What if Matt Holliday Walks?
Chone Figgins would give the lineup a boost in the speed and obp departments.
As long as we are talking hypothetical situations, assuming Holliday walks, what I wouldn’t mind seeing done is for the Cardinals to sign Chone Figgins for 3b and Derosa for the outfield.
-Offense-Figgins walked in over 14% of his plate appearances this year and had a .395 obp and is a switch hitter. Derosa we all know suffered from a wrist injury this season and managed a .752 ops.
-Defense-using UZR(Ultimate Zone Rating), Figgins saved an outstanding 14.5 runs at third base, meaning it would be like having another Brendan Ryan in the infield. Derosa meanwhile, would also benefit from a move to the outfield, specifically RF where he has saved 20 runs over 160 games in his career. Ludwick is a good LF and RF so the Cardinals could move Ludwick to LF or put Derosa in Left, where he has been average in his career but in much smaller sample size.
-Conclusion-In terms of Wins Above Replacement, or WAR, Figgins was a 5.9 win player last year, or .3 wins better than Holliday, but we all know Holliday will be the one pulling in a 5-6 year deal worth around 85-105 million, not Figgins. Compared to Holliday, Figgins could be an undervalued bargain at something like a 3-4 year deal worth 10-12 million annually. Derosa could be a 2-3 win player when his defense gets a boost from the outfield and his wrist recovers.
Bottom line is the Cardinals would get a leadoff or a two-hole hitter in Figgins to combine with Schumaker to have more runners on base when Albert hits, and also have a very solid LF in Derosa. Although this approach wouldn’t be as sexy as adding Holliday, the combined salaries of Figgins and Derosa would be about equal to Holliday and Freese and likely to outproduce or equal them in terms of WAR while taking less years of commitment to save money in the future for a Pujols extension.
By: secret_sauce on Oct 15th, 2009
Tagged as: GM Suggestions
So what would you pay Figgins? IS he a $7-10 mil person?
# 1 year/$5.775M (2009)
* re-signed by Angels 1/14/09 (avoided arbitration)
* award bonuses: $50,000 for All Star; $75,000 each for Gold Glove, Silver Slugger, LCS MVP; $0.1M for WS MVP; $0.15M for MVP ($75,000 for 2nd or 3rd in vote, $50,000 for 4th or 5th)
Why not go cheap with Freese and use the money to get frontline pitching? Use DeRosa as super utility everyday.
Because the offense is quite average WITH Holliday, and you don’t need filler types like Freese getting substantial at-bats.
-I would be fine with paying Figgins 10 million per, considering that he was worth 5.9 WAR this season. Generally teams pay 4.5 million per Win Above Replacement that a player is worth on the free agent market, so getting Figgins at 10 million annually could be considered a bargain.
-Since Figgins and Holliday were worth basically the same amount in terms of WAR, why will Holliday get the huge dollars and Figgins not? It’s because a lot of Figgins value comes from his defense. Defense is still undervalued on the free agent market. Take for example, the signings of Adam Dunn and Adam Everett from last year. Dunn had a fantastic year with the bat, but when you take into account all the runs he gave away on defense, he was only worth 1.1 WAR. Adam Everett on the other hand, had his typical worthless season at the plate, but his superior defense made him worth 0.9 WAR, yet we all know Dunn got the huge contract and Everett had to settle for much less(though he was coming off injury) Bottomline is that a run saved on defense is just as important as a run created on offense, and Figgins does both very well and will likely be a bargain to whomever signs him in the offseason.
As far as going cheap with Freese and using the money to get a frontline pitcher, it’s an interesting idea. The only problem is that there is really only one healthy stud in the free agent class, John Lackey, who has had arm problems himself the past two years. The Cardinals have already signed 3/5 of their rotation to long term deals, and I just don’t see them adding another multi-year contract to that. Mo’ has also stated that he wasn’t crazy about signing another starter to a multi-year deal as well.
The starters I would like to see the Cardinals look at this offseason are of the low-risk, upside type that don’t take the multi-year deal to sign. Guys like Pavano, Penny, Bedard, Sheets, Smoltz, Duchscherer all fit this bill.
When planning my above scenario, I tried to address the problem of not having enough on-base % guys in the lineup, and thought that Figgins would not only benefit the offense by having more people on base in front of Albert, but also be a great help to the groundball heavy pitching staff as well on defense. Thank you for questioning me though, this is what’s great about the hot-stove season!
Thanks for the comment Pat. I’d personally like to see Freese in more of a reserve role next year, as I’m not convinced his bat is/will ever be ready to start.
We need a frontline pitcher though!
As long as Carpenter and Wainwright are healthy, the frontline pitching on the Cardinals is in good shape.
Carpenter and Wainwright are a good 1-2 but we could allocate some of the resources for another front-end pitcher. I don’t think winning 2 or 3 out of 5 is going to cut it.
If I thought Smoltz was the answer, there wouldn’t be a comment from me on this.
I think Milton Bradley would be a terrific addition to the Cardinals’ outfield. He is a high on-base guy, and adds fire to an otherwise laid back group of players. The intangibles he brings will no doubt also lead the Cardinals to another division championship.
Motle,
I wouldn’t complain if they added another quality starter one bit. When you consider the starting pitching depth availiable in the minors if some starters were to go down it is a cause for concern, especially when you consider:
1. Carpenter-health will always be a question
2. Wainwright-had a major increase in innings from previous years
3. Lohse-had torn flexor muscle and never was 08 Lohse in 09 after it
4. Smoltz(Seems like their is mutual interest between him and the Cards)-was healthy, but like Carpenter health will always be a question
5. Garcia-made several strong rehab starts in AAA, but will be a rookie and has already went under the knife.
In AAA, the only starters considered ready to be available at the start of 09 will be Boggs and Thompson, and maybe P.J. Walters, a trio that hardly inspires any confidence. You are right the team could do a lot worse than sign some depth for the rotation, and this offseason is a perfect one to do so with guys like i mentioned above, or really play with fire and try to keep a guy like Harden healthy.
MasterFlex:
I am not so sure about Milton Bradley’s fire and intangibles, and there is no way the Cubs would do a trade like that with the Cardinals, but if they had the chance to grab Milton Bradley at the pro-rated minimum like they did with Lugo and Smoltz this year and not give up much in a trade, I wouldn’t complain. If he misbehaved,there would be almost nothing invested in him so it would be easy to release him.
from Strauss dated October 20, 2009
There currently is little thought given to a free agent class offering Adrian
Beltre, Chone Figgins and Pedro Feliz at the position. Freese instead appears
the man for the moment to address a yearlong riddle
“There currently is little thought given to a free agent class offering Adrian
Beltre, Chone Figgins and Pedro Feliz at the position. Freese instead appears
the man for the moment to address a yearlong riddle.”
It appears Mozeliak and co. really believe that Freese can be an everyday player. This may be partly because they seem set on adding a big bat for LF and wouldn’t have the money to add both a LF and a 3B. I’ll be pleasantly surprised if the Cardinals are able to sign Holliday, but just offered the above suggestion as an alternative. My personal opinion is that Figgins and Derosa would be a better bet than something like Bay and Freese, but thats just one opinion.
[...] 1.5-2 WAR player he’s likely to be. I’ve already discussed the projected value of Derosa in another post, so I won’t get into that here. So if the Cardinals have 30 million to spend, John Mozeliak [...]