smitty wrote:He is talking about the entire big leagues. I don't think Howard ranks all that high. Is he in the top 30 right now in all of baseball? Well, he's not in the top two of his own team (Utley and the Doc). I'm not sure where he ranks. But there's an awful lot of really good players out there if you're counting pitchers.

If you're only going with position players, You can make a top 30 case maybe. Not sure about top 20.

its not fair to compare to pitchers because the good ones get injured too often and can't earn what they are worth (see harden/sheets).

but howard is probably a top 25 baseball player(28th in WAR last year). and a lot of the guys that are above him are still in arbitration or inked their big deals years ago.

this contract makes me want to punch amaro in his vagina

Zolecki said his feeling is that the Phils think they can sign Wertz.

Trent Steele wrote:this contract makes me want to punch amaro in his vagina

This.

Neyer made the WAR vs salary argument, but what he left out was that the value of a win ($/win) does not stay constant. It has gone up steadily over time, and logically will continue to go up over time. So if he continues to put up 5 win seasons, they'll be worth more and more dollars-wise each year. Bad job by him not acknowledging that fact

All in all though, both are right. Howard got a great deal, Phils didn't

hoya wrote:Howard was 28th in FanGraph values last year among position players, if you buy like those numbers.

To be fair, I should note that if you are consistently ranking 28th, you are probably a top 20 player.

jamiethekiller wrote:

smitty wrote:He is talking about the entire big leagues. I don't think Howard ranks all that high. Is he in the top 30 right now in all of baseball? Well, he's not in the top two of his own team (Utley and the Doc). I'm not sure where he ranks. But there's an awful lot of really good players out there if you're counting pitchers.

If you're only going with position players, You can make a top 30 case maybe. Not sure about top 20.

its not fair to compare to pitchers because the good ones get injured too often and can't earn what they are worth (see harden/sheets).

but howard is probably a top 25 baseball player(28th in WAR last year). and a lot of the guys that are above him are still in arbitration or inked their big deals years ago.

I can see throwing pitchers out of the equation.

So he's about 25-30th? He crushes RHP; has a lot of problems with lefties and his defense has been pretty good the last two seasons it seems to me. He was the most clutch guy in the big leagues last season according to Bill James and it wasn't close.

He doesn't play a key defensive position. That's why maybe guys like Tulowitski and Zimmerman and Wright have an advantage.

25-30 seems right at this point. I can be convinced otherwise if someone wants to do the work and present it. But right now it seems that's where he belongs.

I was kind of hoping we would try to sign Pujols in 2 years. So much for that.

It just seems like a classic case of paying for what a player has done instead of paying for what a player will do.

joe table wrote:Neyer made the WAR vs salary argument, but what he left out was that the value of a win ($/win) does not stay constant. It has gone up steadily over time, and logically will continue to go up over time. So if he continues to put up 5 win seasons, they'll be worth more and more dollars-wise each year. Bad job by him not acknowledging that fact

All in all though, both are right. Howard got a great deal, Phils didn't

He has 1 season in his career when he was worth more than 5 wins above replacement. 1 season, the same number as Vernon Wells, the same number as Alex Rios, and 2 fewer than Alfonso Soriano. Replacement quality 1B tend to be good hitters, which is why this extension is dumb. This is actually pretty comparable to the Soriano deal, in that it pays for fantasy baseball numbers (OMG 40/40, OMG 150 RBIs) for a position player at a position where it is easy to find offense.



What's most depressing about this extension is that it proves that the Phillies front office doesn't like sabermetrics, valuation, or any of the new-fangled numbers. This portends bad things down the road.

I'll tell you what. We just saw some sparse crowds in Atlanta and Arizona (and a LOT of folks were wearing Phillies stuff in both places). And I've seen a lot of sparse crowds in a lot of games outside of Philly this season.

And CBP is sold out and SRO and all of that good stuff. You know they're selling tons of overpriced gear too. The Phils have got to be really close to the top of money earning franchises in MLB. and I'd bet most teams are WAY behind them.

Maybe the Phils are going to be the new Yanks. Or maybe Amaro is just getting way too cocky. Too soon to tell yet but the dude is really throwing the dough around.

The Eeming Tree wrote:Zolecki said his feeling is that the Phils think they can sign Wertz.

whaaaaa????
/boner

smugsmugsmug

WAR leaders among 1B the past three seasons (2007-2009):

Pujols 26.2
Teixiera 16.8
Youkilis 15.5
Fielder 14.7
Berkman 14.3
Cabrera ~13.9 (took 1 away since he played 3B in 2007)
A Gonzalez 13.3
C Pena 12.8
D Lee 12.4
Howard 12.4
Helton 9.8
Morneau 9.6
Votto 8.5 (two seasons)

If I took it back one more year it would probably look better, since Howard's 2006 was so massive

Werthless wrote:

joe table wrote:Neyer made the WAR vs salary argument, but what he left out was that the value of a win ($/win) does not stay constant. It has gone up steadily over time, and logically will continue to go up over time. So if he continues to put up 5 win seasons, they'll be worth more and more dollars-wise each year. Bad job by him not acknowledging that fact

All in all though, both are right. Howard got a great deal, Phils didn't

He has 1 season in his career when he was worth more than 5 wins above replacement. 1 season, the same number as Vernon Wells, the same number as Alex Rios, and 2 fewer than Alfonso Soriano. Replacement quality 1B tend to be good hitters, which is why this extension is dumb. This is actually pretty comparable to the Soriano deal, in that it pays for fantasy baseball numbers (OMG 40/40, OMG 150 RBIs) for a position player at a position where it is easy to find offense.



What's most depressing about this extension is that it proves that the Phillies front office doesn't like sabermetrics, valuation, or any of the new-fangled numbers. This portends bad things down the road.

Didn't the Ibanez deal prove that? I feel like that was already established

joe table wrote:

Werthless wrote:

joe table wrote:Neyer made the WAR vs salary argument, but what he left out was that the value of a win ($/win) does not stay constant. It has gone up steadily over time, and logically will continue to go up over time. So if he continues to put up 5 win seasons, they'll be worth more and more dollars-wise each year. Bad job by him not acknowledging that fact

All in all though, both are right. Howard got a great deal, Phils didn't

He has 1 season in his career when he was worth more than 5 wins above replacement. 1 season, the same number as Vernon Wells, the same number as Alex Rios, and 2 fewer than Alfonso Soriano. Replacement quality 1B tend to be good hitters, which is why this extension is dumb. This is actually pretty comparable to the Soriano deal, in that it pays for fantasy baseball numbers (OMG 40/40, OMG 150 RBIs) for a position player at a position where it is easy to find offense.



What's most depressing about this extension is that it proves that the Phillies front office doesn't like sabermetrics, valuation, or any of the new-fangled numbers. This portends bad things down the road.

Didn't the Ibanez deal prove that? I feel like that was already established

Or signing Placido "Productive Outs and One BB Per 75 Plate Appearances" Polanco

joe table wrote:Didn't the Ibanez deal prove that? I feel like that was already established

True. But each supporting signing is like a twist of the knife.

The easy initial reaction = this deal is terrible.

But I don't think its that easy, for a number of really simple reasons.

1. The Phillies are one of the 5 best teams in baseball, they have been over the last 4 years, and there is nothing to indicate they won't be in the next 5 years. Howard, no matter how you measure "value" has been an integral part of the lineup since he became a full time player. His faults are obvious, but he really only has one obvious fault, and that is his performance against LHP. Lots of big power hitters struggle against their same side platoon. Not many lefties kill LHP. But Howard is one of the 2 best hitters in baseball against RHP. And I see no real reason that skill will drop off. The other knocks on Howard are red herrings. His "bad body" really isn't bad. He's a big dude, but he's not fat anymore, and he runs well enough for a player his size. His defense still won't be confused with that of Keith Hernandez, but he's not a liability there, and I'm not convinced that the value of defense at 1B is as important as it is at the key up the middle positions. Howard moves well enough around the bag, he makes a fair number of running catches on popups, and he's good at digging balls out of the dirt. So the one knock against him, and its real, is his performance against lefties. The rest of the criticisms are poorly constructed at best.

2. Building on #1, the Phillies had to have figured out something if Howard left via free agency. Option 1 was trading for Adrian Gonzalez, and then paying him $25M per year. Option 2 was signing Prince Fielder on the open market. What would the market be by then? What if the Cardinals had given Pujols a 6/210M deal? Howard would have surely gotten 5/145. Fielder, because he's younger, might have gotten 8/215. There is no discount here. Its a ton of money. But there wouldn't have been a discount on the free agent market either. Agents understand that the Phillies would have had to get a marquee name to replace Howard at 1B if they let him go. There wouldn't have likely been any bargains. Maybe you can sign a good hitter at 5/85 to play 1B, but will he have produced as much as Howard?

3. I think its almost pointless to look at Howard's comparable hitters on BR or BP. His career arc is very unique, and while it seems the guys he is often compared to broke down and lost their physical shape as they aged, Howard is going in the opposite direction. The game of baseball is very different now than it was even 10 years ago, let alone 25 or 50 years ago. Guys take better care of themselves, they have more opportunities and possibilities as far as training and preparation goes, and the medical staffs are 100x better now than they were 50 years ago. If Howard turns into Mo Vaughn, and he might, it will be because of an injury or because he just let himself go. But he hasn't shown any indication that he's planning on letting himself go physically, and in fact, he looks better now than he did 4 years ago.

4. Howard's salary hurts the Phillies in 3 years if payroll stays the same. Since its generally understood that teams spend 80-90% of their revenue generated, if the Phillies continue to play well, sell out games, and raise prices of services, then there is no reason payroll will be cut, and in fact, payroll should continue to increase. It was $140M this year, but it could well be $150M next year and 160M in 2012. Obviously it still reduces the margin for error, but this team is basically assembled for the next 5 years anyway. Some of the fringe parts will need to be replaced and recycled, but the core won't. There is a bunch of salary coming off the books after 2010, and the money to sign Werth will be there, as long as his demands are reasonable. He's never stated that he didn't want to play in Philly, or that he couldn't wait to test the open market. In fact, I bet the Phillies already know exactly what the number is that he'll require to sign. And I wouldn't be shocked if they sign him in the next 3 months.

5. Make no mistake. The Phillies probably overpaid. No, they did overpay. But I don't view this as something that is going to hamstring the team down the road. If ownership suddenly tells Rube the payroll is going from $140M to $110M next year, then there will be problems. But there is no indication that the team is cutting payroll any time soon, and in fact, payroll has been steadily rising. This move doesn't hurt all that much. There won't really be any big free agent signings this winter, because there won't be many real needs. They will have $20M or so to re-sign Werth, maybe bring in a starter, and maybe bring in a reliever.

We overpaid. And I'm not sure why we did it now. But this isn't end of days stuff. The team will be fine.

Now I will say this. There is an argument that WAR/OPS/wOBA do underrate Howard's contributions to the Phillies, because he is one of those rare players that has shown a sustained ability to perform better with men on/RISP throughout his entire career

Career line: 2767 PAs, 279/384/583, .967 OPS, .394 wOBA

Career with men on base: 1665 PAs, 291/405/628, 116% better than his career line

Career with RISP: 1040 PAs, 280/416/582, 111% better than his career line

Career splits in Medium Leverage situations: 1460 PAs, .982 OPS, .401 wOBA
Career splits in High Leverage situations: 339 PAs, 1.176 OPS, .462 wOBA

These aren't small sample sizes either, other than the High Leverage split. They are significant, sustained patterns of elevated performance, which are even supported by one tangible theory: the removal of the shift on defense

He is not getting credit for this enhanced performance in more important spots in his straight slash line. So I am going to re-do the rankings with some more context-dependent stats to see where he ranks among 1B

probably a bad deal considering his age, and his known weaknesses.

but maybe not. he could improve OBP a little and be worth the $$$. plus the owners may view this as an investment in the urban market (or more likely fear the PR hit when he left).

so whatevs, not my money. welcome aboard.

Casey Close:

"The reason he felt the time was right was he loves his teammates, he loves the city. He wanted to be a part of something special for a long time to come."