2020-1 Arbitration Cases

[luismatos4prez]

Matt Swartz at MLBTradeRumors has made some predictions about arbitration eligible cases around the league. Below are his projections for the Orioles:
Hanser Alberto – $2.3MM 
Shawn Armstrong – $800K 
Trey Mancini – $4.8MM 
Renato Nunez – $2.1MM 
Anthony Santander – $1.7MM 
Pedro Severino – $1.4MM 

I don't expect Mancini to go to arbitration, I would guess they work something unique out with him.

Nunez is likely gone, but it will be interesting to see if they can work out a trade for him. I speculated that a team would give up a Cadyn Grenier level prospect for him, but many believed that he's destined for a DFA.

I would like the team to keep Alberto. I'd be disappointed if they can't afford $2M for a ML caliber infielder next year.

[Sports Guy]

I would just like to say that the way MLbTR is put on a pedestal for their arb numbers is hilarious to me. (This isn’t directed at the original post, just a separate thought). The Villar number last year is exhibit A of this.

That being said, I think a lot of these cases are going to be settled fairly early this year. , across the league.

Players know they need to take what they can get coming off of a season where so much revenue was lost.  I would suspect that a lot of players take less to make sure they get something.  The exceptions to this will be the top flight guys but those players are few and far between.

[Frobby]

14 minutes ago, Sports Guy said:

I would just like to say that the way MLbTR is put on a pedestal for their arb numbers is hilarious to me. (This isn’t directed at the original post, just a separate thought). The Villar number last year is exhibit A of this.

That being said, I think a lot of these cases are going to be settled fairly early this year. , across the league.

Players know they need to take what they can get coming off of a season where so much revenue was lost.  I would suspect that a lot of players take less to make sure they get something.  The exceptions to this will be the top flight guys but those players are few and far between.

I agree with your first point and have said so many times.   Saying that, my initial reaction to these predictions is that they are not far off.   I note that wildcard and others have guessed $3 mm for Alberto and Nunez, and at first blush I think MLBTR is correct that they’ll both be lower than that.  I also agree with you that players will be cautious this year if made a decent offer before the nontender date.   They’ll want to lock something in IMO.

[jerios55]

Was curious for myself, but will post if others are. 

https://abcnews.go.com/Sports/mlb-raising-minimum-salary-minor-leaguers-2021/story?id=68993778

"The major league minimum is $563,500 this year"

I had heard a few say Armstrong may not be back because of arbitration.  Even if they settle at 800k, that's not a big difference from the minimum.  Although $237k is similar to several of the PTBNL values for international players.  So I can at least see someone making a fair argument the O's would consider that difference as important.  IDK.

If cases are settled early, I do think with slightly lower salaries than above we'll see at least half of these guys back.  Santander and Mancini are the ones I most want to watch play another year here.

https://www.masnsports.com/school-of-roch/2020/10/light-free-agent-winter-workload-for-orioles.html

"Shawn Armstrong could become too expensive in Baltimore, which doesn’t throw cash at relievers, but he was outstanding when healthy. "

Ok, well there is another potential vote against Armstrong. 

[Sports Guy]

14 minutes ago, Frobby said:

I agree with your first point and have said so many times.   Saying that, my initial reaction to these predictions is that they are not far off.   I note that wildcard and others have guessed $3 mm for Alberto and Nunez, and at first blush I think MLBTR is correct that they’ll both be lower than that.  I also agree with you that players will be cautious this year if made a decent offer before the nontender date.   They’ll want to lock something in IMO.

I agree these numbers aren’t far off and more spot on than the 3+M numbers we have seen from some.

That being said, that’s kind of my point.  We can easily come up with pretty accurate numbers on our end and be as close as MLBTR is with theirs.  This isn’t that hard to figure out but yet people (I know Roch quotes them all the time, as an example) treat them as if they have some magical formula to figure this out.

[Sports Guy]

4 minutes ago, RZNJ said:

If the Orioles are firing coaches to save money, nothing will surprise me as far as other cost cutting moves are concerned. 

They have laid off a ton of employees until January too.

[hoosiers]

I wouldn't throw the baby out with the bathwater because of one poor projection.  There wouldn't be many people here if we discredited everything they post because of a poor estimate!

Matt Swartz has been doing arb analysis for a long time and is more experienced than anyone here by far at the nuances in the process and the appropriate comps.  

It would be interesting to reach out and ask him about last year's Villar projection and whether he has modified his program as a result.  The article is written by Tim Dierkes who started MLBTR.

[Philip]

1 hour ago, luismatos4prez said:

Matt Swartz at MLBTradeRumors has made some predictions about arbitration eligible cases around the league. Below are his projections for the Orioles:
Hanser Alberto – $2.3MM 
Shawn Armstrong – $800K 
Trey Mancini – $4.8MM 
Renato Nunez – $2.1MM 
Anthony Santander – $1.7MM 
Pedro Severino – $1.4MM 

I don't expect Mancini to go to arbitration, I would guess they work something unique out with him.

Nunez is likely gone, but it will be interesting to see if they can work out a trade for him. I speculated that a team would give up a Cadyn Grenier level prospect for him, but many believed that he's destined for a DFA.

I would like the team to keep Alberto. I'd be disappointed if they can't afford $2M for a ML caliber infielder next year.

First of all, thank you for posting this. I think 800 for Armstrong is fine, Alberto is fine as well because we don’t have anybody who can replace them in the system, he’s not blocking anybody, and despite his flaws he certainly acceptable for the team as it is.

Severino and Nunez are gone, one because he’s terrible and the other because he’s terrible and he is a duplicate. We’ve got a lot of young pitching coming up, and it would be preferable to have at least one catcher who knows how to work with pitchers.

Mancini is a special case, I think they will work something out with him.

Santander is of course a no brainer

[survivedc]

31 minutes ago, Philip said:

First of all, thank you for posting this. I think 800 for Armstrong is fine, Alberto is fine as well because we don’t have anybody who can replace them in the system, he’s not blocking anybody, and despite his flaws he certainly acceptable for the team as it is.

Severino and Nunez are gone, one because he’s terrible and the other because he’s terrible and he is a duplicate. We’ve got a lot of young pitching coming up, and it would be preferable to have at least one catcher who knows how to work with pitchers.

Mancini is a special case, I think they will work something out with him.

Santander is of course a no brainer

Severino is terrible?

[Can_of_corn]

3 minutes ago, survivedc said:

Severino is terrible?

Some posters care a great deal about defense.

[wildcard]

Whoa, whoa, whoa.  That is not what Swartz projected:   He did three projections because the uncertainty of arbitration this year.

Quote

 To reflect that uncertainty, we’re providing three projections for each player:

• Method 1: Applies model directly with actual statistics from this 60-game season
• Method 2: Extrapolates all counting stats to would-be 162-game totals.  One home run becomes 2.7 home runs.
• Method 3: For non-first-time eligibles, finds the raise they’d get in a 162 game season, then gives them 37% of that raise.

Keep in mind that with a potential record number of non-tenders, many of these players will be released by December 2nd.

• Hanser Alberto – $2.3MM / $4.1MM / $2.6MM
• Shawn Armstrong – $800K / $1.0MM / $800K
• Trey Mancini – $4.8MM / $4.8MM / $4.8MM
• Renato Nunez – $2.1MM / $3.9MM / $2.1MM
• Anthony Santander – $1.7MM / $3.0MM / $1.7MM
• Pedro Severino – $1.4MM / $2.3MM / $1.4MM

•  

If Elias has to pay Alberto 2.3m he may tender him.  If he has to pay him 4.1m he may non tender him.  Same with Nunez.   With the low number the player may be tradable.  With the high number the O's may be stuck with paying the salary.

https://www.mlbtraderumors.com/2020/10/projected-arbitration-salaries-for-2021.html

 

[wildcard]

2 hours ago, Frobby said:

I agree with your first point and have said so many times.   Saying that, my initial reaction to these predictions is that they are not far off.   I note that wildcard and others have guessed $3 mm for Alberto and Nunez, and at first blush I think MLBTR is correct that they’ll both be lower than that.  I also agree with you that players will be cautious this year if made a decent offer before the nontender date.   They’ll want to lock something in IMO.

Before you tear down my guess,  (and that is all it was, a guess) too much you may want to read what Swartz really wrote:

https://www.mlbtraderumors.com/2020/10/projected-arbitration-salaries-for-2021.html

 

[Philip]

1 hour ago, survivedc said:

Severino is terrible?

.02 fWAR, and an 94WRC, so yes I’d say so. But the offense isn’t the problem.  With a lot of young pitching we have coming up, we need catchers who better able to help them. He isn’t. Sisco isn’t either,  but we have to keep one of them. Sisco is younger and hit better, but only had a 0 fWAR. He is also worse on defense with -6 DRS, but we have to keep one of them and given that they are both lousy, go with younger and cheaper until you can jettison each. And Sisco is better at avoiding passed balls. So dump Sevi, keep Holaday for his defense, and long for the day when you have neither.

[Frobby]

1 hour ago, wildcard said:

Before you tear down my guess,  (and that is all it was, a guess) too much you may want to read what Swartz really wrote:

https://www.mlbtraderumors.com/2020/10/projected-arbitration-salaries-for-2021.html

 

Thanks for pointing me to this.    And I didn’t mean to “tear down” your guess.    More than most years, I think we’re all guessing.