Free Agent Poll: Marcus Semien

Since we are a long way from knowing who won the US election, let’s run a poll.

I abducted an idea from Lone Star Ball. It isn’t the first time I’ve stolen from them. The idea is to go through some of the top free agents, use the contract FanGraphs suggests they will get and have a poll asking if we would like to sign him for that amount.

Marcus Semien sits number 4 on FanGraphs but number 6 Keith Law’s list of top free agents.

Craig Edwards figures he will get a 4-year, $64 million contract, making an average of $16 million a season.

Semien didn’t have a great 2020 season, hitting .223/.305/.374 with 7 home runs good for a 1.2 fWAR. The season before he hit .285/.369/.522 with 33 home runs, good for a 7.6 fWAR. Over the past 5 seasons he’s had fWAR numbers of 2.1, 1.7, 3.8, 7.6 and 1.2.

He is a good defensive SS. He had a 4.8 UZR/150 this year, after a 5.0 in 2019 and a 6.4 in 2018.

If he is the player he was in 2019, the 4-years and $64 million is a bargain. If he’s the player from 2020, you are overpaying. We would have to thing he’ll be somewhere in the middle. I’d imagine he would find it easier to hit home runs in Rogers Centre than it was to hit home runs in whatever they are calling the park in Oakland this week.

Edwards points out that Semien had a crappy first two weeks of the season , but the rest of the way he had a 133 wRC+ (including the playoffs).

There are a lot of shortstops looking for a free agent contract this year, so there will be some bargains out there, maybe Semien will be one.