Bob McCown with a contract proposal for Halladay
by JohnnyG on Jul 20, 2009 10:19 AM EDT
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Bob McCowen of Prime Time Sports fame on the Fan590 mentioned something interesting. Although I still take anything he says about Baseball with a grain of salt.
He floated the idea of offering Halladay an extension at Market Value but provide him with the dreaded opt out clause. Of course he stipulates that this would also come with a plan presented to Halladay to show him what they are willing to do to win. So it would be basically be a conversation along the lines of
"Sign this X year deal for X amount of dollars which is a good approx of what you would get elsewhere. We are then committed to doing X for the team, if come 2011 you do not like what you can see you can opt out of the contract"
Now I like this idea at first glance because it keeps Halladay a Jay and I can be pretty shortsighted about that. But there are a couple flaws.
1- It presupposes that the Jays have the budget to sign Halladay and then commit X amount of dollars to improving the team overtop of that.
2- Losing Halladay to an Opt Out would be even worse publicity wise then losing him to Free Agency.
Now it may be that the team would not have to spend to Market Value to convince Halladay to do this, or even that they would have to spend that much extra in free agency.
Provided Snider can turn it around and their young pitchers can keep it up it is reasonable to expect that the team could be a good one next year (Save for this nasty injuries). Now that does not mean I think they will run away with the division, what it means is I think they could be competitive.
My question to everyone here is, What would think of a deal like this for Halladay, Let's say for instance it is for 6 years approx 20Mil a season with an opt out after 2 years (so after 2011). This would keep Halladay here but give him the option to leave to win if he feels he must.
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Paul Beeston said 'money is not an issue'
for signing Doc and said that he would talk to Doc within the week. So yeah I think it would be an idea. Next year’s rotation looks good with Marcum likely back and Romero being terrific. Scott Richmond has proved himself. One of Rzep, Cecil or a dozen other names to round things out and you have a pretty decent rotation.
Snider in the outfield would plug our biggest offensive hole and, if Cito could be convinced to play him everyday, would save us the frustration of watching Millar/Dellucci play.
since Doc's most important criteria is winning at this point
I think the Jays would have to include an opt-out clause if they want to keep him. The trick would be, where to find the money to plug the Jays’ other holes, most glaringly at catcher and shorstop for 2010, but also at third base for 2011, without getting some salary relief and without trading Halladay, the most valuable trade commodity the Jays have.
In truth, after the Jays’ hot start, once Snider was sent down and got hurt, the Jays should have made the investment to acquire the biggest bat they could reasonably acquire without giving up Snider or Cecil to fill the Millar/Dellucci spot. I’m not saying it would have prevented their pre-all-star break slide, but it could have mitigated it off long enough to keep the team in contention, and thus, keep attendance numbers up through the summer, especially with the large number of AL East games, and it could have staved off the Halladay situation. It’s my guess that their investment in the bat would have been recouped. But instead they communicated to fans and to Doc that they really weren’t interested in investing in the near-term for the team, and so now it will be very hard to convince fans and Doc that they intend to do so for 2010 and 2011.
"Let us go forth awhile, and get better air in our lungs. Let us leave our closed rooms... The game of ball is glorious." - Walt Whitman
Im starting to hope that Doc gets traded
I love the guy as much as anyone else, but realistically, the Jays are not going to compete in the AL East with essentially the same team as this year… We are going to have some younger players progress, but also older players get worse, along with the usual injuries… The way the team is set up right now it is just not ready to compete in the AL East.
The Jays farm system is pretty thin now that all our pitchers are playing in the Bigs… Besides Snider, we really dont have a lot of solid offensive players who are performing down there. Trading Halladay will stock up the farm system with s
future studs and give us a much much much better chance of winning in 2011+ than we would ever have in 2010 with Roy.
Onions Baby Onions
all the teams who are mentioned as potential suitors for Doc
seem to be taking their best prospects and young players off the table. Indeed, some of the names that have been thrown around as potential centerpieces to deals are, in my mind, worth less than the draft picks that Halladay would command if he left after 2010. If we could really get 3-4 high-ceiling prospects close to the majors in return for Doc, it would be worth considering, but that doesn’t seem very likely based on what I’ve read.
Even if we could get, say, three very solid prospects for Doc, that wouldn’t magically catapult this team to contention in, say, 2012. In truth, with all the talent we have leaving in the next few years, we would be lucky to rebuild the team to as good as it is right now and will be next year. Any team other than the Yankees and the Red Sox is still going to need a lot of things to break right to make the playoffs (as the Rays had last year), and trading Doc won’t change that fact. We’ll still never be able to compete with those two teams on paper. What we will have going for us in 2010 if we keep Doc, which we are unlikely to have for the forseeable future if he goes, is a rotation headed by the finest and most valuable pitcher in baseball.
"Let us go forth awhile, and get better air in our lungs. Let us leave our closed rooms... The game of ball is glorious." - Walt Whitman
Why?
but realistically, the Jays are not going to compete in the AL East with essentially the same team as this year
Don’t you remember the first 6 weeks of the season? Now take out the 400 injuries and take out Dellucci/Millar and add a Snider, and thats a pretty good damn team. This team is close, and selling the best player for a handfull of prospects sure as hell won’t make them any closer.
Happiness is a long walk with a putter in your hand.
by craig in calgary on Jul 20, 2009 11:29 AM EDT up reply actions
hate to be a pessimist
but i really doubt we’re as good as those weeks were (and man, they were fun), though likely we’re (much?) better than the rest of the season, especially with the 400 injuries
Prehistoric Hoops - a neat little Raps blog
Im curious about the comment
Our system is thin now that our pitchers are in the bigs.
If the young pitchers are throwing in the bigs it makes sense that the farm seems depleted because you just pulled what you could from it. Provided these young players do well and stay with the big club you theoretically shouldn’t have to pull from the minors again for a bit which gives the players time to develop and build up the system again. It’s a cyclical thing.
Now as far as the offensive players comment, that I tend to agree with to a point. We do seem devoid of high class positional player prospects, particularly in the infield.
'But I don't want to go among mad people' Alice remarked.
'Oh, you can't help that' said the Cat 'we're all mad here'.
opt out vs free agency
I like the idea, but what’s the difference between losing a player to an ‘opt out’ clause vs Free Agency? When Burnett opted out, he became a free agent, and the Jays got compensatory draft picks right?
No difference, they are still considered free agents and if signed by another team the Jays would get picks.
What I am saying is that it would be a bad PR move. It would look worse on the Jays if he left this was as oppose to at an end of a contract.
'But I don't want to go among mad people' Alice remarked.
'Oh, you can't help that' said the Cat 'we're all mad here'.
i agree
i’m sure all the people on bbb know that we’re certainly going to try as hard as possible to keep if (if we don’t trade him) but a lot of casual fans would be turned off if he left. think the potential backlash from if wells had left… x10?
Prehistoric Hoops - a neat little Raps blog
i suck
we’re certainly going to try as hard as possible to keep HIM
Prehistoric Hoops - a neat little Raps blog
Why trade Halladay, when there is another option. Looking at our (currently injured) starting rotation, plus what we’ve cobbled together over the last couple of months, we have to realize something – we have an absolute wealth of major league-ready pitchers and pitching prospects that have shown that they can at least compete in the strongest division in pro ball. We have Halladay, let’s keep him. Next year, we SHOULD have: Marcum, McGowan, Romero, Cecil, Rzep, Richardon, Janssen, Purcey (hopefully), possibly Litsch, and who knows what else. While we could probably put Janssen back into our bullpen, that still leaves us with 8 legitimate professional starting pitchers PLUS Halladay and Brian Tallet, of whom Marcum, Romero, McGowan, Richardson, and Rzep have been stellar in the time they’ve pitched for us. I would be willing to drop a couple of those guys to another team in exchange for a good bat. If Arenciba can compete for a first-team spot, and if Snider picks his game up, then we’ll be alright next year regardless. I think, in light of this, that re-signing Halladay with an extension and an opt-out clause is the right thing for the team and Halladay. We have a good team, we just need a bit of luck. Halladay is the best pitcher in baseball, and deserves a ring. I want him to get it with us, but I’d rather he get it in NY or Boston than not get it at all – for what he’s done, he deserves that. This way, he’ll get that opportunity.
by Blue and White Expat on Jul 20, 2009 3:04 PM EDT reply actions
Unfortunate I wouldn’t say any of those 8 pitchers aside from Halladay are a sure bet to succeed except for Romero. Marcum and McGowan coming off injury don’t feel me with 100% confidence. The other guys are not seasoned veterans yet. Unfortunately the team needs a #2 and #3 starter to compliment Halladay. Romero might be one of them. We need another. I don’t think Halladay is looking at the situation as exuding confidence in the ability to win next year or the few years after that. However, there is something to be said for winning with a team that isn’t bought. Yeah Halladay can go to the Yanks or Red Sox or some other team that has oodles of money and win a championship, but wouldn’t you love to bring it home for the team that brought you up? Unfortunately whether Halladay likes it or not, he can’t really be loyal to the Jays even if he wanted to due to the economics, players union and general sense of persistent failure to make the playoffs that seems to surround the Jays organization since 1993.
by BigTimeBlueJayFan on Jul 20, 2009 3:30 PM EDT up reply actions
name me a team
that has 5 proven, seasoned, veteran starters in their rotation. I think the Jays really have as close as any team in the league to having 5 solid starting pitchers up and down their rotation.
Prehistoric Hoops - a neat little Raps blog
I like McCown's idea
However, provided that what Beeston said is true (that there’s enough money to sign Doc to an extension), I am asking yet again the same old question: do the Jays really have enough money to make more acquisitions besides giving Doc an extension like the on envisioned by McCown? To me, both these points are sensitive but then again, if Beeston says that money is there to give Doc an extension, then the number of issues gets down to 1. Although it’s a big one as I don’t think they have money to spend on big players after giving an extension to Doc, provided they succeed in signing that first……..
Remember....
Doc is 32 and is in his prime now, but three years from now He will gradually start his decline. So a three year extension would be fine with an opt out after that. But If you think this team can compete in the EAST with the same weak hitting for the last two years your fooling yourself. Snider is not the answer to our problems seeing as he is unproven at this level. Overbay needs to go, as does Wells. We need a viable clutch hitter. Somebody who can drive the runs in when we load the bases with none out. We just cant stand around and hope Wells and Overbay eventually come around. We’ve been doing that the last 3 years.
See in how you said Snider isn’t the answer since he is unproven, I guess that means you want proven MLB players coming into free agency to fill up the holes in the outfield? Exactly how are we going to do that?
Let’s say we find a taker for Wells (likely we will have to eat some of the contract) add that contract that we sign the replacement to and all of a sudden we are paying just as much if not more.
'But I don't want to go among mad people' Alice remarked.
'Oh, you can't help that' said the Cat 'we're all mad here'.
making sense of Wells
it makes no sense to get rid of Wells if you cannot get rid of the contract
if you trade someone to Wells and agree to eat $10M a year and than have to pick up a replacement at $10M a year, you are still playing $20M a year for the replacement
so lets say you found someone to take Wells next year but would eat $10M. Then if the Jays went out and picked up, say Damon for $8M a year, all it means is that you are paying $18M a year for Damon – no matter who gets the checks.
bottom line, the cost of any replacement for VW will be the actual cost paid for the replacement + whatever part of Wells contract you eat. This does not make the team better off.
Unless the replacement plays better than Wells, of course
They're not just hitting home runs. They're doing the little things, like hitting doubles.
Which is the real question....
that you can’t trade Wells with money because you won’t save money is the whole thing. If you can do that and improve the position that is a gain.
if the Jays can fill the spot
with someone in the system it makes sense to pay to move Wells. But it’s not clear we have someone to do that right now – so if you have to get a free agent you’re not saving any money, I agree. I suppose you could do Snider in right, Rios in cf, Lind in lf with Dopirak DHing (though that might be a stretch) but then when Overbay leaves you have a spot open up and the Jays don’t really have anyone else ready to step in – if you hit the free agent market at that point, you’re not saving anything by paying Wells to play somewhere else.
It’d be different if the Jays had more young outfielders and corner infielders in the minors who could step into the lineup in the next year, but they don’t. Now if they could get them in a trade, you could consider it. But if you pay to move Wells, you better know who is going to take his spot in the lineup or it’s not going to end up helping the team.
"Let us go forth awhile, and get better air in our lungs. Let us leave our closed rooms... The game of ball is glorious." - Walt Whitman
Are you sold on Lind as an everyday LFer?
How about Trade Wells and Millar back to the Orioles for Adam Jones!!!!
…and yes. I had 3 beer at lunch.
Happiness is a long walk with a putter in your hand.
by craig in calgary on Jul 21, 2009 3:25 PM EDT up reply actions
i am
he hasn’t looked all that bad (subpar arm, but that doesn’t really come into play very often) and it’s the second least valuable defensive position… plus, with any luck Snider will play LF more than Lind
Prehistoric Hoops - a neat little Raps blog
Helping the team do what?
How is keeping VW going to help us? Snider needs a few more years. So lets say by next year when VW is making 11 million more then this year. what team is going to take him then? His value right now is a “throw in guy” in the Doc trade. Whats his value after another bad season?
This is what we signed VW for. His extension called for a $25.5 million signing bonus, payable in three $8.5 million installments each March 1 in 2008, 2009 and 2010. He received a salary of just $500,000 in 2008 and $1.5 million in 2009, but his salary jumps to $12.5 million in 2010 and $23 million in 2011. Wells receives $21 million in each of the final three seasons. Under the extension, Wells has the right to terminate his agreement after the 2011 season and become eligible for free agency.
Lets hope he does opt out!
of course he's not going to opt out
I don’t follow what your point is. The point is that if we have to trade Wells, and have to pay half his salary, and have to find his replacement on the free agent market, we’re not saving any money and it’s not clear we’re improving the team. If you are going to pay another team to take a player off your hands, even one who is underperforming, you have to know who is going to take their spot and ideally it would be someone making less than they’re worth.
Now if we had someone to step in for Wells in the lineup long-term at a low cost, we could afford to pay to move Vernon. Put Snider in, we still have a hole. Even if you put Snider and Dopirak in, we still have a hole once Overbay leaves.
"Let us go forth awhile, and get better air in our lungs. Let us leave our closed rooms... The game of ball is glorious." - Walt Whitman
His value right now is NOT “throw in guy”, a throw in guy is a low cost flier usually a minor leaguer.
Wells is scheduled to make 100million over the next 5 years. His value is a negative number, not a throw in guy. You “Throw him” into any trade with Doc and it weakens a trade down to almost nothing.
Aside from that it has already been reported that the Jays have not mentioned Wells to anyone in trade talks (MLBTradeRumors)
And there is no chance he opts out. Because that would be leaving a ton of money on the table which he wouldn’t get in another contract.
'But I don't want to go among mad people' Alice remarked.
'Oh, you can't help that' said the Cat 'we're all mad here'.
taking $20M per year off your payroll
is worth alot
even if you only spend $14M of that … two $7M per year players can make a good contribution – just ask Aaron Hill
Aaron is a very good deal and on the open market you aren’t getting him for that price.
And this has been discussed ad naseum now, do you really think if the Jays package Halladay and Wells together that they will get anything significant? And secondly do you think that Rogers will use that money to bring in a top of heap FA?
'But I don't want to go among mad people' Alice remarked.
'Oh, you can't help that' said the Cat 'we're all mad here'.
if you own an asset that is worth $20M that is equity financed and you sell it, you should get $20M in cash back
if you own an asset that is worth $20M that is debt financed and you sell it, you can expect the buyer to assume the $20M liability and you get nothing back
the substance of the transaction is the same in either case
asking a team to assume Wells in a trade that includes Halladay does not mean you are getting nothing … having someone assume your liabilities is the same thing as them paying you cash (or prospects)
bottom line, having someone assume your contracts (ie: liabilities) is as valuable as having them send you new prospects – 6 of 1, half dozen of another
only if you use the money you saved on other players
as Johnny points out
"Let us go forth awhile, and get better air in our lungs. Let us leave our closed rooms... The game of ball is glorious." - Walt Whitman
well
this is why I have couched my comments to say … if Jays saved $20M on VW contract, they could still spend $7M on 2 different players … this is still a $6M savings for the Jays as a business entity while swapping out one $20M player for two $7M players (and pointing out how Hill is a $7M man and still very good)
so what I am saying, is that unloading the VW contract could benefit BOTH the Jays business org. and the Jays sports org.
So what is better, we undo the Wells and perhaps Rios deals by dealing Halladay and free up a tonne of cash to use or we trade Halladay by himself and hope these prospects we get in return are the real deal. At least with the former we know what we are getting, some money to play with. With the latter we could be doing this all over again in three or four years with no big fish to dangle.
I still like finding a way to keep Halladay. He’s the only meal ticket we’ve had in a long long long time. Perhaps the Yanks will take VW off our hands if we pay $60 million. To me it’s worth it. Buy it all out now. Go really lean next year, sign Halladay and play for 2012.
Still bashing my head against the wall over the VW deal. Angers me more and more each day as we are now seeing the effects of the stupidity of that deal. I knew it was bad from minute one. I can’t believe it has come to possibly trading Halladay to get rid of an absolutely awful contract. How wrong is that?
I would love to see Wells go in the deal if for no other reason so I can start hammering someone else on here. I don’t even have time to get upset with Overbay for the throw tonight. I’d like to get back to analyzing the small ball rather than complaining about one really terrible contract.
by BigTimeBlueJayFan on Jul 21, 2009 10:43 PM EDT up reply actions
I think Halladay would prefer to win in Toronto …. but is aware that is not likely.
He is obviously ok with the trade at this point.
The Jays appear to have pitching in the pipeline but not position players.
Whether the Jays pick up position players via prospects or whether they acquire them on the open market from freed up payroll probably does not matter.
by aagoodfella on Jul 21, 2009 11:19 PM EDT up reply actions
I think Rogers is going to sell the team. So what do they care? My fear is we lose the team and that would be awful. We need Roy if for no other reason to put butts in the seats every fifth day.
by BigTimeBlueJayFan on Jul 21, 2009 10:45 PM EDT up reply actions
Rogers isn’t going to sell the team it makes too much money for them.
- Free Content for Sportsnet
- Free advertising and exposure as an owner
There are too many synergies for Rogers to let it go.
'But I don't want to go among mad people' Alice remarked.
'Oh, you can't help that' said the Cat 'we're all mad here'.
this is the paradox facing Rogers
Rogers can extract more money from Blue Jays (via the synergies you mentioned) so they can afford to pay more for the Jays than could another buyer
But once they own the asset, most other buyers are less strategic, so they cannot extract the same value that can Rogers, making them less able to pay up, so it is difficult for Rogers to find a buyer that can pay them an equivalent price to what the team is intrinsically worth to Rogers
this makes exit strategy complex for Rogers
this is the paradox of value for Rogers: they can realize a higher value via ownership than they can by selling
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