The Tigers Left Field Vacancy

Well, after my last post about the Detroit Tigers Shortstop vacancy, Matt, one of the Tigers Minor League bloggers asked if I'd look towards left field and who the Tigers should pursue.

Well, I gave it a shot. The guys I examined were Marcus Thames, Timo Perez, Raul Ibanez, Adam Dunn, Shannon Stewart. The first two, Thames and Perez, are the most likely in-house platoon. Shannon Stewart is a free agent and (this should say enough about the LF free agent market) he's the best available, in my opinion, other then the rest of the guys I'm looking at. Ibanez is under contract through 2008, so the only way he'd end up a Tigers is via a trade with the Seattle Mariners and that's an entirely plausible option. The Mariners have a young outfielder named Adam Jones who's poised to finally take over an everyday spot in left field in 2008. They could look to move Ibanez to 1st base and deal Richie Sexson, too, but that's neither here nor there in relation to the Tigers left field position. Adam Dunn has a 2008 option that the Reds must think about picking up. They cannot pick it up and trade him, as exercising his option gives him a full no trade clause through 6/15/08 and a limited no trade clause from that point after in which he can designate 10 clubs he would accept a trade to. So dealing him at next years deadline could be tricky. So we'll just assume Dunn will be a free agent if he's any option for Detroit, because if he's coming back with the Reds he cannot be dealt until at least 6/15/08.

But, that's a whole lot of contractual non-sense that doesn't help evaluate each guy. We'll compare them to each other, offensively and defensively, as well as to the baseline projection of the average left fielder.

First, the baseline projection:

The Average Left Fielder:

Using the same process from the last post about the shortstop vacancy, I've concluded that the average left fielder would "create" about 74.75 runs offensively when weighted for 550 plate appearances in a season.

How do the rest of these guys fare? Well . . .

Raul Ibanez - 106 Weighted Runs Created
Adam Dunn - 103
Marcus Thames* - 77
Shannon Stewart* - 77
Timo Perez* - 67

(Note: * = I figured out both Thames and Perez's runs created per plate appearance for the last 4 years since they were part time players. I took that number and extrapolated it out over the course of 550 PA's and got a Runs Created number for each of their last 4 seasons. Then, I used the weighting [.10 for 2004, .20 for 2005, .30 for 2006, .40 for 2007] system to get the Weighted Runs Created number that is above. For Stewart, I did that for his 2 injury plagued years in 2004 and 2006. That was what I felt was the best way to deduce what Thames and Perez could do when given their last 4 years worth of sporadic playing time.)

What sticks out from those numbers is just how good Raul Ibanez has been offensively. He's one that not many people talk about but he seems to fit the bill for a left-handed hitting left fielder that the Tigers have been pining for for what feels like forever. Also, Shannon Stewart is a very underrated outfielder and has been his entire career. He's got a career .796 OPS, which is higher then I had thought.

But, we all know that offense is only half the battle. In 2007, everyone who played in left field for Detroit was a collective -0.4 defensively. So, just a few ticks below average.

But, how do Thames and the rest we're reviewing, compare to each other defensively?

(remember, these defensive numbers are just from 2007)

Stewart - +6.1 runs
Perez - -0.8
Thames - -1.8
Ibanez - -7.1
Dunn - -18.6

This is the reason I wanted to include Shannon Stewart. Offensively, yes, he's not near on par with Dunn or Ibanez, but he's always been a solid defender. The rest of this list is brutal, which is to be expected. I've been shocked Marcus Thames has stuck in the outfield for as long as he had without being worked out at 1st base before he came to Detroit. Raul Ibanez and especially Adam Dunn are screaming "Designated Hitter" but with Gary Sheffield on the roster, the DH spot is occupied.

So, we add the offensive and defensive numbers and we get (I'm rounding off the defensive numbers):

Ibanez - 99
Dunn - 84
Stewart - 83
Thames - 75
Perez - 66

When you factor in defense (granted it's just the 2007 numbers, but Dunn hasn't ever been a good fielder and Ibanez has been declining for a while) Shannon Stewart's value starts to rise.

The baseline test to figure out these guys' worth are their numbers compared to the average left fielder. Remember, I concluded that the average left fielder is worth 74.75 runs created, rounded up to 75. The average left fielder defensively is worth 0.0 runs (doesn't help, doesn't hurt). So these guys total of runs above average are:

Ibanez - 24
Dunn - 9
Stewart - 8
Thames - 0
Perez - -9

To put a dollar value on it, every 10 runs are roughly equivalent to 1 win. Each win is worth, in major league baseball, about $2.5 million which is their actual value (AV). Last year teams paid about $4 per 'win' so we'll multiple their runs number by 4 to get their market value based on last years market (MV) and compare it to their 2008 salary (AS). The following are in millions. . .

Ibanez - $6 (AV), $9.6 (MV), $5.5 (AS)
Dunn - $2.25, $3.6, $13
Stewart - $2, $3.2, $N/A - (Free agent. Made $1 million in a 1 year deal with Oakland in 2007*)
Thames - AV = the average salary for a LF (MV is the same as his AV), he made $432.5K last year.
Perez - Does it matter? 9 runs below average should = Toledo Mud Hen.

Marucs Thames is essentially the average left fielder in baseball. The minimum salary a player can make for a full 2008 season is $390K, so bringing Marcus back at even a raise to $500K would probably be about what he's worth. The average Major League baseball player made $2,944,556 million in 2007. In this article from the winter of 2006, it says outfielders average salary was $4.88 million. Most of that is probably center and right fielders, so I'd think it's safe to assume the average left fielder is in the neighborhood of $1.2 to about a tick under $2 million. Timo Perez should just not be on the roster.

Remember, the reason that Adam Dunn scored so low is due to the fact that he's the Carlos Guillen of the outfield. In a word: Atrocious. He shouldn't even really be a 1st baseman in baseball, and if he were a DH (where he should be), he'd be worth a ton more since he wouldn't be playing defense. You could make a case that based purely on offensive output he should be worth over $25 million and I think he'll get near that come 2009 (or 2008 if they decline his option) when he hits the open market.


The asterisk next to Shannon Stewart is that his $1 million contract from 2007 is misleading. His 2004, 2005, 2006 salaries were: $4.5, $5.5, $6.5 and he took the $1 million because people were skeptical as he was hurt in 2006. Now that he's played an entire season and back to what he's done recently, he'll make more then that. I think he'll get somewhere between $3.5-5 million depending on the amount of offers he receives.

Keep in mind that this, and the post on Guillen's replacement at shortstop, do not take into account the cost of trading prospects for guys like Ibanez, Edgar Renteria, or Jack Wilson.