The Dominoes Start to Fall

Since we last spoke, Mark DeRosa signed a 2-year, $12 million deal with the Giants, and Jason Bay signed a 4-year, $65 million deal with the Mets.

DeRosa stated he was 'Tired of being someone's Plan B'. That's a veiled shot at the Cardinals, isn't it? You know what? I don't blame him for moving on. Even if he waited until Matt Holliday signed, the odds of Mark DeRosa not playing somewhere next season hovered around 0.000001%; the amount of money he would make next season, however, probably rode an inverse proportion relationship with when he signed. The longer he waited, the more anxious he would get about signing on with someone, and the less money he might have been forced to take to play.

To you and me, the difference between $4 mil and $6 mil is like the difference between apple and watermelon Jolly Ranchers - apple is clearly better than watermelon, but in the end they're both pretty darn good. For a guy trying to maximize his earning power using perishable physical gifts, that's a pretty big difference. So Mark took the best deal with a team he didn't mind playing for. Good for him.

One guy out of the LF sweepstakes.

The Cardinals never expressed real interest in Jason Bay, for which I remain thankful. We've had plenty of decent-bat, no-glove guys patrol that corner (see Gant, Ron; Sanders, Reggie; and Duncan, Chris), and I hoped that pattern wouldn't repeat itself with Bay. The more important outcome of Bay joining the Mets is the price tag. He's to make $16.25 mil per year. Since most observers rank Holliday a better outfielder than Bay, I believe we've just firmly established the floor for the Holliday negotiations.

Boras/Holliday won't accept less than $16.25 million per season to play for the Cardinals. The length of contract, opt-out clause, no-trade protection? All just contract language. First, we must agree on price. Chet Novak posted on Facebook his guess: $17 mil per/8 years. If the $18 million figure bandied about before the season ended becomes the high end of the range for Holliday, this is a completely reasonable guess at a per year cost for his services. But boy, I really hope the Cardinals don't ink him for 8 years. Paying a guy $17 million a year for his age 37-38 seasons seems a tremendous waste of money to me. Should the Cardinals go with a 8-year contract, I'd prefer to see a mutual option each year for the last 3 years written into the contract language. That would at least protect the club should a Vernon Wells-type decline in skill start, and not make the contract a millstone.

Rumors, Arrests, and Whatnot

Been an interesting week for rumors, no?

First, Matt Holliday was offered a contract for about $15 million per, 5 years. Then it became 8 years. Then 8 years at $16M per. Now it's back to 5 years, but still $16M per. And today ESPN Insider contains a report he's drawing interest from the Orioles.

I'm having a hard time imagining Holliday with the Orioles. Not saying Camden Yards is a bad place to play, or the people of Baltimore are somehow lesser humans than the rest of us; although they did take away the Browns. Even that, I guess, could be considered a good thing depending on your point of view. It's just that Baltimore has a lot of young outfielders on the roster already - Nolan Reimold, Adam Jones, Nick Markakis, Felix Pie - under cost-effective control for a while still. Baltimore needs a third baseman and those guys who throw strikes and get people out. Plus, as I mentioned last night on the UCB Hour, AL teams likely remain a little leery of Holliday's bat in their league, given how he struggled in Oakland the first half of 2009.

So I think this becomes nothing other than "more posturing" by Holliday's representation.

What is interesting is the lack of rumor out there regarding other teams most thought might make a run at Matt, like the Yankees, Mets, and Angels. I don't believe a guy with Holliday's skill isn't in demand with teams other than the Cardinals, but you wouldn't know it based on the RUMINT out there.

The other big news item this week revolves around David Freese's drinking. Or rather, his drinking and driving. David, arrested for DWI, reportedly blew a 0.232 BAC, 45 minutes after his arrest. David stands 6 foot 2 inches tall and weighs 220 pounds. If I remember correctly, the story reported David admitting to drinking 7 beers. I don't know the time frame; let's assume from 8pm to 2am (he was arrested at 2:4am). That's 6 hours. The chart below shows BAC based on number of drinks and body weight.

OK. Twelve drinks would give an average 220 pound man a BAC of .205. The body burns approximately .015 alcohol per hour, and his BAC was taken approximately 1.5 hours after his last drink. If he'd had 12 drinks, his BAC should have been (.205 - (.015 x 7.5)) = .0925. It was close to three times that value. Which means (a) he drank for less than 6 hours, and/or (b) he had more than 7 beers, and more than 12 drinks.

I'd say David Freese has a drinking problem. Especially since it's recently come to light he was cited for public intoxication while in the Padre minor league system.

I have two thoughts on this. First, I'm glad to see the Cardinals and Freese have decided David needs professional help, and taken steps to provide that. Second, seeing as this becomes the fourth substance abuse issue to hit the Cardinals in the last 2 years, they club has a problem. And they need to aggressively move to squash it.

No reasonable person would recommend the club can David Freese, or deny him a shot at the everyday third baseman job. He didn't (luckily, I know) hurt anyone driving drunk. We will probably not know the full details of what the club does, but I wouldn't be surprised (and frankly expect) he'll pay a fine imposed by the club, and be 'asked' to perform some community service, like talking to high school students, something like that, in addition to whatever John Law throws his way.

And on that sober note, this will probably be my last post until after Christmas. Should some large story develop between now and 31 December, like Holliday signs with St Louis or signs somewhere else, or they pry Cliff Lee from the Mariners, I'll put some thoughts up here. There is a UCB topic coming up - top 5 Cardinal stories of 2009 - that's collectively to be posted 31 December, and I'll be involved in that.

And there may be a story of an empty stocking here on Christmas Eve.

But until the calendar starts to turn, to echo the Christian tradition my ancestors bequeathed me, Peace to You and Yours, and a very Merry Christmas.

[update] I fixed the formatting issues. Sorry about that.

More Posturing

Well according to several sources, talks between the Cardinals and Matt Scott Holliday Boras are heating up. John Mozeliak confirmed tendering an offer for Holliday to Boras before departing Indianapolis last week, but terms weren't disclosed and nothing was heard from the Boras, er, Holliday camp.

Since historically Boras seemed to like conducting his negotiations in public, this lack of news was somewhat disconcerting. The lone leak reported Mo's contract offer didn't approach the $18 million per year the Rockies offered Holliday (which he subsequently rejected).

Late last night more news broke. Seemed the Cardinals and Boras have talked since the winter meetings broke up, and the Cardinals sweetened the pot a little. Holliday's contract offer is now reported to average about $16 million per. That doesn't approach the Teixiera-level money Boras set as a benchmark for this negotiations. Perhaps there are other considerations being made. The Post-Dispatch story talked about guaranteed money, an opt-out clause, and full no-trade protection as possible contract language to make the 'lower' figure more amenable to Holliday.*

*As an aside, is there really that big a difference between $16 million and $18 million a year? Would one's quality of life suffer terribly if compensated 11% less per year than one wanted?

Complicating matters is Jason Bay. Reports on ESPN indicate Mike Cameron has signed a 2-year deal to play for Boston. Which OF spot Cameron will mann remains to be seen; he is a gold-glove center fielder, but I hardly think Boston will shift Ellsbury to left and install Cameron in center. So pencil Cameron into the LF slot. That means Bay won't be returning to Boston. As the popular choice for second-best bat on the 2009 free agent market, where he goes will limit Holliday's options if he doesn't accept St Louis' offer.

All of this is cause for one to shake his head. Matt: you could do a lot worse than play baseball for $16 million a year. If you want to play in St Louis, take the deal. Work out the specific contract language you want, but take the money. If you don't want to spend a hot summer on the shores of Big Muddy, that's fine - just say so.

All this posturing is quite silly.

A quick final word on Ben Jukich. He was taken in the 13th round by Oakland in 2006. He hasn't pitched in the major leagues yet. He's spent the better part of 3 seasons at AAA.

Arbitration Results and Brad Penny

I thought Matt Holliday would decline arbitration, but that DeRosa and/or Pineiro might accept. Holliday did indeed decline, and so did Mark and Joel. So that's that.

No one reading these words should be surprised Holliday declined. He's 26 and $cott Bora$ is his agent. He's about to become a very rich man. DeRosa's move to decline was perhaps influenced by the big deals Placido Polanco (3 yrs/$18M with Philadelphia) and Chone Figgins (4 yrs/$36M with Seattle) signed. Erik Manning posted an article over at Fangraphs today which neatly summarizes DeRosa's value. I think Mark saw the two aforementioned deals and realized he could command between 7-9 million dollars, even while coming back from wrist surgery. Can't blame him for chasing the funds.

Pineiro, well, he had expressed interest in staying a Cardinal. However, he probably thinks based on this past season he'll get something north of the $6.5M he made in 2009, and get a multi-year deal. He may be right. Again, he's chasing the money and long-term security.

There is still a chance Joel could return to the Cardinals, but that chance became a lot longer based on the widely reported imminent signing of Brad Penny. There had been discussion about bringing a veteran pitcher on a short term deal like a 1-year contract. John Smoltz dominated that discussion. Ben Sheets also seemed a viable candidate. But Brad Penny? Wow.

Why would the Cardinals give Penny $7.5M in base salary after he struggled for most of last year? Penny finished 11-9 with a 4.88 ERA in 173.1 innings for the Red Sox and Dodgers. Doesn't seem to make sense. Let's look a little deeper. His FIP was 4.46. That's not great; in fact, it's the fourth highest FIP of his career (his worst FIP season was 2008 - 5.27). His K/9 was 5.66, the second lowest of his career. BB/9 ratio? 2.14 (fifth BEST of his career, and best since 2006). K/BB (2.14) and BABIP (.307) were right on his career averages (2.17 and .303 respectively), and his HR/9 ratio was slightly elevated (0.88 career vice 1.14 in 2009).

Other than his strikeouts being down, what caused his bad year last year? Well his fly ball percentage was the worst of his career (38.4%), and in a park as small as Fenway is, that probably killed him. Guys also didn't swing at his stuff out of the strike zone as much as they did in years past, which would also explain his lower strikeout totals.

Penny becomes an intriguing guy for next year's rotation. He won't be as good as he was with the Giants (and in their pitching-friendly ballpark), and he won't be as bad as he was with the Red Sox (and their hitting-friendly park). Not sure if he's worth $7.5M, but Mozeliak is a better judge of market pricing than I am.

Welcome, Brad Penny.

Arbitration Offers

During a recent UCB interview, when asked which Cardinals would be offered arbitration, Matt Leach (mlb.com) replied he thought only Matt Holliday would get an offer. Here's the quote (question starts at 17:25 on the recording):

"I think that this front office has shown that it has a real hesitation to offer arbitration to anybody who even might accept that they might be worried about having to pay the salary. I think that they have pretty consistently shown that. Each of the past two years I have been surprised at some of the decisions, and I have yet to be surprised with them offering to somebody. If I had to guess I would guess that there's a pretty good chance that Holliday is the only guy they offer to. They've just shown themselves to be very risk adverse when it comes to the possibility of somebody accepting arbitration.

Now if the negotations start going somewhere that kinda leads you to believe things are different, that's one thing - but also remember that under the new CBA [collective bargaining agreement] that not offering arbitration is not the sort of 'death knell' in negotiations that it once was. So to some extent, not offering is no longer the risk that it was. Again, this is one area where I actually disagree with them - I think that you should be willing to take those risks. I think the draft picks are so valuable. But I think they have shown themselves to be very, very risk adverse when it comes to the possibility of players accepting arbitration."

Apparently the Cardinal Front Office has reconsidered their position and decided to accept the risk, because today they offered arbitration to Matt Holliday, Mark DeRosa, and Joel Pineiro. According to about.com's baseball page, that's all the Type A/B free agents the Cardinals had this season.

What are the implications? Baseball's arbitration rules are summarized here. Bottom line is Holliday, DeRosa, and Pineiro have until midnight EST on 7 December to accept/reject arbitration. If they accept, they go back on the Cardinals 40-man roster even though they do not have a contract in place yet, and negotiations for compensation continue. If they reject they return to the free agent pool. The Cardinals will get a compensation pick (or two in the case of Holliday, a Type A free agent) when/if they sign with someone else.

My take on the why.

Prospect Replacement. The Cardinals traded away a large chunk of their high value prospects to acquire DeRosa and Holliday. If in the worst-case all 3 reject arbitration, the Cardinals would receive 4 compensation picks. They traded away 5 in 2009 (Perez, Todd, Wallace, Mortensen, Peterson), so those 4 picks would go a long way to evening the scales in the minors. Granted, picking up raw talent to replace MLB-ready guys like Perez/Todd/Wallace isn't a fair swap or comparison, but at least there will be some return on the DeRosa/Holliday investment.

Third Base Situation. At the start of the off season there was a lot written about David Freese getting a real shot to play third next season, and although no one in the Cardinal organization anointed him the starting third baseman in 2010, it 'seemed' to be the case. Freese may not be ready. Bringing DeRosa back would allow him to develop a little further in the minors, and perhaps hold down a bench position on the major league club while learning. Call it risk mitigation going forward for the big club. Not a bad move.

Who Wouldn't Want These Guys On The Roster? Holliday is a bona-fide power hitter giving the Cardinals additional thump in the lineup. DeRosa should - will - hit much better in 2010 when fully healthy than he did the second half of 2009 with a bum wrist. And Pineiro thrived last year under Duncan, using his sinkers to force hitters into pounding the ball into the dirt (Career year concerns do exist for Pineiro, but his ground ball dominance continued a trend he's had for a couple of years, and is a repeatable skill in my opinion).

Prognosis. Holliday is due for a big payday this off-season if he stays a free agent. I would expect Holliday to reject arbitration. Pineiro already expressed interest in returning to the Club for 2010 and beyond. I think Pineiro accepts as well. DeRosa, with the bum wrist, isn't as desirable this off-season as he was last. The Cubs may make a real run at him; if they've already been in contact with DeRosa, and have a tantalizing offer on the table, he'll probably reject arbitration. Absent that I would expect DeRosa also returns.

Well... So Much For That

First, a Public Service Announcement: the United Cardinal Bloggers Radio Hour will continue on through the off-season, at least for now, and specifically for tonight. Dan Shoptaw will host today's show, scheduled for 7:30 PM Pacific time. Adjust your schedules accordingly. I hope to dial in and talk with him, as always, but that's contingent on a few other things lining up tonight.

It's been 4 days since the Cardinal season finished with a thud. I thought the Cardinals had a good chance of winning this series. I remember looking at various predictions of the NLDS, both at ESPN, CBS Sportsline, and other places, and virtually everyone picked the Cardinals to win in 4 or 5 games. That kind of uniform thought started me thinking something had been missed. For me, I didn't fully appreciate, until the series was over, how razor-thin the Cardinals' margin for error was. Their roster contained 4 players - Carpenter, Wainwright, Pujols, and Holliday - who in 2009 were arguably better than anyone the Dodgers could run out there at any position. However, looking at roster slots 5-25, the Dodgers were better. Better bullpen, better bench, better.

In order for the Cardinals to have won that series, their 4 studs had to play at their A-game level every game. Objective analysis indicates only Wainwright succeeded (8 IP, 3 H, 1 BB, 7 K). AP (3-10, zero extra base hits) was largely neutralized, Holliday had a HR in Game 2 but was 1-11 otherwise, and Carpenter pitched poorly. With 3 of their 4 big guns scuffling, the team just didn't have enough to compensate.

I think the fact Troy Glaus got 2 post-season at bats underscores that point.

I said before Game 3, that when you find yourself pinning all hope to Joel Piniero (after August 1: 4.64 ERA, .738 OPS against), you're in trouble.

So the off-season started Sunday. I would expect there won't be much activity on any front until after the playoffs end around Christmas. As an aside, isn't is asinine all 4 LDS series are over but we still have to way until tomorrow for the LCS round to start? The Yankees will have had 5 days off between games, the Angels 4, the Dodgers 4, the Phillies 3. Why can't MLB run their playoffs like hockey does - once the two series winners are known, start the next round no more than 2 days later. All the excitement that had been generated last week is gone. No wonder MLB is losing the next generation of fans.

There are already reports that Ankiel probably won't be re-signed. Dave Duncan is leaning towards returning if LaRussa returns. LaRussa hasn't decided if he wants to manage yet next year. Then there's Molina being sued for failure to make contracted autograph appearances and other minutiae.

Anyway. This will be the fourth off-season for the ol' blog. I've got some things lined up - there are Baseball Bloggers Alliance award justifications to write, a fantasy baseball wrap, roster analysis, and so on - that will be up over the coming days/weeks. Not to mention stories as warranted about the ongoing playoffs. So check back - hopefully you'll find something worth reading.

Holliday Blues

Well it's been an ugly homestand so far, no?

Dropping 5 of 6 to Atlanta/Florida will cause most to reflect a little bit on what went wrong. St Louis certainly should have won 1 more game (Saturday's 7-6 loss), but Franklin had some issues. They could have taken two more (Friday's 1-0 and Tuesday's 2-1 decision) with a bit more timely hitting.

Let's focus on the hitting for a bit.

Cardinal hitters haven't been lighting up the scoreboard this homestand. Here are some numbers for you to chew on (BA/OPS):

Holliday - .231/.567
Pujols - .381/.921
Schumaker - .455/.975
Ryan - .333/.762
DeRosa - .136/.356
Rasmus - .273/.727
Ludwick - .222/.556
Lugo - .250/.724
Ankiel - .273/.545
Molina - .313/.764

Lots of guys struggling on the homestand.

Ankiel's been in essentially a season-long funk, so no new news there. Ludwick's OPS peaked on 25 July (.850) and he's been in a gentle, but steady, decline since (.689 OPS with 11 XBH since).The DeRosa struggles aren't a surprise, because of the wrist issue he's been fighting through since coming over from Cleveland.

Holliday's struggles, however, are a bit of a eye-catcher. There is some anecdotal evidence Holliday's pressing, given the way he's reacting after chasing bad balls, and some non-clutchiness in key situations (his bases loaded at bats in the 6th on Tuesday and 9th yesterday stand out).

He's not being patient on this homestand: 0 walks in 27 PA. Since coming to the Cardinals, he's walked in about 11% of his plate appearances (17 + 4 intentional in 212 PA), which would place him 30th in the league or in the top 10% of NL hitters. Why has he abandoned that part of his game this homestand? He's struck out 34 times in those PA, or just over 16% of the time (which, if he kept it up over a full season, would make him the second toughest guy in the NL to strike out behind AP), but it's ticked up on this homestand to 26%; and the 7 strikeouts represent 20% of his half-season total with St Louis.

Why the lack of patience? True the Cardinals have faced better pitching in the last 6 games than they have for a while, but that shouldn't cause Holliday to throw pitch selection to the winds. He could be pressing with Ludwick hitting behind him, due to Ryan's own slump; he's struck out 3 times in the 3 games Ludwick's hit 5th, but 4 times with Rasmus behind him, so that doesn't seem to be the reason either. What is true is in the 3 games Ludwick's hit 5th, the Cardinals have scored 3 runs total, and 2 of those runs came well after the game was decided.

His XBH have dried up - 2 (both doubles) on the homestand. There are, to my mind, two possible causes for this. Again the good pitching argument. The other could be his knees. I know, I know - small sample size blah blah blah. But he hasn't hit the ball with authority since tripping over the bag in Milwaukee, so you wonder what he actually did to the knee, and if he's having trouble pivoting around it. If I had access to game tapes for the last two weeks, state of the art video analysys equipment, and no need to work I would examine his swings and make a definitive assessment, but out here in the real world that's not possible.

I don't have a solution - I point it out as something to watch.

Holliday and Boras

Sunday's Post Dispatch featured an article about Matt Holliday. Yes, he of the .606 AVG going into yesterday's game (which was subsequently deflated by his first 'oh-fer' as a Cardinal). The jist of the article was discussing how much Holliday has helped the Cardinals, but the interesting part was the talk about re-signing him.

Money quotes:

Finding the term "rental player" repugnant, team chairman Bill DeWitt Jr. has pledged an all-out attempt to sign Holliday to an extension before he reaches free agency in November. The club minimizes Holliday's rejection of a Rockies proposal that averaged $18 million...

and

Boras on Saturday called "absurd" any suggestion of pending talks. He also sees ready comparisons with Carlos Beltran's trade from Kansas City to the Houston Astros in 2004 and Mark Teixeira's move from Atlanta to the Los Angeles Angels last July(emphasis mine). Both players landed elsewhere via free agency months after their big-splash trades.

Hoo, Boy.

So what does that really mean?

Beltran and Teixeira were both traded at or near the 31 July deadline; Beltran in 2004, Teixeira in 2007 and 2008. Here are some select numbers they each put up after the trade, and their subsequent contracts:

Beltran:
2004 (KC): 309 Plate appearances, .278/.367/.534, 15 HR 51 RBI
2004 (HOU): 399 PA, .258/.368/.559, 23 HR 53 RBI.
Post Season: 20-46, 8 HR, 14 RBI.

His numbers in Houston were pretty close to what he put up in Kansas City. He hit for a lower average but had more power. His post-season numbers, however, were ridiculous. That post-season, more than anything else, drove the 7 year/$119 million deal he signed with New York (which will pay him $18.5M through 2011)

Teixeira:
2007 (TEX) - 335 PA, .297/.397/.524, 13 HR 49 RBI.
2007 (ATL) - 340 PA, .317/.404/.615, 17 HR 56 RBI.
2008 (ATL) - 451 PA, .283/.390/.512, 20 HR 78 RBI.
2008 (LAA) - 234 PA, .358/.449/.632, 13 HR 43 RBI.
Post Season (2008) - 15 AB, .467/.550/.467, 0 HR 1 RBI.

Teixeira was widely accused of sand-bagging in Texas prior to the trade to Atlanta, but the numbers don't quite bear that out. However, he didn't command what he thought he should on the open market, so signed a 1 year deal for $12.5M with the Braves.

His Anaheim numbers look like they declined from his Atlanta ones, until you realize he did that in about half the at-bats he had in Atlanta. His post-season didn't drive the market quite as radically as Beltran's did in 2004, but he still got paid with the 8 year/$180M the Yankees bequeathed him ($20M this and next year, then $22.5M until 2016).

If those are the kinds of numbers Boras is contemplating for Holliday, that's a scary proposition.

Holliday's WAR right now is 3.8, which translates into $17.2M for his work in 2009. In 2008, when he finished his season, Teixeira's WAR was the highest it had ever been (6.7), which put his value at $30M; he got $22.5M a season (average, including bonuses). His compensation probably suffered that hit based on both the state of the economy last fall, as well as the Sabathia signing. Beltran's 2005 WAR was 6.5, good enough to be worth $20.2M, and he got $17M a season (average).

I assume teams will still be willing to pay ~$5 million dollars a win for high-end free agents this winter. Holliday certainly qualifies as a high-end guy. Holliday's career high in WAR is 7.9 (2007), and he's tearing it up right now; so let's further assume he'll stay in the high end of his statistical averages (assuming he'll stay as white hot as he is now is a little silly), so that'd put his 2009 WAR at a solid 7.

That's $35M a year for him. The Cardinals can't afford that.

Drop the price to $30M. So what? The Cardinals still can't afford him.

Lower his yearly salary to $22.5M, the same level Teixeira got last year. That could be doable, however, there's this additional elephant in the room: Albert Pujols is a free agent in 2011, and the team wants to re-sign him too. Albert's AVERAGED a 7.8 WAR from 2002-2008. That's, um, $40M per.

If they break the bank to sign Holliday, will there be any $$ left to sign Pujols? Highly unlikely.

It's becoming increasingly clear the Cardinals can't afford both Holliday and Pujols. At least to me. Now, there are options, which we'll explore later this week.

Let's hope they win the World Series this year. It may be their last shot for a while.