As I like to do every season, I’m going to compare the Yankee players’ theoretical fWAR dollars to their actual salaries and see which players gave the Yankees the most value and which players drained the most money. We’ll do batters today and pitchers tomorrow.
We’ll do the list in WAR order (nine highest), then we’ll sum it up at the end.
1. Robinson Cano, 6.4 fWAR worth $25.5MM. Salary: $9MM. Value: +$16.5MM
2. Brett Gardner, 5.4 fWAR worth $21.6 MM. Salary: $0.425MM. Value: +$21.175MM
3. Nick Swisher, 4.1 fWAR worth $16.4MM. Salary: $6.75MM. Value: +$9.65MM.
4. Alex Rodriguez, 3.9 fWAR worth $15.3MM. Salary: $32MM. Value: -$16.7MM.
5. Curtis Granderson, 3.6 fWAR worth $14.3MM. Salary: $5.5MM. Value: +$8.8MM.
6. Mark Teixeira, 3.5 fWAR worth $14.00MM. Salary: $20MM. Value: -6.00MM.
7. Derek Jeter, 2.5 fWAR worth $9.8MM. Salary: $21MM. Value: -$11.2MM
8. Jorge Posada, 2.4 fWAR worth $9.7MM. Salary: $13.1MM. Value: -$3.3MM.
9. Francisco Cervelli, 1.1 fWAR worth $4.4MM. Salary: $0.418MM. Value: +$3.82MM
Value Ranks:
1. Gardner
2. Cano
3. Swisher
4. Granderson
5. Cervelli
6. Posada
7. Teixeira
8. Jeter
9. Rodriguez
Italics means negative value.
This list should really surprise no one. The Yankees’ high priced, older talent had a bad collective 2010. Brett Gardner had what will likely be his career year while making just over the league minimum, so of course he’s going to return great value. And despite our frustrations with him, Frankie Cervelli did give the Yankees a bit of value this year. I think we’ll see the Melky Plan with Francisco: hang on to him while he’s cheap, then jettison him when he starts hitting arbitration and starts making too much money.
It also turns out that the Granderson deal was not some horrid thing that should’ve been undone. Granderson is relatively cheap for next year ($8.25) but goes up a bit in 2012 and ’13 ($10, $13 option) so granting a rebound year, he should return good value next year as well.
Nick Swisher makes only $9.75 next year so assuming he can repeat this year–or do something between 2010 and 2009–he’ll probably return value again, too.
As for the guys in the red, Teixeira is the only most likely to bounce back, considering his relatively young age compared to Jeter and Rodriguez and Posada. He also plays the least physically demanding position of the three and had a down year with the bat. I don’t think we’ll see the aforementioned trio in the black unless they have monster years.
Check back tomorrow when we look at the pitchers, starters and relievers.
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3 Responses to Money Savers and Drainers
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TIQ IQ
Really no surprise. I don’t think Gardner had a career year, I think more indicative of what his career will be—good OBP, steals, about .270-.280. I just hope Teixiera had a fluke bad year. With A-Rod and Jeter & Posada most likely not being worth their paychecks, Tex will have to pick up the slack.
I hope so too. I read a comment on a blog (can’t remember if it was here or elsewhere) that, after two seasons, Teixeira (2009-2001) was tracking Giambi (2002-2003) pretty closely. If you look at the drop in AVG, OBP, SLG and BABIP, it’s kind of uncanny. It could just be a coincidence.
Anyway, it bears monitoring next year because Teixeira was an easy out for long stretches of the season. Hopefully with improved luck and some adjustments, he can bounce back in 2011.
At the end of the year he was really badly hurt and had injuries on both his feet and hands and when you combine that with his awful start worse than norman you get a weird year I expect a much better season next year from Tex because I don’t think the begining slump will be as bad.
Granderson has a chance to really be big next year he missed a full month of the season this year and really never got around to looking comfortable until the mechanical change and carrying the feeling he had this year into next I think is going to promote great things.