It's better to have a mediocre-to-bad player locked up at an inflated price than to even try to be creative. It's the same way you end up with John Lannan. It's this kind of stuff that makes me just completely lose all faith. Any real GM would non-tender Kendrick, make him a cheaper offer to come back, and then move if he doesn't because he's completely fucking fungible.

"I don’t know why people are asking about that." is really an amazingly asinine quote

I go back and forth between high confidence that Amaro's demonstrated awfulness at talent evaluation and roster construction are being brought to bear here, and thinking that given pitcher salaries, Kendrick might actually be able to command a one-year deal for $6 million or so.

Not that he'd be likely to merit it, or that a smart team would extens it, but it wouldn't shock me if he got that offer.

Yeah. KK at $6MM is not great, but I'd rather do that than have to commit to someone else just as bad for more years.

mcare89 wrote:

Trent Steele wrote:He only had the worst ERA in the NL in the 2nd half, so yeah, of course this makes sense.

It's not even the re-signing Kendrick part that annoys me.

It's the idea that Amaro sees re-signing Kendrick as an absolute no brainer and is confused as to why people are asking him about it. That's terrifying.

ERA? you didn't dig too deep - 4.01 FIP and 4.15 xFIP - where do those rank?

nycphils wrote:

mcare89 wrote:

Trent Steele wrote:He only had the worst ERA in the NL in the 2nd half, so yeah, of course this makes sense.

It's not even the re-signing Kendrick part that annoys me.

It's the idea that Amaro sees re-signing Kendrick as an absolute no brainer and is confused as to why people are asking him about it. That's terrifying.

ERA? you didn't dig too deep - 4.01 FIP and 4.15 xFIP - where do those rank?

His 2nd half FIP was 4.30 (15th worst, minimum 50 IP) and his xFIP was 4.40 (10th worst, minimum 50 IP). He also had the 2nd highest BABIP in the 2nd half, but that's probably more due to hitters getting good hits off of him, and not luck.

Kendrick is terrible and it's annoying Ruben is dead set on signing him. /fin

They also said Martin will be invited to spring training as a starter, not a reliever

Trent Steele wrote:It's better to have a mediocre-to-bad player locked up at an inflated price than to even try to be creative.

Do we really want/trust Amaro to do that? He tried being creative in acquiring an OF bat last offseason, we got Delmon Young.

(I'm not advocating KK, I just doubt Amaro's competency)

You guys are certain the second-half Kendrick is the one we'll get moving forward? That the way he pitched the previous season and a half (which followed previous stretches of effectiveness and league-averageness) was a fluke? He's 29 years old. The shoulder issues are a concern, obviously, but they could also explain his drop off.

I do agree that the Phillies are prone to making the safe move and erring on the side of cost certainty but don't see this as an egregious example. As for creativity, Gonzalez was pretty creative, and there would still be another open spot.

Kendrick is a ML pitcher. I'm not going to dispute that, but he's no more than a backend of the rotation guy. HIs K% and swinging strike % all reverted back close to his career norms making last year look like the outlier. I don't mind KK being here, but this team has a million holes and I hate the idea of losing payroll and roster flexibility in November by overpaying for a 5th starter. He's not good enough to be necessary. He can be replaced. The fact that he's convenient should not be enough.

Trent Steele wrote:Kendrick is a ML pitcher. I'm not going to dispute that, but he's no more than a backend of the rotation guy. HIs K% and swinging strike % all reverted back close to his career norms making last year look like the outlier. I don't mind KK being here, but this team has a million holes and I hate the idea of losing payroll and roster flexibility in November by overpaying for a 5th starter. He's not good enough to be necessary. He can be replaced. The fact that he's convenient should not be enough.

At most you are overpaying by a couple million - there is value in his durability, his Gb% was up this year and his LD% was flat, so I don't think he's necessarily the 2nd half Kendrick anyway. In my opinion I have no issue with them penciling him in at 5th starter and spending their time looking for 2 more starters, hopefully one that is #3 caliber (Garza?), plus an OF upgrade.

The hate is undeserved, despite his punchable face. May not have been the most creative move, but not the worst either.

Trent Steele wrote:Kendrick is a ML pitcher. I'm not going to dispute that, but he's no more than a backend of the rotation guy. HIs K% and swinging strike % all reverted back close to his career norms making last year look like the outlier. I don't mind KK being here, but this team has a million holes and I hate the idea of losing payroll and roster flexibility in November by overpaying for a 5th starter. He's not good enough to be necessary. He can be replaced. The fact that he's convenient should not be enough.

This is right. It's one of Amaro's signature moves: take the uncreative, wishful thinking option without, so far as we can tell, a good process of evaluation and consideration of alternatives and opportunity costs. Kendrick at a pre-arb or early arb price is one thing, but that guy's gone.

A league average starter who can go 180-200 innings is a valuable guy. Unfortunately, Kendrick isn't that guy. He has had three pretty good seasons during his career. But that was for between 114 to 160 IP. He has also been pretty awful for long stretches. He had a really good run from the latter part of 2012 through the first half of this season. He was really good.

But he doesn't strike guys out. He doesn't have enough command or sink on his heavy sinker to be reliable. When he's on his game he gives you a bunch of starts in which he throws 6-7 innings and gives up 2 or 3 runs with a few disaster starts mixed in. That is pretty valuable.

But he rally isn't very good. I think the Phils should let him go however possible. If they could trade him for a reliefer that would be ideal. But he lives on the edge way too much. And we already have Mr. Pettibone.

I believe if he goes to another team, he will be lousy like Happ and Worley. Ruiz and Dubee have this magic regarding getting good performances out of kinda lousy pitchers for a while. But that's not something I'd count on from Kendrick for much longer if at all.

He's still a hero.

nycphils wrote:

Trent Steele wrote:Kendrick is a ML pitcher. I'm not going to dispute that, but he's no more than a backend of the rotation guy. HIs K% and swinging strike % all reverted back close to his career norms making last year look like the outlier. I don't mind KK being here, but this team has a million holes and I hate the idea of losing payroll and roster flexibility in November by overpaying for a 5th starter. He's not good enough to be necessary. He can be replaced. The fact that he's convenient should not be enough.

At most you are overpaying by a couple million - there is value in his durability, his Gb% was up this year and his LD% was flat, so I don't think he's necessarily the 2nd half Kendrick anyway. In my opinion I have no issue with them penciling him in at 5th starter and spending their time looking for 2 more starters, hopefully one that is #3 caliber (Garza?), plus an OF upgrade.

The hate is undeserved, despite his punchable face. May not have been the most creative move, but not the worst either.

I don't really mean "overpaying" in the sense of what KK is "worth". That really isn't my point. Even if he really is worth 6m, I think paying 6m for 6m worth of performance from a 5th starter is a terrible way for this team to allocate resources. That's how you get to 77 wins next year. Especially when you have to lock that number in without knowing what your other options are. I would rather take a ton of flyers on cheap 5th starters and use the 6m to improve the team elsewhere, whether by taking on money in a trade for an offensive upgrade or signing a FA that is remotely possible of making an impact. With this payroll and this roster, they need players that outperform their salary. That requires risk taking. Kendrick is the opposite of that.

Exactly, Trent. It's stuff like this and Ruiz that are driving me crazy. We're locking in 70% of our payroll and this payroll/players is/are going to win 71 games. We can't do that. There is absolutely a chance that if you re-allocate the 12-15 million dollars that Ruiz and Kendrick makes, you will spend it worse. But that's a risk a team trying to win should make. Because when you use it on Ruiz and Kendrick, you've locked in your upside.

Most teams take flyers on cheap 5th starters every year. It mostly doesn't work out. The Phils have a cheap 5th starter option in a healthy Mr. Pettibone. There are probably one or two more around. Righty Martin if he can command his control a bit more and not give up a slew of homers. They can sign a few flyers for depth. It's not a bad plan and maybe they get lucky. It happens. That was my point regarding Liriano before Shore made that go off in an interesting but different direction. I think Amaro almost HAS to get lucky in this regard whether it's a hard throwing but lousy starter who could capture (recapture) his mojo for a year or have one of our own youngsters get lucky.

The Cuban almost HAS to be good. And we still need a fourth starter. We are awful thin. Morgan might be healthy and good next year. Biddle might be over his whooping cough and be ready at some point. But we ain't solid in starting pitchers right now.

I don't have a lot of confidence in Kendrick being good next year. Let him go and try other options. The team is gonna need luck in any case. Try it with new faces.

This is much like the Ruiz argument except this one makes more sense in my view.

well it's exactly the same given Carlos Ruiz had a .692 OPS this year and is pretty mediocre and there are several starters better than him (MORE THAN 20!!!). His previous years don't really count since he was cheating. Also, he'll be 35. As smitty would say, zomg, lol.

The fact is that you may be capping your upside next year, but that doesn't harm the team long term, which is my concern. With Howard and Rollins, you have $36 million down the drain for mediocre performance - nothing can be done about that. Dom is locked in, as is Utley so flexibility on what positions can upgrade is limited. LF would need to be a hell of an upgrade to do better than the .800-.850 OPS Ruf is likely to produce next season (and will cost 5 years and $100m given the pence deal) and 3B is going to Ashe or Franco, as it should.

That means you only have C and CF - McCann isn't a good fit and in any event tying up a C for big money in his later years could lead to disaster so I have no interest in that (YMMV). This team is stuck until Howard and Rollins move on - as disappointed as I am for a couple of great phillies. As a result, I'm all in for a CF FA or trade that keeps Franco or signing a 3rd starter to a 3 year deal and/or bullpen upgrades/options and hoping for a bounce back from Howard and the pen.

sydnor wrote:well it's exactly the same given Carlos Ruiz had a .692 OPS this year and is pretty mediocre and there are several starters better than him (MORE THAN 20!!!). His previous years don't really count since he was cheating. Also, he'll be 35. As smitty would say, zomg, lol.