Nationals Arm Race

A quick wrap-up of news items floated lately with a Nats interest in mind… and some opinion on each bullet point.

• Baseball America posted a wrap-up of the 2011 Nats draft.  In short, BA thought the Nats had the best draft in 2011, getting the draft’s best hitter in Anthony Rendon, a big arm in Alex Meyer and a potential steal in Matthew Purke.   Nothing we didn’t already know…
• Speaking of Rendon, this news item reports that he may not make it to the AFL after all.  This concerns me, honestly.  Just how bad was his shoulder injury??
• Interestingly, the Nats returned 2011 rule-5 pickup Elvin Ramirez to the Mets after having him languish on our 60-day DL all season.  I’m slightly surprised by the move, in that the team obviously wanted to give him a shot when they took him earlier this year.  Now, after paying his freight all year without ever really seeing him perform in a game situation (he did throw in the instructionals though) we’ve given up on him.  My guess is that the team knows its bullpen is going to be competitive in 2012 and don’t anticipate being able to carry a youngster.
• Ken Rosenthal has a quick primer on the issues remaining to be haggled over in the next MLB deal.   Some things of interest that could be included are draft slotting, an earlier signing deadline date, earlier free-agency, more wild-card teams and a balanced league schedule.
• Si’s Jon Heyman had a quick blurb about Phillie’s closer and FA Ryan Madson being a possible Nats off-season target.  More interestingly he reports that Jayson Werth is trying to pitch Madson on the team.  I’m guessing that the pitch job would include an understanding that the Nats already have a pretty good closer in Drew Storen (who just came in 3rd in the 2011 Rolaids Reliever of the Year award) and that Madson would be a setup guy.  In a crowded closer FA market, perhaps Madson needs to keep his options open in case he can’t get a closer guaranteed job.  I’m hoping that Werth’s “pitching” his former teammate isn’t interpreted as a lack of confidence in his current closer … a bit of press hype that certainly isn’t out of the realm of possible to be overblown so as to start a New York-style press issue.
• A couple different news sites along with MLB’s beat reporter Bill Ladson are reporting that the team is close to signing Chien-Ming Wang to a new deal.  This isn’t terribly surprising to those of us that have read every bit of Nats news this off season, and I’m all for signing him for 2012 after he’s been paid to re-hab for two years by this team.  It would be a refreshing bit of FA business to see someone like Wang take a lesser-monied deal to stay with the team that nursed him back to health.  Wang would probably slot in nicely as our #4 starter next year but would mean that the team faces a tough decision next spring training for the back end of the rotation.  Ross Detwiler is out of options and seems set to compete right now with Tommy Milone for this 5th starter spot.  This also leaves no room for additional FA signings (CJ Wilson anyone?).
• Thank god we don’t live in Boston.  Terry Franconia scapegoated for his team’s collapse in September and then absolutely denigrated by his owner (stay classy Mr. Henry).  Theo Epstein (who you may put more of the September collapse on than the manager by virtue of leaving the team rather thin in terms of quality starting pitching) reads the tea leaves and escapes for Chicago.  Now the whole “beer drinking” story that won’t die; starting pitchers would drink some beer and eat chicken on their off days, or maybe they were drinking beer in the dugout during games.  I dunno; a starter in-between starts has little to nothing to do during the games; in fact veterans are often allowed to travel home early to be with family.  It seems to me to be the Boston press playing into the hands of a rather cowardly news source, looking to grind a personal axe with the named players.  Not a very healthy organization, the Red Sox, right now.
• Bryce Harper finally exploded in the AFL with a homer, 2 other hits and 2 walks for a pretty good game.  I wouldn’t read too much into his struggles in the AFL, or in AA for that matter.  I think he’s exhausted after his first full season and it should be more telling to see how he starts 2012.
• Bill Ladson had a quick interview with Adam LaRoche, who reports that he’s recovering, starting baseball activities soon and that the team hasn’t promised him any playing time in 2012.  What??  I’m sure that quote is being blown out of proportion; why would the Nats have signed him for 2 years if they didn’t want him, for 2 whole years??  Of course the team wants him to play next year, to be the 25homer/100rbi left handed middle-of-the-order plus-defender player that they paid for in the off-season.  I suppose its possible the team will make a splash for Fielder or Pujols, but don’t think for a second this team doesn’t plan on just flushing LaRoche’s $8M salary in 2012.  Follow up comments from GM Rizzo seem to indicate the team plans to stand pat.
• Please, please Nats do not get involved in the Yu Darvish madness.  They got burned on Maya; the Red Sox got burned on Dice-K.  It’ll cost many tens of millions of dollars just to “win” the posting, then even more money to sign the guy.  Is he worth $80-$100M?  Wouldn’t you rather get a known quantity for that kind of pitching outlay?

Zack Greinke at the Royal's photo day 2010. Photo by Harry How/Getty Images North America

12/19/10 update: this article is essentially moot: Zack Greinke was dealt to Milwaukee along with infielder Yuniesky Betancourt for four players (outfielder Lorenzo Cain, shortstop Alcides Escobar and pitching prospects Jake Odorizzi and Jeremy Jeffress (who played HS ball in South Boston ironically enough).  I’m not familiar enough with the Milwaukee prospects to offer opinion one way or the other; here’s some opinions on the trade from FanGraphs, Ken Rosenthal, Jerry Crasnick, Joe Sheehan, and Keith Law.  Also from beat writers Kilgore and Zuckerman.

And, according to Jon Heyman via twitter, the Nats were close to a deal for Greinke in a deal that may or may not have included Storen and Espinosa.  Read more below.

—-

About 6 weeks ago the question of a possible Nat’s trade for Zack Greinke came up in a Keith Law chat (link is ESPN insider only) and the trade proposal was Zimmermann, Espinosa, Burgess and Detwiler.  I wrote about this theoretical deal at the time, saying it was too much to give up.

A glass-is-half empty analysis of these four players (which was apparently the opinion of Law, since he thought this would be a good deal for Washington) is something along the lines of the following: Zimmermann is promising pitcher but has yet to really produce consistently at the major league level.  Espinosa is also promising but is replaceable by our up-and-coming 2nd base prospects Lombardozzi and Kobernus.  Burgess has been solidly improving as he’s progressed through the system but he’s still the toolsy/high promise player that Jim Bowden adored but which has never really panned out.  Lastly Detwiler has shown flashes of dominance but lost pretty much the entirety of 2010 to injury and is getting pushed further and further down the rotation depth chart.

The glass-is-half full opinion of these four players is simple: they represent the bulk of our farm system’s player development over the past few  years.  These four players represent the absolute cream of our drafting crop over the past few  years; a #1, a supplemental #1, a #2 and a #3 round draft pick.

Now today, we are hearing the TRUE bounty that Greinke would cost, and it is similarly heavy.   Greinke has hired new agents and apparently demanded a trade.  He also has a limited clause in his contract that allows him to block trades to certain teams, and the Nats are on that list.  According to Buster Olney though, the Royals and Nats have been talking and he discovered the actual price it would take (another ESPN insider link): Zimmerman, Espinosa and new closer Drew Storen.  On 12/24/10, KLaw reported that the offer was Zimmermann, Storen, Norris.  Wow that would have been quite the bounty.

This trade option replaces the unknown players (Detwiler and Burgess) with the known quantity (Storen), and only seems slightly less palatable than the Law chat proposal.  Can the Nats possibly give up 3 of their planned “starting 14” players (the 8 out-field players, the 5 rotation guys and the closer) next year for Greinke?

Here’s my problem: Greinke had the makings of looking like an otherwise solid pitcher with a one-year wonder season that won him the Cy Young in 2009.  Is he really an “Ace” in this league?  His 2010 season was unremarkable (an ERA+ of exactly 100, meaning he performed at the mlb average), but now scouts are surmising that he was tired of his team going nowhere and he was “bored” most of the year.  But the fact remains there is no guarantee he returns to his 2009 performance.

If i’m Rizzo, I say no to this deal.

One last note about possibly overvaluing “prospects.”  Storen, Espinosa and Zimmermann are not prospects; they’ve graduated to becoming “promising young players.”  They have all made the majors, they’ve all competed at the highest levels and the Nats have a decent idea of what they can do.  Guys like Detwiler (because of his injury history) and players who have never reached the majors (Burgess as mentioned in this post) are the real “prospects” in question.  Teams and Fans overvalue prospects in a pseudo-parental relationship because they’ve watched the players grow up and grow.  But as Rosenthal pointed out (in the linked article above), prospects mostly flame out or don’t become major leaguers.  That’s the difference; teams MUST be willing to part with prospects to get real players.

Nats fans have seen Adam Dunn do this for the last time. Photo: seasonticketdc.com

Several years ago, I began a rant about the Nats payroll levels vis-a-vis our market size that essentially continues through to today.  Washington DC as a market is clearly a large market:

• We are 7th in total population (when measured by Metropolitan Statistical Areas); just behind Miami/Ft. Lauderdale and Dallas and just ahead of  Houston and Detroit.
• We are 9th in terms of DMA TV households (just behind Atlanta/Boston and just ahead of Houston and Detroit again).

And yet, in 2010 we had the 23rd ranked payroll of the 30 teams, spending just $66M in salary (2010 opening day number).  Meanwhile the teams located in comparable cities spent much much more.  Houston had a $92m payroll, Detroit $122M, Atlanta $84M.  Miami and Boston are outliers for separate and obvious reasons (Boston essentially services the entire NE area while the Florida Marlins owners are the worst examples of owners taking advantage of the revenue sharing system in the league).

According to my estimates (available here or via the link in the Nats Creations section to the right), the Nats (as of publication) have $29M committed for 2011, and likely will have a payroll that is around $46.5M once all arbitration cases are settled.  Notice this is almost exactly $20M less than in 2010 (Dunn at $12M and Guzman at $8M neatly equal the delta).

Clearly, the Nats need to be increasing payroll.  I’m pretty sure this is one of the reasons Kasten left the team frankly; I don’t think he saw eye to eye with the Lerners in terms of payroll outlay.  Certainly not in terms of the 2009 opening day roster team, which was an abomination of a roster and successfully gutted the season ticket base and fan satisfaction leading into the new stadium.

BUT, and this is a large But, we should not just arbitrarily spend money just to spend it.  So we have a conundrum.  With Vazquez and De La Rosa off the market, the FA pitcher market is, as Jayson Stark put it, a disaster area.  With the exception of an experimental flyer on Webb, I wouldn’t want a single guy left.  Jon Heyman ranked the top 15 or so FAs and it has to be one of the weakest FA markets ever.  Of the hitters out there, we definitely could use them (especially Werth in right and Crawford in center, as well as the probable eventual signing of Pena for 1B), but the question is, will they come to Washington?  Why come to the Nats if a perennial playoff contender comes calling with more money and longer guaranteed contracts?  Isn’t that why Dunn just left?

Tom Boswell put out a post expressing some worry about the Nats and this off season, only somewhat alluding to the payroll issue.  And I agree.  Who knew that we’d be seeing a spending spree this off season, after two relatively frugal off-seasons preceding it.  Now that Dunn has left, one has to wonder what the team really should do.

I’m afraid the Nats are stuck frankly.  We have money to spend, and NEED to spend money to show some good will towards a fan base that clearly sees the Lerners as incompetent, penny pinching and too cheap to really deserve a $600M baseball team.  But, who are we going to spend this money on?  At this point the best moves seem to be to try to acquire guys via trade ( Greinke or Garza come to mind) but these guys will cost us what few prospects we actually have right now.  Is it worth it to give up 4 upper end guys to acquire 2 years of Greinke’s services?

As much as I hate to say it, I believe the best course right now is to NOT spend money, play out 2011 with what we have (and perhaps a couple of lower end, one-year FAs) and regroup for 2012.  Let our prospects play and get experience, find out if the likes of Espinosa, Desmond, Morse, Morgan, Bernadina, Ramos, Zimmermann, Maya and the rest of the bullpen are really quality guys.  Trade Willingham for more kids. Wait for Strasburg to get healthy. And go firing into NEXT off season with a vengeance.

Is this the Nat's 2011 Opening Day Starter? (Photo deadspin.com)

By now we’ve all seen predictions of free agents in the off season.  Here’s some from Tim Dierkes, here’s the rest of the MLB trade rumors writers, here’s some by Jon Heyman, and here’s a bunch by the HardBall Times guys.   By various accounts the Nats are going to:

• Let Adam Dunn walk.
• Sign Carlos Pena to take his place
• Roll the dice on Brandon Webb
• Chase after but not obtain Cliff Lee
• Eventually sign Javier Vazquez (I really hope not)
• Maybe get Jorge de la Rosa (I hope not)
• Possibly get JJ Putz as a closer placeholder/trade bait version of Matt Capps

Note: I’ve also seen comments here and there that we’d be interested in Hisanori Takahashi, a 35yr old utility guy in the Mets bullpen or taking Kosuke Fukudome off the Cub’s hands.  The former isn’t a FA and is arbitration eligible but the Mets reportedly are non-tendering him.  The latter could be mildly intriguing; he’s a decent hitter, a decent fielder who has played center in the past.  But it doesn’t necessarily improve over a Morse/Bernadina combo.  Of course, i’m also hearing about possible trades for Zack Greinke (as covered in this blog posting) or Matt Garza.  I’d love to have either guy of course, but don’t want to give up the farm for either guy.  And now that Dan Uggla has indicated that he wants out of Florida (and honestly, given the cheap-skate way the franchise is run and the way the players are run out of town as soon as they get too expensive, who wouldn’t?), there’s all sorts of rumors about his possible destination … and the Nats are in the thick of it.

(Side note: do you start to think that the Nats are acting a little out of character this off season?  They’re attached to marquee free agents, they’re listed as “interested parties” on half the free agents out there, and they’re putting their name in the hat for all the big names on the trading block.  Is this all for real or is this severe over-compensation for the Lerner’s spending the past 5 years of acting like MLB paupers?)

So, our 2011 rotation could look like this:

1. Livan Hernandez
2. Brandon Webb
3. John Lannan
4. Javier Vazquez
5. Jordan Zimmermann

Leaving the likes of Maya, Detwiler, injury disappointment Wang and $15M bust Jason Marquis on the sidelines (to say nothing of the next tier of guys like Stammen, Atilano, Martis, Mock and Chico looking at bullpen spots or AAA).  I can’t see Sammy Solis making a Mike Leake-esque debut at the MLB level having never pitched a day in the minors, especially after his less-than-dominant AFL numbers.

The POTENTIAL of this rotation is great.  Webb’s a former Cy Young winner, Vazquez an innings eater who garnered Cy Young votes in 2009 in Atlanta.  Lannan (outside of the first half of last year) is a difficult lefty who gets a ton of ground balls and pitches at a 110 era+ level, Livan is a revalation and Zimmermann is a Matt Cain replica who could be just as dominant with mid 90s possible shutdown stuff.  The reality could be just as bad: Livan is a soft tossing righty who depends on guile and is regularly shelled, Webb hasn’t pitched in 2 years, Vazquez has lost his fastball, Zimmermann is promising but has never produced, and Lannan (our Ace) is a #4 pitcher on a good staff.  Nothing like glass is half empty/glass is half full analysis.

Our non-pitching/out-field lineup looks pretty set already for the 2011 season.

1. (L) Nyjer Morgan – CF
2. (R) Ian Desmond – 2b (yes I think he and Espinosa need to switch)
3. (R) Ryan Zimmerman – 3b
4. (L) Carlos Pena – 1b (he has to bat cleanup to go R-L-R in the heart of the order)
5. (R) Josh Willingham – LF
6. (L) Roger Bernadina/(R) Michael Morse platoon in RF
7. (R) Ivan Rodriguez – C
8. (S) Danny Espinosa – SS
9. Pitcher

I can live with that.  Frankly i’d like to see another outfielder acquisition.  I liked Bernadina and Morse’s production this year but they’re not game changers.  You really need to use your power positions on the field (first and third base, right field, left field) to hold your big boppers, and we need more production out of the RF spot.  Jayson Werth would really fit in nicely there wouldn’t he?  I guess we wait til 2012 and the introduction of Bryce Harper to fill that spot.

I also think we need to do something in center/leadoff.  Morgan’s troubles towards the end of last season are well documented, but his production wasn’t earning him playing time.  If the Red Sox acquire Carl Crawford, that might make Jacoby Ellsbury available.  His 2010 was a wash but he’d be the perfect center fielder/leadoff guy.  2009 stats: 70sbs, .301 BA and a .355 obp.

Willingham has mentioned that he would be willing to play First, and I think that’d be a great alternative if we can’t get any of the free agent 1st basement to come here.  We could go with an outfield of Bernadina, Morgan and Morse with Willingham at 1st base, giving us a decently good lineup both offensively and defensively.

It looks to be a really interesting offseason for the Nats.