New Fangraphs article "The Orioles Stars and Scrubs Problem"

[scOtt]

This is why people obsess over cost-controlled players, and good value in free agency, and losing draft picks, and not overpaying, and cutting-edge analysis. This is why people said "there's a lot of risk here" about extending Roberts and Markakis while others yelled "hometown hero pay the man" and "sabermetrics is ruthless and baseball is about real people", and why people hated on horrible FA contracts like Prince Fielder and Jayson Werth while others yelled "make a commitment to winning."

We are right now feeling the crunch of a team without enough surplus value. 15 WAR (from our "stars") for 40M is excellent value, and would cost us about 75M (or more, with rising spending) on the FA market. That's great. But things like Markakis's contract, a bunch of blown draft picks, and the apparent reality that we're a middle-of-the-road spending team combine to demonstrate in no uncertain terms what happens to a team when its front office fails to execute well. We have no realistic way or expectation of making up that missing 20 WAR (which would only get us to fringe contention anyway).

This is why people care about things like overpaying Kendrys Morales and giving up a first rounder for him. Because when you don't care about things like that, you get a poorly run organization with very few avenues for improvement.

You perfectly summarized the article and made me feel JUST as pessimistic after reading it.

Thanks.

[SrMeowMeow]

While there were quite a few people who thought we overpaid for Roberts, the vast majority were flipping cartwheels when Markakis signed his deal. I hardly remember any dissent at all about that one, which committed Markakis to the team for his age 25-30 seasons after posting increasing OPS's of .799, .848 and .897 at ages 22-24. It has not worked out well, but that's a deal I'd do every time given a similar opportunity.

I'd certainly do it again too. In that case, it's more a question of people refusing to acknowledge the risks and downsides of deals. Many people acted as if Markakis really was a guaranteed star, which is of course never true.

[weams]

I'd certainly do it again too. In that case, it's more a question of people refusing to acknowledge the risks and downsides of deals. Many people acted as if Markakis really was a guaranteed star, which is of course never true.

There's no such thing as no man's land to me. A man just needs a place where he can be wild and free.

[Can_of_corn]

There's no such thing as no man's land to me. A man just needs a place where he can be wild and free.

I had to leave him there, in no-man's-land.

[Singleton]

This is why people obsess over cost-controlled players, and good value in free agency, and losing draft picks, and not overpaying, and cutting-edge analysis. This is why people said "there's a lot of risk here" about extending Roberts and Markakis while others yelled "hometown hero pay the man" and "sabermetrics is ruthless and baseball is about real people", and why people hated on horrible FA contracts like Prince Fielder and Jayson Werth while others yelled "make a commitment to winning."

We are right now feeling the crunch of a team without enough surplus value. 15 WAR (from our "stars") for 40M is excellent value, and would cost us about 75M (or more, with rising spending) on the FA market. That's great. But things like Markakis's contract, a bunch of blown draft picks, and the apparent reality that we're a middle-of-the-road spending team combine to demonstrate in no uncertain terms what happens to a team when its front office fails to execute well. We have no realistic way or expectation of making up that missing 20 WAR (which would only get us to fringe contention anyway).

This is why people care about things like overpaying Kendrys Morales and giving up a first rounder for him. Because when you don't care about things like that, you get a poorly run organization with very few avenues for improvement.

Fabulous post and a really good explanation of our challenge and the risks of certain paths.

[SteveA]

Adam Jones, Chris Davis, Matt Wieters, J.J. Hardy, and Manny Machado are all underpaid relative to their market values, but they?re still going to cost a combined $40 million in salary for 2014, and Nick Markakis is going to make another $15 million from a contract that was signed when he too looked like a future star. Those six are going to cost the team about $55 million of their roughly $95 million budget for 2014, leaving the Orioles with about $40 million to spend on the other 19 spots on the roster. Getting +20 to +25 WAR from 19 spots might seem easy on the surface, but it gets a lot more difficult when you require the team to spend about $2 million apiece to acquire each of those wins, especially when the market price of wins is over $6 million now.

Even including all of the guys making the league minimum and having their salaries held down by arbitration, the overall cost of a win is a little over $3 million now, and a lot of the guys who are productive and make no money aren?t available to acquire. In the market of available players, the going rate is much higher, and that?s the market that teams have to shop in if they want to improve their rosters in the short term.

Isn't that just an overly long way of saying you simply can't contend with a $95M payroll?

I mean, he says we are not overpaying our 5 stars, only Markakis. And yet that still doesn't leave enough to pick up all the 2-win players needed to fill out the roster to get a contender, with the assumed payroll.

[Hallas]

This is why people obsess over cost-controlled players, and good value in free agency, and losing draft picks, and not overpaying, and cutting-edge analysis. This is why people said "there's a lot of risk here" about extending Roberts and Markakis while others yelled "hometown hero pay the man" and "sabermetrics is ruthless and baseball is about real people", and why people hated on horrible FA contracts like Prince Fielder and Jayson Werth while others yelled "make a commitment to winning."

We are right now feeling the crunch of a team without enough surplus value. 15 WAR (from our "stars") for 40M is excellent value, and would cost us about 75M (or more, with rising spending) on the FA market. That's great. But things like Markakis's contract, a bunch of blown draft picks, and the apparent reality that we're a middle-of-the-road spending team combine to demonstrate in no uncertain terms what happens to a team when its front office fails to execute well. We have no realistic way or expectation of making up that missing 20 WAR (which would only get us to fringe contention anyway).

This is why people care about things like overpaying Kendrys Morales and giving up a first rounder for him. Because when you don't care about things like that, you get a poorly run organization with very few avenues for improvement.

While Roberts was a decided risk, very few pre-26, pre-FA signs have not resulted in positive value for the club. Especially those that sign with the kind of numbers that Nick produced during his first 3 seasons. While there is downside risk, the risk is far lower than signing a typical free agent, because he is younger, and because the club doing has access to far more information than they do with normal FA signings. While you are correct that there is downside risk, to compare Nick's deal with 7/132 given to Jayson Werth completely mischaracterizes the actual risk that the Orioles faced in signing him. The primary conclusions that we can draw here are that the O's had some terrible luck in signing Nick, or that the O's missed some internal sign that his production would slip faster than normal. While I wouldn't put it past the Orioles for this to be a case of the latter, it's really hard for us to prove that assertion.

[Stotle]

Isn't that just an overly long way of saying you simply can't contend with a $95M payroll?

I mean, he says we are not overpaying our 5 stars, only Markakis. And yet that still doesn't leave enough to pick up all the 2-win players needed to fill out the roster to get a contender, with the assumed payroll.

It's saying you can't build a winner through FA for $95 MM. BAL needs more surplus value outside of FA if it wants to be a low-mid-market payroll.

[weams]

It's saying you can't build a winner through FA for $95 MM. BAL needs more surplus value outside of FA if it wants to be a low-mid-market payroll.

Meaning projectible prospects available for surplus value during the upcoming season? A Manny and Jeff Locke in the minors?

[MrOrange82]

Fabulous post and a really good explanation of our challenge and the risks of certain paths.

It was a good post, with the exception of the completely-divorced-from-reality idea that, at the time of his signing, Markakis' contract was a bad one.

And that's really the problem rooted in a lot of these arguments (i.e., getting wrapped up in both hindsight and future-casting). Some people want to conserve draft picks and not spend on FA, but only consider those issues in a vacuum. For the most part, with some exceptions, the Orioles have stayed out of the FA market and conserved draft picks, and the result has been a team that's not quite good enough to win the World Series (and even saying that much might be generous).

The problem I have with the draft pick fervor is that if you were to overhaul the O's internal structure (i.e., cut whatever dead weight there is to cut, and reinvest wisely and consistently in MiL player scouting and development), the time it would take to round out the major league club would likely outstrip the competitive window of the current "core." So what's the best case scenario? You reinvest in the MiL system, and trade whoever has significant value on the ML team in an effort to restock the high-minors? How does that effect the clock when it comes to competing in the postseason? Are you looking at 2018? Beyond?

Unfortunately, the absolute pinnacle of "realism" when it comes to the Orioles is that they're probably not going to do much of anything. Whether they make good use of their first round pick in the upcoming draft is a crap shoot, IMO (specious, deceptive arguments citing to the Orioles' recent glut of "successful" top-five picks), and they're unlikely to augment the team through FA in order to bridge the WAR gap referenced in the OP.

All that said, with "realism" in mind, the people on the opposing side of the draft pick argument (at LEAST) seem to acknowledge that, for the next couple of seasons, the Orioles have a chance to make some noise. They could make a couple of signings right now, if the yearly budget is ~100 million dollars, that might, with some 2012ish luck, put them in the playoff picture between now and the time that Davis & company are free agents. Given that the O's are not currently able to adequately replenish the ML club through their MiL system, what do you do? Sacrifice the viability of the current core for the sake of the integrity of the MiL system, or throw your hat into the ring for a couple shots at the postseason? For my part, the O's haven't done enough over the last 20 years to make me believe that hoarding draft picks will pay dividends such that refusing to give up a mid/late first round pick is, in every case, a bad idea. Moreover, my understanding is that the Orioles' personnel charged with evaluating and developing talent hasn't changed that much over the last few years, so why should we believe that standing pat with them, again, will lead to an improved system several years from now?

Basically, all this reminds me of the debate that swirled through DC when Strasburg reached his innings limit a couple years go. Specifically, what is the point of playing and following MLB? The Nationals decided to protect their long-term future and investment in Strasburg by sitting him during the postseason. Would he have given them an improved shot at the title in 2012? Probably. Might he have gotten hurt? Sure. All I know is that they protected him and themselves, and they stayed at home last October. Such are the quirks of professional sports. On the one hand, the Nationals might have been protecting their future. On the other, they might have missed one of their best, possibly only, shots at a World Series title this decade. If the purpose of playing the game is, ultimately, winning, then, IMO, waiting for the perfect hand to be dealt is not the way to go.

I wish the Orioles were smarter, AND I wish they spent more. However, if they're not and they won't, I'd at least like to see them make enough improvements this winter to stay relevant for a couple of seasons. After that...well...PA can't own the team forever, right?

[BohKnowsBmore]

The big problem with our star players, particularly Davis and Machado (and to a lesser extent Jones), are projected for big drop offs in production next season. I think the projection systems are too low, but even with orange-colored glasses I wouldn't expect more than 4 fWAR out of Davis and Jones and 5 fWAR out of Manny, which would still represent about a 3-4 fWAR loss off of last year.

I think we can stay put with 2B and LF - both positions should be able to give us 1-2 fWAR based on our internal options. But we are really lacking at DH. I think Pearce is a perfectly reasonable RH complement for DH to put up 0.5-1 fWAR in part time, but we really need the LH complement to give us the additional 1.5-2 fWAR. Urrutia has not shown enough to be counted on as that guy yet. If we do get that DH piece, I think our position players will be about as good as they were last year, and then it comes down to pitching.

2 things.

1) those regressions still vault those five players well beyond 15 total fwar 4 for jones and Davis and 5 for machado.

2) this feels like the classic case of any player who has an up season is due for regression, yet any player with a down season has realized his new true talent level.

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[Frobby]

2 things.

1) those regressions still vault those five players well beyond 15 total fwar 4 for jones and Davis and 5 for machado.

2) this feels like the classic case of any player who has an up season is due for regression, yet any player with a down season has realized his new true talent level.

Sent from my iPhone using Tapatalk

I think the big point is that we aren't likely to experience another season where Davis, Hardy, Macahdo, Jones and Wieters all stay healthy all season. That's where we're likely see some net regression in the overall contribution of this group.

[wildcard]

I think the big point is that we aren't likely to experience another season where Davis, Hardy, Macahdo, Jones and Wieters all stay healthy all season. That's where we're likely see some net regression in the overall contribution of this group.

Both Machado and Davis hurt their knees and Wieters hurt his bat.

[Can_of_corn]

Both Machado and Davis hurt their knees and Wieters hurt his bat.

I thought he pulled his swing?

[Roll Tide]

The Orioles seem to be using a "stars and scrubs" strategy in building their team, Fangraphs' Dave Cameron writes, and the tactic doesn't seem to be working given the clear holes on the roster and their relatively limited payroll space.

The Os are the laughing stock of baseball.