Pablo Sandoval is playing out his age-27 season as one of the game’s better third basemen. Barring a last-minute run at an extension, he will enter the open market as one of the most desirable position players available. Though he doesn’t provide as much value at the plate as he did in the earlier part of his career, and is a below-average baserunner, Sandoval has produced consistently at a well-above-average rate with the bat and the glove. (And did I mention that he just turned 28 a little over a month ago?) Of course, he comes with questions of conditioning, though Sandoval reported in good shape this spring and has seemingly carried that positive vibe through the season. He should have a number of suitors awaiting him if he tests the market.
With a seller’s market awaiting him, it is hard to see Sandoval taking any sort of discount to re-up with San Francisco. But the club kept Hunter Pence and Tim Lincecum off the market with late-breaking extensions last year, and GM Brian Sabean has recently given expression to the club’s oft-noted penchant for retaining its own players. (Of course, he also noted that difficult decisions will need to be made, and added that payroll will be an issue.) Sandoval is a highly marketable player for a large-market team that lacks an obvious replacement. He has spent his entire career with the Giants, and there are plenty of reasons to think that the Giants will look to make a run at him (whether through an extension or via free agency).
So, the question is simple: will Sandoval be back in San Francisco next year, or will he find a new home?
I’ve never gotten the sense that the Giants loved Sandoval, with so many reports over the years of them being upset with his weight. While the fans love him, I kind of expect another team will value Sandoval greater, and the Giants will look to replace him with Headley or Aramis.
It’s doubtful Aramis will be available. There’s a mutual option in play for $14 with the Brewers on the hook for a $4 million buyout if they choose to opt out. Ramirez is probably worth closer to the $10 million the Brewers have to add to the buyout amount, than the $14+ million Ramirez would have to feel confident he could get should he be the one opting out. Now if the Brewers could land Sandoval, then Ramirez would be available.
That would be swell if he would take the Pence deal like he supposedly said in the spring. Definitely not holding my breath…
If Kenny Williams was still the White Sox GM I think Sandoval is the exact type of player he would overspend on. Someone will, and likely regret it because of the length and his likely health issues that pop up again. But how many times do we see reporters claiming that overpaying in money and/or years is an accepted part of the game these days.
If everybody is overpaid….. Does that make them overpaid?
Well, you know how it is. Everybody in baseball is either massively overpaid, or just plain overpaid.
So your view is that the players make too much money and the owners don’t make enough? Because that’s what it means to say a MLB player is overpaid.
My view is that everybody claims every new deal is an “overpay” when in reality that’s the new market rate
Yeah, I meant to reply to BlueSkyLa.
IMHO, I think the Giants are under pressure to keep him. He is a middle of the order type hitter, switch hitter, good defensively, and still very young at 27, and the Giants have no other real options to replace him at 3B. Posey has been discussed, but the Giants don’t really consider him as an option, given that he has never played the position, and at 1B, his range isn’t that great and his glove work is so-so at best……what more at 3B; Duvall hits for power, but strikes out a ton and is poor defensively at 3B, and Dominguez strikes out a ton too, and although he’s the same age as Pablo, is just now getting his first taste of the major leagues.
The other thing to consider is that if Pablo hits free agency, the one team that will need a third baseman next year, and has a ton of cash to spend would be the Dodgers (I don’t think they plan on re-signing Juan Uribe).
Juan Uribe signed a two year deal, for 15 MM, last offseason. He’s under contract. Additionally, if LA re-signs Hanley for 2015 SS, it seems logical Hanley would slide over when Uribe leaves after the year. They’ve got plenty of infield depth, too, with Justin Turner, Gordon/Guerrero, and others. I think one of their top prospects is a 3B too (Seager? Or is he a SS?)
sorry about that……i stand corrected.
Seagars a ss right now but his size(6’4″) I read projects him long term at 3b, when his frame fills out. dodgers won’t be signing Pablo at his price tag like you said they have plenty of infield depth.
yeah, Seager would be (literally) the biggest SS of all time. Every analysis I’ve read about him says 3B in the majors. He’s got at least one more full season in the minors, though, and probably two.
In the end it all comes down to money. I do not see the Giants coughing up the money it may take to sign Sandoval, but then again I have trouble seeing him going anywhere else. We’ll see.
The only negative will be the QO hanging over him. Sandoval is a very good, middle of the order guy who hits from both sides of the plate… there are several teams who need a third baseman who could easily sign him.
Let Pablo walk.Too many swings at bad pitches….
Dodgers sign him.
Ned C typically waits until he can get a bargain on ex-Giants then signs them. The Dodgers have no shortage at 3B though. I highly doubt the Dodgers re-sign Hanley next year, despite the offer they or perhaps he make(s) to transition to 3B.
Are you saying this because Uribe isn’t signed through 2015, or because he is not cutting it defensively or at the plate? Or is because the Dodgers don’t have anyone coming up who plays the position?
No chance. Too many in-house possibilities in LA…. If Hanley comes back, he’d probably *eventually* play 3B, but Uribe is signed thru 2015, and even by then, Seager may be switched to 3B.
Let Pablo walk, have Posey transition to 3B, and spend that Pablo money on Yasmani Tomas. The Giants are in a good situation this upcoming off season…Panik and Susac have shown they can play regularly, Belt will be back at 1B, and if Miguel Cabrera can play 3B, Posey can.
The Giants need an everyday LF, and 2 SP. If they let Pablo and Romo walk, they should have the funds to get a top flight pitcher, Tomas in LF, and bench help. They are deep enough to replace bullpen pieces and 1 rotation spot.
Not only that, but Chase Headley could come at a significantly cheaper price-tag… and I think the Giants are holding out for a rotation guy… it would be nice to get a strong right-handed arm like Shields or Scherzer, but I doubt they are willing to fork out the money for those guys.
I’m also okay with Posey moving to third base as it would get him in the everyday lineup.
As for LF, dare they go after Melky again? I hope they go and bring in a good daily OF guy like Markakis. Sabean needs a good, lengthy deal for a good bat in the OF.
Though Sabean has a penchant for retaining his own players, he has an equally strong penchant for signing aging free-agents… my guess is Sabean pulls the trigger on a 2-year contract with Aramis Ramirez and watches some other team (possibly Atlanta, the White Sox, or even Milwaukee) commit the years and dollars for Sandoval… Some of those dollars might be used to re-sign Jake Peavey and/or invest in a long-term solution at 2nd base.
At this point, I have to believe they view Joe Panik as the long-term solution at 2nd base.
Much more likely is Ramirez stays with the Brewers for the $14 million mutual option. Brewers would be on hook for hefty $4 million buyout if they just let Ramirez walk and is Ramirez going to turn down $14 million for 2015 in hopes of getting 2 years at $20 million? Perhaps, but that could come from Brewers just as well.
That being said, Brewers could have interest in Sandoval, who rakes in Miller Park and would add some balance to their lineup. Brewers have quite a bit coming off their books.
It is very possible that Ramirez turns down a mutual option. Players like the security of a muti year contract if case they get injured.
Whitesox will sign Sandoval 5 yrs 75 – 80 mill
If that’s what it takes to sign Pablo, then his is a Giant in 2015. Giants are likely to go about $20M per up to 5 years at most.
I tend to agree, but it’s unclear where that money comes from. Every dollar paid to Sandoval is essentially a dollar over this year’s budget.
I voted for Sandoval to stay in SF. Not sure why it hasn’t been mentioned yet, but Sandoval is a good case for a QO. Our limited experience with QOs suggest that they greatly increase the odds of a player staying with his old team.
I think it’s accepted as a given that the will get a qualifying offer.
Dunno, is it? We know how much more difficult a declined QO can make it for a player to land a contract elsewhere.
Right, that’s a key reason why they will make the qualifying offer. It makes it harder for him to sign elsewhere, driving down what the Giants would have to pay him for a long term deal. Worst case scenario, they’re paying him something like $14-$15 million for one year.
The Giants GM said that Sandoval is not going to get what he is asking for on the free agent market. He is reportedly asking for 90-100 mil. The Giants offered him 3/40 in spring training. The Giants have not been happy with him. I don’t see the Giants going over that. Injuries, weight problems, swinging at pitches out of the strike zone.
spot on
As everyone knows, the crux is payroll. Assuming that the Giants raise payroll by a percentage comparable to what has been seen in recent years, and making some plausible assumptions about who else will get what, signing Sandoval for, say, $20m a year would put them over by about $10m. Their saving grace would be if they could find a team that would take Tim Lincecum if the G’s would eat, oh, about half his (ludicrous) $18m 2015 contract. Or maybe ownership will bite the bullet and carry the Lincecum excess for one year. But it is that contract that is the sandbags on the racehorse.
Not sure trading Lincecum helps. They already need to fill two SP slots, then they’d also have to fill Lincecum’s slot. And, if they’re paying half his salary, they’d have to do it for less than $9 million to save money. Not an easy task.
The starting rotation should be Bumgarner, Cain, Peavy, Hudson, & Petit (that assumes a re-up of Peavy, which should be feasible economically and practically); Lincecum should be the long man out of the pen, a job Vogelsong could do better and cheaper, but the Giants do not believe in the concept of “sunk costs”. But even if they were to cut Lincecum, they still have that dreadful contract, so trading him (for effectively no player return) for maybe half or so of that horrid $18m 2015 salary is their best hope. Maybe some org would take a chance on him for $9m.
Okay, let’s say they re-up Peavy at $5mm, move Petit to the rotation and replace him with another reliever at the approx. $500K minimum. You’re right, that is a cheaper rotation that gives them some flexibility (though, again, they’re already in a world of hurt budget-wise without signing any new players).
I don’t think that sunk cost applies here. Sunk cost is a past cost that has already been incurred and can’t be recovered. So, Lincecum’s contract is a sunk cost (more or less–technically the concept doesn’t apply future salary because theoretically they could recover some or all of it in a variety of manners — trade or injury + insurance payout being the most likely). But, assuming they cut or trade Lincecum, they have to sign somebody to replace him. That DOES cost money. Your sunk cost approach assumes that you can dump Lincecum and not pay a replacement, but it doesn’t work that way.
Now, if they keep Lincecum for the bullpen, they have the same pitchers as this year, except Vogelsong and Romo. Let’s say you replace them with two guys making $1 million. With those assumptions, and roughly estimating the raises for the four arbitration/pre-arbitration relievers (Gutierrez, Petit, Machi and Kontos), the pitching staff includes the following players at a savings of about $1.8 million from this year:
SP Cain
SP Bumbarner
SP Hudson
SP Peavy
SP Petit
RP Lincecum
RP Affeldt
RP Lopez
RP Gutierrez
RP Machi
RP Kontos
RP $1 million FA
RP $1 million FA
CL Casilla
That’s pretty brutal. They need to get a better RH setup man. So, let’s add another $4 million to one of the $1 million relievers, putting the pitching staff at an increase of about $2 million over this year.
Adding the offense in, and they’re at about $145 million (with some fairly conservative assumptions about raises for Belt and Blanco), with LF and 3B to fill.
Looking at all that, I think you may be right — this is probably the pitching staff for next year (except that Lincecum will probably start and Petit will probably be in the ‘pen).
That allows them to put all of whatever salary increase they have into filling LF and 3B, whether re-signing Pablo and Morse or going with other players. Based on recent years, that’s about $14 million to fill those two positions, which will be tough. Absent a trade, or non-tendering Blanco, they’ll likely have to exceed that to fill those two positions. If they non-tender Blanco, that frees up another $3 million (based on an assumed $500K raise), giving them $17 million to fill LF and 3B. But they can’t really do that because they need Blanco behind Pagan.
It’s tough. Sabean has his work cut out for him.
There’s speculation that they could try and move Posey over to third and use Susac as their day-to-day catcher. That leaves the money available for either an outfielder, but they could easily use a Blanco-Pagan-Pence outfield and have some cheap options on the bench.
I don’t think that speculation is very believable. The Giants have repeatedly said they want to keep Posey at catcher as long as possible, Posey doesn’t want to move, and the Giants have also said if he moves it’s almost certainly to 1B. Look: he’s not even that good defensively at first, third would be a stretch. Not saying he couldn’t be serviceable, but he wouldn’t be good. Of course, Sandoval was awful defensively until this year, so maybe they don’t value 3B defense that much.
As for money: what money? They don’t have enough money for an impact player at any of the four positions they have to fill (LF, 3B, and 2 SPs, not to mention a righty setup man).
It’d be hard picturing the Panda anywhere else but in San Fran, But i’m not saying i wouldn’t be completely shocked if he was in another uniform come Spring. I’m sure plenty of teams would offer Sandoval some good money to play 3rd
I think in 15 the giants might let Sandoval slide and play Joquin Arias at 3rd. He has experience there and filled in and performed when Mr Panda was on the DL.
Yankees will sign Sandoval. 5 years 100 mill