or hitting friendly?
GIP
The Nats have been trying to make a signing like this, they offer Teixera more than any other team ($200M).
ReplyDeleteIt now appears that the Nats are jumping into the Lee-stakes as well.
ReplyDeletehttp://mlb.mlb.com/news/article.jsp?ymd=20101207&content_id=16271012&vkey=news_mlb&c_id=mlb
Interesting
Well, the good news for Werth is that he's getting 126 million reasons not to worry about the fact that his new homepark affects RHB WORSE than AT&T.
ReplyDeleteAT&T boosts BA but depresses HR for RHB; The Nats park both depresses BA and HR to greater degree (though only slightly worse in terms of HR). This is all according to Bill James 2010 Handbook (2011 is already out but I don't have it).
Unless Werth has an unusual late 30's resurgence, I think his contract is going to look even worse in 3-4 years.
But here's how finances work in baseball: if you are rich, you can spend all you want. Lerner, who bought the Nats, is a multi-billionaire. If he wants to spend a lot of money, he can.
That's why I want a billionaire to buy the Giants in a couple of years, like Oracle's Ellison, so that we can keep all our young players for sure. I saw how having a billionaire helped a team spend when a billionaire bought the Angels and they started going out and signing a bunch of players. I've been begging for Ellison to buy the team after the whole Vlad Guerrero/Maddux Mad Money episode of many years back (Giants claimed poverty in passing on Vlad, then suddenly found money for Greg Maddux).
Then the Giants can experience a little of what the 49ers enjoyed in the 80's as their rich owner spends willy-nilly to bring in a winner every season.
Boston and St. Louis get more revenues because they have a rabid fanbase that go no matter what and corporate sponsors who pay top dollar. Boston also has been soaking up money via their sports network (NEST?) that copies the Yankees YES (or something like that) that has been raking up big money by broadcasting to Japan (hence why they spent big money on getting Godzilla).
Meanshile, SD may have a new park, but nobody breaking down the doors to get in. There is no waiting, whereas in Boston, people have to wait for people to die for new season ticket seats to open up, and often the children pick them up, so it is really a wait for childless season ticket holders.
Also, Boston, I think, added expensive (and I am blanking out, but they are enclosed rooms where you are protected from the hoi polloi, usually in the middle tier of the park) rooms where they soak corporate clients for the rights to rent the rooms. Giants have them too, but not the overwhelming demand for them (and hence probably sky high pricing as well).
Something that people have not known a lot about is that MLBAM, which owns all MLB internet properties has been a HUGE financial success, paying off relatively soon when it was expected for teams to pay in for a number of years investing in it. It is throwing off a lot of cash to all the teams, it was like tens of millions a couple of years ago, so it is pretty big money.
I believe that MLBAM is the equivalent of the equalizing national TV network contracts for the NFL. Eventually everything will be on the internet, and the local radio contracts where the Yankees make big coin plus their TV networks will go to the wayside, as MLBAM has all the rights to all media on the internet, I believe.
And about Lee, it seems like the Nats owner is trying to copy the Yankees and sign every top free agent, with the hope that eventually they'll be a winner, particularly with their top young players coming up ready around 2012.
ReplyDeleteFor $67 mil more than Rowand and 2 more years on the hook, I just don't see how the Nationals looked at Jayson Werth and thought spending that kind of dough was a good idea. All the warning signs are there. Albeit the guy is a very good player, but like DrB already discussed, he isn't even in the ballpark with some of the players who have commanded that kind of money.
ReplyDeleteThere are multiple teams that had to cringe when they heard of that deal, as it sets an expectation for younger players that is going to make teams dish out cash. I will definitely be interested to see how he handles a park that doesn't got 225ft. to all the walls like Philly (joking of course.)
Great comments everybody!
ReplyDeleteThe Maddux "mad money" and now with a new managing owner a sudden willingness to up the payroll is part of what makes me kind of jaundiced about the owners claims that they are strapped for payroll $$$$. I know there has to be some upper limit of spending, but I seriously doubt many teams are coming close to whatever that limit is.
As for Jayson Werth, I do think he is a better player than Rowand ever was, but the new park is going to have an effect and the contract is way, way too long. It will be an embarrassment to the Nationals by the time it's run it's course.
I will say this: After running through a list of available FA's both for this year and 2012, I can see why the Nats might have been desperate to sign Werth. Once you get past Werth and Crawford, the pickings get mighy, mighty slim. There just aren't a lot of FA's out there and most of them are Boras clients. Not too hard to see why Boras advises all his clients to not sign contract extensions and test free agency.