A look at the Fernando Tatis Jr. Contract

 This article won't be too in depth, but it will generally give a good summary of this deal and whether or not it is a good deal.

Fernando Tatis Jr. just signed a 14 year, $340 million dollar extension with the Padres. At first glance, this is a comical steal. From ages 23-36, a healthy Tatis would be expected to post around 84 Wins Above Replacement. That is, 6.5 WAR per season until age 30 when he loses half a win every year from that point onward. Using this calculation, the Padres will be paying around $4.03 million dollars per WAR produced by Tatis. The current pandemic-impacted market is around $6.4 million/WAR. On the surface, this looks like a huge steal for the Padres. Does this hold up?

For one, it is a little unfair to assume that Tatis will play 150 games per season for the rest of his career, as is expected in the original calculation. I don't have the data at hand, but I doubt that many players played 150 games per season from ages 23-36. Now that I think of it, I actually can check this. Give me just a second... I got it. 150 games per season for 14 years equates to exactly 2100 games played. Since integration, just 14 players have surpassed 2100 games from ages 23-36. All of them besides Pete Rose and Rafael Palmeiro, who were hall of fame talents, seem to be Hall of Famers. The most recent stretch was Albert Pujols playing 2108 games from 2003-2016. Tatis will be good enough to get that many starts, that is not a concern. The concern is that he would be healthy, especially later in his career. To get an arbitrary but reasonable number for his games played, I will look at Alex Rodriguez' games played from ages 23-36. He played 2011 games, or 143 per season. Tatis and ARod are both very similar players, so I think this works out. 

Using said playing time total, Tatis is now "only" projected for 79.5 WAR, which comes out to 4.27 $/WAR. This still remains a massively team-friendly contract, so what could we be missing? Well, the Padres already had 4 years of control over Tatis remaining. He was still going to make money, but a lot less than what he would make on the open market. The next step of this examination will be to calculate how much he would have made over the next 4 years. 

It isn't entirely easy to do so, but a good comparison would be Mookie Betts of the LA Dodgers. If not for the pandemic, Mookie would have made around $58 million in his last 4 years of his rookie deal. Only 3 of those years qualified for arbitration, and I'm pretty sure that Tatis qualified for the thing where a young star gets 4 years of arb and just 2 years of getting paid nothing. If this is confusing, I apologize. Anyways, you take the 58 million that Mookie made and then take Juan Soto's 2021 contract, as he is on the same track as Tatis, and you get 66 million. Inflation is a thing, and Tatis probably would have made a little more money than Mookie as a result, so let's just say Tatis was essentially on a low-risk, 4 year $70 million dollar deal. In practice, the Padres replaced that deal with a 4 year, $100 deal in exchange for a 10 year, $240 million dollar extension. To put it simply, they basically just gave him a 10 year, $270 million dollar extension on top of what he would have gotten already. If the Padres signed theoretical 26 year old Fernando Tatis Jr. to a 10 year, $270 million dollar extension, and he played 143 games per season, they would be expected to pay $4.9/WAR. I think this is the best measurement for the deal and it remains a huge steal.

Tatis provides value beyond his WAR as well. For one, concentrating 6.5 WAR into just 143 starts is more valuable than signing 3 separate 2.5 WAR players and getting 7.5 WAR in around 430 starts. Playing time, just like WAR, is a scarce commodity, and a true superstar player gives a team the chance to give playing time to different positive WAR players and ultimately win more games.  This is difficult to articulate without using poor and incorrect logic, but basically a team that has the ability to give more playing time to positive WAR players benefits from concentrating resources into one 6 WAR player instead of spreading it across multiple 2 WAR players. For a team without the depth necessary, it does not matter. However, those teams won't be competing for playoff spots anyways.

Tatis is arguably the face of baseball and easily one of the most marketable athletes in the game. The value he provides when the Padres gain popularity as a result of his name and performance is completely unknown, but there is definitely additional financial value in having a guy like Tatis on your roster. 

This article got off the rails, but the point is that the Padres did a great job with this Tatis extension and that they set themselves up handsomely for future success. As for Tatis, he did just fine. $340 million dollars is a lot, even after like half of it gets removed for taxes. Considering the diminishing marginal utility of money, I doubt that the difference between $340 million and around $600 million (which is probably what his market value is, lol), is a big deal. He eliminates all of his risk and gets to play baseball in San Diego for 14 years, which sounds fun enough. 

Examining J.T. Realmuto's Contract

 Very recently, the Philadelphia Phillies signed catcher Jacob T Realmuto to a 5 year, 115 million dollar deal. It was kind of like an extension, since he was already on the Phillies, but not really. He was on the open market, so I do expect that the Phillies were in fact the highest bidder. In the case of a lot of extensions, a player might take a home town discount. Nolan Arenado's deal, at the time, was a slight underpay. At this point, after a season has been burned and he regressed, it is not longer an underpay. Then there is obviously the case of Mike Trout's comically large extension, which still managed to be a massive underpay. Mike Trout is just that good, and I can't imagine how much he could have made had he tested free agency. It would have been fascinating. As of now, Trout has already been paid $52 million over the first 2 years of his extension, but he has 10 years left at around $354 million remaining. Playing 150 games per season with standard regression, Trout will be paid $6.3/WAR. The current free agent market is paying players $6.5/WAR. Even by a very simple measure, Trout is absurdly underpaid. Of course this fails to factor a few things. The $/WAR model is general. There isn't MUCH evidence that better players actually get more $/WAR, but it can be safely assumed that say 4 Cesar Hernandez' aren't as valuable as 1 Mike Trout, although the WAR would be the same. Another missed factor is that the current market should hopefully not represent the market 5-10 years down the line. Free agent spending is actually still up from the 2018 offseason despite the pandemic, so if MLB can get back on track pandemic free, the $/WAR should go up. 

Anyways, this post isn't about Mike Trout. It's about J.T. Realmuto and the interesting catching market. I think the best place to start is with the signing of Yasmani Grandal in both the 2018-2019 and the 2019-2020 offseason. Grandal is the best catcher in baseball and has been for a while. In the 2018-2019 offseason, he signed for just 1 year, 18 million. This was the best signing of the offseason for any team, and the Brewers were the beneficiaries. Grandal took his elite framing and discipline to Milwaukee, where he posted a 122 wRC+ and a 5.3 fWAR. Without him, there is no way the Brewers make the playoffs. His market value improved after the impressive season. He signed a 4 year, 72 million dollar deal with the White Sox. This was still a comical underpay. He was expected to be paid under $4.7/WAR at the time, which is absurd for such an elite player. After another solid season, he is now only expected to be paid just $4.4/WAR heading forward. It is established Yasmani Grandal is underrated by the market. Why?

Despite generally being considered an important trait, framing does not seem to be factored by the MLB market. Max Stassi, a projected 4 WAR/162 catcher, was traded to the Angels at the 2019 trade deadline for basically nothing. Sure, he was hitting really poorly for the Astros at the time of the trade. However, MLB teams are smart enough to understand that he wasn't going to maintain a 5 wRC+. In 339 plate appearances before 2019, Stassi posted a 101 wRC+. That production combined with his incredibly framing (31.0 DEF from 2018-2019 in 139 games) would make Stassi an All Star level talent. A 101 wRC+ wasn't realistic. He is currently considered an 87 wRC+ hitter by Steamer and a 92 wRC+ hitter by ZiPS. Even using those offensive outputs, he is an elite catcher. How would he not be an elite catcher? Max Stassi becomes a mediocre catcher if pitch framing was not a skill. His projected WAR/162 is cut in half, from around 4 to around 2. 

Just in general, catchers that are considered good framers are underpaid. Mike Zunino, Yasmani Grandal, Tyler Flowers, Martin Maldonado, Jason Castro, etc were all paid under market in the past few years. Vice versa is also true. James McCann and Robinson Chirinos, horrible framers, were both paid well above market value when they were signed in their respective offseasons. The reality seems to be that MLB teams do not factor framing when they pay catchers. Does this mean that they think framing stats are irrelevant? It's hard to say, but they're probably just blissfully unaware. The best framers usually remain the best framers year to year. Framing stats are generally results based, so the stability would indicate that framing is a sustainable skill. This begs the question: is J.T. Realmuto underpaid?

Realmuto's current contract, using Steamer projections and factoring projected framing success, is a slight underpay. With any other position, this would be surprising. If framing is removed, Realmuto jumps from 6.2 $/WAR to 7.0 $/WAR, which is now above market. This makes a lot more sense all things considered. Realmuto is a top catcher in the league, and should therefore get slightly overpaid. Removing framing from a few more catchers justifies the signings a lot more. Grandal's contract is still an underpay, but it is a lot less minor. James McCann, who is expected to suck at framing, sees his $/WAR drop from 15 to 10. It is clear that MLB teams do not seriously consider framing when they sign players, at least in regards to production. Electronic umpires might have an impact on this, but for now, this is a huge market inefficiency that needs to be exploited. 

Bryce Harper is Underpaid

 According to conventional wisdom (and the majority of analytics), Bryce Harper is overpaid. The infamous Phillies right fielder signed a 13 year, 330 million dollar deal in the 2019 offseason. He posted 4.6 fWAR in the 2019 season, which was a surplus of 11 million dollars, but the doubt still remains. Is Harper worth the contract?

Assuming no inflation and a steady 4.5 WAR with standard age 30 regression and no significant injuries, Bryce Harper will be worth 252 million dollars. This would put his true value at around -20 million, which would indicate that he is not worth the contract. However, this obviously leaves out that he already produced a +11 surplus in 2019, and it is looking like he will do the same this season. He is currently projected at a 6.5 win pace over a 162 game season for 2020, which would give him another 27 million in surplus and would put his contract as a whole into the "success" column as he would have produced 339 million dollars in value with just 330 dished out, a +9 success of a contract. But that assumes a lot of things, and it might not be entirely correct. However, there are more factors that would make Harper even more valuable.

Harper is probably the most famous player in baseball. He was supposed to be the greatest player ever, but he didn't live up to the hype. However, he was still good enough to maintain a large fanbase, and he is also exciting as fuck. Whether it's Matt Vasgersian busting over a 450 foot bomb in a high leverage situation in the playoffs, or it's him sliding into second base with his flow hair flying everywhere, he is a dynamic personality. As a result, more fans will show up if he is playing. More people will buy his jerseys, and more people will watch the Phillies. I have absolutely no clue how to quantify this, but simply put, he produces a lot of cash value off the field. 

Furthermore, inflation is a critical factor here too. I also have no clue how the MLB market will change in 13 years, but it is safe that say the 25 million now won't be worth nearly as much as 25 in 2030. For example, in 2010 Troy Tulowitzki produced 5.3 fWAR and 33 million in value. In 2019, DJ Lemahieu produced 5.4 fWAR and 42.8 million in value. The market might not improve by that much, but any money improved is value added to Bryce Harper's deal.

Finally, Harper could be much better than a 4.5 win player. 4.5 is a reasonable total, but if Harper ever cuts down on strikeouts, he could be a consistent top 5 player. As of today, he has a strikeout rate of 15% in 2020, 11 percent lower than last season. He doesn't need to maintain that clip, but if he can stay at around a 20% K rate without sacrificing power or discipline, he will be a perennial MVP candidate and will be well underpaid. 

Nolan Arenado will hit 94 Home Runs

From what I have seen in the Rockies inter-squad summer camp games, Nolan Arenado might just be the second coming of Christ. I swear he is hitting like 2 home runs per game or something insane like that. I don't know if he made some adjustments in the offseason, if Coors is feeling super friendly at the moment, or if something else is going on. All I know is that Nolan has been on absolute fire recently. Here's where the numbers get involved.

If he hits 2 home runs per game, and plays 60 games, he will hit 120 home runs. Pretty easy math, right? To pass Barry Bonds, he will have to hit 73 home runs, or 1.21 home runs per game. Some analytic nerds might say "Nooooo you can't just hit over a home run per game" but they are empirically wrong. Here is why:

Here is a video of Nolan Arenado hitting a home run against the Giants last year. According to ZiPS projections, Arenado will have around 4.26 plate appearances per game. If Nolan hits a home run every single time he is up to bat, he will hit 4.26 home runs per game. 4.26 is a lot greater than 1.21, as it would end up being around 256 home runs in the season.

Of course I am joking. This is very misleading. Obviously Nolan isn't going to hit 256 home runs. After all, ZiPS only projects him to play 56 of his team's 60 games. In a world where he played only 56 games, he would slug just 238 home runs. That is still 4.26 home runs per game, but just 238 home runs over the season. Fortunately, Barry Bonds only hit 73. Nolan has some room for error, but he now needs to hit over 1.3 home runs per game to keep up. We also need to add some more adjustments. 

Here is a video of Nolan hitting a double off of former Dodger and now Blue Jay Hyun-Jin Ryu. Unfortunately, this will sometimes occur. Nolan got a bit on top of this one, a rare mistake, and it ended up just being a double. Over a long season, Nolan might get a little tired. Because of this, I will pencil him in at 20% of his at bats ending up as doubles off the wall. I know this might undersell Nolan's skill a bit, but I am trying to be as unbiased as possible. As a result of this adjustment, Nolan is now only projected to hit 3.4 home runs per game. 

What about robbed home runs? I doubt that Nolan would hit a fly ball weak enough to be robbed, but it might happen. After adjusting for robbed home runs, Nolan is now projected for just 3.35 home runs per game, but that is still quite a lot. Even for a guy like Arenado, slugging 188 home runs in a season would take a lot of effort and energy. Nolan is a very motivated guy, but he isn't perfect. Here's how to fix that: A common practice in the analytical community in reaction to a potential outlier is to simply just divide the potential outlier by 2. It doesn't really matter what the context is, but always just divide by 2. This is very important. When we divide by two, we get around 1.68 home runs per game. This is closer to our number of 1.3 and it is a very reasonable projected outcome. Over a 56 game stretch, 1.68 home runs per game will amount to 94 home runs, 21 more than what Barry Bonds hit in 2001. That is the final projection, there are no other adjustments to be made, so you should expect around 94 home runs from Nolan Arenado this season.

Attempting to fix xwOBA

xwOBA is an interesting but flawed stat. It takes the exit veto and launch angle of each batted ball and assigns an estimated wOBA to the specific outcome. It then takes the xwOBA on contact, or xwOBACON, and fully factors K% and BB% to create the actual xwOBA. It is pretty good, but there is a general flaw in creating such a broad stat based purely on two inputs. Other factors, like sprint speed and launch direction, are not included in the calculation but will effect the actual outcomes on the baseball field. Unfortunately, Baseball Savant makes it impossible to find launch direction but that's not the point of this post anyways. 

Home runs are a true outcome, just like K% and BB%. The correlation to future success on home runs are just as stable as BB%, but it is not treated as a true outcome in xwOBA. I decided to change that. I took xwOBACON on balls that were not home runs, normalized it to fit the actual league average so things would not be inflated, and then factored in BB%, K%, and HR% using the basic wOBA values. This makes more sense in terms of a descriptive purpose, and I haven't tested things out but it is likely a lot more predictive as well. It still probably lags behind the incredible predictive powers of DRC+, but it is likely better than xwOBA. 

Nolan Arenado went from a 0.344 xwOBA to a 0.385 xwOBA. Alex Bregman went from 0.378 to 0.418. Matt Chapman fell from 0.360 to 0.354. Cody Bellinger went from 0.429 to a very impressive 0.460, just a tick behind Mike Trout, who also heavily improved to 0.461. I do want to acknowledge that it this stat definitely overrates the value of good players by a smidgen. The league average is still 0.314, but there is more variation between players than what there should be.

To normalize the xwOBA,  I just plugged in the new xwOBA into an equation which puts it on the same scale as the original xwOBA. The rankings and percentiles did not change, but the values did. Then I went and used a different equation factoring sprint speed into the xwOBAcon that I had. For example, Mike Trout dropped from 0.461 to 0.430, but the sprint speed adjustment brought up up to 0.433, and he still ranked first in the league. Jeff Mathis jumped from 0.191 to 0.216, still the worst in the league, but a higher value. Bregman and Arenado, who I mentioned previously, fell down to .397 and .369 respectively, but Bregman remained in the 98th percentile and Arenado in the 93rd percentile.  You can find the full results for 2019 here-> here <- . 

MLB Standings Predictions: American League

Tampa Bay Rays: 35-25

The Rays are pretty good and I don't want the Yankees to win the division or make the playoffs at all. It's interesting how Tampa Bay seems to be investing in outfield defense (Hunter Renfroe and Manuel Margot) while already having Kevin Kiermaier, who is arguably the best defensive outfielder in the league. Their pitching is incredibly deep, and maybe we will see Wander Franco play, who is probably the best prospect since Trout and Harper came up. 

New York Yankees: 32-28

The Yankees are good but I do not want them to do well. Aaron Judge is the second best power hitter in baseball and takes a ton of walks, although he doesn't put enough balls in play which hinders his overall production. Despite that he is still probably like a 4-5 win player at worst and I do not like that. Gleyber Torres also has a ton of home run potential, and could breakout this season. Gerrit Cole is the best pitcher in baseball but the rest of their rotation is not as high in quality. They make up for that with an absolutely absurd bullpen, but I'm just hoping that they get a bit unlucky.

Toronto Blue Jays: 31-29

Vladimir Guerrero Jr. wasn't as impressive as he could have been last year, but I'm hoping that he breaks out this year. Bo Bichette has a lower ceiling but also a lot higher of a floor, and overall the Blue Jays squad is pretty good. Their pitching and outfield need work, but I am pretty confident in their future outlook. As far as 2021 and beyond goes, they might just be the team to beat in the MLB.

Boston Red Sox: 29-31

The Red Sox aren't bad, but their outlook on this season is not inspiring. Despite the Mookie trade, I expected them to contend for a wild card spot. That changed when Chris Sale was sidelined for the year with an injury. The loss of Sale puts their pitching in a really bad spot, and they probably do not have enough depth to compete. With that being said, their offense is still elite and Rafael Devers has the potential to become a superstar.

Baltimore Orioles: 20-40

The Orioles somehow went from a playoff team in 2016 to one of the worst teams ever in 2018-2019. Not much has changed this year, and they are still a few years away from even having a competitive farm system, much less a competitive Major League Team.

Minnesota Twins: 42-18

I do not think the Twins are as good as my predicted record, but I am really high on them this year. They already won 101 games last year, but this years' team is more talented. Josh Donaldson was an incredible signing, as he is probably their best player. Guys like Kepler, Buxton, Sano, Arraez, and Polanco all have great high floor potential, and some pitching luck could allow them to win 42. At the same time, they could easily underachieve and win less than 30.

Cleveland REDACTED: 32-28

Francisco Lindor might be my favorite player in the MLB. He and Jose Ramirez are one of the best duos in the MLB, but the rest of the Indians roster isn't great. It's not particularly bad, and they could do pretty well, but it's not great. I am very high on prospect Nolan Jones, who has an astonishing 80 scouting grade in terms of pitch selection. He has a very good analytical skillset, and is very similar to a younger Josh Donaldson. 

Chicago White Sox: 32-28

White Sox fans can be irritating, but they support a team that should be pretty good this year. While Yoan Moncada had some unsustainable luck with balls in play this year, he is still an incredible talent and projects really well. The same can't exactly be said for Mr Tim Anderson, who is very fun to watch but does not have as productive of a skillset. Nick Madrigal is a unicorn, as his minor league strikeout rate hovers around just 3%. He has a low ceiling but a very high floor, not just as a prospect but just as a player in a given game. Lucas Giolito is one of the most underrated pitchers in the league as well. 

Kansas City Royals: 25-35

The top of the Royals lineup is actually pretty good, but their offensive depth and pitching is very poor. I am just hoping that Adalberto Mondesi and Jorge Soler transform into superstars. The Royals are still pretty far away from contention.

Detroit Tigers: 18-42

The Tigers were a pretty good team a few years ago, but they were very old and failed in their attempt to cultivate good young talent. Now their farm system isn't as bad, but their major league team is incredibly depressing. I don't think Spencer Torkelson is supposed to play this year, but his elite power potential should be exciting for Tigers fans.

Houston Astros: 45-15

I am really hoping that this happens.

Los Angeles Angels: 34-26

If Mike Trout opts out of the season, this is obviously subject to change. With that being said, a lineup with Trout, Anthony Rendon, Shohei Ohtani, and maybe Jo Adell (?) is incredibly dangerous. They need their pitching to perform well this year, but if that works out then they should be good. 

Oakland Athletics: 31-29

The A's are good but they are weird. I'm not sure if their pitching approach will work out in this small sample. 

Texas Rangers: 28-32

Their top 3 of their rotation is as good as any in baseball, but the rest of the team is a mess. Joey Gallo is great, but they do not have much outside of him. I'm not quite sure why they haven't traded Minor and Lynn, although it didn't make much sense to do so after acquiring Corey Kluber. Weird team.

Seattle Mariners: 26-34

Like the Royals, the top of their lineup is actually pretty good. Their run prevention is very poor, both in their pitching staff and defensively, but they have good potential. A lot of their arms are coming up soon and guys like Jarred Kelenic and Evan White have a lot of upside. 

Playoffs

The Yankees, Indians, and White Sox will have a three-way in this scenario. The Yankees beat the White Sox, then they host the Indians and loose. The Indians go to Houston and lose. The Twins beat the Rays, but then they lose to the Astros. People will cry as the Astros make yet another World Series. I'm not even an Astros fan, but their detractors are so obnoxious. They won't be as good as last year talent wise though.