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Jacoby Ellsbury nearing 7 yr/$153mm deal w/MFY
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Post by jimed14 on Dec 5, 2013 19:45:15 GMT -5
So now that Ellsbury is gone, Lester is easily signable next year. What do people think he'll want?
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Post by mredsox89 on Dec 5, 2013 19:54:31 GMT -5
So now that Ellsbury is gone, Lester is easily signable next year. What do people think he'll want? He was just on WEEI. Speier tweeted out a few things. Alex Speier ?@alexspeier 6m Lester on possible extension: 'Boston's my home... It's all I want to know.' Alex Speier ?@alexspeier 5m Lester said wasn't hard to leave millions on table in 1st extension, and understands if he wants to stay, has to be OK doing the same So he's at the very least saying the right things now. Obviously a ton can change within a year. I would assume on the open market he at least approaches Greinke contract status. Would the Sox sign him at that, I'd lean towards no. But at some point the marginal value of every dollar on the contract isn't worth very much. If he's willing to take a below market deal, he certainly ends up staying in Boston
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ericmvan
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Post by ericmvan on Dec 6, 2013 11:33:32 GMT -5
Call me a skeptic ... Again, I don't fault the guy for taking the best deal but let's not sugar coat this as a strategic decision. His strategy was to get as much compensation as possible. I won't call you a skeptic. I'll call you a cynical, spoiled child who either has no understanding of human psychology, or is willingly setting it aside out of a desperate need to take down their departing ex-hero as some kind of greedy mercenary, or, fueled by jealousy, needs to see all athletes that way. And this accusation goes for everyone else who has taken this attitude. I'm frankly tired of it, because it's depressing that people could either be so out of touch with universal human reality, or (worse) so willfully out of touch with it. The Yankees were in a unique position where Jacoby Ellsbury was worth way more to them than to anyone else. They have the steepest relationship of team success to revenue of any team in baseball, and they were in the exact point in their win versus revenue curve where the gain in revenue by adding wins would yield the biggest return. And here's a ballplayer ideally suited for their ballpark who is terribly suited for his current one. So they can offer him $30M more than their estimate of his old team's best possible offer. What else might a ballplayer want, they ask? Oh, we play in a city that some regard as the greatest on the planet. We have the greatest winning tradition in American sports. We play in a brand new park with every conceivable amenity. There's no argument that taking that offer tells you anything about Ellsbury's priorities. But I will tell you precisely what Jacoby Ellsbury's strategy actually was: to take the contract he liked the best.Because cognitive neuroscience has established that all human beings make every decision that way. When people suffer brain damage to the parts of the brain that deal with feelings, so that they can no longer tell what they like, they develop enormous problems making decisions. Your assertion says that Ellsbury would have signed with the Astros for $5000 more than our offer, right? Oh, sure he would, because uprooting his family and playing for the worst team in baseball instead of the best is so worth $5000! Your assertion is equivalent to saying that money is the only thing that mattered to Ellsbury. Literally. The only thing: the quality of the city he'd be playing in, the climate, the reputation of the manager (e.g., Ellsbury would have taken $5K more to play under Bobby Valentine again), the team's chances of winning, whether his wife and family said they'd be happy in that situation ... none of that meant jack shit. Only the money mattered, because he derives so much pleasure from money that everything else becomes irrelevant. That's the only thing he likes in life that's worth considering ... which follows from you assertion that whoever pays him the most money, that's what he likes best.
I want you and all the others repeating this tired crap to ask yourself, how many people do I know personally who fit that description? And then take a good hard look in the mirror and ask yourself, why exactly do I need so badly to see this guy as inhuman?
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Post by rjp313jr on Dec 6, 2013 12:20:51 GMT -5
I agree we cannot draw conclusions as to what Elsbury's strategy was and we shouldn't cast aspersions as to what his desires were just because he took that contract from the Yankees. Which is one reason why you shouldn't kick the crap out of someone then say something like "I will tell you precisely what Jacoby Ellsbury's strategy actually was:"
Another reason you shouldn't kick the crap out of someone like that especially in this context is because you basically just did to the poster what he did to Elsbury except MUCH MUCH MUCH worse. I mean seriously, can you read what you wrote to him and not feel like a complete jerk?
Not to mention your "precisely" was the most general statement you could have possibly made.
"to take the contract he liked the best."
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Post by James Dunne on Dec 6, 2013 12:58:21 GMT -5
It's ok that Jacoby Ellbsury signed with the Yankees. It's ok to root against him because he did it - it's sport, after all. Let's all just try to stop playing armchair psychologists, ok?
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Post by jimed14 on Dec 6, 2013 13:03:02 GMT -5
It's ok that Jacoby Ellbsury signed with the Yankees. It's ok to root against him because he did it - it's sport, after all. Let's all just try to stop playing armchair psychologists, ok? It's like the endless "why won't high schoolers sign?" debates.
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Post by James Dunne on Dec 6, 2013 13:06:09 GMT -5
It's ok that Jacoby Ellbsury signed with the Yankees. It's ok to root against him because he did it - it's sport, after all. Let's all just try to stop playing armchair psychologists, ok? It's like the endless "why won't high schoolers sign?" debates. Frankly, those are even worse because they involve (supposedly) emotionally-developed adults getting pissy at 17-year-old kids for wanting to go to college instead of signing with their favorite sports club. But yes, it's along those lines. We have no idea what Ellsbury's goals are, and he's not us. It's fine to root for or against him but it's not ok to think we can psychoanalyze him.
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Post by thelavarnwayguy on Dec 6, 2013 13:25:36 GMT -5
The college issue has nothing to do with emotions. The only one having emotional issues about it is the kid. I have no personal issue with any of these guys. It's just a judgement call based on reason and probability. For a lot of these guys it's about "My buddy is going to that college and it will be fun" instead of "Heh, I can put a definite $1.4 mil in my pocket right now and probably get to the majors faster" as compared to "I might even get 3 mil if I wait another 2 years".
It's their choice. No one is holding a gun to their head. It's our advice and reasoned argument. That's all it is. No emotion.
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Post by jimed14 on Dec 6, 2013 13:31:39 GMT -5
The college issue has nothing to do with emotions. The only one having emotional issues about it is the kid. I have no personal issue with any of these guys. It's just a judgement call based on reason and probability. For a lot of these guys it's about "My buddy is going to that college and it will be fun" instead of "Heh, I can put a definite $1.4 mil in my pocket right now and probably get to the majors faster" as compared to "I might even get 3 mil if I wait another 2 years". It's their choice. No one is holding a gun to their head. It's our advice and reasoned argument. That's all it is. No emotion. There is a lot of "all highschoolers should sign even when they said they're going to college" talk. Then some fans get pissed that they don't and start whining about why they won't take $1.2 million when they might get nothing. It's all whining.
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Post by James Dunne on Dec 6, 2013 13:36:52 GMT -5
The college issue has nothing to do with emotions. The only one having emotional issues about it is the kid. I have no personal issue with any of these guys. It's just a judgement call based on reason and probability. For a lot of these guys it's about "My buddy is going to that college and it will be fun" instead of "Heh, I can put a definite $1.4 mil in my pocket right now and probably get to the majors faster" as compared to "I might even get 3 mil if I wait another 2 years". Thanks for proving my point!
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Post by rjp313jr on Dec 6, 2013 14:25:32 GMT -5
Wait, what? He finished in the top 10 in the National League in nearly every category. He had an awesome season. Yeah, that's a weird claim. He finished 8th in Cy Young voting, and posted the second best ERA, ERA+, and WHIP of his career. His FIP/xFIP's were a bit higher than in recent years, but still better than his career norms. I also don't think we should forget that he's an absolutely fantastic hitter, winning the Silver Slugger after hitting .328 with a 126 OPS+ and 1.3 oWAR. And hey, it's certainly not his fault Carlos Quintin made him miss a five starts by fracturing his collarbone. Looking at the Dodgers schedule during the time he was out, he missed out on facing some very weak offensive teams. You call it an awesome season, I call it a very good one. If you think it's worth 24.5m then that's your opinion and I won't tell you that you are wrong. I did say it's too early, but sorry in a big contract like this the expectations are often you outperform it or live up to it early then tale off. Jrff makes a valid point on the generality of the way to look at the contracts. However, with regards to Greinke, I don't really care where he ranked amongst himself (esp since i thought it was an overpay to begin with) and sure comparing him to the NL is valid, but as far as I'm concerned we're talking 24.5m so i'd prefer to compare him to MLB. It's not about whether he's a good pitcher. We know he is. He's being paid like he is elite and I don't think he was last year. His year last year by comparison to some other pitchers along with their MLB ranks.
| WAR | SIERA | xFIP | FIP | tERA | K% | BB% | K/BB | WHIP | HR/9 | Greinke | 43 | 29 | 21 | 15 | 28 | 39 | 34 | 32 | 15 | 16 | Scherzer | 2 | 6 | 12 | 7 | 3 | 2 | 39 | 10 | 3 | 22 | Kershaw | 1 | 8 | 6 | 2 | 2 | 10 | 23 | 8 | 1 | 2 | Wainwright | 4 | 7 | 4 | 4 | 8 | 22 | 3 | 2 | 9 | 7 | Price | 15 | 18 | 14 | 10 | 12 | 40 | 2 | 4 | 14 | 24 | Fernandez | 19 | 12 | 10 | 6 | 9 | 4 | 44 | 30 | 4 | 6 | Hernandez | 6 | 3 | 2 | 5 | 7 | 6 | 19 | 7 | 18 | 17 | Darvish | 10 | 2 | 5 | 20 | 26 | 1 | 56 | 24 | 11 | 63 | Verlander | 7 | 32 | 37 | 21 | 29 | 15 | 42 | 42 | 57 | 26 | Harvey | 5 | 1 | 1 | 1 | 1 | 3 | 8 | 3 | 2 | 1 |
What does this tell us? I'm sure it tells different people different things and obviously it's a random sampling of pitchers, but i just listed 10 high level big named pitchers. Greinke compares most favorably to Verlander and Price on this list, which is pretty good company by name, but also two guys who had some big struggles (for them) during stretches of this year. Greinke is the only guy on this list that isn't top 10 in any categories (his highest is a 15) and everyone else other than Verlander had multiple top 10s. His SIERA rank is 29 and WAR rank 43. xFIP and tERA outside the top 20. Even the stupid Fangraphs value calculator had him being worth almost 10m less than his contract. I always tend to think that inflates a players worth, but even I won't try to say he wasn't worth $14.9m last year because he certainly was and probably more. Greinke also had the best BABIP since his rookie year. GB% rate down a bit, his LD% up a bit and K rate was down from recent years too. Just comparing him to him. He's getting paid as Elite and in my opinion it wasn't quite an elite year. Very good though and with the Dodger's money if he can repeat that season over 6 years he'd be worth the contract. To me there's reasons to think regression is more likely than not. Oh yea, and the Carlos Quentin injury was absolutely his fault. In fact, it was one of the more preventable injuries there was in the game last year, if not the most preventable. He has no one to blame but himself. If you were at a bar and spit in a guys face, especially one you had a bad history with and got your nose broken, who's fault is that?
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Post by rjp313jr on Dec 6, 2013 14:31:22 GMT -5
It's like the endless "why won't high schoolers sign?" debates. Frankly, those are even worse because they involve (supposedly) emotionally-developed adults getting pissy at 17-year-old kids for wanting to go to college instead of signing with their favorite sports club. But yes, it's along those lines. We have no idea what Ellsbury's goals are, and he's not us. It's fine to root for or against him but it's not ok to think we can psychoanalyze him. How about not psychoanalyzing or better yet not demonstratively belittling other posters? We can all get snippy at times and that's just part of this and truthfully somewhat entertaining, but.... (no need to say more)
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Post by James Dunne on Dec 6, 2013 15:09:51 GMT -5
Because it's useless and it just leads to arguing.
This whole "Ellsbury SHOULD have done X," "Ryan Boldt is irrational"... there's no point of discussion there. We have no way of knowing what a player's goals are when he hires an agent or accepts a contract or whatever. The vitriol when a free agent leaves is bad enough, but to be expected - we grow an emotional attachment to the players, and we want to rationalize why they might not feel the same about us. I can understand it to a point, but the above posts arguing about the semantics in their own fake Ellsbury psyches is just too far outside the realm. That's why I brought it up.
In the cases that jimed brings up, though, about the high schoolers, it's much, much more destructive, mean-spirited and harder to fathom. And it happens every single year. If you'd like to discuss that in more depth we should probably take it to another forum though, because that's pretty off the topic of Ellsbury signing.
Back onto Ellsbury. The Yankees inability to bring Cano back makes the Ellsbury deal a bit curious to me. I think 7/$153 is a lot but not exorbitant. Honestly, it reminds me quite a bit of the Teixeira deal, where elite money is given to a very good but non-elite player (Joe Posnanski coined deals like this "Tex-pensive" which I kind of like). It made sense to me, though, because I thought the Yankees had enough space to bring back Cano. Sometimes a team has to overpay free agents when there isn't another alternative. But then they didn't bring Cano back. The downgrade from Cano/Granderson/Pettitte/Mo Rivera to Ellsbury/McCann/Kelly Johnson/whatever else they do with that cash is notable.
Transactions can't be considered only in a vacuum. If they were, 7/153 for Ellsbury is defensible in the same way that the Royals dealing Myers for Shields was defensible. What makes me put both into the bad deal is the context. The Royals went into win-now mode, but didn't go far enough in that direction. They sacrificed a chunk of their future to become better, but sort of hedged their bets into a worst-of-both-worlds scenario where they just missed the playoffs. So it goes with the Yankees. If signing Ellsbury cost them the chance to keep Cano, then it was a bad signing. Cano's AAV is only about $2 million more than Ellsbury got, and there's very, very little chance that Ellsbury plus what they do with that $2 Million will be worth Cano in the next seven years. And since they're willing to overspend to win now, why overspend on the inferior, less durable player?
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Post by rjp313jr on Dec 6, 2013 15:22:23 GMT -5
Doesn't Cano getting those years 8-9-10 mean a lot though? He's likely to be AROD-like where they are paying huge dollars to someone who can barely play replacement level baseball, if at all. I'm not talking about the Arod of the last couple years (when on the field) I'm talking about the ARod we're likely to see over the next 3-4 years.
However, if you can't make your team good enough during Elsbury's good years then that contract was a waste too...
I think this is a case of the Mariners screwing themselves and the Yankees, which is kind of nice.
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Post by jimed14 on Dec 6, 2013 15:24:34 GMT -5
Because it's useless and it just leads to arguing. This whole "Ellsbury SHOULD have done X," "Ryan Boldt is irrational"... there's no point of discussion there. We have no way of knowing what a player's goals are when he hires an agent or accepts a contract or whatever. The vitriol when a free agent leaves is bad enough, but to be expected - we grow an emotional attachment to the players, and we want to rationalize why they might not feel the same about us. I can understand it to a point, but the above posts arguing about the semantics in their own fake Ellsbury psyches is just too far outside the realm. That's why I brought it up. In the cases that jimed brings up, though, about the high schoolers, it's much, much more destructive, mean-spirited and harder to fathom. And it happens every single year. If you'd like to discuss that in more depth we should probably take it to another forum though, because that's pretty off the topic of Ellsbury signing. Back onto Ellsbury. The Yankees inability to bring Cano back makes the Ellsbury deal a bit curious to me. I think 7/$153 is a lot but not exorbitant. Honestly, it reminds me quite a bit of the Teixeira deal, where elite money is given to a very good but non-elite player (Joe Posnanski coined deals like this "Tex-pensive" which I kind of like). It made sense to me, though, because I thought the Yankees had enough space to bring back Cano. Sometimes a team has to overpay free agents when there isn't another alternative. But then they didn't bring Cano back. The downgrade from Cano/Granderson/Pettitte/Mo Rivera to Ellsbury/McCann/Kelly Johnson/whatever else they do with that cash is notable. Transactions can't be considered only in a vacuum. If they were, 7/153 for Ellsbury is defensible in the same way that the Royals dealing Myers for Shields was defensible. What makes me put both into the bad deal is the context. The Royals went into win-now mode, but didn't go far enough in that direction. They sacrificed a chunk of their future to become better, but sort of hedged their bets into a worst-of-both-worlds scenario where they just missed the playoffs. So it goes with the Yankees. If signing Ellsbury cost them the chance to keep Cano, then it was a bad signing. Cano's AAV is only about $2 million more than Ellsbury got, and there's very, very little chance that Ellsbury plus what they do with that $2 Million will be worth Cano in the next seven years. And since they're willing to overspend to win now, why overspend on the inferior, less durable player? I think they underestimated the market for Cano. They probably didn't see any teams stepping up like Seattle did so they figured he'd just sign with the Yankees. Especially when the rumors of $300 million were floating around.
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Post by JackieWilsonsaid on Dec 6, 2013 15:31:57 GMT -5
I also se no path for the mfy to become dominant any time soon.
I loved Ells but he is marginally elite when perfect and a ticking time bomb.
Their are very few if any elite free agents coming up.
Their former stars are aged not aging.
This is exactly why the sox aren't following the MFY Model.
I
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Post by taftreign on Dec 6, 2013 16:33:10 GMT -5
Doesn't Cano getting those years 8-9-10 mean a lot though? He's likely to be AROD-like where they are paying huge dollars to someone who can barely play replacement level baseball, if at all. I'm not talking about the Arod of the last couple years (when on the field) I'm talking about the ARod we're likely to see over the next 3-4 years. However, if you can't make your team good enough during Elsbury's good years then that contract was a waste too... I think this is a case of the Mariners screwing themselves and the Yankees, which is kind of nice. I don't know. I'd say based on the alternatives Seattle chose the right player to go 9 or 10 years with from what was available on the free agent market. He's the one player I'd look to give a chance to provide positive value in the back end of the deal. I guess I'm buying his hitting ability to sustain him. The power is likely to decline but he can extend his career as a .280 to .285 hitter, 15 to 17 HR player who is average in the field at 2nd IMO. Just as Ortiz has remained productive despite his age. I think Seattle gets enough value in the first 7 years to make the last 3 seasons worth the risk. This slight "overpay" also legitimizes the team to other free agents they are trying to land and sends a signal to the fan base. Ticket sales should rise after this off season for Seattle which should have a part B and part C coming. Despite a long list of recent bad decisions for Nintendo it looks like they might have made a pretty solid one here.
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Gwell55
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Post by Gwell55 on Dec 6, 2013 17:05:56 GMT -5
Doesn't Cano getting those years 8-9-10 mean a lot though? He's likely to be AROD-like where they are paying huge dollars to someone who can barely play replacement level baseball, if at all. I'm not talking about the Arod of the last couple years (when on the field) I'm talking about the ARod we're likely to see over the next 3-4 years. However, if you can't make your team good enough during Elsbury's good years then that contract was a waste too... I think this is a case of the Mariners screwing themselves and the Yankees, which is kind of nice. I don't know. I'd say based on the alternatives Seattle chose the right player to go 9 or 10 years with from what was available on the free agent market. He's the one player I'd look to give a chance to provide positive value in the back end of the deal. I guess I'm buying his hitting ability to sustain him. The power is likely to decline but he can extend his career as a .280 to .285 hitter, 15 to 17 HR player who is average in the field at 2nd IMO. Just as Ortiz has remained productive despite his age. I think Seattle gets enough value in the first 7 years to make the last 3 seasons worth the risk. This slight "overpay" also legitimizes the team to other free agents they are trying to land and sends a signal to the fan base. Ticket sales should rise after this off season for Seattle which should have a part B and part C coming. Despite a long list of recent bad decisions for Nintendo it looks like they might have made a pretty solid one here. 3 Year Marketing Strategy = Buy CANO, buy X power player, buy X outfielder, trade for Price and shoot the moon for 1st World Series... Thanks for giving us team dad we are now SELLING TEAM for good profit!
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