2011-12 Hot Stove Thread

Re: 2011 Hot Stove Thread

No. Gonzalez is a better overall player than Fielder, though.

 

Re: 2011 Hot Stove Thread

Cecil Fielder's best seasons came at 26 and 27. Mo Vaughn fell off big time after his age 30 season.

The "28-32 peak" is a wives tale. Historically, hitters have their best seasons from ages 25-28, give or take.

 

Re: 2011 Hot Stove Thread

Cabrera and Fielder at the infield corners? THAT should be an adventure.

 

Re: 2011 Hot Stove Thread

It'll be pretty interesting, to say the least. Here is one thought experiment I had recently - What's the breaking point between offense and defense? Meaning, let's say you had an absolutely insane owner, and he just signed nine Prince Fielder-type players. Would the offset defensively totally negate the monster numbers of each player? Could you compensate by signing a bunch of strikeout pitchers? It would be interesting to see a team say, "Fuck it, we don't care if he has 40 errors, Prince Fielder is our shortstop," but 1) I don't think any team wants to step out of the box that way, given how horrible even "minor" strategic decisions things like bullpen by committee went and 2) I don't think an individual player would want that kind of embarrassment.

 

Re: 2011 Hot Stove Thread

As someone who watched Yuniesky Betancourt up close and personal last year, I can tell you that defense can and does definitely give back as much as the offense will deliver on certain nights. On other nights, it doesn't matter, but I think the balance definitely swings towards having sound defense. That, to me, is more controllable. Even great offenses get shut down at times.

 

Re: 2011 Hot Stove Thread

I could leg out a bunt against those fatties .. and as my old high school coach used to say, I need to be timed by a sundial instead of a stopwatch.

 

Re: 2011 Hot Stove Thread

Can't wait to see Fielder in nine years. He'll need a walker -- or a handcart -- to get around.

 

Re: 2011 Hot Stove Thread

I'd find it ironic that his last name is Fielder ... but I'd probably be mis-using the proper application of irony.

 

Re: 2011 Hot Stove Thread

There's no denying that Fielder is a slow/bad base runner, but is it really fair to compare him to the average base-runner without accounting for position? Of the 34 1B who had 400 or more plate appearances, only seven had a positive BsR (according to fangraphs). I'm not trying to let Fielder off the hook on this one (since he's 29 out of 34), but comparing his base-running to 2B, SS and CFs seems unfair since the quantity of above average base runners at 1B/DH are slim.

Also, as others have pointed out, those ZiPS projections for Prince seem awfully pessimistic considering he had a WAR 5.5 in 2011 and 6.4 in 2009.

Is he going to be worth $214 million? I doubt it, but I think it will be better than Jonah Keri is projecting.

 

Re: 2011 Hot Stove Thread

I don't see how you can think Gonzalez is paid fairly but Fielder is overpaid by $6 million. That five runs on the basepaths bothers you that much?

I agree Cecil's best seasons were during his age 26 and 27 years, but he was still quite productive at age 32 before he fell off the cliff at 33.

Vaughn was still quite productive when he went to Anaheim for his age 31 and 32 seasons. I think he hit 38 homers for them one year. He fell off the cliff when he went to the Mets (who doesn't? )

Sorry, but neither of those guys, the poster boys of fat, power-hitting first basemen, fell off after age 27 the way that article you linked predicts Prince will.

Will Prince hit 50 home runs again? Probably not. But predicting he will never have another season as good as his worst season in majors seems silly at this point.

I don't doubt he'll fall off the cliff, which is why I think the Tigers were foolish hand him such a long contract, but on AAV, he's right where the market dictates he should be.

 

Re: 2011 Hot Stove Thread

You can compare him there if you want, but it all ends up in the same place. If you give him a few runs back there, you have to take the same amount away when you do the positional adjustment.

It's either "great hitter + terrible baserunner + terrible defender + doesn't play a premium position"

Or "good but not great hitter for his premium position + below average baserunner for his position + terrible defender for his position"

It adds up to the same thing.

You skipped 2010 and 2008, rather conveniently. If we could confidently project Fielder to repeat his 2011 numbers for the next few years, then he'd be worth a bit more. But we can't, because he's had two bad (for him) years in the last four.

My WAG is that the projection is a bit light on offense in the short-term, but underestimating how quickly he's going to fall off a cliff when he hits 30-32.

The math works out pretty perfectly. They are nearly identical hitters (OPS+ the last three years: 166/135/164 vs. 162/152/155).

On a yearly basis, Gonzalez is about 2-3 runs better on the basepaths (he's a bit supbar himself) and 8-10 runs better in the field.

So that makes Gonzalez about 12 runs/year better than Fielder.

As a very rough rule of thumb, coverting between runs and wins and dollars goes like this:

1 win = 10 runs = $5 milllion.

So Gonzalez being about 12 runs better defensively and on the basepaths makes him worth about $6 million a year more than Fielder.

This isn't meant to be an exact science, but it shows you the rough ballpark.

"Quite productive" is a relative term. Up until his age 30 season, Vaughn was a .400 OBP player. At 31 and 32 in Anaheim, he still had his power, but he started making a lot more outs and became a .355 OBP player.

 

Re: 2011 Hot Stove Thread

Vaughn never really was the same after that injury falling down the dugout steps for the Angels. I think it is interesting, once again to see that statistical analysis reveals Fielder is a bad investment. As long as I've been on this board, stats have been cited in support of the contention that EVERY big money free agent signing or long-term contract is a bad investment, and the bigger the deal, the worse it is.
And yet, baseball teams with access to those same stats continue to give out those allegedly horrible deals. And further yet, there is a school of thought (hi, OOP!) that being able to give out those big horrible deals is an insurmountable competitive advantage for a baseball team.