Tanking in the NL

[gunnarthor]

Interesting piece from Jayson Stark on tanking and the possibility that the 6 worst teams in baseball will be in the NL this year.  

 

http://espn.go.com/mlb/story/_/id/14568028/odd-troubling-state-national-league

 

An interesting idea was the suggestion of a draft lottery to stop tanking.  ""To me," another NL exec said, "there's a difference between rebuilding and saying, 'We're going to get the No. 1 pick,' and then really trying to lose -- trying to lose 105 or 106 games to get that pick. ... If it's the system that's leading to that, then one way to solve it is to have a lottery.""

 

It also pointed out that the winning teams in the NL will have a few more victories than they deserve b/c of how bad those six teams might be.

[nicksaviking]

I think tanking in baseball is hard, unless Stark thinks tanking and a ground up rebuild are the same thing.

 

I mean no manager or player is going to throw a game intentionally so it really falls to the GM to "tank". Unless I'm missing something, these teams "tank" by getting rid of the established vets and replacing them with young players. While that may be a recipe for a lot of losses that year, isn't that also the same recipe teams have been using to win in the ensuing years? Including the Astros and Cubs last year? I think the high draft picks are a nice bonus, but I really think that there generally isn't anything devious about playing the young players; teams just want them to get experience in hopes that they'll be able to contribute to a winning team in the future. If teams truly were "tanking" than when the youngsters end up thriving and helping the teams win games, wouldn't those guys find themselves demoted or on the bench?

 

Seriously, why would anyone fault the Phillies or Reds for not shelling out big bucks to free agents when they have no chance anyway? What's wrong with saving your money for when you're ready to compete?

 

These were the quotes from the unnamed GM:

 

The Brewers -- "I think Milwaukee is tanking. They're basically trying the Houston approach. They spent a lot of money trying to win. It didn't work. So now they're prepared to go through three or four years of losing, and going the Houston route."

 

The Reds -- "They're in Houston mode, 100 percent. They tried it the other way. Now they're the biggest example of doing it this way. They're willing to do pretty much whatever has to be done."

 

So Milwaukee and Cincinnati spent more money than they were comfortable spending trying to win, failed, and now the small marked teams are supposed to continue pushing on down the dead end path throwing money out the window? What the hell, this unnamed AL GM must be Brian Cashman, emphasis on Cash. If one approach doesn't work, it's only logical to try another one. Hint, hint Twins.

[gunnarthor]

I wonder if this is more of a you know it when you see it thing.  Certainly, the Marlins and Astros have both had seasons where they unquestionably weren't trying to win as opposed to rebuilding.  I think the Cubs, Twins and White Sox, who have all had bad years as well, never went as far as some of those teams.  

 

Stark doesn't mention it but the tanking in Houston, for example, had a pretty toxic effect during the tanking seasons with fans completely leaving the team and ratings for games nearing zero.  

[Loosey]

I think tanking for the #1 pick in baseball makes no sense and I highly doubt GM's are doing it on purpose.  Yes, it's nice to have that top pick, but really it's still a crapshoot the player pans out.  In most years the the likelihood the #5-10 player being a star is probably minimally less than the #1 overall pick.  There are some circumstances where the #1 pick is a no brainer but those are few and far between. 

 

 

[Vanimal46]

I really don't think any of these teams are "tanking". In fact, I think it's almost impossible to tank in the game of baseball. It's not like the NBA or the NFL where a #1 overall pick is going to immediately transform an organization. We've seen numerous teams over the years go with this route to rebuild their teams. It just so happens that the teams this year are in the National League. There's also going to be an AL team in the mix of having the worst record, but the projections don't see it yet.

If there's any problem in baseball, maybe it's time to start thinking about parity in the game. This is the one of the only ways that small market teams can compete these days. They have to pick their time when they can go all-in, like Milwaukee in 2008 and 2011, and when it doesn't work out, they know they're losing great players for very little other than a QO.   

 

[nicksaviking]

 

I wonder if this is more of a you know it when you see it thing.  Certainly, the Marlins and Astros have both had seasons where they unquestionably weren't trying to win as opposed to rebuilding.  I think the Cubs, Twins and White Sox, who have all had bad years as well, never went as far as some of those teams.  

 

Stark doesn't mention it but the tanking in Houston, for example, had a pretty toxic effect during the tanking seasons with fans completely leaving the team and ratings for games nearing zero.  

 

The Marlins might be a different story, but I still wouldn't call them tanking, if as Stark implies tanking is done for draft position. The MLB draft is just so uncertain, much more than the NFL, NBA and even NHL.

 

I think the Marlins sold the farm, not for draft position but because they have a highly unethical owner who didn't care about winning, similarly the Mets the past several years didn't spend any money because they were using the team to pay off their Bernie Medoff penalties.

 

I just don't buy that draft picks are the motivating factor. The Astros may have upset people, but they were giving a lot of young guys experience and trading vets for more young guys whom one would have to assume were intended to help the team in the future.

 

Full disclosure, I desperately wanted the Twins to do this; start from the ground up and do what they did in the early part of this century getting rid of all the vets and letting the kids learn on the job.

[gunnarthor]

Yeah, I think tanking - to lose on purpose - doesn't have to be to get the first pick.  It could be to maximize profits.  I believe the Marlins, Astros and some NHL teams have been accused of that.  

[Vanimal46]

 

Yeah, I think tanking - to lose on purpose - doesn't have to be to get the first pick.  It could be to maximize profits.  I believe the Marlins, Astros and some NHL teams have been accused of that.  

I wonder, hypothetically, if the Astros were not successful with their version of rebuilding, if other teams wouldn't follow suit? Seems like professional sports in a nutshell are copycats. For example the NFL: Washington and San Francisco had 1 good year with mobile QBs, then all of the rage was trying to find that duel-threat QB. In basketball, Golden State won with a ton of 3 point shooting, now every team is trying to copy their formula. It all seems to be cyclical. 

EDIT: And to bring it back to baseball, the Royals won it all last year with a great bullpen, and now everyone's jumping on that bandwagon, inflating the going rate for a quality bullpen arm. 

[markos]

 

An interesting idea was the suggestion of a draft lottery to stop tanking.  ""To me," another NL exec said, "there's a difference between rebuilding and saying, 'We're going to get the No. 1 pick,' and then really trying to lose -- trying to lose 105 or 106 games to get that pick. ... If it's the system that's leading to that, then one way to solve it is to have a lottery.""

This is kind of mean, but that NL exec is an idiot. The NBA has had a draft lottery for a long time, yet NBA teams tank ALL THE TIME. A lottery doesn't "solve" anything. It might slightly tweak the benefits, but that's about it. Does anyone really think the Astros would have done anything differently if their was a lottery in place? Like nicksaviking said, the benefits of tanking go well beyond just slightly higher draft picks. It includes acquiring more young players for veterans, ability to take flyers on high-upside talents, financial flexibility (sign international free agents, pay international signing penalties, absorb bad contracts for other teams, etc), roster space for rule 5 picks, etc. 

[Mike Sixel]

These "tanking" teams should:

 

Sign RP, then deal them at the deadline for prospects. You are just buying prospects.

Sign guys that have been blocked in AAA off of other teams, if possible.

Sign a guy(s) that was hurt last year, and give him a shot.

Trade every player that has value.

 

As for the league, it is correct, teams still tank in the NBA. I prefer the following hybrid approach:

 

The 10 worst teams have 1 month to sign up to 2 or 3 (depending on if they signed 3 last year) "draft eligible" players. Those players are free to sign with any team, or even wait for round 2. No player signed in this section can get more than $7MM. In round 2, the 10 next teams can sign 1-2 players, for up to $5MM. In round 3, every team can sign any player they want, up to 3 players, for $3MM. Round 4+.....every other player is a FA, and can sign for up to $2MM.

 

Worst teams get to sign more prospects, but the prospects are free to wait and sigh with other teams for less money.

 

All the dollar amounts could be moved around, but I do believe the top 20 or so players should be PAID.

[biggentleben]

I love how they try to reference that Griffey was the first #1 pick voted in to the HOF as saying the draft is a complete crap shoot and going for #1 is fool's gold. That could have been true in the past, but teams don't draft in 2016 like they did in 1976 or 1986. Soon, Chipper Jones will join as another #1 pick. Alex Rodriguez will have the numbers as a former #1 pick, but I'm sure PEDs will keep him out. Joe Mauer is building toward a very interesting case for sure, though it'd sure be nice for his case if he could get past 2500 hits or even to 3000, and that's likely at least 5 more years, if not 10 at his current production to skim the bottom end of those numbers. That doesn't take into effect the guys like Price, Strasburg, Harper, and Justin Upton who could very well work their way to the Hall someday. That's not to say the #1 pick is a lock for success, but it's certainly not the crap shoot that it once was with better scouting and processes overall for the draft.

 

I guess I certainly don't have a problem with what the Braves are doing right now. That said, they've been put there by the finances of the game being so incredibly uneven, and that's going to continue to be an issue in the game until baseball finally pulls itself together and negotiates one media deal for the sport and splits it across the teams. Until then, there is a tremendous have-and-have-not line in the game, but I noticed Stark never mentioned THAT in his article...

[Mike Sixel]

 

I love how they try to reference that Griffey was the first #1 pick voted in to the HOF as saying the draft is a complete crap shoot and going for #1 is fool's .....................and that's going to continue to be an issue in the game until baseball finally pulls itself together and negotiates one media deal for the sport and splits it across the teams. Until then, there is a tremendous have-and-have-not line in the game, but I noticed Stark never mentioned THAT in his article...

 

If the draft was a crapshoot.......why do teams keep paying the guys at the top so much, if they aren't likely to be better than the guys picked after them? The "math" used here might be typical of people that don't like math, but it isn't math.

 

As for the money.....even if they just pooled half the revenues, and shared that much evenly, that would help.

[drjim]

 

I wonder, hypothetically, if the Astros were not successful with their version of rebuilding, if other teams wouldn't follow suit? Seems like professional sports in a nutshell are copycats. For example the NFL: Washington and San Francisco had 1 good year with mobile QBs, then all of the rage was trying to find that duel-threat QB. In basketball, Golden State won with a ton of 3 point shooting, now every team is trying to copy their formula. It all seems to be cyclical. 

EDIT: And to bring it back to baseball, the Royals won it all last year with a great bullpen, and now everyone's jumping on that bandwagon, inflating the going rate for a quality bullpen arm. 

 

I don't buy that any of the teams are doing a full Houston, but this is a really good point. Houston might be the fluke. If these teams get it wrong, and have completely stripped down their organization, they are looking at multiple cycles and 6, 7, 10 years or more of not being competitive. That is a huge risk.

 

If I'm a team that is not "tanking" I would certainly welcome another team that is "tanking."

 

EDIT: Thinking about this, fluke is the wrong word, Houston has talented people that executed a plan very well. Outlier might be the better word, though there was some good fortune (such as the emergence of Keuchel) to more than balance out the bad moves. Either way, it is a very thin line to walk to pull it off. I don't recommend it for teams - and the cost was high in lost attendance and cratering tv ratings.

[TheLeviathan]

Yeah, lotteries have more than proven themselves useless at decreasing tanking.  

[nicksaviking]

These "tanking" teams should:

 

Sign RP, then deal them at the deadline for prospects. You are just buying prospects.

Sign guys that have been blocked in AAA off of other teams, if possible.

Sign a guy(s) that was hurt last year, and give him a shot.

Trade every player that has value.

 

As for the league, it is correct, teams still tank in the NBA. I prefer the following hybrid approach:

 

The 10 worst teams have 1 month to sign up to 2 or 3 (depending on if they signed 3 last year) "draft eligible" players. Those players are free to sign with any team, or even wait for round 2. No player signed in this section can get more than $7MM. In round 2, the 10 next teams can sign 1-2 players, for up to $5MM. In round 3, every team can sign any player they want, up to 3 players, for $3MM. Round 4+.....every other player is a FA, and can sign for up to $2MM.

 

Worst teams get to sign more prospects, but the prospects are free to wait and sigh with other teams for less money.

 

All the dollar amounts could be moved around, but I do believe the top 20 or so players should be PAID.

Way too many variables to figure out if that would work in an Internet forum, but it sounds like a fun outside-of-the-box idea to try. Clearly you've been thinking about this, nice one.

[gunnarthor]

I think we may also be giving Houston a bit too much credit for all those losses. They sucked for 8 years and a lot of the talent on their team this year was from Ed Wade's moves as GM.  The first picks by Lunhow haven't been that great with the exception of Correa.  But they (and a few other teams) did use the new draft slots pretty effectively. 

[jimmer]

McCullers looks pretty darn good for the Astros.  Same draft as Correa.  21 years old, already has 22 starts in the majors. Over 9 Ks per 9IP.  3.26 FIP, 3.50 xFIP. ERA+ of 125.

[gunnarthor]

 

McCullers looks pretty darn good for the Astros.  Same draft as Correa.  21 years old, already has 22 starts in the majors. Over 9 Ks per 9IP.  3.26 FIP, 3.50 xFIP. ERA+ of 125.

Yeah, he was part of their draft strategy. They had a pretty good draft that year (although that draft is lining up to be a real good one for a lot of teams).

[dgwills]

This is really the only option for most small and mid-market teams to complete.  Some may be able to manage to avoid it with good management, but most will have to rebuild periodically. I like the new rules because they at least give the small market teams a chance. How many prospects did the Twins pass on because they weren't able to sign them in the old system? That was infuriating. Letting the big market teams have the best free agents and the best prospects leaves very little parity in the game. We like to blame Gardy for failing to win in the playoffs, but we forget that the team he was losing to was the Yankees who had every advantage. This is not something the players union has any right to complain about. They fought tooth and nail to avoid any kind of salary cap which is what would actually solve this problem.

[biggentleben]

 

These "tanking" teams should:

 

Sign RP, then deal them at the deadline for prospects. You are just buying prospects.

Sign guys that have been blocked in AAA off of other teams, if possible.

Sign a guy(s) that was hurt last year, and give him a shot.

Trade every player that has value.

 

So, in other words, the Braves 2015 and 2016.

[drjim]

 

So, in other words, the Braves 2015 and 2016.

 

You probably have a different view, but as an outsider I'm still not sure punting was the right move.

[biggentleben]

 

You probably have a different view, but as an outsider I'm still not sure punting was the right move.

 

I don't see any other way the team would have been viable. After this offseason, the team would have been screwed. With their financial situation, no way could they bring back Heyward and Upton along with keeping Kimbrel and Melvin's salaries on board as well. Heck, even with all the trades they've made, they're still around $80M in payroll. The revenue stream really can't afford much more than $100-110 in Atlanta, in spite of it being one of the largest metro areas in baseball.

 

The farm system was complete crap. As has been seen since, Peraza as the best prospect wasn't exactly a great thing. Albies has been coming well. Heck, of the top 30 or so prospects in the system currently, only 4 actually had played a moment in the Braves system as of the final day of the 2014 season. I put together a top 100 prospects in the Braves system (and just updated it this week), and I cringe to think of how bad that list would be without the last two seasons. It's crazy the return to the system.

 

However, it's darned near magic to turn taking on Bronson Arroyo's salary into also adding Touki Toussaint. Turning Alberto Callaspo and Kelly Johnson into John Gant and Rob Whalen is a stroke of genius. Heck, even Jonny Gomes was flipped for a viable prospect. The team really used its resources well in their rebuild.

 

Obviously, there are things done that haven't been perfect. I was not a fan of coming out so strongly with the 2017 rhetoric. The Andrelton deal still doesn't make sense to me, and it definitely didn't then, but the points of contention with what has been done are much fewer than the overall satisfaction with the return on what has been done thus far.

[Mike Sixel]

 

So, in other words, the Braves 2015 and 2016.

 

Yes, absolutely. 

[Mike Sixel]

 

Way too many variables to figure out if that would work in an Internet forum, but it sounds like a fun outside-of-the-box idea to try. Clearly you've been thinking about this, nice one.

 

Really, the exact numbers are not the key. They key is to make it a FA period where the worst teams have the first shot at the best players, and they get real money and a chance to choose where they go. But, the money has to be significantly different between "rounds" or it doesn't work. 

 

You should see my "every team makes the playoffs" proposal!

[diehardtwinsfan]

I don't see the players tanking.  Too much in it for them if they don't perform.  That costs them money in arb and FA down the road... so if by tanking you mean either calling up people who have no business being up, delaying the leaders of your new farm system so that they are being called up with the core, or signing old washed up vets who you know will underperform, sure it might happen... but that's all on the GM...

 

I think for most bad teams, they make take some FA gambles and then do what the Cubs did and trade them off for some more prospects, but I'm not sure I'd call it tanking.