The Potential Value of Spring Training Signings

Every season for one reason or another there’s always several free agents that don’t end up signing for a team until spring training has already begun. They tend to be aging veterans, unexceptional relief pitchers, or guys who set too high a price early in the off season, only to get passed over for others at the same position. Most of them don’t wind up being big contributors but every year some of them do.

And they usually turn out to be a bargain if they produce so much as one fWAR of value. Also, as you’ll see they often get dealt during the season and bring back players who have the potential to provide the club with future value. Using mlbtraderumors.com’s wonderful transaction tracker, every player to sign a deal during spring training over the last two seasons was analyzed to see how much value they ended providing the club that signed them.

The data is clearer with regards to players who signed a minor league deal and who signed a major league deal during the 2010 spring training than in 2009. For 2010 we’ll look only at players who signed MLB contracts and for 2009 we’ll be picking the best from anyone that signed a spring training deal since the separation between the two is not so clear.

During spring training 2010, nine players signed MLB deals and four of them ended up providing more than one fWAR of value. All four were position players and none of three pitchers to sign ended up contributing anything worth mentioning. Two of the four also wound up switching teams during the course of the season.

The star of the group was first baseman and DH, Russell Branyan, who signed with the Indians for two million dollars. He played in 52 games for the Indians before being traded to the Mariners where he played in another 57 games the rest of the way. The Indians wound up spending just under a million dollars for 190 plate appearances in which he hit .263 with his usual impressive power as he hit 10 homers and had a .228 isolated power. The Indians received a pair of minor leaguers in return for Branyan.

With the Mariners, Branyan only hit .215 but walked 12.7 percent of the time, hit 15 homers in 205 at-bats and upped his ISO to .268. Overall between the two clubs Branyan provided 2.0 fWAR with a .350 wOBA and a 2.8 UZR in limited time at first. That’s a total on field value of roughly nine million dollars based on the average cost per WAR in the 2010 off season free agent market.

Johnny Damon wound up being a close second providing 1.9 fWAR to the Detroit Tigers in 145 games and 613 plate appearances. Damon spent most of his time at DH but did play 33 games in left field and 4 in centerfield while providing his lowest total fWAR since 2001. Still, Damon was relatively healthy and produced a .340 wOBA good enough for a 110 wRC+. Damon only hit .271 with 8 homers but he did walk enough, 11.3 percent of his plate appearances, to give him a .355 on-base percentage. He also collected 36 doubles and continued to provide some prowess on the bases, stealing 11 bases in 12 attempts.

Both Branyan and Damon joined new teams as late signings again this off season. Branyan chose to sign with the Diamondbacks, a bit of an odd choice given his back problems and no DH option, while Damon signed on with the Tampa Bay Rays. The other two players to make the cut were both catchers, who both played well enough in 2010 to avoid sweating it out until February again this past off season.

Rod Barajas signed with the Mets for just a half million dollars late in February last season. Barajas wound up with a .310 wOBA, the third highest mark of his career and his second highest wRC+ of 95. A decent amount of that production wound up coming with the Dodgers who claimed him off waivers on August 22nd. He played 74 games and had 267 plate appearances with New York. He hit .225 with a 3.0 percent walk rate and a .189 isolated power with the Mets.

After joining the Dodgers he hit much better, albeit in 25 games and 72 plate appearances, with a .297 batting average and a booming .281 ISO. He struggled more than usual behind the plate controlling the running game, FanGraphs showed him being worth -4 runs in that department, his first negative run value since 2004. Still, Barajas was worth 1.2 fWAR between the two clubs who collectively spent just half a million dollars to get it.

Barajas ended up resigning with the Dodgers in December for 3.5 million. Like Barajas, Jose Molina played well enough in 2010 after signing late to land himself a job for 2011. The Blue Jays picked up his one million dollar option last October after signing him in mid-February before the 2010 season. Molina impressively was worth 1.1 fWAR in 2010 in just 57 games and 183 plate appearances.

Molina provided his usual defensive talent behind the plate for the Blue Jays. He saved three runs above average in his control of the running game in large part by gunning down 44 percent of would be base stealers. His .303 wOBA and 86 wRC+ were far and away his best career numbers. You could downplay that a bit considering he only batted 183 times, but Molina has almost always been a backup catcher anyways with his yearly plate appearance totals ranging from 123 to 297 since 2003.

Molina hit .246 and walked just nine times but thanks to getting plunked five times he was able to push his on-base percentage over .300 to .304, the first time he’s cracked that level since 2002. He didn’t have much power with a .132 ISO and 6 homers but those were actually career highs for Molina. This season he’ll be perfectly suited backing up rookie J.P. Arencibia with his usual solid defensive ability.

It’s worth mentioning that Jonny Gomes signed late with Reds last season and made 571 trips to the plate in 147 games. He had an almost perfectly league average .330 wOBA thanks to hitting .266 with 18 homers, a 6.8 percent walk rate and a .164 ISO. However, his fielding was deemed to be bad enough by UZR to the point of cancelling out his plate production completely. His -16.2 UZR dropped his fWAR to -.1 on the season.

As mentioned above, the data is less clear from 2009’s spring signings as to whether they were major or minor league deals. But four players signed in that period wound up being worth more than one fWAR, and one of them was even a pitcher. Also, a pair of relief pitchers ended up contributing solid performances worth noting as well. A couple of other players also warrant mention from the 2009 group too.

The clear cut winner of this group was shortstop, Orlando Hudson, who signed with the Dodgers for 3.8 million dollars in February of 2009. The O-Dog played in 149 games, the second highest total of his career. He provided his usual above average hitting with a 109 wRC+, which was his fourth straight season with a wRC+ above 100. His defense at second wasn’t great with a -2.8 UZR but it wasn’t horrible either. Hudson ended up producing 2.9 fWAR, a full 1.1 fWAR better than any other late signer from either 2009 or 2010.

The only late signing pitcher from either year to produce any significant value was none other than Livan Hernandez. The ever durable Hernandez turned in 31 starts in 2009 producing 1.6 fWAR despite a 5.44 ERA. His FIP, which is what fWAR is based off, was a full run lower at 4.44. Neither number is great but a 4.44 FIP over 183 innings is certainly valuable. Livan made 23 starts with the Mets before being released on August 20th and joined up with the Nationals five days later and made eight starts for them down the stretch.

2009 was a remarkable twelfth straight season in which Hernandez made at least 30 starts in the majors. The results have varied over the years but he’s been one of, if not the, most durable pitchers of his time. He went on to following up 2009 with a 3.0 fWAR performance in 2010 with the Nationals that saw him make 33 starts with a 3.66 ERA and a 3.95 FIP.

Back tracking a bit, Adam Kennedy had the second highest fWAR total of the 2009 class giving the Oakland As 1.8 fWAR in 129 games. The only difference with Kennedy from the others is that he did sign in February but it was with the Rays for whom never played a game and was then traded to Oakland on May 8th. The Rays received Joe Dillon who played in 15 games for the Rays in 2009 and hasn’t been seen in the majors since.

Once joining the As, Kennedy split time at second and third base and didn’t provide much defensive value piling up a -10.2 UZR. He did produce at the plate though hitting 11 homers and 29 doubles while batting .289 with a 7.7 percent walk rate. He had a .337 wOBA and chipped in 20 steals in 26 chances. 2009 was the first and perhaps last time his bat was above average since 2005.

A couple other position players also had good contributions in 2009 after signing late. The age less catcher, Ivan Rodriguez, combined a .287 wOBA with four runs of added value from controlling the running game to give the Astros and Rangers a combined 1.2 fWAR in 121 games between the two clubs. I-Rod is still hanging around too he’s currently set to open 2011 at age 39 as the Nats opening day catcher. Orlando Cabrera produced .8 fWAR in 160 games between Oakland and Minnesota.

A couple of left handed relievers signed during spring training 2009 didn’t provide more than one fWAR but that’s a tall task for most relievers. They did however contribute noteworthy performances. Joe Beimel signed with Washington on March 18th and was traded at the deadline to the Rockies. The Nats got a 3.40 ERA out of Beimel in 39 innings and at the cost of a couple minor leaguers the Rockies got a 4.02 ERA in 15 innings of work from him after the trade.

Overall, Beimel had pretty good control walking just 3.09 batters per nine while only striking out 5.69 batters per nine. His FIP on the year was 4.09 and he was worth .3 fWAR. His collective dollar value was only 1.35 million dollars, however. The other lefty was Dennys Reyes who also didn’t provide the club that signed him, the Cardinals, with any surplus value. After being signed to a three million dollar deal his .2 fWAR was worth only about 900k.

Reyes did fill a roll as a lefty specialist quite well for the 2009 Cardinals, however. In 75 appearances that only covered 41 innings he posted a 3.29 ERA and a 3.88 FIP. As is the norm with Reyes, he generated an excellent 53.4 percent groundball rate and only coughed up .44 homers per nine innings. He also faced 108 left handed hitters and walked just eight of them, struck seventeen of them out and allowed none of them to hit a homer.

And last but not least, well in terms of fWAR he is indeed the least, the always entertaining Julian Tavarez signed on with the Washington Nationals for his last go around in the majors on March 12th. Tavarez, as this link will attest, was one of the more unique players during his time in baseball. The well traveled, aging, part time starter, Tavarez turned in 35 innings for the 2009 Nationals all in relief.

As few could do, Tavarez managed a 4.13 FIP despite walking 6.94 batters per nine innings. He did so by striking out 8.23 batters per nine and yielding only .26 homers per nine as well. Tavarez’s 50 percent groundball rate probably allowed him a few more chances to emphatically use his hands to instruct his infielders to where the ball should be thrown. Tavarez’s antics and unique quotes alone were probably worth more than the .1 fWAR he contributed on the field.

Be sure to pay attention to any signings over the next several weeks. Most won’t add up to anything, but some will have good years, some will fill a small role, some will get traded, and well, there probably won’t be another Julian Tavarez, but you never know.