This is the time of year when "rosterbation" tends to crescendo. The basic idea is to see what player acquisitions your favorite team can make and stay within your best guess of what the team's payroll limitations may be. I used to engage in "rosterbation" a lot back in the Giants Message Board days, but ultimately found it to be unsatisfying due to too many unknown unknowns. I still like to read these ideas and we still do a little of it here, but trust me, there is not much point in trying to outguess what the Giants might do or not do with their money in a given offseason. Heck, I'm not sure even THEY knew what they wanted to do with their money last year!
Grant Brisbee indulged in a bit of rosterbation on his McCovey Chronicles site. After reading it and also reading the comments, I had some thoughts I don't think have been widely considered which I will now share:
1. We've received some mixed signals from the Giants front office about what they consider to be their payroll limit for next season. On the one hand, you have Giants President Larry Baer saying he does not anticipate going over the Competitive Balance Adjustment aka "Luxury Tax" threshold. On the other, he also said he anticipates a continued steady rise in payroll by 5-10% per year. Depending on how you interpret the "Luxury Tax" rules, those two positions may or may not be mutually exclusive. Depending on what number you believe last year's Giants payroll to be, a 5-10% increase would either put them over the threshold by a small margin or put them under by a small margin. One thing I did learn from reading that piece and the following comments is the non-salary part of the "Luxury Tax" calculation is around $11 M which means the maximum the Giants can go is about $178 M which is about $7 M above what they started the 2015 season at.
2. The Giants committed payroll for 2016 for "Luxury Tax" calculations is probably about $4-5 M less than actual payroll due to current backloaded deals with Jake Peavy, Sergio Romo, Buster Posey and Madison Bumgarner. This means they could conceivably go to the low $180's M range and still technically start the season at or under the "Luxury Tax" cap. BTW, option years do not count unless it is a player option although it appears that buyouts count in the numerator but the year does not count in the denominator.
3. The Giants have already demonstrated that they are willing to pay penalties to get what they need or want. They went slightly above the "Luxury Tax" last year after the mid-season acquisitions, and they paid a penalty for signing Lucious Fox and were apparently willing to pay an additional penalty for signing Eddy Julio Martinez.
4. This is the third season in which the "Luxury Tax" threshold is stable at $189 M. It will probably go up significantly in the next CBA agreement which will kick in for the 2017 season. This increases the likelihood that the Giants could get back under the threshold in the near future even if they go slightly above again this year.
5. Deferred payments were a huge part of Max Scherzer's contract last year. If the Giants are serious about signing either David Price or Zack Greinke, it is possible, even likely, that they will have to also consider deferred payments as part of the package. Deferred payments are interesting from a "Luxury Tax" standpoint. On the one hand, they are counted in the numerator of the Average Annual Value(AAV) equation. On the other hand, they are discounted to today's dollars. For example, even though Scherzer's $105 M of deferred payments were counted toward his AAV, they were discounted so that the total compensation was calculated as $191 M instead of $210 M which gave about $3 M per year in "Luxury Tax" relief to the team. Also, deferred payments are not counted against the "Luxury Tax" in the years they are made.
6. The Giants, either by design or good fortune have done a good job of staggering their major contracts so that they have significant amounts of salary coming off the payroll in each of the next 3 seasons: Pagan, Peavy, Romo and Lopez after 2016, Cain after 2017 and Pence after 2018.
7. The Giants have a deep farm system which should help keep costs down over the next 5-6 years, while continuing to give the Giants flexibility to make needed trades.
8. The mortgage for AT&T Park will be paid off after the 2017 season freeing up an extra $17 M per season. Revenues from the new development across from McCovey Cove will start flowing in about 4-5 years which will be revenue that is not subject to revenue sharing.
What does this all point to? I honestly don't know in specific terms. I do not expect the Giants to go $100 M over the "Luxury Tax" threshold like the Dodgers or to hand out $105 M in deferred salary like the Nationals did with Scherzer, nor would I want them to do either. I believe it does show that the Giants have some flexibility and a number of different ways of attacking the free agent and trade market this offseason and still remain true to their commitment to responsible budgeting and also maintaining payroll flexibility in future seasons.
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Good topic. The Times had something on the Doyers this morning: http://www.latimes.com/sports/dodgers/la-sp-dodgers-payroll-20151115-story.html
ReplyDeleteI'm just thinking that a Greinke negotiation is sort of like threading a needle. You have to put on a big charm offensive, you have to get the numbers in, and then you have to wait for the player to decide. That is a lot of variables that can fall apart at anytime.
I have noticed the Giants staggering their contracts for a number of years, I'd call it deliberate. I was in favor of the Scutaro, Pagan and Cain contracts, if you look at them hard, its hard to say any are successes, injuries are a big variable as well. The best laid plans can fall apart quick.
I don't expect the Giants to go over the luxury tax, but I do think they should consider it for a year if it puts them in a place to compete. You can sneak back in 2017. Of course, they aren't giving up 40-50MM a year like the Dodgers are looking at right now, its more like 5-10MM. If you get in the playoffs, that's a good trade off. It seems like the NL Central is going to be good competition for that wild card sneak in, as we found out this year. I also think the Nats will improve, and the Marlins might get one of their sneaky runs with Fernandez healthy. Of course... Donnie Two Times will prohibit a deep run most likely, but lots of competition for that wild card.
Wow, great article, makes a lot of sense, been what I've (and others) been thinking, that they used their money to build a competitive team, while sheltering the player development side with that money. That's essentially the years after the punted picks years for the Giants, they bought a lot of free agents to try to keep it going, but sheltered the player development side by allowing them to draft and keep the players they liked best.
DeleteAren't they all threading a needle? And some really have no hole for you, we chased Carlos Lee but he really wanted to be in Texas, near his ranch, and Greg Maddux's wife apparently did not care to live in the SF area.
Yes, I would say that the Giants have deliberately stagger their contracts. They have mostly carried forward 80%+ of their roster and key players from year to year, so that they don't have to pivot so much in any one off-season and put themselves at the mercy of the marketplace or of the player's agents. That's a good strategy.
Big multi-year contracts are probably not the best deals, even internally, but the question few ever brings up is that the alternative is either signing a free agent to fill that vacancy or having a prospect ready to take that player's place. I don't know how many times I've seen Naysayers blame Sabean for not having a replacement ready, but the fact is that most teams do not have a replacement ready, as players do not have "Good Until Date" labels on them, and you can't effectively develop talent across a whole team to cover all emergencies. Which is why Sabean's and gang's predilection for procuring up the middle talents, who can shift to another position if need be, is such a good strategy. And why a consistent focus on procuring more pitchers than less is a good strategy, as an over abundance of pitching can help fill a pitching staff, both SP and RP. So, yeah, big contracts are not likely to work out, but what was the alternative to letting, say, Huff go, you don't easily replace 5 WAR production with a $10M free agency signing outside, you place your chip on him and hope for the best (unfortunately, his fragile mind could not handle extreme success).
I would love to see the Giants go over the luxury tax, but I don't expect it either, given Baer's statement and their behavior historically. They did go over last season, so there is some possibility, but with the tax percentage being doubled if they become a two-time offender, it does not seem likely. Perhaps if they had not gone over in 2015.
Trading seems the best possibility for the Giants to get two good SP and a LF. And Belt is probably our best trading chip for achieving that SP improvement, as DrB has explored in the comments, though Susac could possibly enable that with the addition of a good SP prospect. I would prefer not to do either, as I like both a lot, and think that they could do a lot with one healthy season, but I see no way to accomplish the Giants goals via free agency, as that's a lot of money, and if Leake is probable as one of the gets, that makes the other SP more likely via trade than free agency.
I am leaning towards David Price these days. His AAV is going to be right where Greinke is except more years. They both have been healthy most of their careers but the fact is that Greinke has 600 more innings on his arm and he is only 2 years older. That does not suggest either one will have a TJ issue coming up but I am thinking the extra 600 innings could denote a decline for Greinke much earlier than Price. This is just my assumption. So, my belief is that we might be able to get a good 5-6 years out of Price on an 8 year deal where we might be only be able to get 3-4 years on a 6 year deal. I always believe the last few years on these long term $100MM+ usually don't end well. So, if we were to extend Bumgarner in a few years we could have Bumgarner and Price for several years shutting down Dodger lineups. Once again these are just my beliefs.
ReplyDeleteI see your point, and add that I think that IP don't show the full difference, as Greinke has thrown 33,194 pitches, whereas Price has only thrown 22,724. And Greinke 300 IP in the minors, Price 151 IP. Of course, there was Price's college years too, but I can't imagine that would make the the 10,500 difference in pitches, plus the additional pitches each has thrown in the minors.
DeleteSo good point about the difference in arm usage.
And if the Giants were, for instance, to trade with the Indians, getting Carlos Santana and Danny Salazar for a package of Belt and others, but including Pagan and including a cash payment of $10M, would the $10M be part of the Giants' payroll for CBT purposes? That is, could they reduce their payroll by the expedient of passing the burden on paper to another team and handing that team a lump sum to go towards its payroll? If so, then such a trade and payment would let the Giants sign Price at $30M/year for seven years and Heyward at $20M/year for ten years, say, without incurring a CBT penalty.
ReplyDeleteI could be wrong here, but I believe the payroll for "Luxury Tax" purposes only includes players on the 40 man roster, so yes, paying another team to take Pagan off their hands would be a way to increase their room under the cap. Of course, in your scenario, Santana would cost something. Also, I don't know if MLB would allow something that blatant. Usually these cash deals only cover a part of the players salary.
DeleteAlso, what's the difference if they send $10 M to Cleveland vs just paying $10 M in penalties? They would be more likely to send a prospect or two to get Cleveland to take on Pagan's salary. Let's flesh this scenario out a bit. The Giants send Belt, Pagan, Beede and Williamson to Cleveland for Santana and Salazar. Belt's projected arbitration salary is $6 M which means the Giants lose $16 M in salary obligations. Santana's contract pays him $8.5 M in 2016 which I think all counts against the Luxury Tax because after the trade, the Giants do not benefit from the low salaries of the earlier years of the deal. The Giants would gain flexibility in that Santana can play catcher as well as 1B. They also gain about $8 M in Luxury Tax relief. They also get a pretty good, cheap pitcher in Salazar. I like it. The biggest question with the trade is if Cleveland would give up Santana and if they would take on Pagan's salary for a prospect.
DeleteI have heard many trades including Belt. But nobody says who will play first. Posey is not moving to first for at least a couple years. We have nobody to play there.
ReplyDeleteAnybody similar or better than Belt will cost way more!
I assume in Campanari's above trade, Carlos Santana would play 1B.
DeleteIf we expect his starts to break down like they did this year: 103 C, 37 1B, 3 DH.
DeleteThen you could simply look for a LH platoon mate and start Posey at 1B vs. LHP.
Like Adam Lind. (Career vs. RHP .295/.354/.509, 2015 vs RHP .291/.380/.503) Who's only due to make somewhere around $2MM more than Belt's projected arb salary.
NOTE: Not that I'm championing trading Belt. I'm just talking about one possible, reasonable way to approach 1B if that were to happen. An even more reasonable way to solve 1B would be to simply keep Belt.
Yes, Santana at 1st. He was worth 2.4 fWAR last year, 2.8 the year before, so though he's no Belt offensively or defensively, he covers that position adequately. He also, as DrB notes, gives us a backup catcher in case of need; and Salazar would give us a very good young starter (3.0 fWAR in 2015) behind Bumgarner and the #2 we hope to get this offseason.
DeleteThe reason for giving money to the Indians, if MLB would allow it, rather than pay the same amount in "luxury tax" penalties, would be to let us get off the escalator by which a team pays a 17% penalty the first year of exceeding the CBT threshold, but 30% the second year and 40% the third. Also, if Cleveland had to fork out $11.5M for Pagan's 2016 salary, they might be pretty demanding about which prospect they received from us, whereas giving them money finesses that potential problemallows them to decide simply about whether Pagan, given to them more or less free with no strings attached, could do the job they want done in their outfield till Brantley is back full strength and, less crucially, afterward.
I don't like that trade at all. Belt is better than Santana and younger. Trading just for Salazar makes more sense. Why break up an all homegrown infield. Those guys like and trust each other. Chemistry is something you cannot buy or trade for. I would just pay Pagan his money. If they are deadset on aquiring a long term guy like Upton then maybe flip Pagan but if it is just an Aoki type signing then we may need him.
ReplyDeleteYeah, if they want to get rid of Pagan that bad it probably makes more sense to just pay him his $10 M and let him go. Not gonna happen, though. I don't think the Giants are as desperate to get rid of Pagan as some of the beat writers are making them out to be.
DeleteOn the other hand, the trade does get you a very good pitcher who is cost controlled for 4 years and frees up enough immediate payroll to get an ace pitcher plus an impact OF, Greinke/Price + Heyward/Upton/Cespedes. But who plays CF? Blanco?
DeleteThinking more about it, I agree with DrB regarding the beat writers and Pagan. Sometimes the beat writers go to extremes with their positioning regarding sports teams, and that leads fans to roller coaster throughout the season instead of being calmer. I think Pagan's case is one of those situations. Reading between the lines, clearly the Giants have identified Pagan as a problem area, both for defense and lack of health. To DrB's point, it does not mean that they will necessary dump him and/or his salary.
DeleteDrB makes a good point about obtaining Salazar, as that would enable other moves to happen. I am thinking more and more that this is what the Giants are intending, to get a #2 via trade and use Leake as our #3, with Peavy and Cain 4/5, which with their injury/poor-performance histories, fits right in with the back of the rotation. As my calculations don't show enough to get a #2 plus Leake to stay under penalty tax and budget. And that would leave Heston as long relief, first starter they turn to if they need a replacement starter, and Blackburn as the next option, and perhaps first option, depending on how well he does early.
And if the Giants upgrade LF with a high end LF, then they can afford to use Blanco in CF despite his declining defensive value in CF (I think it was even negative last season), because he would still be an improvement over what Pagan did last season and the new LF would be a huge improvement over Aoki/Others.
That's what I call a pivot move on the Giants part, there are some fans (and I'm not referring to DrB here) who are only happy if the new starter is superstar good, but don't account for moves where the new guy, while not superstar good, is still better than what we had last season. We had a good offense and fielding last year. We have basically the same crew, but hopefully Pence all season and Blanco for a full season is defensively better than Pagan/Blanco/others that we had in 2015, which would be an improvement over 2015 in CF.
DrB, instead of trying for what seems like a hard road of signing Greinke or Price, how would you feel about signing Leake, Upton and trading for a guy like Salazar? I think that combination is pretty decent. Upton is a decent upgrade at LF and he is still young. I didn't like Leake as our best SP pickup but that was before I knew they were interested in spending money for LF.
ReplyDeleteI think the Giants need to make a splash at SP and LF because the 2017 is barren of outfielders and the SP class consists of Bucholtz and Nova. Poor FA class at the areas the Giants need. Leake and Salazar isnt necessarily a splash but those 2 combined with Bumgarner could be a nice. We didnt need much more to make the playoffs this year so with a bat like Upton it might just be enough.
I am not sure Cleveland is a good trade fit because they want a MLB bat. Belt is the only MLB bat who is remotely tradeable for the Giants and that creates a hole at 1B. I do think a trade may be part of the offseason plan and I don't think they have to sign Price or Greinke to have a successful offseason. I think they need a CF more than they need a LF because of Pagan's defensive struggles. LF could be filled by any number of cheaper short term options such as Aoki or Byrd.
DeleteI suggest that if we can't trade Belt, or swap him for a capable starter at first, we're unlikely to get the quality of SP we want. Our next chip is Susac, whose injuries last year mean we're probably selling low on him. Is there an alternative that has a good chance of success and that doesn't eviscerate the farm? Cleveland is an attractive partner, since their needs coincide with our tradable strengths, and they have two SPs who were among the top 30 or so last year in all MLB, Salazar and Carrasco. If the Giants had the chance to get either by swapping very good Belt for more-than-competent Santana, and could also clear enough payroll room to get an ace and to get Heyward, I would like to see them do so. As to scrapping Pagan to create payroll space, part of the hypothetical trade I suggested, I agree that we would have a hole in CF. But does anyone think it likely that the Giants can acquire someone to play CF, sparing us P's "defensive struggles," while Pagan himself remains on the roster? If Roger wonders about the loss of team chemistry from trading Belt, shouldn't we wonder about the chemistry involved in sitting Pagan or moving him to corner OF, as Bochy emphatically refused to do this past season? Who would play CF if Pagan left? Blanco, maybe
Deletethat excellent defender Heyward, with a resigned Aoki in LF. Maybe an elite defender with a weak bat, such as Billy Hamilton, for whom we might be able to trade with less damage than we'd incur by trying, and almost surely failing, to trade for Salazar or Carrasco.
DeleteHeyward is not a CF. There are other teams that may be as good or better fits than Cleveland as trading partners who would not necessarily demand an MLB player in return. I think Billy Hamilton is a possibility. There is Julio Tehran and Cameron Maybin from ATL. The Mariners seem to be in trading mode. What about James Paxton? There are several lower tier CF and SP options on the FA market that may be possible also. Or maybe Kyle Blanks is Brandon Belt's replacement? LOL!
DeleteCleveland' GM has already said that all the talk is about how many good pitchers he has, but what he would like to do is build around those young SP. Which, to me, means that you will need to overpower him in a deal to get one of them. So Salazar or Carrasco would probably cost an arm and a leg to get, you will need to overpay to get them, not give them injury-prone CF who you are trying to dump on somebody. Particularly when Almonte is playing well enough in CF for them, offensively and defensively. I would never want to overpay for anyone.
DeleteNow, where Pagan could fit in with them is at leadoff, they have been batting Kipnis there, but they probably prefer to move him to middle of the order. Lindor too. They could move him to RF for 2016 or perhaps live with him in CF for the season, hoping that the surgery fixes his defensive issues there. Iffy, but at least that is an area of need for them, and I see nobody looking promising for them to take over RF for them right now off their 2015 roster.
They are probably most interested in a starting C, starting 3B, and starting RF. So perhaps a Susac/Williamson/Arroyo trade might work, that would cover all three positions, though not immediately, so if they throw in Pagan and cover, say, $5-7M of his salary, that covers RF for a season, to go with Susac as starting C, with Arroyo and Williamson being ready for MLB play within a season. If we get Salazar and Santana in exchange, then they only have 1B and 3B needing help in, with Chisenhall getting to play 3B fulltime instead of utility, plus they have Chris Johnson on their roster, who could play 1B or 3B, as well. But that seems like an awful lot to give up to get Salazar, and there's a reason Santana don't catch anymore, he's horrible there per DRS, though perhaps with limited play he'll be OK, but even though the Indians needed a better starting C, they didn't even think of having him catch, they threw him to 1B, where he was only about average there offensively.
I know nobody is gaga over Josh Tomlin, but he's already 31 YO and in his third year of arbitration, but has done well in prior tries, though never in a full season, and thus should not cost as much to acquire. Last season was his first actual good ERA season as a starter, but he has good K/9, especially since it should go up in the NL, and great K/BB ratio the past two seasons. Plus, cut his HR/9 down to norms of under 1.0 and he would be very good. Should not cost us a lot of great prospects to acquire, as either Carrasco or Salazar would, either. But he's more of a back of the rotation starter, and already 31 YO, so I know he's not close to ideal, but I think we would have a better chance of getting him reasonably from Indians than any of the other young starters that they have.
I agree that the Braves seem a more likely trading partner than the Indians. The thought of Blanks replacing Belt crossed my mind too, and he'll be easier to sit because he's a RHH, so Bochy could pick and chose among starters to sit Blank.
Another possible replacement for Belt is Susac, I believe. Should not be hard to play him there, he won't be great, but with time and practice, decent, like Posey in early years. He and Posey could share the starting C position, with Susac as backup C. That would allow the Giants to carry Sanchez as 3rd catcher.
And to be clear, I want to keep Belt, I think he could break out even better than he's been, and he's been plenty good as is. But the only way to get a good #2 starter via a trade is to give up talent, and he's one of the better trade chips the Giants have right now, and at a position that is relatively easy to carry a platoon guy there who would easy give up starts to Posey there. Personally, I would prefer starting Belt in LF, there's your offensive upgrade and that clears the way for Susac to start there, and defensively he should be OK there, no worse than Morse or Aoki (and probably better) and better than Ishikawa.
Excuse me. The Giants have signed Brandon Crawford to 6 year $75M contract. That is all. Please continue the rosterbation.
ReplyDeleteThat's an awesome deal for the Giants. Does anyone else think this is great news?
ReplyDelete