[Closed] The 2009 Hot Stove League: Making us Phillie Proof in 2010

hunteralan:

This is one you'd be better off to forget again.

Marquis won 11 games with a 3.65 ERA in the first half of 2009 and BBTN and Joe Morgan jumped on his jock and started touting him as the most deserving All-Star starter and a possile Cy Young candidate. Problem was, the only things that looked nice were his win total and to an extent his ERA. His WHIP was still above 1.30 and he still had a terrible K/BB ratio (58/40). Not surprisingly, the ESPN dweebs didn't think to look past the wins and ERA. All his peripherals show he was the recipient of one of those 'lucky' streaks.

In the second half of the season Marquis reverted to previous pumpkin status. Those lucky breaks stopped and his ERA jumped to 4.57, his WHIP to 1.48, his BAA to .284, and he still had that terrible K/BB ratio. He went from an 11-6 first half record to a 4-7 second half record and shockingly (not really) disappeared from the ESPN screen.

Marquis is no better than back of the rotation filler, and if we're going to go that route . . . and I can't believe I'm saying this . . . I'd rather have Vicente Padilla. At least with Padilla there's a possibility of upside. And Padilla will certainly come a lot cheaper.

Not to mention how handsome Vicente is !

Die-Hard Dodger Fan:

On XM this morning all they were talking about was how there was too much of a competitive balance b/w the Yanks and the rest of the league.

Billy Ripken was clamoring for a salary cap of $150 mill AND a salary floor of $70 mill.

Obviously, Yanks fans didn't see an issue with status quo and small market fans seemed to be in favor of some sort of cap and floor.

Actually, this was another reason I wanted to see the Yanks win. I knew commentators and fans alike would be calling for a salary cap and claiming competitive unbalance b/w big and small market teams.

Personally, I think there should be a floor and a luxury tax threshold like we have now except the the tax should be steeper.

I think a tax of $2 for every $1 over the tax ceiling would be big enough.

What MLB needs to do is figure out how much money is being spent on players using the current system and how much would be spent if they went to a salary ceiling/floor system.

As an example, based on ESPN's '09 figures:

http://espn.go.com/mlb/teams/salaries?team=nyy

The Yanks spent $209 mill in salaries. Let's say theoretically that there was a cap of $150 mill. If that's the case, then the Yanks would be $59 mill over the cap.

Now, let's say there was a salary floor of $70 mill, like Ripken suggested.

Well, each of the following teams would then be required to spend the corresponding additional monies to get over the floor:

Pittsburgh - $45 mill
Florida - $34 mill
San Diego - $32 mill
Oakland - $14 mill
Baltimore - $8 mill
Washington - $8 mill
Cleveland - $4 mill
Minnesota - $2 mill
Tampa Bay - $2 mill

That's $149 mill in additional money on salaries spent versus $59 mill in salaries lost, resulting in a net GAIN of $90 mill in salaries for the players.

Not saying that is the answer, just saying that a move to this type of system may actually benefit the players versus hurting them, which is probably what they think right now.

The turth is that it is the concept of a payroll floor that has likely been the biggest factor in precluding the establishment of a payroll ceiling, as evidenced by your numbers. The "small market" owners don't wanna be forced to spend, while they love getting whatever re-distribution of wealth they can get from the "rich" clubs.

The owners love blaming the player's union for everything, and oinking about competitive balance, but for the most part they are most concerned about a net positive balance sheet.

All MLB clubs get about $60M/yr in equally distributed "league" revenues, and the 10 smallest "small market clubs" get an average of about $25M in re-distribution from the 10 "richest" clubs, so it doesn't take a huge amount of local revenues to get total income up to $125M or better - and afford a team payroll of $70M or better.

The Brand aren't the only owners playing fast and loose with where the $ are going.

Agree, kennerbuggy. A lot of these "small market" owners are probably pocketing some large profits.

They don't care about the lackluster attendance because they make out just fine with all the MLB revenue sharing.

They go with young, cheap players and then just trade them off for more young, cheap players when they get close to free agency.

Personally, I think if an owner is unwilling to spend around $70 mill in salaries to field a team, then they really aren't all that concerned about winning.

BluePastorKyle:

I'm very naive about the players union and owner's gripes, etc., but one question that comes to mind to address the $90M discrepancy is this: Why not just lower the floor $3M (to $67M)? Doing the math for 30 clubs, that's $99M. It evens out the discrepancy. Then it's a scratch number and neither side can complain about who's getting more or less.

I'm guessing it's not that simple.

It always comes down to that age old quote "Follow the money".

In terms of making the $ fit, DHDF listed only the Yanks amount over $150M. I think there may have been 1 or 2 other clubs above that figure. The "soft" cap for this season was something over $160M IIRC, so the Yanks were the only club that paid the payroll tax.

The reported max for MLB revenues came a couple of years ago, at around $6.5B, which works out to about $215M/club. Of this, about $2B was "league" income, with the rest being "local" team revenues. Income appears to have settled back a bit since then, but it's gotta still be above $6B - and of course the revenues aren't evenly spread. Continuing to work on the "average" basis, clubs probably spend $60M or better on aspects other than 25-man payroll. Factor in $25M owner equity (profit), and the revenues minus non-25 man roster expenses and owner equity and clubs would have an average of $120-130M to spend on MLB players.

$70M as the floor and $150M as the ceiling should work, but while we ponder that and give the Yanks the stink eye, many of the other owners are playing a shell game of hide the $.

The Brand probably takes $25M off the top to make their loan payments, and then takes another $25M in owner-equity, AND THEN pay themselves $7.5M or so in team salaries. An owner of the average "small market" team without stadium and/or team purchase debt could easily pull out $10-15M in owner-equity while paying $70M to the 25-man roster. So, paying less to the 25-man roster means more $ being allocated to owner-equity.

MLB teams do a great job of hiding income and inflating expenses. Going to a fixed payroll floor and ceiling undoes all that "fine work".

i know there's a deadline, but if manny really wanted to pick up his option, would'nt it be done by now?
you HAVE to think that him and the BOR-ass could be peeking around. i know the body is still freshly dead but it's better to bury it earlier. agreed? or am i overthinking it?

the ditchdigger:

nevermind!!!!!!!

Yeah, he likes it in LA! I think it is more about no one else is going to give him $20 million spread over the next several years.

DoppelgangBang:

Not a real shocker, but Kurkiijiaian drops a note that the McCourt divorce is going to hamstring us financially ... in that we need to acquire an ace, but we don't even have the money to retain Randy Wolf.

Ugh.

Pathetic.

With Phillips gone and both Morgan and Kruk searching for a brain, Kurkjian is well on his way to being the next Captain Obvious on BBTN. Hell, he is well on his way to being the leading moron on this side of the globe.

The Jays are also talking to the D'backs about a deal that would send Lyle Overbay to Arizona for catcher Chris Snyder. I've always liked Snyder, since he is a U of Houston product. He always hit well against the Dodgers, so it would be good to see him move to the AL. Snyder became expendable after Miguel Montero Wally Pipped him.

I'm kinda inpressed with the trade action so far. Many teams seem to have sobered up to the need to fill as many holes as possible via trade, and not just try to "win" lopsided deals. It just seemed like much of the trade discussion over the past few years revolved around teams trying to exchange all of a good vet's expensive contract for a lot of good inexpensive talent. The trades that have gone off since this past WS seem to largely involve clubs trading what they had in excess for something they needed, or in other words, good old fashioned trades. Some $ are shifting around a bit, but nothing huge, and the off-sets seem appropriate.

I might disagree with the talent impact in some of the deals, but the trades that have gone down recently appear "balanced" to me.

One factor seems to be that the rich clubs, like the Yanks, BoSox, Mess, etc., appear to have decided that they are better off doing expensive FA signings that being the "taker" in a salary dump trade where they are also being asked to give up an appreciable amount of prospect talent as well as taking on all of that big contract. And the "selling" clubs seem to have come to realize that Daddy Warbux isn't coming to their rescue any more than is Santa Claus. They are not going to get a lot of good young talent in exchange for all of an expensive vet's contract. They either need to take far lesser talent in exchange, or kick in a serious $ off-set to get some good young talent in exchange.

For the most part, the big salary dump deals that have gone off over the past 2-3 years have netted the selling clubs only moderate prospect talent. The prospective sellers asking for big returns have been left waiting. The Jays old GM couldn't make his desired killing for Halladay, while Jake Peavy, Cliff Lee, CC Sabathia, Johan Santana did get traded over the past couple of years but netted less than stellar returns. The Strangers made out very well in the first trade of Teixeira to the Bravos, but the Bravos didn't do very well in the 2nd trade of Teixeira, to the Halos. And in all these big salary dump deals of the last few years, the only one that involved one of the rich clubs in the NE was the Mess with Santana. The Yanks ended up with both Sabathia & Teixeira, but only after each eventually reached FA. The only aspect the BoSox ended up being involved with was trading away an expensive player, Manny, but only got that done by eating said contract.

kennerbuggy:

Some more on the "validity" of salary dump deals -

Several pundits now put the BoSox in much the position we have been in the the past 2-3 years in terms of prospect talent - many of their top kids are now young MLB vets, while other previous top prospects have gone in trade, and now most of their best true prospects are in the low minors.

The Mess farm system is now largely depleted and their few studly looking prospects are very young foreign born kids way down in the low minors.

The Yanks farm system isn't all that deep, with few studly guys, but what do they care - they are now WS champions, with a nice mix of young and old vets. They should be able to reload with complimentary players from a FA pool that is deep in such talent. They don't need heart of the order hitters, an ace or a closer.

The Cubbies and Phillies look spent out, the ChiSox, Jays and several other mid-market to rich clubs look to be paring down payroll-wise, and the Dodgers are now a mess. The Halos may be the only club with the means and need to do something, but they have a lot of holes to fill with all the key players they have going FA.

So, who are the Jays gonna trade Halladay to, and really, how much talent are they going to get in exchange? Are the BoSox really gonna be willing to include someone like Lester in a deal for Halladay? Isn't the current Yanks MO to wait until Halladay becomes an FA? Would the Strangers really gain that much by trading several kids from their deep pool of top prospects for Halladay, or in other words, largely undo what they gained in the Teixeira deal?

The best time to trade Halladay was probably the past July 31 trade deadline, but their GM had sugar-plum prospects dancing in his head.

I think Halladay is a goner before the start of the season. There's no chance of the Jays contending and they are in FULL rebuild mode. Any GM worth his salt knows that it's time to ditch expensive players and reinvest in player development. I have to think that's what they're trying for ... the good thing here is that perhaps they are willing to take players who are in the low minors, considering they are several years off from contending. What kinda play would a Loney & Elbert deal get? Then maybe sign Beltre to a cheap deal, move Blake to 1st. Just a thought. That is of course adding like 10M in payroll ... so perhaps NOT gonna happen.

My #1 move would be to snag Adrian Gonzalez, but I just don't see SD giving him to us without putting us through the wringer - there are lots of teams out there that would be VERY interested and that are our equal in prospects cache.

It appears that the Phillies are already working on making themselves Yankee proof. They've declined the option on Pedro Feliz and are rumored to be interested in going after Beltre or Figgins. Beltre in that ballpark is scary.

From KF:

Dutton mentions one interesting rumor to watch, a "deal sending second baseman Alberto Callaspo to the Los Angeles Dodgers for catcher A.J. Ellis." Callaspo, who hit .300/.356/.457 in 2009, would help fill the Dodgers' second base vacancy, while the 28-year-old Ellis would give KC a defensive standout behind the plate. Ellis also has a career .398 OBP in the minors, with more walks than strikeouts in nearly 1,800 plate appearances.

Thoughts?

Mike Scioscias tragic illness:

I went through this on the blog a few hours ago, but long story short: Ellis is useless, Callaspo's a mediocre fielder who had the same OPS as Dan Uggla did this year. So while I think it would take more than Ellis to get this done, I say yes. Absolutely.

Well, that's what I call plugging a hole cheaply. I like Uggla ... but that really depends on what he'd cost us in prospects ...

I'd rather save those prospects for pitching or an improbable run at Adrian Gonzalez.

hunteralan:

My initial reaction was, 'Callaspo'?!?!?... But after looking over the stats it looks decent to me too. Callaspo is more OBP and contact while Uggla is more power and more strikeouts. Don't know a lot about Callaspo's defense, but he's got to be better than Uggla, right?!?

Uggla, 29, is in his second year of arbitration and should command about $8 million this year and possibly over $10 million next winter. Callaspo, 26, is in his first year of arbitration and shouldn't approach Uggla's fist year arb. award of $5.35 million. Uggla has two years of team control left and Callaspo has three. Getting Uggla will also cost quite a bit more in terms of trade, I would think.

All things considered . . . . I'm not sure. More in cost of prospects and money to get more power vs. less prospects and money to get contact and a little younger.

I'd like to say that I like the thought of this ... as long as it is Ellis for Callaspo straight up ...

That frees up DeWitt to be used in a trade. What kinda traction would Loney & Dewitt + get us for Adrian Gonzalez? Or we could use DeWitt for Halladay ... if we aren't completely hamstrung.

i strongly believe we have to make a serious run at those exact two players
Gonzales and/or Halladay
i know that both of their respective "teams" are gonna want the farm but these two guys are difference makers
post manny, face of the orginization guys.