Would you offer Austin Hays the Scott Kingery deal?

[Frobby]

1 hour ago, Aristotelian said:

Last time we saw Hays, he had a miserable year hitting .235 across levels and struggling with injury. I would not be locking him up to anything long term. We have him for 6+ years. Seems like the Phillies deal is all downside with no upside.

Sure it has an upside.    Just depends on whether Kingery turns into a good player.  

[HowAboutThat]

6 hours ago, Can_of_corn said:

Yep.

I'd look into it for Mountcastle as well.  I would have included McKenna but his ST stats are deplorable! 

I think it’s very dangerous to offer a lot of money to a guy who can’t play defense. Designated hitters are plentiful.

[Can_of_corn]

3 minutes ago, Philip said:

I think it’s very dangerous to offer a lot of money to a guy who can’t play defense. Designated hitters are plentiful.

You know he can't play first?

 

[LookinUp]

26 minutes ago, Ohfan67 said:

I just spent some time cruising through stats and it is very hard for me to name best case comp and say 80th percentile case comp for Hays. Without that it is impossible to really analyze the potential savings to a deal like this. 

The crazy comp I think of for Austin Hays is ... Adam Jones. Decent CF. Good power. Not great BA/OBP spread. Maybe hits for more average. Flame away. That's probably your 80th percentile for Hays, with somewhat more upside than what Adam actually produced*.

 

*Noting that I think Adam's upside was certainly higher than he ever produced too. Most people don't hit their ceiling.

[Frobby]

8 minutes ago, LookinUp said:

The crazy comp I think of for Austin Hays is ... Adam Jones. Decent CF. Good power. Not great BA/OBP spread. Maybe hits for more average. Flame away. That's probably your 80th percentile for Hays, with somewhat more upside than what Adam actually produced*.

 

*Noting that I think Adam's upside was certainly higher than he ever produced too. Most people don't hit their ceiling.

It’s an excellent comp.    I doubt Hays will be as good as Jones, but their offensive styles are similar and I’d be really happy if Hays had Jones’ career.   

[Beef Supreme]

5 hours ago, Can_of_corn said:

You have to admit he had a short career in the game.

<<rimshot>>

[LookinUp]

5 minutes ago, Frobby said:

It’s an excellent comp.    I doubt Hays will be as good as Jones, but their offensive styles are similar and I’d be really happy if Hays had Jones’ career.   

I actually could even see him being better if everything goes right. I will always think AJ should have been better too. Maybe it's because he didn't have the advanced data perspective that he wasn't able to really work through his flaws (offensively and defensively). Hays won't have that anchor on his career.

I agree though...would be absolutely thrilled if Hays has a AJ-like career.

[Beef Supreme]

22 minutes ago, LookinUp said:

The crazy comp I think of for Austin Hays is ... Adam Jones. Decent CF. Good power. Not great BA/OBP spread. Maybe hits for more average. Flame away. That's probably your 80th percentile for Hays, with somewhat more upside than what Adam actually produced*.

 

*Noting that I think Adam's upside was certainly higher than he ever produced too. Most people don't hit their ceiling.

I can't understand the fetishization with "BA/OBA spread." If you hit well, you may be able to take walks. But if you stop hitting, nobody is going to walk you. The only time that walks are as good as singles is with no one on base. Give me the hitter with a high BA and a high xwOBA and I won't give one hoot about the spread between OBA and BA.

[LookinUp]

2 minutes ago, Beef Supreme said:

I can't understand the fetishization with "BA/OBA spread." If you hit well, you may be able to take walks. But if you stop hitting, nobody is going to walk you. The only time that walks are as good as singles is with no one on base. Give me the hitter with a high BA and a high xwOBA and I won't give one hoot about the spread between OBA and BA.

The fetish is because it usually leads to a hitter swinging at poorer pitches (people who walk more swing at fewer balls), and ML pitchers can victimize hitters who swing at poor pitches. But now we're back to talking about Adam Jones and Jonathan Schoop.

[Frobby]

6 minutes ago, Beef Supreme said:

I can't understand the fetishization with "BA/OBA spread." If you hit well, you may be able to take walks. But if you stop hitting, nobody is going to walk you. The only time that walks are as good as singles is with no one on base. Give me the hitter with a high BA and a high xwOBA and I won't give one hoot about the spread between OBA and BA.

The point is, Jones hit well but didn’t take walks.    Hays doesn’t either, now, but he may learn.   And if his BA stays steady while his BA/OBA spread increases, that should lead to a better xwOBA.

[Aristotelian]

52 minutes ago, Frobby said:

Sure it has an upside.    Just depends on whether Kingery turns into a good player.  

He would have to be worth more than the salary in the option years. Not just a little more, a lot more, otherwise you would not take the risk in locking up those dollars. The number of guys who are worth a lot more than $13-$15M in MLB is pretty small. Trout only got, what, $35M per? Hays would have to be worth half of Trout for the contract to work significantly in the O's favor. He would need to have at least that kind of upside to take the risk on the front end. I don't think the odds are good that Hays will pan out on that level given we have seen he is capable of .230 in AA in a down year. I think he's much more likely to be worth $0-5M than $25-30M.

[SteveA]

3 hours ago, Aristotelian said:

Last time we saw Hays, he had a miserable year hitting .235 across levels and struggling with injury. I would not be locking him up to anything long term. We have him for 6+ years. Seems like the Phillies deal is all downside with no upside.

But he had 40 really good plate appearances against AA level opponents this spring!   Last year is history, I tell you!

[HowAboutThat]

1 hour ago, Can_of_corn said:

You know he can't play first?

 

I don’t know that he can’t play first, but there are two people in front of him who are also terrible defenders at other positions.

[Frobby]

25 minutes ago, Aristotelian said:

He would have to be worth more than the salary in the option years. Not just a little more, a lot more, otherwise you would not take the risk in locking up those dollars. The number of guys who are worth a lot more than $13-$15M in MLB is pretty small. Trout only got, what, $35M per? Hays would have to be worth half of Trout for the contract to work significantly in the O's favor. He would need to have at least that kind of upside to take the risk on the front end. I don't think the odds are good that Hays will pan out on that level given we have seen he is capable of .230 in AA in a down year. I think he's much more likely to be worth $0-5M than $25-30M.

I don’t think this analysis is very useful, because Trout has been criminally underpaid compared to most players.    

However, I do find that $24 mm is a lot to pay an outfielder for his pre-FA years.    Just looking at some guys who were solid starters:

Nick Castellanos $20.5 mm

Dexter Fowler $15.3 mm (excluding Arb 4, $9.5 mm)

Adam Jones $19 mm

Nick Markakis $22 mm

Kole Calhoun $19.3 mm (excludes Arb 4, $10.5 mm)

Kevin Kiermaier $18 mm (excludes Arb 4, $10.2 mm).     

[Can_of_corn]

2 minutes ago, Philip said:

I don’t know that he can’t play first, but there are two people in front of him who are also terrible defenders at other positions.

Three actually.

I only said I would look at Mountcastle.