Bill Conlin, fun and fact-free!, weighs in on Ryan Howard:
There is one set of numbers, however, that fails to match the monetary implications raised by his stature as a power hitter – the numbers on his paycheck.
Conlin appears willfully ignorant of how baseball salaries work. Ryan Howard is eligible for arbitration this year as a Super-Two player, and he will and should be paid like a first-time eligible player. Conlin is making the argument that the Phillies should give Howard a long-term deal that pays him closer to his market value – in other words, he’s saying that the Phillies will be better off if they voluntarily pay Howard more than baseball’s economic system says he should get. Conlin points
You don’t need an economics degree and an MBA to realize that voluntarily overpaying for your inputs is a rather simple recipe for failure. For all the complaining you hear about baseball’s economic system, it is heavily stacked in the teams’ favor: Player salaries are below market value for the first six years of major league service, and for most players, that six-year period will include some or most of their peak years. In Howard’s case, because he reached the majors so late, the six-year period will include ALL of his peak years. By the time baseball’s economic structure allows Howard to be a free agent, he’ll be 32 years old, and given his profile as a hitter and body type, he’ll be paid a salary commensurate with his peak-years production during his decline phase, assuming that he becomes a free agent.
But hey, should we be surprised? Conlin’s own employer pays him the top salary at the paper plus his pension, and his peak years are behind him, too.
Bill Conlin willfully ignorant? That hardly seems possible.
Bill Conlin had a peak? I must have been out doing yard work and missed it.
My two favorite parts of the Conlin article:
1. He treats his 199 strikeouts as a plus. Wow! He hit tons of home runs, even though he made 199 unproductive outs.
2. He trots out the stupid, “fewest games to 100 homeruns” argument. Congratulations for being so non-productive in the minors that you didn’t debut until you were 25 years old. He might enjoy the distinction of being the hitter with the fewest major league games played before hitting his power prime.
Does this really surprise anyone? This is the same guy who didn’t vote for Nolan Ryan for the Hall of Fame because he was protesting the fact that Don Sutton had to wait several years before getting in.
Isn’t discussing Conlin’s peak sort of like pointing out the tallest midget?
Non-productive? Howards minor league numbers were excellent, from the time he debuted to the point he was finally promoted to the majors. The problem was that too many people use K rate as a way to devalue hitters, even if said hitters have proven that they can be productive in spite of their K totals
Keith, I have a question. For a player like Howard (meaning an established super-star who isn’t particularly young but doesn’t have a lot of service time), couldn’t he force the Phillies hand by threatening to sit? The Phillies couldn’t afford to not have Howard in the middle of that lineup, so I wonder what the ramifications would be (on both sides) if he threatened to sit until they gave him an extension for top dollar? Also, is there precedence for this?
Brian – The last action like that I can remember was Piazza, which would be over ten years ago. The Dodgers caved fairly quickly. The arbitration process and the 0-3 salary structure are collectively bargained, so the individual doesn’t have much standing to contest them. If he sits, he won’t be paid or accrue more service time – so he’d delay his free agency – and he could be fined, although I don’t know what that last process would entail.
Interesting; thanks Keith. Ryan Howard is barely a millionaire (if he is at all), so he can ill-afford to sit. But the Phillies are contenders in the NL East, so they can ill-afford to have their best hitter not playing. I wonder who would cave first in that scenario. And I like to say “ill-afford”.
In the NHL, they also have an age-based cutoff for free agency (in addition to years of service). That is, whichever occurs first.
The MLBPA simply let it slip in not having caught this. Forcing a 6yr basically discriminates against Japanese ballplayers, and teams that simply have their heads up their a$$es. Forcing unrestricted free agency at, say, age 29 or 30 (or 6 yrs of service) would be the right thing to do.
In the NHL, it’s 7yrs or 27 years old, whichever comes first. Hockey players peak right around then (maybe closer to 26).
If you want to see a cheerful and friendly Bill Conlin, email him pointing out any kind of value Pat Burrell might have – say, a high OBP.
Keith: using your line of reasoning (which I agree with), why would any team pay any more than the minimum salary for pre-arbitration eligible players? Isn’t this just throwing away money also?
Keith, in arbitration, are super2s only allowed to be compared to other super2s, or also the 3 to 3+ players?
And, in the case of former super2s (say Ryan Howard next year), does he only get compared to 3 to 3+, or is he now lumped into “2nd time in arbitration”, and is now part of the 4 to 4+ players?
I’m 99.9% sure that the guys in the 3 to 5+ are compared based on service time (not years in arbitration).
I’m unsure as to the super2s.
Naveed: Yes, absolutely. There’s some question over whether it’s acceptable to pay them all exactly the minimum salary – Florida did this a few years ago, and there was some grumbling but no action taken – so most teams will pay a guy with a year of service an extra $10K or $20K. I don’t have a problem with that.
Tango: Great question – the groups are actually based on # of times through arbitration. First-time eligibles include super-twos as well as three-plus players who were not super-twos the prior year. The one exception is that third-time eligible and fourth-time eligibles are lumped together.
For comparison purposes, a player may be compared to players in the same “service class” in the current year or in prior years, and third- and fourth-time eligibles may be compared to free agents who have signed in the current year or in prior years. Single-year salaries are more powerful comparisons than multi-year deals, since the individual salaries within a multi-year deal may be skewed due to bonuses, backloading, or other factors. So Howard’s agent can compare him to any first-time eligible player he can find – Miguel Cabrera made $7.4 million last year as a first-timer, which I think is/was the record. Howard is ahead of Cabrera (using Cabrera’s stats through 2006, of course) in HR, RBI, OBP, and SLG, and is behind in AVG. He also has hardware, which makes a significant difference in the process. That’s a pretty compelling case to earn a premium over Cabrera’s salary. I’m very surprised that the Phils would file under Cabrera’s figure, given the data above.
This is off-topic, but I don’t know where else to bring it up where someone might appreciate it.
As kind of a throw-in comment in a Chicago Tribune article today (you can find it within Buster’s blog), the writer mentions that White Sox talks with the Giants regarding Pedro Feliz have stagnated.
One ~ I had no idea there were discussions regarding Pedro Feliz. And Two ~ Friggin’ Pedro Feliz?!?!?!?! What in the world is my GM doing? The offseason he’s had is a complete head-scratcher.
Apparently he was thinking of trading Joe Crede for an older version of Joe Crede who gets on base even less. I have to tell you; it’s so hard being a White Sox fan sometimes. The weirdest part is that despite the moves they’ve made, their team should be considerably better in ’08. Then again, what’s the point of going from bad to average? And more importantly, what’s the point of going from bad to average when it will cost an extra $20 million, as well as your 3 top prospects? Ugh.
Okay I’m done. Thanks for listening. I mean reading.
I think the difference is that there’s a huge difference between a 3B and a 1B (not that the arbitrator may be aware of the difference, nor how to account for it, based on the presentation of either party).
Ok, so the “lumping” of players happens at the back-end, not the front end. That’s very interesting. I’ve gotta change my model now.
Also, is it based solely on players who sign single-year contracts? That is, were Vlad and Nomar not allowed to be used as comps, and is Sizemore, etc not allowed to be used as a comp?
They’re allowed as comps, but because there’s never agreement on to interpret them (average annual value of the long-term deal? single-year salaries?), they’re usually discarded.
Pedro Feliz is a free agent. It would be difficult (though, knowing Ken Williams, perhaps not impossible) to give up 3 top prospects for him.
As a Phillies fan, short of a blockbuster type trade, nothing good will come of this for the Phillies. They are being smart by not signing him long term if he’s not willing to give the Phillies a discount in his first year or two of free agent eligibility. He showed up out of shape last season after making the rounds on the banquet circuit. Lets also not forget him “demanding” a trade before he’d done jack squat at the major league level just because the Phillies had Thome signed long term. He clearly doesn’t understand how service time works, and if he does, he thinks it just shouldn’t apply to him.
While it might suck for Howard, the Phillies arguably did the right thing by not starting his clock earlier. They could have called him up when Thome got hurt the first time, they could have called him up to DH in an interleague series, but they didn’t. Now they are reaping the benefits, when the team is actually quite good, and he’s going to be signed for less than market value.
And I should have said “nothing good will come of this”, I meant in terms of public relations.
Keith: that’s interesting. It might be a reason (other than trying to backload) that these contracts are signed as they are (2MM, 3MM, 7MM, 12MM let’s say for a 4 year deal), in recognition of the possibility that they can be used in arb cases. Just guessing. Thanks for the info…
What Conlin is trying to say is that no one in the history of baseball has done what Ryan Howard has done. Howard has no comparisons other then Pujols as a Super Two.
It’s economics but its also showing the clubhouse that you care about your players and reward them for exceeding expectations.
I hate when people like Bill Conlin are on the same side of an argument as I am, because when he states it, he almost makes it impossible for me to still believe what I do.
One thing that makes it hard to argue for either the Phils or Howard, we have no idea what his demands are. if the Phils meet him halfway at 8.5mil, will he accept? What are his long term deals? He may be unreasonable and the Phils are forced to stick to the guidelines and pay him as little as they can.
Anthony, there is no evidence that rewarding players when the system does not require you to do so carries any benefit going forward, not with those players themselves, not with other players on the club, not with players who might sign with the club in the future. Pujols received $900K as a two-plus (non-arb-eligible) player, and I was in the room when Frank Coonelly aired out the Cardinals in front of representatives from seven or eight other clubs. His main point was that such deals do not help the signing club in the future, and may actually hurt the club, as the player’s agent can then use a percentage-raise argument to push for a higher salary in the subsequent season.
Keith, those GMs must hate what’s going on in the NHL then. I’m utterly fascinated that the NHL has created a system that does not have the gap in player salaries that MLB does (based on service time), instead rewarding players who deserve it. They can do this, since they’ve got a payroll cap.
And since we’re on the subject: why are MLB salaries now below the 50% revenue mark, unlike the NHL, NBA? Shouldn’t MLBPA now be begging for a payroll cap?
I enjoy the “overpay Howard to show the clubhouse you care” argument. The team has historically treated players in this stage of their careers very equitably as evidenced by the lack of cases reaching a hearing over the years. And don’t the Rollins, Myers, and Utley contracts over the past three years display a willingness to pay when your time comes?
The team is in a no-win with the vast majority of fans. Don’t pay him and they’re yet again cheaping out. Give him the 7-year/$100MM and have Gillick held in the same regard as Ed Wade when we’re eating salary and getting two A prospects back for a past-his-prime 34-year old Howard.
“Congratulations for being so non-productive in the minors that you didn’t debut until you were 25 years old.”
Non-productive? He was 21 yrs and 7 months old when he was drafted. He made his MLB debut at age 24 and he was spectacular in the minors. The problem was that the Phillies signed Jim Thome about 18 months after drafting Howard so he was blocked.
I think people are a little confused about what Howard did in the minors. From 2001 – 2003 he was in single A baseball. He had shown some power but nothing amazing. The most home runs he had was 23 in 490 at bats, and he also had 151 strike outs that year. I don’t think any player would get called up with those kinds of numbers. It wasn’t until 2004 that Howard had his breakout minor league season in AA and AAA. So, based on what Howard did in the minors, it looks like having Thome with the Phillies delayed his major league debut by one season. His rookie season would have been in 2005 instead of 2006.
Howard was also not considered to be a future super star when drafted, he just surprised people in the minors in 2004.
He was MVP in A ball in 2003 (he was born in 1979…. gotta be one of the oldest prospects there), and MVP in AA ball in 2004. And they waited to mid-season 2005.
If Ryan Howard makes the Hall of Fame, he will be the oldest post-Negro League HOF player to have reached 1000 PA. This is unprecendented.
If that’s not missing the boat, I don’t know what is. He should have been in AA in 2003, and called up half-way through that season. They called him up to the majors at least 1 season too late, and maybe 2 seasons too late. This can be blamed on going after Jim Thome, about as bad a move as you can find.
Do you realize he’s born just a few weeks before Pujols? Pujols would have been a free agent *last* year. Looking at the strikeouts is a terrible reason to keep someone down.
Most Phillies fans don’t get this, but the best approach with Howard will most likely go through the arb process year-by-year. This way, his next year’s salary will always be tied to his prior year’s production giving him all the incentive he needs and giving the Phillies protection in case he peaks in the next year or two. A Burrell-like contract for Howard will come back to bite them in the rear.
Just because Bill Conlin says it is so, doesn’t mean it is. In fact, these days, Conlin is usually on the wrong side of these arguments.