Berardino: Twins close to extension with Dozier

[jimmer]

Not all third year players are almost 28 with team control through their prime years.  

 

Given the combination of production, age, and team control - anything approaching 6/52 would be totally unnecessary.  He has been healthy thus far but halfway through a six year deal his risk of injury and dip in performance will increase substantially as his costs escalate.  

 

I'd probably do something like 4/28 with an option in the 8-9 range.  

I believe my guess was actually 6 years in the 40M area.  Earlier I wrote: 'I'd guess Dozier will get something like 6 years/in the 40-45 range'

[TheLeviathan]

I believe my guess was actually 6 years in the 40M area.  Earlier I wrote: 'I'd guess Dozier will get something like 6 years/in the 40-45 range'

 

That's significantly less than Kipnis, like almost a 25% discount on the total value.  If that's the case, I can get behind it.

[diehardtwinsfan]

I think the deal will be 5 years and in the low 30s (32-33M) with a possible 6th year team option around 10M. That would be about right for what he'd get. It also makes the contract very, very tradeable.

[drock2190]

The Twins seem to always give out contracts to players coming off career years. Suzuki and Mauer are clear examples of that. Not sure why they can't wait it out a year because he's not going to go all Robinson Cano on them. 

[Shane Wahl]

5 years, 40 million is my guess.

[Thrylos]

This is part of the reason this team needs a new GM.  He never gets the "sell high" (especially when you have a pipeline) idea...  

Extending Dozier after a single above average season, is what they did with Blackburn and that worked really well for them.

[Seth Stohs]

I wrote about the possibility of the Twins and Dozier working out a long-term deal. I asked who would say no to a 6 year, $45 million deal? In it, I looked at what he would get from year to year if all he did was what he has done the last two seasons. 

 

I think we're hearing more of a 6 year, $40-42 million range. The risk is on both sides, for sure.

 

One way to alleviate some of that concern for the Twins would be to cut it down to a 3-year contract. Could do something like 3 years, $12-13 million. That way the risk for the Twins is lower and for Dozier, he would still have a year of arbitration remaining. 

 

Could also do a 3-4 year deal with a series of creative options. 

[Seth Stohs]

The thing that is going to bother me if he were to sign that contract... as soon as he get an injury or even just takes a day off, or (Yikes) has a down year, many in these forums will turn on him quickly...

 

That's the thing that bugs me the most. It's a constant, and it's unfortunate.

 

Of course, if he goes year to year, some will say that his only care was maximizing his value, rather than giving the Twins a team-friendly deal.

[sorney]

The thing that is going to bother me if he were to sign that contract... as soon as he get an injury or even just takes a day off, or (Yikes) has a down year, many in these forums will turn on him quickly...

 

That's the thing that bugs me the most. It's a constant, and it's unfortunate.

 

Of course, if he goes year to year, some will say that his only care was maximizing his value, rather than giving the Twins a team-friendly deal.

I think it would be in the best interest of both the Twins and Dozier to go year to year.  

[jorgenswest]

The thing that is going to bother me if he were to sign that contract... as soon as he get an injury or even just takes a day off, or (Yikes) has a down year, many in these forums will turn on him quickly...

 

That's the thing that bugs me the most. It's a constant, and it's unfortunate.

 

Of course, if he goes year to year, some will say that his only care was maximizing his value, rather than giving the Twins a team-friendly deal.

I won't turn on Dozier. He should absolutely take advantage of mismanagement on the part of the Twins front office.

 

I will express my frustration with the management and their lack of understanding aging curves. They should not extend him past 31. It is very likely that he will be a well below average defender at 2B past that age and he also should be expected to post a below league average OPS+. He will not be a starting 2B on a winning team.

 

Extending turns a trade asset into a liability. They are not a small market team. Worst case is he takes a big step up to a 125 OPS+ player at ages 28-29 and becomes expensive. Sell high.

[tobi0040]

In five years mauer will be off the books and 80 percent of our roster will be on rookie deals and in arbitration (or on sweetheart deals that start low). Assume he loses 40 percent of his WAR as he is 30, which is not that old, he is a 3 WAR player making 12m a year and will be gone by the time others get more expensive.

 

And it also creates a culture where performance is rewarded. That is exactly what we want. Hungry, young, motivated players.

[Mike Sixel]

Fangraphs with another article about him, this one not as favorable to an extension.

[Willihammer]

Fangraphs article on Dozier today

 

http://www.fangraphs.com/blogs/locking-up-brian-dozier/

[Mike Sixel]

Fangraphs article on Dozier today

 

http://www.fangraphs.com/blogs/locking-up-brian-dozier/

 

If only you had looked one post up........

[Twins Twerp]

This is part of the reason this team needs a new GM.  He never gets the "sell high" (especially when you have a pipeline) idea...  

Extending Dozier after a single above average season, is what they did with Blackburn and that worked really well for them.

Ridiculous statement...laughable even.  The Dozier will end up costing much more if we don't lock him up now.  Also, for every Blackburn, there is a Span.  Don't bring up JUST the negatives with buying out these arbitration and first few years of FA.  Sometimes it works out great.  Sell high doesn't work in MLB.  Plus, why on Earth would we trade one of our few decent players when we are on the backend of a rebuild?  It is Spring Training dude, have SOME optimism.  

[halfchest]

This honestly changes my opinion.  I'm not much more in favor of waiting a year than previously.  Worst case his price goes up a bit.  If he signs now it better be for a decent discount. 

[tobi0040]

Ridiculous statement...laughable even.  The Dozier will end up costing much more if we don't lock him up now.  Also, for every Blackburn, there is a Span.  Don't bring up JUST the negatives with buying out these arbitration and first few years of FA.  Sometimes it works out great.  Sell high doesn't work in MLB.  Plus, why on Earth would we trade one of our few decent players when we are on the backend of a rebuild?  It is Spring Training dude, have SOME optimism.  

 

I think you can point to Hunter, Santana, Koskie, Cuddy, and Kubel as guys we sort of "sold" on.  Only Johan was traded and actually sold, but the rest of these guys left at a time in which we received draft picks for them.

 

We were a contending team at time so we probably wanted to keep them as long as we could while receiving something.  The return on Cuddy has been good (Berrios).

[Willihammer]

I'm not sure how much I buy that pulling the ball is an end of career signal. Dozier is still 27. The comps in that article - Gomes, Ibanez, Young, are much older. Are we supposed to conclude that because Dozier pulls the ball that he's aging faster than normal?
 

 

Dozier has not shown an ability to hit a ball even reasonably hard the other way in the air, on a line, or on the ground. Pitchers are going to pitch him away, and all Dozier is going to be able to do is draw a walk……for a little while at least, until that skill begins to decline as his ability to inflict damage erodes.

Again, he's 27, should we expect his eye to erode that badly over the next 4-5 years?

 

The  point about O-swing% correlating with walk rate is more compelling IMO. Perhaps we should expect a future BB rate closer to 10% (between his '13 and '14 rates), and not 12.6% like he showed last year.

[Secondary User]

The Twins seem to always give out contracts to players coming off career years. Suzuki and Mauer are clear examples of that. Not sure why they can't wait it out a year because he's not going to go all Robinson Cano on them. 

 

A big reason for this is that is also when players want to talk contract extensions.  If he were nearing the end of a contract, Mauer wouldn't want to discuss a contract extension after his 2014 seasons because his value would be at a low and he wouldn't even come to the table to discuss it.  Contract extensions are two way discussions.

[Secondary User]

I'm not sure how much I buy that pulling the ball is an end of career signal. Dozier is still 27. The comps in that article - Gomes, Ibanez, Young, are much older. Are we supposed to conclude that because Dozier pulls the ball that he's aging faster than normal?

 

Again, he's 27, should we expect his eye to erode that badly over the next 4-5 years?

 

The  point about O-swing% correlating with walk rate is more compelling IMO. Perhaps we should expect a future BB rate closer to 10% (between his '13 and '14 rates), and not 12.6% like he showed last year.

 

the inclusion of Simmons in his list makes it more about skill level than age I think.  If you have marginal offensive skills, whether it's through age deterioration or just not having a lot of offensive skill to begin with, you end up resorting to pulling the ball. 

[Willihammer]

the inclusion of Simmons in his list makes it more about skill level than age I think.  If you have marginal offensive skills, whether it's through age deterioration or just not having a lot of offensive skill to begin with, you end up resorting to pulling the ball. 

Alright, so Dozier needs to pull the ball to succeed. The shift is designed to defend against pulled balls. Therefore shifting Dozier will reduce Dozier's success. I buy that, for ground balls. But Dozier hits all his balls in the air. Unless they park the RFer on the LF line or something, I don't see a lot to worry about for now.

[Secondary User]

Alright, so Dozier needs to pull the ball to succeed. The shift is designed to defend against pulled balls. Therefore shifting Dozier will reduce Dozier's success. I buy that, for ground balls. But Dozier hits all his balls in the air. Unless they park the RFer on the LF line or something, I don't see a lot to worry about for now.

 

Right now, no, but if you start talking about a 6, or even 4 year contract, we're not talking about right now

 

Let me be clear, I like Dozier, and the idea of extending him is something I'm ok with, it just has to be handled carefully.

 

One other thing from that article though, is that Dozier did perform very well on ground balls, including 10 ground ball doubles.  Shifts would cut into that dramatically

[nicksaviking]

Here is the quote about his extreme pull tendancy:

"Extreme pulling is generally a hallmark of a player harvesting power near the end of a career, when it’s basically all that he has left in his offensive game. The most comparable 2013 pull factors were posted by the likes of Jonny Gomes, Raul Ibanez, Chris Young and Andrelton Simmons; three guys who appeared cooked in 2014, and another who is struggling to find an offensive identity. Dozier didn’t become an extreme puller to extend his major league career; he did so just to have one, at least as a regular, in the first place."

 

I'm not a fan of the extension, but Blengino is using conjecture here as to why Dozier is pulling the ball when anyone who has followed the history of Target Field doesn't need conjectur.

 

Dozier is an extreme pull hitter because Josh Willingham and Trevor Plouffe showed everyone in 2012 that the only reliable way to create power is to pull the ball down the LF line. 

[Shane Wahl]

Worrying about pull hitting is stupid. Seriously. That cannot be the focus of the discussion about Dozier. Signing him for six years is crazy, in my view, if the goal really is to keep him. If this is about making a product package for a trade if the young ones come through, then, ok. Dozier does have the potential 3-4 years from now of being Nick Punto++ as well. That is, I do imagine that he ends his career as a utility guy because he is a smart player who will maximize his value. But he can still hit very well.

[Willihammer]

Right now, no, but if you start talking about a 6, or even 4 year contract, we're not talking about right now

 

Let me be clear, I like Dozier, and the idea of extending him is something I'm ok with, it just has to be handled carefully.

 

One other thing from that article though, is that Dozier did perform very well on ground balls, including 10 ground ball doubles.  Shifts would cut into that dramatically

I suspect a lot of those doubles are less a product of lucky ball placement and more a product of Dozier's superior baserunning stretching some singles into doubles. Although speed will certainly decline at some point.

 

The fact remains that whatever infield shift implemented against Dozier is going to have a minimal impact as long as he keeps hitting everything in the air.

[tobi0040]

Dozier is an extreme pull hitter because Josh Willingham and Trevor Plouffe showed everyone in 2012 that the only reliable way to create power is to pull the ball down the LF line. 

 

I assume this is a Target field reference given the right handers cited?  If so, Dozier has more HR on the road than at home.

[Steve Lein]

An extension for Dozier this year seems a year too early for me. He hasn't even had an arbitration season yet (at age 28!), and I don't like doing that for guys like Dozier. Great piece on your team, but he's not a superstar.

 

I'm also guessing we're seeing the best of what we're going to from him, hopefully for a bunch more years yet, but contracts being handed out based on one season of that are never a good idea.

[jimmer]

Seems that if a guy is pull crazy then pitching him becomes easier.  It was well pointed out Dozier is pull happy in the first half last year and in the 2nd half his slugging % dropped under .400 (though his OBP got better, so that's something).

 

I have always been a big Dozier fan, basically since being drafted. He is my favorite current Twin, but whenever a weakness is so clearly out there, it's not stupid to discuss it or be concerned about it. Opposing team scouts and, gasp, SABR guys are going to be telling the team about players' weaknesses at the plate and pitchers are going to try and exploit them.

 

I'm hoping the team and Dozier have looked into this and are working to adjust his approach.

[Willihammer]

Seems that if a guy is pull crazy then pitching him becomes easier.  It was well pointed out Dozier is pull happy in the first half last year and in the 2nd half his slugging % dropped under .400 (though his OBP got better, so that's something).

 

I have always been a big Dozier fan, basically since being drafted. He is my favorite current Twin, but whenever a weakness is so clearly out there, it's not stupid to discuss it or be concerned about it. Opposing team scouts and, gasp, SABR guys are going to be telling the team about players' weaknesses at the plate and pitchers are going to try and exploit them.

 

I'm hoping the team and Dozier have looked into this and are working to adjust his approach.

I disagree, I think its a solid formula. He's basically halved the plate. Which is why I think his walk and power numbers move inversely. He sits inner half waiting for a pitch to pull, and draws a lot of walks on pitches that won't go there. I wish more Twins batters annexed a portion of the plate like that.

[jimmer]

An extension for Dozier this year seems a year too early for me. He hasn't even had an arbitration season yet (at age 28!), 

So if he's not extended he will hit arbitration at 28.  Why is this a knock on him or somehow an indictment on his abilities? This happens a lot with players drafted out of College if they get to arbitration.  Meyer is 25, he'll be 28 or 29 before he's eligible too. 

 

And while he may not be a superstar, if he continues to play the way he has the last two years, especially last year, he is extremely valuable.  Those guys don't grow on trees and we currently have a dearth of players in that category.