Last week the Orioles agreed to a 1 year, $8 million contract with free agent Vladimir Guerrero. When I heard the news I was confused. Guerrero is a good offensive weapon but in my opinion he doesn’t fit into the Orioles plans. Here, I describe my two main points of confusion and speculate on the Orioles plans for Guerrero.
Confusion Point 1: The Orioles don’t need a new designated hitter, they have Luke Scott. Scott is just as good a hitter as Guerrero and Showalter will be unable to fit both players into the lineup. Currently, Bill James projects a .369 wOBA and (.261 AVG/.351 OBP/.501 SLG) line for Scott and a .373 wOBA and a (.304 AVG/.363 OBP/.505 SLG) line for Guerrero. Guerrero’s projection is expected to drop since he is leaving uber-hitter-friendly Arlington, TX. The Orioles cannot move Luke Scott to the outfield to make room for Guerrero because they have Felix Pie. Scott isn’t a poor defensive player but Pie is an elite defensive player and younger than Scott. Replacing Pie with Scott would truly reflect a win-now attitude and would not net many runs. Guerrero is an extreme defensive liability and is not an option in the outfield. The result of signing Guerrero is too many pigeons for too few pigeonholes. It makes the Orioles look silly for either: (1) signing Guerrero or (2) not moving 32-year old Luke Scott, coming off a career season, for younger prospects this offseason.
Confusion Point 2: Even if the Orioles had moved Luke Scott during the offseason and needed a veteran designated hitter, Guerrero was not the best DH available when 2011 began. Manny Ramirez was the best DH available in early 2011. While most consider his 2010 season to be a down year he still posted a .382 wOBA and a (.298 AVG/.409 OBP/.460 SLG) line. Only 16 hitters with enough plate appearances to qualify achieved better offensive statistics in 2010. In 2011, Bill James projects a .393 wOBA and a (.290 AVG/.401 OBP/.503 SLG) which would make him more valuable than James’ 2011 version of Guerrero. Furthermore, the Tampa Bay Rays signed Manny to a 1 year, $2 Million contract, making him 75% CHEAPER THAN Guerrero and an unbelievable bargain. Over 500 plate appearances, a .393 wOBA is worth approximately 3 WARs and $15 million. If the Orioles where hell bent on brining in a veteran designated hitter and Manny was available to them at any price less than $5 million, not signing him was an inexcusable mistake.
The Orioles acquisition of Guerrero reflects a desire to maximize offensive output by sacrificing roster room. I assume that they intend to platoon Guerrero and Scott at DH creating a ridiculous offensive weapon with a Pujolsian (.300 AVG/ .390 OBP/ .540 SLG) line. If the Orioles were close to contending, generating output like this from any position, for a single year, would be a great move. However, signing a $8 million aging DH to platoon with a $4 million Scott is an expensive and unnecessary move for a team with little chance of making the playoffs in 2011. When I factor in the potential to stunt the growth of younger players such as Nolan Reimold and Felix Pie this deal does not make sense.
I wasn't a big fan of the Guerrero move but I have to answer a few points of your confusion. Pie is not elite by any stretch. He is very athletic, but he doesn't make very good reads on the ball. Scott will play in left.
Manny is a huge headcase who can create a terrible clubhouse situation. The Orioles don't want any part of that. You have to look past the stats and think of the baggage a player carries with them.
The Orioles probably paid more than they had to to get him, but it isn't THAT bad.
I understand your response to my confusion point about Manny. There certainly is no way to quantify his antics. However, I believe most of the descriptions are exaggerated and his talent level is still high. Reasonable people can disagree on which DH will result in the Orioles winning more games in 2011, I would vote for Manny.
Pie is elite huh?
Have you watched him play LF?
Thanks for the feedback guys and gals. I think the best description of Pie's defense comes from this excellent article by Heath on Dempsey's Army: http://dempseysarmy.blogspot.com/2011/01/three-th…
"In terms of Runs Saved, the best showing from a regular fielder was…Felix Pie. This is not a surprise to some but the "Felix Pie looks lost in left field" reputation has been tough for him to shake. But Pie was credited with 6 Runs Saved, good for 5th among all left fielders in baseball, in only 70 games. Double that for 140 games and the 12 Runs Saved would put him right behind the likes of Brett Gardner (13) and Carl Crawford (14). He's one of he best fielding outfielders in baseball. It's time to retire the notion that he's not."
I'd love to see exactly that those numbers are reached because he absolutely costs the team runs as well.
Vlad signed for 8 million (with 3 deferred) for one year. Everyone knows this team isn't going to the playoffs with him or without him. But it's completely missing the point to use that as a reason to pan the move.
If you'd like to retire the notion that Pie is a poor fielder, then I'd like to the retire the notion "blocking" Nolan Reimold is detrimental to this team. In another classic case of overvaluing homegrown talent. Reimold has somehow become something he isn't: a top notch prospect.
I've stated the reasons I believe the team needed a guy like Vlad numerous times on this site.
Mark,
Thanks for the continued comments. My goal is not necessarily to change everyone's opinion but to encourage BSR readers to consider the Vlad signing in a slightly different light. Below are notes on Runs Saved and Nolan Reimold.
Runs Saved is an intricately tracked statistic. It takes a massive database of defensive information and simplifies it into a single number estimating a player's defensive value. Every ball in play is charted, and the field is divided into vectors to determine the frequency with which each play gets made. Other components come into play, such as throwing arm and bunt defense. The number of outs and runners on base are also taken into account to determine the probability that a run would score in a given situation. Complete details for runs saved can be found here:
http://www.billjamesonline.net/fieldingbible/Fiel…
The most pertinent information is about 1/3 of the way down the page.
While it is fair to describe my optisim about Reimold as "over-valuing" home grown talent I do think he has a very good pedigree. He was a 2005 second-round pick who compiled a .286/.383/.521 triple-slash in the minors. Throughout his time in the minor he showed quality secondary skills (12.5 percent walk rate, .235 Isolated Power). While Reimold is too old to still be considered a prospect, his ascent to the majors was slowed by a series of injuries (foot and back in 2006 and oblique in 2007) not a lack of production. Furthemore, I don't think Reimold actually regressed much in terms of skills during the 2010 season. The biggest difference in Reimold's advanced statistics from 2009 to 2010 was his batting average on balls in play (BABIP), a statistic that is assumed to be randomly distributed and not correlated with a player's skill set. In 2009 Reimold's BABIP was .316 and in 2010 it was .231, despite no significant changes in his BABIP profile. In 2010, Reimold hit more outfield fly balls but those flyballs came in the place of infield fly balls, which are the worst possible outcome of a batted ball. Given this data I would expect Reimold's BABIP to be around the MLB average of .300. With an average BABIP Reimold is a nice offensive MLB player. Three different MLB projection systems (Marcel, Oliver and Bill James) evaluate Reimold and Guerrero very similarly for 2011: (.356 vs. .373), (.343 vs. .345), and (.347 vs. .349) respectively. Until Reimold has 1000 MLB ABs I won't give up on him, especially at his current price of $400K/season.
Thanks for the feedback, I appreciate it!
When he was on the field in 2010, Pie was one of the best defensive left fielders in the AL. We are not talking about 2009.
Since Ross quoted my article, I'll let you know that those numbers came from the Bill James Handbook and were taken from John Dewan's defensive measurement systems,systems which are based in people watching every single defensive play of every single major league game every year, more than 2,400 games. I'm going with them on this one. Pie is a fantastic fielder. Lots of stuff to knowck him on but in 2010, that really isn't up for a question.
An Reimold is not a top-notch prospect but he could be a useful one.
Thanks for the post and helping out with the runs saved explanation. I really enjoyed the post I quoted. I'm looking forward to reading your stuff throughout the season!
Thank you! The reason I posted that little tidbit is that I didn't realize how good Pie was last season until I saw those numbers. Sure, I thought he had improved a lot in left (even late in 2009 he looked much better) but he was within shouting distance of Carl Crawford. Hopefully he builds on that this year because I am doubtful that the bat will ever really come around…
You're right it doesn't matter now but it remains fun to analyze. The Orioles are better for this season with Vlad. I'll be hoping for the best from him and monitoring what Manny brings to Tampa in terms of antics and offensive production.