The Cardinals have reportedly reached an agreeement with SS Jhonny Peralta on a 4 year/$52 M deal. The Cardinals badly needed an upgrade at the SS position, the one position where they don't seem to have an endless supply of MLB ready prospects. Although he does not look much like a SS, Peralta has been one of the more productive ones over the last 3 seasons racking up a total of 11 fWAR for an average of 3.6 including last year that was shortened to 107 games by his 50 game suspension for PED involvement.
Peralta is entering his age 32 season, so 4 years is a long contract for a SS of his age. In addition, he just has a look about him that suggests he may not age well. On the other hand, with the average market price for 1 fWAR sitting at around $6 M, he just has to put up a total fWAR of about 8.6 to earn his contract.
With the Cardinals able to save bushels of money due to their insanely productive farm system, they can easily afford to the modest risk and possible overpay to upgrade a position that has been a big negative for them for several years now.
Man, gotta say. The Cardinals are looking good!
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Guys who get caught using PED's today should only be eligible to make the league minimum for the next 2 or 3 years. That would make them think twice about using. It's a pretty big joke to me that Peralta was allowed to play in the postseason, that the Tigers welcomed him back with open arms, and that St Louis is giving him $52M. What exactly are the downsides of using PED's again? Certainly not Bud's slap on the wrist 50-game suspension. It also doesn't help that A-Rod is working on making a mockery of the league either. I'm a little fed up with this stuff.
ReplyDeleteCove Chatter
I consider the whole PED thing to be pretty much of a sideshow, myself. The hypocrisy and downright abuse of the legal system by pretty much everybody involved is disgusting and a joke, and I'm not at all convinced that they even make much of a difference in performance, if at all.
DeleteThat 50 game suspension cost him about 2 million buck - suspensions are without pay. I think that's more than a slap on the wrist. The next one - if it occurs during this contract - will cost him about 8 million.
DeleteWhich to Cove Chatter's point leaves him with $44M, he's laughing to the bank.
DeleteAs always, love the blog Dr B. I have first hand experience with PEDs, they do make a difference. As a college cross country runner in the 80's I used winstrol, it was not the right thing to do but the circumstances were what they were. It helped, a lot. As a 48 year old physician I practice in a wellness clinic that promotes Bio-identical hormone replacement. I am a testosterone user, pellets implanted in the glute 3 times a year, and it helps performance in a number of ways. I think the biggest improvement in my age group comes in energy levels and mental focus which is substantial. There is also a decrease in osteoarthritic pain and the ability to gain muscle as we age. The belief that testosterone also increases healing rate is not a fallacy. I agree with you that T does not help you hit a baseball but it does help in a number of ways and the guys who are over 30 that have been users will see their performance drop off faster than those that did not use. There is my 2 cents for what it is worth.
ReplyDeleteWell, I am not an expert in endocrinology or in anti-aging medicine, but I believe that there are other legitimate points of view about the whole low T syndrome and its management. I believe the evidence at this point is far from settled.
DeleteThe big controversy about PEDs is not that that they might help with other physical things, particularly amphetamines, they are known helps, but that steroids helps hitters hit a lot more homers. So I can see why it might have helped you with your long distance running, but swinging a bat and hitting a ball travelling 90-100 MPH, and getting a homer, is another matter.
DeleteSounds like I could use some pellets though, is that something i would talk with my doctor?
Rich Man's Juan Uribe. I posted up about this, but didn't really want to get into PEDs. The one thing to look at though is that 2 out of his last 3 years have been pretty big outliers, 122 OPS+ in 2011 and 119 OPS+ in 2013. His BA went way up both years, 299 and 303, and most of his career he's been more of a 260 hitter with pop, like Uribe. The BABIP, for what its worth: Career is 315, 2011 it was 325, 2012 was 275 (he had a 239 BA and a 84 OPS+ in 2012) and 2013 it was 374 BABIP.
ReplyDeleteThis seems a tad like the Melky story to me. But it could also be coincidence. I definitely think he'll be more of a 250/325/425 guy going forward.
And I do agree with RBJ that there are seriously good reasons to take PEDs that help out.
Cards had to make a move, to bolster the offense with Beltran leaving and their new CF being a tad questionable with the bat, so it makes sense. But there's also some risk. Still, Peralta can pick it, has some pop and shows up to play. That is definitely worth something. They are coming off of Furcal and Kozma, injury and ineffectiveness, so the move makes sense. Still... They might regret holding onto all these shiny prospects. Some do fail to bloom.
There is a place for anecdotal evidence in health and medicine as long as you recognize the limitations and potential for erroneous conclusions.
DeleteNot to harp on the issue too much (it bores me to no end, really..), but I think the most obvious way to conclude that the substance makes a difference is the very heart of the subject itself ->> The players themselves are using PEDs! and continue to use them despite the hailstorm of bad public media & potential for lost time.
DeleteI mean, in what world are droves and droves of baseball (and football) players being driven to use PEDs, if they gain absolutely nothing from it? Not to mention - While Barry Bonds was an incredible, HOF player on his own right, he became a surreal beast of a player once using PEDs. While I, personally, have no issue with this as likely 70-90% of players we also using some form of PED or anther at the time, it points to how critically the substances can impact the game.
If nothing else, people should now be thanking Bonds for having brought the issue to the forefront. Were it not for a black man breaking all those nice white records, we'd still be looking the other way while other players (Mark McGuire) are openly caught.
Actually Rainball, widespread use proves nothing. There are literally billions of dollars, if not trillions, of substances consumed in this country and the world because people believe they will make them healthier or feel better for which there is not one shred of evidence to support the practice actions.
Delete...er that should read ...not one shred of evidence to support the practice.
DeleteI feel that the general citizenry is not much of a comparison versus professional athletes whose careers are based on whether or not the substances work. Lance Armstrong and a host of other olympic athletes, with advice from well paid professional trainers, put their lives and reputations on the line while using steroids. This is a convincing argument to me, though certainly not factual. (Regardless of ulterior effects, the ability to build and maintain a greater degree of muscle than would be natural goes quite without question.)
DeleteFurthermore, I'd be interested to know Dr. B:
Do you believe Barry's ascension to being unquestionably, by a vast and awe-inspiring margin, the most potent offensive player in the history of baseball, was completely unaffected by PEDs? It's ok to admit that you're mostly arguing as the devils advocate, but that you (like others of us) likely know better, despite a lack of "proof" by scientific fact. I'm just interested to know what you're really getting at here.
I know some physicians who work with elite athletes and let's just say that in my opinion, they have a very tenuous grasp of evidence-based medicine. I have no reason to believe that athletes are more knowledgeable about the pharmacology and physiology of PED's than the general population and I do not think highly of the health care professionals who are selling the substances to them.
DeleteI do not believe that Barry Bonds' success on the field would necessarily have been different if he had simply done his strength training without the PED's, if in fact he did take them. Once again, I point to Willie Mays and Hank Aaron who not only did not take PED's(well, maybe amphetamines, but not steroids or HGH), but also likely never lifted a weight in their lives yet somehow managed to hit over 1400 HR's between them. Just think of what they might have done with just a modest strength training program!
Also, I am NOT arguing as a "Devil's advocate"! I am arguing as a believer in evidence based analysis. I cannot prove that player performance did not benefit from PED's but I also have yet to find any convincing evidence that they did.
Fair enough. Suffice to say that we can agree to disagree.
DeleteAnd I would add that a major sabermetrican, Eric Walker (sinister firstbaseman, A's baseball bible) has researched this and came to the conclusion that steroids did not help juice offense during the so-called Steroid's Era: http://steroids-and-baseball.com/
DeleteQuestion that just came to my mind: steroids is suppose to help these players become more muscular and all that, but my memory of Bonds in his latter career stages is of someone with a thick middle, not the ripped abs I would imagine he would have gotten using steroids and being able to exercise beyond what others could do. I'm no doctor, what am I missing here? Is my memory wrong of his late career physique?
Bonds had very large pecs and upper arm muscles as he got into the later stages of his career, although nothing that he could not have achieved through normal weight training, IMO. The whole head circumference thing is a joke.
DeleteDrB, OGC and others, if you are interested in Bioidentical hormone replacement you can check out my clinic website at Broadwayclinic.com. I am in Oklahoma City so I am sure I am far away from most of you but If you tell me your home town I can find a physician close to you that can set you up a program.
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