Dan talking "offers and physicals" with a RF target

[Babypowder]

1 minute ago, SteveA said:

Well, I guess we'll find out this season if he falls off a cliff in year 4.

Doesn’t even matter at this point. He’s already been worth double the contract he signed. He could miss all of 2018 and that deal would still be an absolute steal for the Mariners.

[weams]

10 hours ago, Babypowder said:

Doesn’t even matter at this point. He’s already been worth double the contract he signed. He could miss all of 2018 and that deal would still be an absolute steal for the Mariners.

I agree. He's been great.

[Frobby]

11 hours ago, SteveA said:

Well, I guess we'll find out this season if he falls off a cliff in year 4.

Doesn’t matter.   His production for the first three years has been worth about $102 mm, compared to the $58 mm he’s being paid over four years.    It was unequivocally a mistake not to give him the fourth year, with the benefit of hindsight.    However, at the time, it was a big risk to sign a guy for four years for his age 34-37 seasons.*

* Cruz’s birthday is July 1.   If he was one day older, these would have been considered his age 35-38 seasons.     

[Ohfan67]

Just now, Frobby said:

Doesn’t matter.   His production for the first three years has been worth about $102 mm, compared to the $58 mm he’s being paid over four years.    It was unequivocally a mistake not to give him the fourth year, with the benefit of hindsight.    However, at the time, it was a big risk to sign a guy for four years for his age 34-37 seasons.*

* Cruz’s birthday is July 1.   If he was one day older, these would have been considered his age 35-38 seasons.     

I totally disagreed at the time and totally disagree now. He was the 51st highest paid player in 2015. It just wasn't a lot of money in 2015 and even less money now (Cruz is currently ranked 68 and will move further down the list in a few weeks). There was always a high probability that the Mariners were going to get their moneys worth out of Cruz. 

[MDtransplant757]

1 minute ago, Ohfan67 said:

I totally disagreed at the time and totally disagree now. He was the 51st highest paid player in 2015. It just wasn't a lot of money in 2015 and even less money now (Cruz is currently ranked 68 and will move further down the list in a few weeks). There was always a high probability that the Mariners were going to get their moneys worth out of Cruz. 

Problem was the team around him was either aging or terrible. 

[Ohfan67]

36 minutes ago, MDtransplant757 said:

Problem was the team around him was either aging or terrible. 

They won the freaking AL East with Nelson Cruz! And the O's average player age was below average, way below average in terms of pitchers' age. You should really think about using Google every so often. 

[Il BuonO]

9 minutes ago, Ohfan67 said:

They won the freaking AL East with Nelson Cruz! And the O's average player age was below average, way below average in terms of pitchers' age. You should really think about using Google every so often. 

Maybe he was referring to the Ms?

[Luke-OH]

I'm OK with not signing Cruz.  Unless you can point me to some data or scouting showing me how he could be expected to repeat his 2017 season going forward at his age (instead of regressing towards the previous three years of production).  It's easy to judge deals in hindsight, but if you were in a presentation to PA or DD back then what evidence would you present to convince the GM and/or Owner that he'd be better than projected going forward.

It's one thing to miss signs, it's another to have something truly unexpected happen.  I think Cruz's years with the Mariners fall more into the latter.

[Ohfan67]

Just now, Il BuonO said:

Maybe he was referring to the Ms?

Maybe. Now that I reread the posts, it is unclear if he was referencing the O's or M's, although I was clearly talking about why I thought extending Cruz would have been valuable to the O's.

[Ohfan67]

Just now, Luke-OH said:

I'm OK with not signing Cruz.  Unless you can point me to some data or scouting showing me how he could be expected to repeat his 2017 season going forward at his age (instead of regressing towards the previous three years of production).  It's easy to judge deals in hindsight, but if you were in a presentation to PA or DD back then what evidence would you present to convince the GM and/or Owner that he'd better than projected going forward.

It's one thing to miss signs, it's another to have something truly unexpected happen.  I think Cruz's years with the Mariners fall more into the latter.

Not hindsight on my part and the part of some other posters. There were many threads where this was discussed back in the day with all the details. As far as convincing Angelos and the like, the Orioles have given out a ton of contracts far riskier than Cruz's contract IMO. The Trumbo contract was for less money, for example, but was much worst than gambling on Cruz IMO. And of course the Davis contract, the Hardy contract, etc. 

[Luke-OH]

1 minute ago, Ohfan67 said:

Not hindsight on my part and the part of some other posters. There were many threads where this was discussed back in the day with all the details. As far as convincing Angelos and the like, the Orioles have given out a ton of contracts far riskier than Cruz's contract IMO. The Trumbo contract was for less money, for example, but was much worst than gambling on Cruz IMO. And of course the Davis contract, the Hardy contract, etc. 

I understand that the Orioles have given out foolish contracts, both foolish at the time, and foolish in hindsight.

I agree Trumbo was a poor deal, I agree Davis was a poor deal. 

I just think it's unwise to be optimistic about a player's future performance without hard evidence for that optimism.  I've looked at his statistics up and down and tried to find signs that something changed in 2014 to indicate that 2014 performance was more likely going forward than 2011-2013 performance.  I couldn't find anything, if someone else has, I'd be happy to accept it (if the evidence is strong).

[Can_of_corn]

1 hour ago, Ohfan67 said:

I totally disagreed at the time and totally disagree now. He was the 51st highest paid player in 2015. It just wasn't a lot of money in 2015 and even less money now (Cruz is currently ranked 68 and will move further down the list in a few weeks). There was always a high probability that the Mariners were going to get their moneys worth out of Cruz. 

Can you explain to me how Cruz was a better bet to be worth his contact than Trumbo?

[foxfield]

6 minutes ago, Can_of_corn said:

Can you explain to me how Cruz was a better bet to be worth his contact than Trumbo?

Cruz' career numbers simply provide more stability relative to the value of his contract.  Trumbo was being paid to nearly replicate career numbers.  But I dont know that I would extrapolate that to Mariners were always going to get their moneys worth from Cruz.

[Moose Milligan]

17 minutes ago, Can_of_corn said:

Can you explain to me how Cruz was a better bet to be worth his contact than Trumbo?

Because, Orioles.

 

[glenn__davis]

 

1 hour ago, Ohfan67 said:

Not hindsight on my part and the part of some other posters. There were many threads where this was discussed back in the day with all the details. As far as convincing Angelos and the like, the Orioles have given out a ton of contracts far riskier than Cruz's contract IMO. The Trumbo contract was for less money, for example, but was much worst than gambling on Cruz IMO. And of course the Davis contract, the Hardy contract, etc. 

There's no question that many people advocated signing Cruz after 2014.  I believe that 4 times out of 5, those people were going to end up being wrong.  This time there's no question they ended up being very right.  Given the same set of circumstances today, I think I would still argue against the signing.  Just didn't think a player of his skill/body type would hold up at all.  I was quite wrong.

With all of that said, I hope the Orioles weren't worried about his year 4 performance.  When you're signing a FA contract such as this one, you pretty much assume that you're paying for production for the first few years, and that the last year (or last few years) are almost always going to be bad ones.  Of course, so far Cruz has debunked even that.