Every Roster Spot Matters in the Post-Pujols Era

People need to get off Mo and Skippy. This deal is probably at most about 0.8% of the entire payroll. If Skip comes out of ST hot, then great. If he struggles for three months, we cut him loose or trade him.

As for centerfield, this got me thinking, I wonder what value the Cardinals might get with another team for a Package that included Jon Jay and Kyle McClellan?

is that it allows for a Beltran, Crisp, or Ross discussion.

You seem to see people saying it was a mistake to sign Schumaker everywhere you look, perhaps that’s because it’s obvious that this is the case.

whatever you want to talk about instead of just bitching about what you’re getting for free. It’s plenty easy to post your own stuff here.

especially with Craig and Waino coming off injuries and surgery.

Not to mention (looks around nervously) Carp’s health after the workout he got.

But I’m also worried about when he will return. It looks like he will miss at least all of April, which makes it pretty unlikely that he’ll produce 3.0 WAR in 2012, IMO. This, and Jay’s likely regression, make me very much in favor of signing Beltran.

The concerning thing about McClellan, though, is his history of arm injuries and dead arm. Last season was not his first bout of the malady.

…the damage from which was worsened by his time in the rotation.

He could have a serious underlying problem with his shoulder, which makes his signing even worse.

Factors such as hitting with RISP, LOB%, and reliever performance affect team wins and losses. WAR’s goal is to get to true talent so it strives to be a context neutral stat that doesn’t take things like hitting with RISP into account. That being said, there’s a good correlation between team’s W/L records and team WAR. As I write above, this makes sense. If a team has a lot of players with high WAR totals, that team will be a good one.

even a team comprised entirely of scrubs would win some baseline amount of games (like ~40 if I recall). So you should add team WAR and that baseline for a proper estimate. Obviously it won’t be perfect (and may be wildly off in some cases). But over the long term across leagues it should be pretty close

That being said, I’m not wild about using WAR for relievers in most instances. However, WAR sure does drive home just how badly Franklin pitched in 2011. -1.8 WAR in under half a season? Yikes.

I was hoping that the Cardinals would sign Mike Gonzalez. Then we’d have two left-handed relievers that are not LOOGYs but that could also retire right-handed hitters. It would have like required paying more than a team ever should for a reliever but it would have given the club maximum flexibility in the bullpen.

so bad that he won’t be considered a LOOGY in the future?

Why? It has been borne out year after year that relievers are the most volatile and least cost effective players on a team. Playoff teams routinely have relievers that are basically unknowns and one year wonders that propel their bullpen. There are almost no relievers who are sure things, and paying anything more than league minimum or just above that amount for them is inadvisable.

this is a fallacy. if he performs below replacement level, he will be worth less than we paid for him by the WAR/$ metric.

It’s really pretty easy to find dominant relief performance. Kimbrel—-not a top prospect. Axford—-found out of nowhere. JJ Putz—-signed for 4M. I don’t even know who Kenley Jansen is and he put up a 1.74 FIP. Heath Bell—-a throwaway from the Mets. Hanrahan—-the throw-in reliever for Nyjer Morgan. Jason Motte was a catcher. These guys are the best in the league.

To a team like the Cardinals, it’s almost impossible to get real value out of a FA closer type given how fairly available it is to find a guy who can throw 97 for 20 pitches.

that makes much more sense, i was always confused why it was so high given the younguns.

There are also reportedly two mystery teams. Perhaps the Rays or Red Sox?

Obviously we are not offering as much as he wants. At what point do the Cardinals walk away if Beltran/Lozano won’t make a decision?

By WAR/$, it’s a fine move

could easily be matched by a cheaper player, I’m pretty sure that’s most people’s problem with the signing.

Do you really trust it to determine whether a part-time player was worth .2 or .3 WAR in 200 plate appearances? Now they’ve got the baserunning metric added in…

What was the alternative to Skip? Eric Komatsu? Adron? Nick Punto?

Nice Punto signed for exactly the same contract. Skip is a clearly better hitter and a clearly worse fielder. Which would you rather have? If the team really likes Skip and feels he adds value in a leadership role, it’s reasonable to say that Skip was just as good as Punto.

You at once wipe away the negative value Skip gives defensively as a second baseman while allowing him the added value of his offense at second base. I haven’t done the positional adjustment for Schumaker’s value as a right fielder but I bet his bat is a much lesser value there or in left field.

Schumaker’s center field defense is horrible and he should never play at that position. Center is about the only position his bat might play. There is also little reason to believe his right field or left field defense at ages 32 and 33 will be as good as it was in 2007. He is likely a below average defensive corner outfielder going forward, a horrendous defensive center fielder going forward, and the equivalent of a gloved potted plant defensively at second base going forward.

Schumaker’s ISO is declining. He has no power to speak of. His walk rate is declining to unacceptable levels as well. This means he has one skill: the ability to make contact. Even this is declining. In 2011, Schumaker was a player dependent on a .321 BABIP to manage a .283 BA. The groundballing extraordinaire may manage a .321 BABIP again; after all, his career BABIP is .322. Nonetheless, I don’t want to find out if 32 and 33 year old Skip Schumaker can do so.

The Cardinals are paying him in 2012 and 2013 to give him roughly equivalent WAR (0.66) that he gave them combined in 2010 and 2011 (0.60). Due to the decline of age and his skill set, I think he is a very good bet to give the Cardinals a value below his salary. The point of the post was that the Cardinals can’t really afford dead weight with no upside on their roster post-Pujols. Schumaker is the embodiment of dead weight with no upside.

His bad defense at 2B was offset by the positional adjustment, which he will no longer benefit from.

Also, the argument, which you ascribe to bgh (and presumably others), that if Skip is paid $1 next year and ends up with 0.1WAR, he will then have been “worth” signing, misses the point quite badly.