Would you sign Fielder to a 6/140 contract?

[MrOrange82]

You've got to spend money to make money. NESN was just like MASN before the Sox took off...

All that's doing is leading to a circular argument. Does Angelos have the money right now to spend with the big boys? Well, maybe not. Well, you have to spend it to earn it. Well, what if you don't have it to spend?

I know Angelos has made a lot of money over the years through his legal practice, but I've always wondered how much he actually has to throw around. A lot of his net worth is tied up in the Orioles and MASN. I know at one point he was on the Forbes 400 list (2-3 years ago), but that he was also reported to have lost something along the lines of 30% of his wealth during the recession. So...is he an owner who can field a 100+ million dollar team? I don't know. My gut says "nope."

[Hank Scorpio]

All that's doing is leading to a circular argument. Does Angelos have the money right now to spend with the big boys? Well, maybe not. Well, you have to spend it to earn it. Well, what if you don't have it to spend?

I know Angelos has made a lot of money over the years through his legal practice, but I've always wondered how much he actually has to throw around. A lot of his net worth is tied up in the Orioles and MASN. I know at one point he was on the Forbes 400 list (2-3 years ago), but that he was also reported to have lost something along the lines of 30% of his wealth during the recession. So...is he an owner who can field a 100+ million dollar team? I don't know. My gut says "nope."

Plus, like... he doesn't like, want to, ya know man?

[MrOrange82]

Plus, like... he doesn't like, want to, ya know man?

Well, yeah, there's that.

(btw...Trea has agreed to blame Angelos once and for all for the O's woes after the team fails to sign any significant FA's this winter)

[Frobby]

You've got to spend money to make money. NESN was just like MASN before the Sox took off...

Where is your evidence for that? If I may say so, NESN has existed since 1984. The Red Sox have been below .500 in five of 28 seasons since NESN came into existence, and were a perenially good team even before that (winning record every year from 1967 through 1982 and just a little under .500 in 1983).

Back to Fielder, I'm in the neutral category on the proposed 6/$140 mm contract. The comparison with Reynolds is nonsensical, as Fielder is a much better overall hitter. I do think having a legit no. 4 hitter (which Fielders undoubtedly is) would help the others in the lineup. I just worry that we are going to waste Fielder's best years becuase we are nowhere near contention, and Fielder isn't going to put us anywhere close.

[DrungoHazewood]

If you trust fangraphs, Powell went from 6.3 WAR in 1970, to 4.4, 3.1, 2.5, 2.0, 4.2 (the 1975 season you mentioned), 0.0, and 0.1.

Prior to the above, he recorded precisely one season of less than 3.1 WAR, two seasons of 6.9 or better, and four seasons of 3.9 or better.

The question isn't necessarily whether Fielder will fall off a cliff within the next year or two...it's how much will he resemble the 6.0 WAR player the O's (or any time that signs him this winter) would be paying for. And the odds are stacked drastically against Fielder in that regard.

Here's some data on players very roughly similar to Prince Fielder. It's taken from the set of players who complied between 15 and 25 rWAR from ages 21-27. Fielder was worth 19.6 rWAR from 21-27. I did a search on those 200 players, but on what they did from age 28-35. Here's that result broken down into WAR bins:

50 of them had a WAR greater than 25 from ages 28-35, led by Big Dan Brouthers' 54 and Roberto Clemente's 52.

21 had a WAR between 20 and 24.99

24 had a WAR between 15 and 19.99

28 had a WAR between 10 and 14.99

65 had a WAR of less than 10

12 of them didn't play at all after age 27

A $175M deal is paying for maybe 35 wins. Maybe a bit more if inflation is slow, a bit less if it picks up speed. But in the neighborhood of 35 wins. Only 22 of 200 (11%) players who had 15-25 wins from age 21-27 had 35+ wins from 28-35. About 5% were worth much more than that, 40+ wins.

So... even if you lower the threshold to 25 or 30 wins, it looks to me like Prince Fielder has maybe a 20% of "earning" an 8/175 contract. And that looks roughly the same whether you search all position players, or just 1B/DHs.

The average player from this list was worth 20.3 wins from 21-27, or $91M, and 16.5 wins from 27-35, or $74M in today's dollars. Just to emphasize, Prince was worth 19.6 wins from 21-27.

[Florida_Osfan]

You've got to spend money to make money. NESN was just like MASN before the Sox took off...

Not true at all. The Red Sox fanbase was rabid before their first WS victory in 84 years. In fact, the curse, the losing streak, etc. all fed into Red Sox fandom. MASN can't spend money they don't have - if there is no revenue, spending it won't bring back the casual fan. You just refuse to accept this. The casual fan ISN'T COMING BACK UNTIL THIS TEAM WINS FOR A WHILE - if ever, really.

Signing Fielder will only excite the die hard fans and create a "huh, err" from the rest.

[Fan4Life]

There is no way this franchise can push the payroll to 120 mil and even if they could this is certainly not the time to do it.

Yeah.. I'm not sure that it's true they can't.. it certainly is true they won't.

[Roll Tide]

At the end of the day the Orioles can afford Fielder and need a MOO bat. The team will be better with Fielder.I dont understand why any fan here would not want Fielder. The Orioles are lacking star talent...

Just remember guys ...Will you be complaining later this year when Atkins, Guerrro, Lee clone number 4 flops and the Orioles have flushed another 5-10 million down the toilet,

[MrOrange82]

Here's some data on players very roughly similar to Prince Fielder. It's taken from the set of players who complied between 15 and 25 rWAR from ages 21-27. Fielder was worth 19.6 rWAR from 21-27. I did a search on those 200 players, but on what they did from age 28-35. Here's that result broken down into WAR bins:

50 of them had a WAR greater than 25 from ages 28-35, led by Big Dan Brouthers' 54 and Roberto Clemente's 52.

21 had a WAR between 20 and 24.99

24 had a WAR between 15 and 19.99

28 had a WAR between 10 and 14.99

65 had a WAR of less than 10

12 of them didn't play at all after age 27

A $175M deal is paying for maybe 35 wins. Maybe a bit more if inflation is slow, a bit less if it picks up speed. But in the neighborhood of 35 wins. Only 22 of 200 (11%) players who had 15-25 wins from age 21-27 had 35+ wins from 28-35. About 5% were worth much more than that, 40+ wins.

So... even if you lower the threshold to 25 or 30 wins, it looks to me like Prince Fielder has maybe a 20% of "earning" an 8/175 contract. And that looks roughly the same whether you search all position players, or just 1B/DHs.

The average player from this list was worth 20.3 wins from 21-27, or $91M, and 16.5 wins from 27-35, or $74M in today's dollars. Just to emphasize, Prince was worth 19.6 wins from 21-27.

I don't think I could possibly put together a new response to this thread that would best the one quoted above. Wow.

[Florida_Osfan]

At the end of the day the Orioles can afford Fielder and need a MOO bat. The team will be better with Fielder.I dont understand why any fan here would not want Fielder. The Orioles are lacking star talent...

Just remember guys ...Will you be complaining later this year when Atkins, Guerrro, Lee clone number 4 flops and the Orioles have flushed another 5-10 million down the toilet,

What's this whole "gotcha" argument about? Who said, "Fielder, meh" on this board? The concern is for the end of his stupidly large contract that will be overpaying for likely deteriorated performance. That there isn't one statistical smoking gun stating the O's have the money from MASN to spend it on a $130 Million dollar payroll. That signing Fielder isn't going to excite squat in the casual fan - only diehards give a crap.

And as for signing Atkins clones... of course they're going to do it. No one is advocating for it - you're just latching it onto people. It's the O's - of course they're going to make terrible decisions. It's the way it roles up there.

[Hank Scorpio]

Here's some data on players very roughly similar to Prince Fielder. It's taken from the set of players who complied between 15 and 25 rWAR from ages 21-27. Fielder was worth 19.6 rWAR from 21-27. I did a search on those 200 players, but on what they did from age 28-35. Here's that result broken down into WAR bins:

50 of them had a WAR greater than 25 from ages 28-35, led by Big Dan Brouthers' 54 and Roberto Clemente's 52.

21 had a WAR between 20 and 24.99

24 had a WAR between 15 and 19.99

28 had a WAR between 10 and 14.99

65 had a WAR of less than 10

12 of them didn't play at all after age 27

A $175M deal is paying for maybe 35 wins. Maybe a bit more if inflation is slow, a bit less if it picks up speed. But in the neighborhood of 35 wins. Only 22 of 200 (11%) players who had 15-25 wins from age 21-27 had 35+ wins from 28-35. About 5% were worth much more than that, 40+ wins.

So... even if you lower the threshold to 25 or 30 wins, it looks to me like Prince Fielder has maybe a 20% of "earning" an 8/175 contract. And that looks roughly the same whether you search all position players, or just 1B/DHs.

The average player from this list was worth 20.3 wins from 21-27, or $91M, and 16.5 wins from 27-35, or $74M in today's dollars. Just to emphasize, Prince was worth 19.6 wins from 21-27.

Hallelujah.

However, this is the kind of data that is typically blatantly ignored in free agency. Teams know they're going to overpay and some are willing to do it.

[DrungoHazewood]

Hallelujah.

However, this is the kind of data that is typically blatantly ignored in free agency. Teams know they're going to overpay and some are willing to do it.

Sometimes, yes, it's ignored. But on the whole it's not, because the $4.5M/win figure is based on what teams have historically paid for free agents. I think you can conclude that teams get burned on big Zito-like deals, but it's balanced out (from the 4.5/win standpoint) from all of the shorter, cheaper deals that aren't as poor, and the handful of big, long deals that work out for guys who end up being inner-circle HOFers.

[Sports Guy]

The bottom line is this...If the Orioles signed Fielder and won with him, thus allowing them to raise payroll, the contract will have been worth it even if Fielder himself is only worth 100M or so.

[DrungoHazewood]

The bottom line is this...If the Orioles signed Fielder and won with him, thus allowing them to raise payroll, the contract will have been worth it even if Fielder himself is only worth 100M or so.

That's one potential bottom line. But as I stated previously, an average player in Fielder's neighborhood in value from 21-27, is annually worth about 75% of that value from 28-35. So if Fielder hits a midline, 50% case he'll be worth about 2 wins a year over the next eight years, or about $75M. And have one more 5-win season.

If the O's win with Fielder it'll likely be because he was a complimentary piece, just one of many improvements. And since they can't afford the other 15-25 wins via high-dollar free agents Fielder will necessarily be among the least efficient of their additions.

I think the real bottom line is that it'll be a minor miracle if the O's contend in the short term, so the odds are stacked heavily against a playoff run that allows payroll expansion and justification of a Fielder deal.

[Sports Guy]

That's one potential bottom line. But as I stated previously, an average player in Fielder's neighborhood in value from 21-27, is annually worth about 75% of that value from 28-35. So if Fielder hits a midline, 50% case he'll be worth about 2 wins a year over the next eight years, or about $75M. And have one more 5-win season.

If the O's win with Fielder it'll likely be because he was a complimentary piece, just one of many improvements. And since they can't afford the other 15-25 wins via high-dollar free agents Fielder will necessarily be among the least efficient of their additions.

I think the real bottom line is that it'll be a minor miracle if the O's contend in the short term, so the odds are stacked heavily against a playoff run that allows payroll expansion and justification of a Fielder deal.

Yea but if Fielder can generate enough fan interest that he can help increase ticket sales, the team can some more games, get closer to 500 and then start looking like a more attractive place for FAs, his signing could potentially be a springboard to other things.

But, for that to happen, the team is probably going to have to keep the payroll around 100M, which is why I started the other thread.