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Saturday, January 16, 2021
Just hours after bringing back The Machine, the Yankees acquired a Klubot.
An incredibly busy 24-hour span for the Yankees — arguably busier than the previous 96 days of their offseason combined — concluded when they signed two-time American League Cy Young Award winner Corey Kluber to a one-year, $11 million contract, an industry source confirmed. “Talkin’ Jake” from Jomboy Media first reported the agreement.
Combined with the re-signing of top priority DJ “The Machine” LeMahieu to a six-year, $90-million pact and avoiding arbitration with eight players, the Yankees provided a great deal more clarity to both their roster and their payroll. If they are resolute on not exceeding the $210 million luxury-tax threshold, then they are rapidly approaching that limit — with the structure and luxury-tax implications of the Kluber deal not yet clear — unless they trade veterans to create more space.
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1. JRVJ Posted: January 16, 2021 at 10:25 AM (#6000091)Purely from a quality standpoint, sure, because Tanaka is (far) more likely to give you 180-ish innings. But I think it's nuts to expect to get him on a long-ish term contract that pays $12.5M a year. If I were his agent I would laugh that out of the room.
If it snaps tomorrow he wouldn't be in an MLB game until he's at least 33. I don't think 33-year-old Tanaka is going to replicate his 25-year-old self. I'd bet against that happening for any pitcher.
Over the last 3+ years (2017-20), Tanaka is 564 IP with just a 103 ERA+ and a roughly identical FIP, 6 WAR, 1 WAA. He was much better in 2014-16 but that and $4 will buy you a cup of coffee and the Tri-City Valley Cats in 2021.
Lance Lynn signed for 3/$30 before 2019. He's not a "name" and he was coming off a bad year and missing all of 2016 but he was also a guy who regularly gave 180-200 IP and had a 110 career ERA+.
I think the only SP contract so far this offseason is Mike Minor who got 2/$18. Minor missed all of 2015 and 2016, spent 2017 as a reliever and wasn't good in 2020 but over 2017-20, it's still 500 IP and a 126 ERA+ (and again, that's 500 innings despite a season as a reliever and a 60-game season). (Oops there's also Charlie Morton at 1/$15 and Smyly at 1/$11 ... why?)
The Cubs extended Hendricks for 4/$56 in early 2019 (covering 2020-23), buying out his last arb year and 3 FA years. He was coming off 3 years with 529 IP and a 148 ERA+.
There are also a good number of contracts from last year that suggest Tanaka should be able to beat 4/$50: Kyle Gibson at 3/$28, Keuchel at 3/$55, Bumgarner at 5/$85, Pineda 2/$20, Roark 2/$24.
So 4/$50 is probably light but I don't think we can rule it out. "At most 4/$50" is off the mark but I won't rule out it could end up less than 4/$50. Tanaka is a year older than MadBum, a year younger than Keuchel so I'm not sure he can hope for more than 4/$70 either. Mainly he'd better hope his statcast-style numbers make him look more like a 115 ERA+ pitcher than a 100 ERA+ pitcher.
Of course if you believe Tanaka is a 100 ERA+ pitcher then the gamble on Kluber becomes a more attractive alternative. Still I can't say this contract as reported makes sense to me. 36 innings since 2018. I mean 1/$4 with bonuses for each (1? 5? 10?) start makes lots of sense. Or 1/$11 plus an option maybe. The chance he doesn't pitch at all this year must be around 15% and the chance he pitches poorly must be pretty high as well. The chance he's the Kluber of old has to be quite low doesn't it ... and if he is, you lose control after one year.
Yea, I'm not suggesting he'd reclaim his 2014 stuff. I think it's plausible that if the surgery is an inordinate success there's an outside chance his stuff is better than it's been since he was diagnosed with the partial tear and underwent PRP therapy in 2015.
Tanaka: 142 IP, 9-8, 4.31 ERA
Kluber: 65 IP, 5-3, 4.19 ERA
The way I see it, Kluber's basically a flyer with a big upside and an affordable downside, even if the chances that the big upside comes around aren't all that great.
Tanaka didn't even average 5 innings a start in 2020, and got clobbered in both of his playoff starts. I'm not sure he's all that much of a lesser risk than Kluber, especially with a 4 year contract.
Manny says the issue is not drug-related.
Are you a fan of both Ohio teams or just have Votto in your name for the rhyme?
Yeah but any Kluber projection is just a guess. bb-r uses good ol' Marcel. It does include a "reliability" measure which is 50% for Kluber and 70% for Tanaka -- that's the %age of the projection based on actual performance vs. regression to the mean. (The reliability of Kluber's projection is probably higher than it should be.) ZiPS won't necessarily do much better ... they put Tanaka at 4.34 (168 IP, somehow 2.3 WAR); and Kluber at 3.98 in 145 innings (ZiPS must have been high that day) for 3.1 WAR.
According to MLB. Trade Rumors, Mike Minor got two years at $9 million per, Drew Smily and Corey Kluber got one year at $11 million, and Charlie Morton got one year at $15 million. If accurate, how much would you offer Tanaka on a one or two year deal?
Deivi Garcia and Domingo German.
Dom Perignon's cousin from across the border.
Oh.
My point being, if there's a team out there that could use (and afford) 1-2 durable, solid starters, it's the Yanks. They should be on the phone to Tanaka.
My point being, if there's a team out there that could use (and afford) 1-2 durable, solid starters, it's the Yanks. They should be on the phone to Tanaka.
Concur. I think they're just posturing to get the price down.
As far as the Yankees getting under the luxury tax, I’m not sure what benefit there is to resetting it in a “win now” season with this roster. The only rationale I can think of is the Yankees want to condition fans to expect a luxury tax reset every 3 or so years. If they reset it this year it’d be safe to assume this will continue to happen every few years. IF they reset this year, but elect to not reset it at some point in the future when it would have been predicted, the owners will likely receive a heroes welcome similar to when they rewrote the narrative of “the Hal Yankees don’t spend big on FAs” when they signed Cole. In other words, they’re potentially creating leverage by setting the bar low.
so if there is that down year or two, you can bounce back without losing most of your inventory.
Carl Pavano.
Don't forget the fan favorites Ed Whitson, Kenny Rogers, the Fat Toad, Javier Vazquez and Sonny Gray. Reportedly four of them are rested and ready.
Supposedly he was offered comparable amounts and more by other teams. MLBTR:
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