I wonder if continued contract inflation will ever change this practice? Crane has no problem paying market rate for 2-3 year deals… but when that player meets or outperforms that contract, and he ends up re-extending them, he’ll technically pay more over that 7-8 year period with multiple deals vs. just signing one big one at the outset. On the one hand, it is fiscally prudent (in all settings) to sign short term deals and then re-evaluate… you’ll never get burned too bad (even with the Abreu/Montero deals), and you want the player to live up to the entirety of the deal. But in cases like JV/Altuve (and possibly Tucker)… guys who have aged well and continued to play at a high level, Crane will pay more by extending them 2-6 years at a time (but again, won’t get too burned if one of them falls off a cliff production wise). Also, they may be taking advantage of human psychology that tends to keep the motivation to perform well higher when closer to contracts running their course… and they may feel the price of contract inflation well worth it if it keeps the player at a mindset that performs very highly.
If a 29 year old free agent superstar RF coming off 5 consecutive seasons of >4.5 fwar were willing to accept a 5 year deal, $40M/yr would be considered a steal.
Future health risks can not be simply ignored. They go up linearly with every year a player is extended and exponentially with age of the player. the total risk factor is unacceptable at a predictable point for each player. Extending a player beyond that point is a foolish gamble. The fact that a few teams have been willing to make that kind of bet does not make it reasonable. Crane is not a sole proprietor. He has to justify his actions to a group of investors. They are not interested in baseball for the sake of the sport. They expect managed risk and a very good return on their money.
All of what you say is true and pretty mu3rdch common sense. But any team and every team needs to look at the big picture. Sometimes what you get in the early years makes the overall contract profitable regardless of what happens towards the end. Let's say 3 players each get 10 yr/$300M contracts. Player A gets 5 WAR each of the first 4 seasons, 4 WAR seasons 5-8 and then gets injured and misses years 9 and 10 completely. 4 all star seasons, 4 additional very good starter seasons and the last 2 wasted seasons = 36 WAR. Player B is consistent throughout all 10 years of the contract never having under 2.5 WAR or over 3.5 WAR and averaging 3 WAR total. 10 seasons as an ok starter = 30 WAR Player C starts out with 2 very poor seasons due to lengthy slumps and has 3 WAR total. In seasons 3-6 he averages 3 WAR. In seasons 7-10 he actually improves to 3.5 WAR per season. 8 seasons as solid starter including the final 4 as better than average and player feels still in his prime. =29 WAR.
JP France- is he a 2? A 5? Probably somewhere in between right? His results are so good right now and the fip actually is coming down, but I don’t trust the stuff and the lack of K’s. If Javier gets right it’s going to be really interesting to see if it would be France or Brown to get game 4 and the other guy to the pen. If Javier is broken I have to go Brown 3 and JP 4 I think. But, I might go JP 4 and Brown bulllen in the other scenario. If we are fortunate enough to make the playoffs and get far enough where such decisions are made. what a season for that dude.
He’s got a 2.6 ceiling with a 4.7 floor. The Astros have had guys like him in the golden era… some started some big games (Peacock, Colin, cough Fiers cough…. ). Not quite sure he’s faced enough repeat opponents to see adjustments, but he’s got a **** ton of confidence right now and looks like he’s going to continue to optimize this opportunity.
He's a solid 9 on the "doesn't ****ing care, and doesn't ****ing matter" scale that goes all the way up to 9.27
I’ve been comparing him to McHugh as a guy who was sort of a quasi all star for a couple years without big stuff, and then it sort of morphed to BOR/bullpen guy. Also a guy who got a late start. he’s been better than any stretch for peacock in my opinion, but I think peacock might have had better stuff, but not as good at throwing strikes.
McHugh and Peacock both had an elite pitch early on that generated K’s. Peacock actually morphed into a really elite bullpen guy in 2018 after being a key starter in the playoffs/WS in 2017. France can probably pitch effectively out of the bullpen… and they may want to use him as a bridge guy or a tandem guy in case a starter flails.
Sure. And peacock was good, but he never had a stretch this good while McHugh did. If Jp could give you McHughs career that would be awesome. The astros got a ton of value out of him and then let him go rightly so. I was very happy for him that he got two more contracts and got to like 30 or 40M in career earnings. He certainly outperformed that value by a to. For the Astros, but was never going to get a big deal due to age. Suspect the same for France. Probably gets through arbitration and that’s about it. I mean ****- he’s 28 right now and we still have him for 6 more years. Ben should be a super 2.
