Saturday, December 16, 2006

Vidro, Matsuzaka, and Vernon Wells

Well... Everyone has been talking about the Chris Snelling and Fruto for Vidro and essentially 4 million dollars. I've been trying every way to think about it, and I've come up with the conculsion that its crap. If this is all we do, then we essentially traded a pretty good defensive young hitter who can walk and is left handed along with a relief pitcher with upside for a old 6 million a year (normally 8) infielder who can no longer field, switch hits, and has shown that he can hit, just not in spacious parks (RFK, which is not all disimilar from SafeCo). So we traded for a worse guy with a guy who is similar but younger and cheaper, and we threw in a decent reliever. They both get injured fairly often, so the injury factor is pretty moot. Why pay $5.5 million extra per year for this? No clue, although many have speculated that this allows us to trade Beltre or Lopex for a frontline starter. This is great and all, but since we just signed a bunch of starting pitching that gets ground balls, what would be the point in making our infield worse defesively? I'm also really high on both Beltre and Lopez, and I was also really high on Snelling. Any guy who can flat out hit and is young and cheap, you trade only because you package him for a better deal, or you get a ton of good prospects because you know he won't sign with you later. I find it hard to root for the Mariners like this, but there'll probably only one more year of Bavasi and Hargrove. Which is part of the problem. Maybe if Bavasi didn't have a one year ultimatum, he wouldn't bet trading for now. A one year ultimatum give him no incentive for preparing the franchise for a few years from now.

Next topic, Matsuzaka. $104 million for 6 years? This works to around $17 million a year. You have to figure you'll make $3 million a year from increased fan interest and Japanese interest, and this is a conservative estimate. Would you pay a $14 million a year for a guy who could be the best pitcher in the world? Of course, this is a no brainer. MVP of the World Baseball Classic. This guy has a whole genereation of japanese people named after him, "the Matsuaka generation" which are the people born around his time, and he's only 26. This guy is going to be good, and I would've given him $20 million a year. Especially when guys like Gil Meche get $11 million a year and Schmidt get $16 million a year. Red Sox have made all the right moves, maybe too expensive for Lugo, but with Drew, they're lineup and their rotation is stacked. They also have enough pitching prospects to keep their bullpen decent.

Last topic, Vernon Wells just signed for 7 years $126 million, which comes to $18 million a year and the 6th biggest contract ever. This is a guy who plays .285 .335 30 hr a year ball, with a gold glove in center field. I know Toronto has to spend to keep players in Canada, but $18 million a year seems like a lot when people are complaining about Manny getting $20 million a year. I don't know if the market will be as crazy next year as it is this year, but it seems Toronto is betting they are and hedging on that bet now by buying futures of Vernon Wells. I'd love to have a guy like Vernon Wells, but I'm not sure if a guy who hit .270 with a .320 obp last year deserves that much money.

1 comment:

Andoverjon said...

Kei Igawa supposedly will sign a contract of $20M for 5 years. His BID was $26M, so this works out to roughly $9M per year. In comparison with the Dice-K deal and with ANY other deal for a pitcher this off-season, this looks like a steal.