The Value Of Role Players
In the comments of the posts on the Tigers acquisitions of Gerald Laird and Adam Everett yesterday, one common theme emerged among those who didn’t like the deals from Detroit’s perspective – that adding average or below average players wasn’t helpful, because good teams are built with good players, and the Tigers were filling holes with mediocre players. The feeling was that even though they didn’t cost much, Laird and Everett weren’t going to help Detroit win, so the moves were poor.
So, this post is for those folks – in it, we’ll talk about the value of role players. To do so, let’s take a look at last year’s World Series champs, the Philadelphia Phillies.
Everyone knows about Chase Utley, Ryan Howard, Pat Burrell, Cole Hamels, and Brad Lidge. Those five guys get 95% of the attention when the media discusses the 2008 Phillies, and they could easily be considered the stars of the team. Utley’s one of the three best players in the game, Hamels is a terrific young starter, Lidge is a lights our reliever, and Howard and Burrell provided muscle in the middle of the order. Between them, the Phillies got about 17 wins above replacement level last year. That’s a strong core.
However, the Phillies won 92 games – about 42 more than a team full of replacement level guys would win. That means they got about 25 wins above replacement from the guys on the roster not named Utley, Howard, Burrell, Hamels, and Lidge. Let’s look at how those guys were acquired.
Jayson Werth: .382 wOBA, +16 UZR – signed for $850,000 in 2007.
After the 2006 season, the Dodgers non-tendered Werth after he’d missed the entire 2006 season with injuries and hadn’t been very productive in 2005. The Phillies saw an opportunity to add an athletic OF with some solid hitting skills, and picked up Werth for practically nothing. They paid him a grand total of $2.5 million over the last two years, and he’s been a fantastic player for them – significantly better than the more hyped Burrell.
Shane Victorino: .355 wOBA, +3 UZR – paid $50,000 to take him in the 2004 rule 5 draft.
They took a $50,000 flyer on a guy who could cover some range and had flashed gap power at times, and for the next four years, Victorino has paid huge dividends as an above average outfielder. Think of it this way – Victorino is about as valuable as Torii Hunter, but the $17 million or so they saved by going with the low cost Hawaiian allowed them to have the financial flexibility to retain the big names and acquire Lidge.
Pedro Feliz: .306 wOBA, +7 UZR – paid $8.5 million to sign for 2008 and 2009
Feliz, like Everett, is a bad hitter and a great fielder. He’s less extreme at both ends, as his offense isn’t completely useless and his defense at third is excellent but not best-in-the-league, but it’s the same idea. The Phillies paid a marginal amount of money to fill their hole at third base by getting a defense first player and figured they’d live with the bad at-bats, and it paid off. Feliz was -8 runs with the bat and +7 runs with the glove, making him pretty close to a league average player. He only took $3 million of the Phillies payroll in 2008, however, and the upgrade they got from their hole at third base in 2007 was a big key in their success.
Greg Dobbs: .354 wOBA, -2 UZR – claimed off waivers in 2007
Dobbs is the anti-Feliz – a bad fielder who hits enough to still be useful, especially as a part time player. He gave the Phillies one of the best pinch hitters in baseball, and an offensive option at third base when they didn’t feel defense would be as necessary. They paid him the league minimum the last two years and got production equal to that of a lot of starters around the league.
Jamie Moyer: 4.32 FIP, 196 IP – acquired for two non-prospects in 2006
When the Phillies picked up Moyer at the deadline in ’06, he was considered a fringe 5th starter. His trademark command was diminishing and his stuff was high school level, and the assumption was that he could only get by on smarts for a few more months. Instead, Moyer has pitched as well as a league average starting pitcher in the NL for the last 2 1/2 years and earned a grand total of about $10 million during that time. Meanwhile, comparable innings eaters like Carlos Silva are getting $52 million in long term deals, while Moyer makes a fraction of that.
Between Werth, Victorino, Feliz, Dobbs, and Moyer, the Phillies picked up something like 9 or 10 wins compared to replacement level players, and they did so without surrendering one iota of talent to acquire any of them, and their combined payroll cost for 2008 was about $10 million. The huge impact the Phillies got from their role players is why they were able to have a parade in November, yet all of these signings would have been derided as non-impact moves, filling holes with guys who were average or worse.
Good teams need a collection of mediocre to average players. You can’t get 25 stars, and if you just focus on the top of the roster, you’re going to end up like the 2008 Seattle Mariners – a few quality players surrounded by crap, wallowing in last place, wondering why your team isn’t as good as you thought. The bottom of the roster matters, and the Tigers clearly figured that out yesterday.
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Well put, Mr. C. A nice way, in different words and from a different angle, of making the point that marginal wins aren’t wins above average, but above replacement level.
So True… Excellent work, Dave.
Btw, you might want to get with the times and change your signature blurb at the end of your posts. :)
Nice piece, though I would have added Rollins to your list of stars (overrated or no).
I didn’t want to sound like I don’t like these moves when I posted in the other thread. One of the easiest ways to improve your team is to fill gaping holes and these moves do a great job at that.
Good job. And seconded on Rollins!
There is a big difference between the phillies inspired moves (nabbing Werth and Victorino for practically nothing) and the Tigers recent overrated moves. Werth and Victorino were young (28 and 24 respectively), cheap and had plenty of upside. Everett and Laird are older (32 and 29), way more expensive as Lair is due for arbitration and Everett is guaranteed a million bucks. Worst of all Laird and Everett have long track records of steady, barely above replacement level performance whereas Victorino and Werth had sporadic glimpses of good performance marred by lack of playing time, injury and working their way up the learning curve. Werth and Victorino each had about 6.5 WARP last year. Laird has never been above 3.4. Everett has never been above 3.9. Both are on the way down from those modest peaks.
Of course every team needs to scour the discard pile for bargains that often end up being the key to winning, but fliers of this sort should be taken on players who are young enough to improve and do not require significant guaranteed money. Guaranteeing money to weak players is a sure path to mediocrity.
Just about any player that costs less than he’s worth can be additive to a team.
Take the case of mediocrities who are -1 below league average (and +1 over replacement value). Suppose five such players were available at $1 million apiece. (The Pirates’ Doug Mientkiewicz was an example last year.) So you pay them an aggregate of $5 million for five wins above replacement, versus $2 million ($400,000 apiece for five replacement players). Those five wins above replacement just cost you an extra $3 million (a bargain).
In the free agent market, five extra wins could cost you $3-5 million each, or $15-$25 million in total. By paying only $3 million for them, you’ve just freed up $12 million to $15 million to recruit “stars.”
It’s possible, however, to be pennywise and dollar foolish. For instance, the same Pirates traded Jason Bay for three replacement players (and a minor Leaguer). For 2009, they saved about $6 million in the process. But Bay was easily worth six extra wins, at the rate of $1 million a win. Since he wanted to stay in Pittsburgh, they probably could have extended him at, say, $12 million per year. At six extra wins, that would be $2 million a win, a huge bargain, even for the Pirates. It’s much harder for a team like Pittsburgh to replace a clear winner than to find plug players for the bottom of their line-up.
Context is also important. The Tigers already had Ramon Santiago and Dusty Ryan on their roster. These players are both above replacement level and bat with the same hand as their purported replacements. Both are also cheaper than the new Tigers. What do the Tigers gain by replacing Santiago and Ryan with Everett and Laird? Not much if anything. Santiago had 1.8 WARP last year in 156 PA. Everett had 1.7 WARP in 150 PA. Pretty similar. Ryan had 1.0 WARP in just 50 PA. Laird required 381 PA to get to 2.7 WARP. Ryan at just 24 years old is not yet arbitration eligible and has vastly more upside than Laird. So what exactly are the Tigers paying Laird and Everett for? Three or four wins above replacement level that they already had available on their roster? That is not a good way to spend 4 million dollars. Bargain or not.
WARP is useless. It’s misleading you.
Santiago: -1.6 UZR/150 career at SS – the gap between him and Everett defensively is enormous. Santiago is the definition of replacement level – bad hitter with a solid glove. Everett is a very bad hitter with a great glove. The latter is about a win more valuable.
As for Ryan, his minor league career line in five seasons is .237/.326/.386. Maybe last year was a breakthrough, but trying to describe him as a major league average catcher based on 290 good at-bats in Double-A is a stretch of ridiculous proportions.
There is a difference between picking up roll players and leveraging their strengths and purposefully planning to give a full time starting jobs at premium positions to guys who project to be below average
Show me a team that entered 2008 with an average or better player at every position.
What I don’t understand is why the Tigers are not considering using Guillen back at SS. It seems that most of Everett’s “value” is due to positonal adjustment. Even if Guillen put up a -10 UZR, wouldn’t his bat still make him a better SS than Everett in 2009? I’m assuming the current plan is Inge at 3B and Guillen at LF.
Show me a consistent winner who continually sticks below average players at several premium positions.
Ryan had 39 walks, 36 doubles, 4 triples and 19 homers in 413 ABs across three levels (AA, AAA and MLB) as a 23 year old catcher in 2008. This is a guy who costs the minimum and might end up being good. Clogging things up with and old catcher who has clearly established that he is not good and who costs real money doesn’t make sense to me.
Guillen would probably be more like -15 to -20 at SS at this point in his career. He just can’t play the position anymore.
And Ryan hadn’t hit a lick before 2008. You’re betting on last year being a true breakthrough and the rest of his career being irrelevant. That’s hardly ever a good idea.
In 2008, the Phillies went into the season with Feliz, Ruiz, and Jenkins as starters – all below average players. The Rays went into the season with Bartlett, Hinske, and Gomes as starters – again, all below average players. Both teams did just fine in 2008.
This idea that you have to fill holes with above average players is just wrong.
I agree with Oscar. Guillen should be in the infield at either short or third instead of clogging up the way for Matt Joyce in left. If Guillen had been assigned to third, Inge could have caught some games making Laird extraneous. If Guillen had been assigned to short, Everett would not be needed. The question is, do you want Joyce in the lineup for free, or do want to bench him in favor everett or laird at a cost of 4 million?
Guillen was -5 at third last year and around average at short from 2005-2007. 2005 = +5.4, 2006 = +1.2, 2007 = -9.1.
I hope you see the trend there – +5, +1, -9, and then -5 even after being moved to a significantly easier defensive position (-5 at 3B is about equal to -15 at SS). Guillen just isn’t the same player he was in 2006 and 2007. He can’t play shortstop anymore. He’d be a disaster there.
What about Guillen in LF? Is this even a good idea? Wouldn’t he be expected to be pretty bad defensively out there as well considering his lack of experience at that position? And doesn’t playing LF take a lot of the value out of his bat since it is such a high-offense position?
If you don’t believe he can play SS anymore, I’ll take your word for it. But isn’t playing him in LF also a bad idea?
(or do they plan on using him at 3B?)
Dear Dave:
I’d say that the Tampa Bay Rays had “an average or better player at every position” (just about) in 2008, which is why they made it to the World Series.
Tom Au,
Dave said: “Show me a team that ENTERED 2008 with an average or better player at every position.” The caps are mine.
The Red Sox were pretty close though.
Dave, how soon until you and your friends open up the University of Baseball Statistics? People could use some lessons on numbers here. Kinda funny, remember when kids in class would say in different math classes “when will we ever use this?”
Now is probably one of those times. I know I wish I had paid even more attention to stats class..
Even outside of that seeing Guillen’s downward trend with his aging shouldn’t be to hard to understand.
To answer the question though, didn’t the Tigers at least offensively walk into last season with an above average player at each position or better? That worked out.
Just goes to show how important defense is…
I read all of these comments from threads past and din’t really feel like entering the debate, but the idea that signing guys that are about average for less than market value isn’t a good thing is crazy. Putting all above average players out there is incredibly difficult and damn near impossible. Marginal wins is being talked about from replacement, not average, which is how it should be approached.
Taking huge hits defensively at an up the middle position is a horrible idea as well, Guillen would be a butcher at SS.