Possible Free Agent Options For Marlins Next Season

[McKeon]

Here are a few better names then Scott Kazmir.

C.J. Wilson
Aaron Harang
Mark Buehrle

Granted, there may be big paydays coming these guys way, but they are high quality pitchers and have been workhorses the last couple years.

[HUGG]

More names better than Kazmir

Josh Johnson
Ricky Nolasco
Anibal Sanchez
Chris Volstad
Javier Vazquez

[Beef]

Dirty

[FishFanInPA]

More names better then Scott Kazmir:

Jesus Sanchez
Billy Koch
Antonio Alfonseca
Armando Almanza
Al Leiter (the old one)
Vic Darensbourg

[emkayseven]

let's not get carried away.

even 2005 leiter was better.

[lou]

Assuming Aramis makes that $9-12, I don't know where he fits into this team (where hypothetically speaking, I think it would be unanimous if there were a poll the top priority is Wilson or Buerhle and the Marlins are probably going to go after one, if not both, of them)

C John Buck $6,500,000
1B Gaby Sanchez $420,000
2B Emilio Bonifacio $1,750,000 (arb estimate)
3B Matt Dominguez $410,000
SS Hanley Ramirez $15,000,000
LF Logan Morrison $420,000
RF Mike Stanton $420,000
CF Chris Coghlan $2,250,000 (super 2 estimate, could be $500k)
B Brett Hayes $420,000
B Veteran CF $2,000,000 (Fa estimate)
B Veteran OF $1,000,000 (Fa estimate)
B Veteran 3B $2,000,000 (Fa estimate)
B Veteran MI $1,000,000 (Fa estimate)

SP Josh Johnson $13,750,000
SP Ricky Nolasco $9,000,000
SP Anibal Sanchez $8,000,000 (arb estimate)
SP Wilson/Buerhle $11,000,000 (Fa estimate)
SP Volstad/FA 5th SP $2,500,000 (arb/fa estimate)
RP Edward Mujica $1,500,000 (arb estimate)
RP Randy Choate $1,500,000
RP Ryan Webb $430,000
RP Mike Dunn $420,000
RP Burke Badenhop $1,250,000 (arb estimate)
RP Steve Cishek $420,000
RP Veteran RHP $2,500,000 (Fa estimate)

$85,860,000

I mean, if you want to shave the entire bench and backend bullpen, and keep Coghaln in AAA this year to deflect salary, there is cash for Aramis and the team could slum again with the collection of Sanabia, Ceda, Marinez, Cousins, O. Martinez, Petersen, etc., but I'm not sure how much of a benefit you get that compared to the longterm contract Aramis will sign. Or, just not sign a starting pitcher but that's pretty insane...

Best offseason plan, assuming no pipe dream Prince/Reyes acquisition (and I intentionally omitted Pujols as that is a terrible idea), is literally blow it out for Wilson/Buerhle, and the bench. Buy out Stanton's arb and give Anibal a 3 year deal. Everyone else on 1 year deals to not destroy longterm payroll. Call it an offseason. Pray Johnson is healthy.

[Erick]

Giving Mark Buehrle 11 million dollars is not something I'd be all that interested in.

I'd rather keep Volstad in the rotation.

[emkayseven]

why do you not want Buehrle?

[MiamiHomer]

Wouldn't mind him but 11mil seems steep for him.

[Erick]

I don't care much for guys who rely so much on their defense. At least not to give them 11 million dollars. A cheaper deal would be fine, although I wouldn't really care for him on a multi-year basis, which he would probably ask for considering his consistency of eating up innings over the years.

Also, while his BB/9 looks great (best thing about him), his regressing F-strike% (53.9) suggest that his BB/9 could regress.

For a guy like that, I'd rather just keep Volstad in the rotation/sign some arms for the minimum to see what works.

Volstad has improved this year; he's just had the shittiest luck a pitcher can possibly have.

Plus, if the goal of getting a guy like Buehrle is to add a lefty to the rotation for the sake of neutralizing lefty-heavy lineups (like the Phillies), he's really nothing special against lefties, either.

[emkayseven]

I think the goal of Buehrle or Wilson is to make the rotation better, not necessarily to neutralize lefty lineups. They are the best pitchers out there.

I would not rather give Volstad another shot. The drop from Buehrle to Volstad is tremendous. His luck has not been THAT bad this year.

[Erick]

I think the goal of Buehrle or Wilson is to make the rotation better, not necessarily to neutralize lefty lineups. They are the best pitchers out there.

I would not rather give Volstad another shot. The drop from Buehrle to Volstad is tremendous. His luck has not been THAT bad this year.

There's a huge difference between Buehrle and Wilson, though. With Buehrle, you get no real upside. Just a #3/4 who is who he is, and hopefully doesn't have a bad .BABIP year or else we're fucked.

With Wilson, you get a guy who's been consistently improving to the point that he's basically an ace now.

I'd be willing to give Wilson what he'd want.


And Volstad's luck has certainly been shitty. He has a 5.6 ERA, despite the fact that his xFIP and SIERA are both under 4.
His .BABIP allowed is .315 and his HR/FB% is 15.5 (+ a 64.9 LOB%). That type of crap luck over the board doesn't really repeat itself every year.

Also, his GB% has improved to 50.4 this year.

I also feel like he's getting better, and it's resulting in nothing. For example, in July, he has a fantastic K/BB ratio, he's lowered the amount of HR's allowed, and yet his ERA for the month is at 9.69 solely due to a .467 .BABIP. Almost half the balls in play off of him are going for hits; that basically never happens.


Point is, given the salary estimations Lou gave, I'd rather have two Volstad's for a combined 5 million than Buehrle for 11.
A normal year and they're more similar than you'd think.

Volstad's also given as many as 185 innings before, and he's on pace for 174 in a year which everything that could possibly go wrong has gone wrong for him. He's certainly capable of a 4ish ERA + 190-200 innings. Obviously an upgrade is always great, but skill-wise, Buehrle actually isn't going to give you much better than that.

To put it simply, there's a lot of luck in pitching. Sometimes weird shit happens. Chris Volstad is basically Jeff Karstens without awesome luck right now. Seriously, their peripherals are nearly identical. If anything, Volstad is slightly better. Yet, Karstens ERA is 2.28 and Volstad's is at 5.59.

[Mainge]

I've liked what he's done this year.

That being said, when you're feeding everyone cock high fastballs every other pitch, your BABIP gonna be high.

[emkayseven]

oh THAT'S where the "Volstad is unlucky" statement comes from, you just discovered SIERA

His tERA is 5.20, if you want to nitpick stats. I like how you didn't mention tERA but only SIERA and xFIP.

His ERA has been higher than his SIERA and xFIP every year he's been in the majors. In some cases, it's close (last year). In others, it's way over. At some point, it's not luck, it's just who he is (see: people waiting for 4 years for Nolasco's breakout season, people waiting for Matt Cain to have a shitty year, etc). Stats cannot and never will quantify everything.
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also I don't know why you figure that getting Buerhle means we won't have Volstad necessarily.

I'm not railing on Volstad, he's fine as a 5 starter but to say you'd rather have him than Buerhle is crazy.

[Erick]

oh THAT'S where the "Volstad is unlucky" statement comes from, you just discovered SIERA

His tERA is 5.20, if you want to nitpick stats. I like how you didn't mention tERA but only SIERA and xFIP.

His ERA has been higher than his SIERA and xFIP every year he's been in the majors. In some cases, it's close (last year). In others, it's way over. At some point, it's not luck, it's just who he is (see: people waiting for 4 years for Nolasco's breakout season, people waiting for Matt Cain to have a shitty year, etc). Stats cannot and never will quantify everything.
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also I don't know why you figure that getting Buerhle means we won't have Volstad necessarily.

I'm not railing on Volstad, he's fine as a 5 starter but to say you'd rather have him than Buerhle is crazy.

Ok, so one pitching metric thinks he sucks, while two others (which SABR guys, for the most part, say are better future indicators) say he's had shit luck.

Even if you want to look at simpler stats that are easier to define, his career .BABIP is .295 (.315 this year), HR/FB 12.1 (15.5 this year), LOB% 69.7 (64.9 this year).
I mean, even if you want to look at ERA only, he's at 5.6 this year as opposed to 4.7 career (lower than that before this terrible year, of course).

Also, the Matt Cain example is not good.

You're not taking into account that pitchers get better.

It's like you're saying that people were going on and on about Cain one year and it never happened, so it never happens.

I'm guessing you're citing his examples from his 2009 year. Well, since then, his independent pitching stats have improved, as well. He's consistently gotten a bit better with strikeouts, and more importantly, his BB/9 has improved a lot. Nowadays, Cain's FIP is actually lower than ERA. It's not as if he stayed the same pitcher forever.

Also, it seems like pitchers in SF have this thing that they're able to keep their HR/FB consistently low, regardless of who pitches there. They've written stuff about this, etc.

Anyway, Cain improving only brings me to my next point. Volstad's only 24. Plenty of guys are just getting to the big leagues at 24. Volstad's not Andrew Miller or something. He's at least given reasons for hope in the sense that he has above average control, gets groundballs at an above average rate, etc.

24 is not even reaching your prime years yet. Maybe someone realizes that his main problem has been lefties and he can develop a pitch for left-handed hitters to make his results better.


You can't ignore luck when it comes to pitchers.

You use the line of "it's just who he is" which I guess is in terms of ERA when ERA often varies from year-to-year.

I mean, seriously, we're talking about Mark Buehrle and Buehrle has had an ERA as low as 3.12/as high as 4.99. He's not necessarily consistently legit. This year he has an ERA of 3.38. Just last year, it was 4.28 (just 30 points lower than Volstad!)

You can't just base a contract on ERA and innings pitched.

And your other example being Nolasco is terrible. Nolasco's ERA changes consistently on a yearly basis. If anything, he might just be the most unpredictable pitcher in baseball.
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I'm not railing on Volstad, he's fine as a 5 starter but to say you'd rather have him than Buerhle is crazy.

I never said that.

I said I'd rather have Volstad at 2.5/another Volstad at 2.5 (or, like, pay someone the minimum and pray for luck) than give Mark Buehrle 11 million dollars.

Buehrle is not that good.