Fonzie Forever's 2009 Non-Tender Candidates Review

Before I start taking a look at the 2010 non-tendered players and trying to decide who might be a good fit for this season's Met squad, I figured it would be instructive to look at a couple of posts from last year to see who I liked and didn't like from that year's scrap heap. Without further introduction:

INTERESTED:

Matt Capps

He was coming off injury last year, and there are a lot of reasons to believe that he was just unlucky. His fastball last year was the best it has ever been... He allowed only 18.7% of hits against him to be line drives... he may have been a little unlucky with home runs...The Mets should scoop this guy up quick.

Matt Capps was an enormously successful pickup for the Nationals last season. Capps signed for $3.5M, with bonuses that could bump it to $3.95M. He had a fantastic season, posting a 2.47 ERA and 42 saves and made the all star team. To add injury to another injury, when the Nationals fell out of contention, they were able to trade Capps to Minnesota for top catching prospect Wilson Ramos.

Ryan Church

He is a great defensive outfielder. His UZR/150 for his career as a left fielder is +3.7, and as a right fielder is a phenomenal +14.2... His average value from 2006-2008, per year, was around $7 million. I think Church... would make an *excellent* fourth outfielder...

Ryan Church took a pay cut to $1.5M last season but absolutely collapsed, hitting only .201 and posting a .265 OBP. He was an minor asset defensively, but was overall worth -0.2 WAR. Man, what happened to Ryan Church?

Jack Cust

Cust is another guy who would be helpful if he could be had cheaply. He could provide late power off the bench, and might want to come to New York to be part of a contender after spending his career in Arizona, Baltimore, San Diego and Oakland on bad teams.

Cust was great last season! He earned $2.8M for his work and batted .272 with a .395 OBP and 13 home runs in only 113 games. According to fangraphs he was worth $9.6M. You may be surprised to know that defensively he graded out as basically even, but only played 105 innings in the field. For his career, he was a negative fielder. Either way, Cust had a great, cheap season.

Ryan Garko: I'm confused about Ryan Garko - he was terrible last season in AAA. There's got to be something we don't know about that story. He earned just above the minimum salary.
Andrew Miller: The former first round draft pick was also a disaster last season.
Neal Cotts: Cotts signed a minor league deal this year but did not pitch anywhere because of injuries. Source.
Jonny Gomes: Jonny Gomes actually had an entire post devoted to him here at Fonzie last offseason:

The Mets absolutely NEED to be in on Jonny Gomes right now, as he is still a free agent. Gomes hit a great .267/.338/.541 for the Reds last season... his career marks are good for a 109 OPS+... he CRUSHES lefties - hitting .307/.369/.545 against them last season... His best offer on the table now is a minor league deal from the Reds. How come nobody will give this guy a major league contract or guaranteed money?

He plays a poor outfield, but did post a +2.2 UZR/150 in left field last season over 253 innings. Maybe we can slap a first baseman's mitt on him and have him back up 1B, and LF. Either way, he would be a strong option to pinch hit off the bench late in games, could grab an occasional start against lefties, and occupy the last spot on our roster.

He actually had an interesting season, did Gomes, as he got to play almost every day for the first time and posted 86 RBI with a 758 OPS. He had a down year offensively - probably a result of playing every day despite his platoon split - but was atrocious with the glove. Who knows, with these things?

Anyway, he was worth -0.1 WAR, which I believe could have been a decent sized positive WAR had he been used properly -- he actually had a 856 OPS vs lefties last year and a 709 OPS vs righties. He probably has a future career as a part-time DH as a Marcus Thames type. He earned 800K last season.


NOT INTERESTED
Garrett Atkins

For what it's worth, I think Atkins is done. Atkins' OPS has decreased steadily over the last four years, from 965 to 853, to 780, and then bottomed out at 650 last year. His career statistics away from Coors Field have been terrible. He is only 30 years old, but he was never the most physically fit player. Finally, he experienced a drastic jump in walks last season (from 40 in 664 ab to 41 in 339 ab) -- which is usually a bad sign for players at the end of their careers.

Get this - Atkins was the highest paid player on this entire list and was absolutely awful last year. He earned $4M for the Orioles to post a 562 OPS, hit .214, and butcher the ball defensively. He was actually worth NEGATIVE $4.4M.

You may remember that Atkins was a Metsblog obsession for a while -- good thing we dodged that one. And as for the Orioles, well, that's why they're the Orioles. It's interesting to note, however, that Fangraphs actually endorsed the move and that the fans were also wrong, projecting Atkins at $5.8M in value.

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So where does that leave us? Certainly, I'd say there were more hits than misses, and especially big hits on Capps, Cust, and Atkins. Another lesson, if there is any, is that projecting a bounce-back for a hitter who is in a pattern of decline wasn't a good bet last year. Garko, Atkins, and Church were all bad. And those with big platoon splits, which would include Gomes, might not be as valuable as they appear to be on paper before they are exposed as every day players.

All in all, it appears that Capps, Cust, and Gomes, were worth their investments, while Church, Atkins, Cotts, Miller, and Garko were not. All in all, there are some big dividends to be reaped in the non-tender market with relatively little risk. I hope the 2010 Mets take a few chances.

Tune in soon for my review of the 2010 non-tender candidates!

Non-Tendered Players - Yes on Capps, No on Atkins

As most of you know, last night was the deadline for teams to offer contracts to their arbitration-eligible players. Any player not "tendered" a contract is non-tendered and becomes a free agent, eligible to negotiate with any team. Here is the list of non-tenders, courtesy of MLB Trade Rumors.

Matt Brown, Dustin Moseley, Ryan Garko, Clay Condrey, Josh Whitesell, Adam Miller, Anthony Reyes, Jose Veras, Matt Capps, Phil Dumatrait, Raul Chavez, John Buck, Josh Anderson, Mark Worrell, Jackson Quezada, Shawn Riggans, Gabe Gross, Ryan Langerhans, Mark DiFelice, Mike Rivera, Brian Anderson, Jack Cust, Mike MacDougal, D.J. Carrasco, Brian Bass, Neal Cotts, Jonny Gomes, Alfredo Amezaga, Scott Olsen, Chien-Ming Wang, Kelly Johnson, Ryan Church, Garrett Atkins, Seth McClung.*

Of those players, there are several I think could contribute to the 2010 Mets. Loosely in order of preference:

Matt Capps
Matt Capps is only 26, has 67 career saves, and a career 3.61 ERA and 1.17 WHIP. Why was he non-tendered? He struggled last season.

Capps was due a raise from his $2.35 million salary, and the Pirates ultimately determined that such a cost outweighed Capps' value.

"If Matt is what he was in '07 and in the first half in '08, it's a no-brainer to tender him," Huntington said on Sunday. "While we believe Matt can be a bounce-back candidate for next season, we just weren't willing to go through the arbitration process and risk losing. We got to a number that was our final offer, and when they rejected it, we felt like this was our only option."

He finished the year with a 5.80 ERA, eight losses and five blown saves. It is worth noting, though, that of the 35 earned runs Capps allowed in 54 1/3 innings, 12 of those came in just three appearances (two innings), which certainly swelled his ERA. Source: MLB.com

Poor, small-market Pirates. Couldn't afford to take a chance on Capps when last year his ERA was an unsightly 5.80. He is a perfect candidate for the Mets, a team with bullpen problems and a big wallet.

He was coming off injury last year, and there are a lot of reasons to believe that he was just unlucky. His fastball last year was the best it has ever been, registering 93.6 MPH on average - up from 91.5 MPH the year before. He got swings on 29.7% of hit pitches out of the zone last year, above his career average of 28.1%. He allowed only 18.7% of hits against him to be line drives, down from his career average of 20%. Finally, he may have been a little unlucky with home runs - 13.5% of fly balls against him went for home runs, an unusually high rate.

The Mets should scoop this guy up quick, even if he is a due a slight raise. He'll want a one year deal to reestablish his value, and he'll provide insurance for K-Rod.

Mark DiFelice
Mark DiFelice had a 2.84 ERA in 2008. He had a 3.66 ERA in 2009. His WHIP is 1.20 for his career. Unfortunately, he'll be missing the year with shoulder surgery. I hope the Mets pick him up on a minor league deal with sights towards 2011.

Ryan Church
Let go by his third organization in as many years, there has to be more to Church than meets the eye. Is he a massive jerk? Whatever it is though, there is one thing that we know he is -- a great defensive outfielder. His UZR/150 for his career as a left fielder is +3.7, and as a right fielder is a phenomenal +14.2.

Church hit .273/.338/.384 last year for an OPS of 722 - down from 785 the year before, and 813 the year before that. He didn't hit well at all. Despite that, however, he was still worth $4.3 million dollars according to fangraphs.com. His average value from 2006-2008, per year, was around $7 million. I think Church is a solid bet to bounce back and if he could be had cheaply, would make an *excellent* fourth outfielder and insurance plan for Pagan/Beltran in case of injury or Francoeur in case of sucking-at-baseball.

Jack Cust
The Good: For his career, Jack Cust has an 864 OPS against right handed pitchers. He's hit 58 home runs over the last two seasons in Oakland.
The Bad: He struck out 185 times last year in only 513 at-bats. His career batting average is .239. He is a terrible defender everywhere.

That said, Cust is another guy who would be helpful if he could be had cheaply. He could provide late power off the bench, and might want to come to New York to be part of a contender after spending his career in Arizona, Baltimore, San Diego and Oakland on bad teams.

Garrett Atkins

Matt Cerrone over at Metsblog.com has talked about Atkins for a while. He pointed out the following:

Despite hitting just .226 last season for the Rockies, Atkins hit .268 against left-handed pitching; he hit .357 against lefties in 2008; .286 in 2007; and .341 against lefties in 2006.

With that left-right split, he becomes an ideal platoon partner for Daniel Murphy at first base. Murphy hit .275/.324/.430 against right-handers last year -- as opposed to .223 agaisnt left-handers.

For what it's worth, I think Atkins is done. Atkins' OPS has decreased steadily over the last four years, from 965 to 853, to 780, and then bottomed out at 650 last year. His career statistics away from Coors Field have been terrible. He is only 30 years old, but he was never the most physically fit player. Finally, he experienced a drastic jump in walks last season (from 40 in 664 ab to 41 in 339 ab) -- which is usually a bad sign for players at the end of their careers.

Others of interest:
Ryan Garko
Adam Miller
Neal Cotts
Jonny Gomes

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Edit: James pointed out to me that Garko might be the best non-tender of them all - especially for the Mets. A writer over at fangraphs really destroyed Giants GM Brian Sabean for letting Garko go, and he's probably right.

Garko has a career .313 average and 887 OPS against left handed pitching - the perfect compliment to Dan Murphy in a platoon at first base. He's not a world-beater in general, being a 28-year-old first baseman with an average bat and average-to-below-average glove, but he has his uses.