Dan talking "offers and physicals" with a RF target

[Redskins Rick]

2 hours ago, glenn__davis said:

 

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.

He has been healthy for the Mariners, then when he was here.

I was one of those that was in agreement that 4 years was too long a deal, and others in MLB must have agreed, because it appears that he only had 1 four year offer.

[Ohfan67]

2 hours ago, Can_of_corn said:

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

Good question and I and others presented arguments back in the day. I honestly don't have time to go dig them up, but even a quick glance at the players' statistics says a ton. Trumbo was worth 1.6 WAR in his first year with the Orioles and he super sucked the two previous years. His career high was his rookie year in 2011 and he never had a year above 2.9. Cruz had a 2.1 WAR the year before the Orioles got him and was worth 4.1 with the Orioles. That was Cruz's second year where he was worth more than 4 WAR. Trumbo was a waste of a roster spot as soon as the Orioles extended him. There were multiple players on the roster to rotate through the DH spot and multiple players that were going to outfield him. Even if Trumbo would have replicated that 1.6 WAR there was a high probability that the Orioles were going to be able to replicate or almost replicate his value with other, far less limited players. That's not true of Cruz. His realistic upside was that he would be one of the most valuable hitters on the Orioles and at a price that I thought was relatively risk free. I didn't think Cruz would do as well as he has with the Mariners, but I thought even with aging there was a good chance that Cruz would deliver enough positive value in the first couple of years of the contract to make it a good investment. At the time I think a lot of posters thought 15 million was more money that it really was/is in terms of baseball value. 

 

Man, I couldn't stop myself from revisiting Cruz! I really do have to get back to work! 

[Ohfan67]

3 hours ago, 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 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.

I supplied a little of my thinking/evidence in a response to CofC, but obviously the Mariners had data and/or scouting suggested that he would be worth his contract. Note that being worth the contract is not the same as "expected to repeat his 2017 season". I didn't expect him to be as good as he's been with the Mariners, I expected him to produce positive value for the contract. 

[Can_of_corn]

2 minutes ago, Ohfan67 said:

I supplied a little of my thinking/evidence in a response to CofC, but obviously the Mariners had data and/or scouting suggested that he would be worth his contract. Note that being worth the contract is not the same as "expected to repeat his 2017 season". I didn't expect him to be as good as he's been with the Mariners, I expected him to produce positive value for the contract. 

I remember the Mariners coming off as desperate for a power bat.

 

[Can_of_corn]

7 minutes ago, Ohfan67 said:

Good question and I and others presented arguments back in the day. I honestly don't have time to go dig them up, but even a quick glance at the players' statistics says a ton. Trumbo was worth 1.6 WAR in his first year with the Orioles and he super sucked the two previous years. His career high was his rookie year in 2011 and he never had a year above 2.9. Cruz had a 2.1 WAR the year before the Orioles got him and was worth 4.1 with the Orioles. That was Cruz's second year where he was worth more than 4 WAR. Trumbo was a waste of a roster spot as soon as the Orioles extended him. There were multiple players on the roster to rotate through the DH spot and multiple players that were going to outfield him. Even if Trumbo would have replicated that 1.6 WAR there was a high probability that the Orioles were going to be able to replicate or almost replicate his value with other, far less limited players. That's not true of Cruz. His realistic upside was that he would be one of the most valuable hitters on the Orioles and at a price that I thought was relatively risk free. I didn't think Cruz would do as well as he has with the Mariners, but I thought even with aging there was a good chance that Cruz would deliver enough positive value in the first couple of years of the contract to make it a good investment. At the time I think a lot of posters thought 15 million was more money that it really was/is in terms of baseball value. 

 

Man, I couldn't stop myself from revisiting Cruz! I really do have to get back to work! 

Thanks for that.

I would say that Trumbo was younger, healthier and signed for less money over fewer years.

Of course I didn't want to sign any of them.

I'm hoping that Mountcastle will eventually make not signing Cruz look good.

[MurphDogg]

6 minutes ago, Ohfan67 said:

I supplied a little of my thinking/evidence in a response to CofC, but obviously the Mariners had data and/or scouting suggested that he would be worth his contract. Note that being worth the contract is not the same as "expected to repeat his 2017 season". I didn't expect him to be as good as he's been with the Mariners, I expected him to produce positive value for the contract. 

And you were right. 29 of 30 teams disagreed with you, but feel free to pat yourself on the back.

This is a fundamental reason why free agent deals so rarely work out, because typically 29 of the 30 teams make the valuation that a player is signing for more than what he would be worth to their team. Obviously all situations are different, so it isn't truly all 29 other teams considering signing a player for his free agent rate, but most of the time the majority of the teams are right, but sometimes, as here, the signing team is right.

[Ohfan67]

51 minutes ago, MurphDogg said:

And you were right. 29 of 30 teams disagreed with you, but feel free to pat yourself on the back.

This is a fundamental reason why free agent deals so rarely work out, because typically 29 of the 30 teams make the valuation that a player is signing for more than what he would be worth to their team. Obviously all situations are different, so it isn't truly all 29 other teams considering signing a player for his free agent rate, but most of the time the majority of the teams are right, but sometimes, as here, the signing team is right.

Thanks! I did!!!  But seriously, I did not mean to pat myself on the back. I was pointing out that not everyone agreed that Cruz's deal was a mistake by the Mariners and was asked to provide some of the justification. 

I disagree that free agent deals "so rarely work out". Some, maybe even many obviously do work out. But enough of them do not work out that, in general, you are over paying for value on FA contracts and all FA contracts are risky to at least some extent. Teams obviously have to invest in FA to win, but you hope your team is underpaying for value with a good number of young players and are taking the smartest risks it can in the FA market. You can't ignore the FA market and compete, unless maybe you are the early 2000's Athletics or similar. And obviously the Orioles have wasted an enormous and painful amount of money on free agents since 1998. 

 

[Ohfan67]

Murph: By the way, I feel more like you regarding the free agent market than my posts about Cruz might indicate. I would only bother to invest in "real" free agents when the team had legit young talent and a legit chance to compete for a while. Then some of the risks associated with free agent contracts are worth it or rather would be worth it to me. And of course the team would lose some of those bets, but I would want the team to be in a good position to handle those losses and still move forward. 

[MDtransplant757]

6 hours 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. 

Sarcasm? I'd hope so, because I was talking about the Mariners. If it is, my bad. I SUCK at sarcasm if it isn't SPELLED OUT

[El Gordo]

21 minutes ago, MDtransplant757 said:

Sarcasm? I'd hope so, because I was talking about the Mariners. If it is, my bad. I SUCK at sarcasm if it isn't SPELLED OUT

It wasn't the sarcasm it was the vague reference.

[theobird]

I will tell you this, it must be a whale of a physical as long as this is taking. Guaranteed it isn't one of those "turn your head and cough" type physicals.

[clapdiddy]

35 minutes ago, theobird said:

I will tell you this, it must be a whale of a physical as long as this is taking. Guaranteed it isn't one of those "turn your head and cough" type physicals.

The Orioles physical involves a full cavity search and body scan.

 

[weams]

5 hours ago, Ohfan67 said:

I supplied a little of my thinking/evidence in a response to CofC, but obviously the Mariners had data and/or scouting suggested that he would be worth his contract. Note that being worth the contract is not the same as "expected to repeat his 2017 season". I didn't expect him to be as good as he's been with the Mariners, I expected him to produce positive value for the contract. 

Na, they just got real lucky.  There was great reason to believe that with increased PED scrutiny that Cruz would fall off. Who knew!

[weams]

2 hours ago, clapdiddy said:

The Orioles physical involves a full cavity search and body scan.

 

They just use real Drs. The last thing you want to tease the Os about is the quality of their health evaluations on FAs.

[clapdiddy]

57 minutes ago, weams said:

They just use real Drs. The last thing you want to tease the Os about is the quality of their health evaluations on FAs.

Just joking...no doubt they are thorough and have saved us more than once!