Dodgers right-hander Dan Haren has exercised his $10MM player option for the 2015 season, Dylan Hernandez of the Los Angeles Times tweets.
Haren, who turned 34 in September, signed a one-year, $10MM contract with the Dodgers last offseason that contained a $10MM player option that would vest upon reaching 180 innings. Haren ended up totaling 186 innings in Dodger blue, posting a 4.02 ERA with 7.0 K/9, 1.7 BB/9 and a 41.5 percent ground-ball rate.
Haren could have hit the open market in search of a larger guarantee, perhaps on a two-year deal, but he’s stated in the past that proximity to his family is of the utmost importance to him, so remaining with them in Los Angeles is likely a key component of this decision. He spoke openly and honestly with Adam Kilgore of the Washington Post in 2013 about how difficult his year with the Nationals was from a personal standpoint, as he had never previously been so far away from his wife and children.
Barring any sort of trade, Haren will return to a rotation that features Clayton Kershaw, Zack Greinke and Hyun-jin Ryu. It won’t be a surprise to see them seek further rotation depth via trades and/or free agency this offseason.
Potentially a solid 4 or 5 starter these days but im sure Friedman hopes he puts up somewhat of a better effort than the previous three years in which hes been paid over $35m to not once put up a positive rWAR, representing pretty terrible value in all honesty.
This emphasis on “value” by baseball fans always puzzles me. Haren’s performance last year would make him a perfectly acceptable #4 starter on any team. What he did in the two prior years or what he got paid for it doesn’t alter anything of real interest.
But this is a baseball site about team transactions, of course all of us are going to examine value of players…
And yeah his cursory numbers are that of a #4 on “any” team the actual value he brings can easily be replaced by cheaper alternatives.
The Dodgers don’t have to worry about cheaper, so I still don’t get why any fan would.
But Kasten is adamant about only spending now to get relevant and then building within and augmenting as necessary. Getting the most out of player value is exactly why Friedman was brought in. And sorry this is an edit, (and I think caring about how the team manages its resources is part of the fun for a lot of fans, myself included.)
I’m not sure about the “only” part, but it still is not relevant because the Dodgers don’t have enough internal talent to fill out a rotation. What Friedman does with this roster and farm remains to be seen but we know his job won’t be the same as it was for a highly budget conscious team.
Yes my “only” is a bit dated as it was the term Kasten used after they acquired the team and did the big trade with the Sox, he said that in defense of everyone saying the dodgers were going to be the Yankee’s of the east and he was trying to temper those expectations. And that he did embrace the Dodger Way of old in the player development they have historically done a great job at.
Yes, but reviving the farm and scouting side of the organization takes time, at least five years to show results. They have made some great strides mostly by jumping on the international market but it is way too soon to say that they don’t need free agents like Haren to fill in for now. To hear some people say it, Friedman was hired to field the best team he can find for $100M. I think we know that isn’t going to be his task and not especially after the huge disappointment this season.
I don’t think anyone is saying that… Its just that Haren isn’t worth 10million and hasn’t been for the past 3 seasons. Colleti made a bad deal.
I simply do not care how much he is paid. I care only about the team they field winning games.
He’s not helping the team win games so your entire argument is invalid.
That of course is not true.
Is it not?
Pitcher W/L records (a worthless statistic in any case) will tell you in the last three years “he” has more losses than wins, so if you are basing your argument on actually “winning games for his team”, then overall, no hes not if thats your criteria, which i rather hope and suspect it isnt?
I am not quoting W-L and I am also not interested in how he performed in Washington, where we all know he had a bad stretch. My point is based on last year’s work he’s perfectly acceptable as a bottom end of the rotation starter. I would expect the Dodgers to want to move him to the #5 spot and find someone else on the free agent market to slip in above him if not above Ryu in the rotation. They could well sign two and use Haren as a swingman and as depth.
4.02 ERA is not perfectly acceptable for a starting pitcher in the 2014 run environment, in Dodgers Stadium. It’s bad. Based on runs-allowed, Dan Haren was a below-replacement level pitcher in 2014. He was bad. He was not good. He was bad. He was better in Washington, despite that 4.67 ERA, because he only allowed four unearned runs on top of eighty-eight earned runs. Last year, only eighty-three of his runs were earned but he allowed over one hundred runs allowed overall, despite the shift from Nationals Park to Dodger stadium and the continuing decline of offense. No, Dan Haren, based on runs allowed, was NOT a serviceable Major League pitcher in 2014. He was not a #5. He was bad. His peripherals from 2012-2014 are not much better. Even using ERA, he had a 114 ERA-, which ranked 59th of the 66 pitchers with 180+ IP. He was not good. He was markedly below average, and allowed a boatload of unearned runs on top of that. He is at the stage of his career you take a 5-6 MM flyer on him.
Nope. You are just pulling out stats until you find the ones you like.
No, I’m really not. Dan Haren allowed 101 runs to cross the plate in 186 innings in 2014. Those are facts. That’s what happened. There’s no making up numbers there. Dan Haren allowed the 12th-most runs in MLB last season, and only five pitchers – holy moly, were Travis Wood, Edwin Jackson, Kevin Correia, Colby Lewis and Clay Buchholz bad – did so in fewer innings. He’s not good. An ERA 14% above league average isn’t a lie.
You rip sabermetric stats left and right, yet the highly inclusive saber stats – SIERA, xFIP – are the only stats that support Dan Haren as a good pitcher anymore. Both of those DIPS-theory stats have Haren as a league average, 3.7-ERA pitcher going forward. You can’t have it both ways. On the surface, with stats such as ERA, runs allowed, etc., Dan Haren is awful. He’s still good at managing his peripherals, but is seemingly a terrible contact manager at this point. If money isn’t an issue for LAD and you want the best team – as you put it – then virtually any FA option is better going forward. I don’t care about Edinson Volquez’ past, or Jason Hammel’s career at Coors Field. Both are equal or superior pitchers to Dan Haren at this point in time, particularly Hammel. Volquez really depends on how well your infield defense plays, and if he can maximize that.
No, I don’t rip them left and right, just the ones with little real-world application such as WAR and the hugely problematical ones like UZR. The problem here is you are being highly selective on the stats you believe are important, and you are also cherry-picking seasons. You can “prove” any point if you do that. All four of the pitchers being compared here have long enough service times that it makes the most sense to look at their careers, all of which had their ups and downs. If Haren is “league average” then the other three are that, at best. The truth is, all of them are the journeymen types most teams use in their 4/5 rotation slots when they aren’t using those slots for breaking in minor leaguers.
Also, why does WAR have little real-world application? Would wins above average have little real world application as well? We can use that if you’d like, though it’s easier to find for position players at fangraphs. UZR also notably takes time to stabilize for true talent purposes, but for retrospective evaluations is actually an okay statistic. Chase Headley isn’t going to be a ~20 run defender going forward, but Chase Headley *was* a 20~ run defender last season, and many eye-witness accounts support Headley’s fielding excellence.
I think you’re hung up on Haren’s career. He’s had a wonderful career, but he’s cooked as a useful Major League pitcher. This happens to older pitchers. It happened to Oswalt, it happened to Lowe, it happed to Halladay, it happens to them all. Haren simply isn’t the same pitcher he was through 2011 anymore. After maxing out at an ERA 6% better than league average from 2005 to 2011, his best ERA mark since 2012 is 12% worse than league average. His K and BB rates have remained good, though he’s seen a downtick since his 2008-2011 heyday, and his BABIP hasn’t been extraordinarily high – .290 career, .302 in ’12 and ’13, .276 in ’14. The biggest problem for Haren is that after maxing out at 1.25 HR/9 from 2005 to 2011 – his full seasons – he has posted HR rates per 9 innings of 1.43, 1.49 and 1.31 in 2012, 2013, and 2014, respectively. His FB rate is a touch higher the last three years than it used to be (though it was oddly high in 2010, a bit over 40%) and his HR/FB rates are higher than before, too. He’s never prevented hits at an extraordinary rates, as a .290 BABIP is normal. He’s lived and died of walk/HR prevention, and one of those skills has evaporated, leading to cumulating runs. He’s not the same pitcher he once was, and things began to turn differently in 2012.
But every team has a limit of resources yes? So the money they save on using a player who is going to put up similar numbers could be used to augment the team in other ways, and in the end give your team more wins..
Sure, but some limits are much higher than others. By now we should know that the Dodgers can easily afford to support a $200M+ payroll until such time as they have the less costly players coming up. Is the goal to lower it? Sure, that leaves more profit for the owners. But right now that can’t be their top priority.
Which is why i said “Potentially a solid 4 or 5 starter”, but personally as a GM i want more than replacement level production for $10m, he hasnt given that since 2011.
Teams on the whole dont want to be committing that sort of dollars for something they could probably get for the league minimum in bringing up a filler from AAA.
What he gets paid for what he produces is exactly the sort of thing MLBTR is going to discuss, so you cant be surprised when people make a relevant link between the two.
To be fair, Haren was a ~1 RA9-WAR pitcher in 2012. If he gave LA that return, it wouldn’t be awful for 10 MM, considering their payroll.
Dan Haren 2012-2014: 86ERA+/4.14FIP/-1.1WAR.
He’s pretty awful considering he’s making actual money that replacement level starters can only dream of. I guess having a track record of being good 4 years ago does something?
He’s better than replacement level, though.
The -1.1 WAR would say otherwise.
Worth about 4 wins from ’12-’14 using fWar, which I trust more
That’s still paying almost 9 million per fWAR, still horrible value.
Horrible value is Tim Lincecum making 17 million next season. Steamers projects Haren to replicate his 2014 season… at 10 million it’s about a 4 million overpay, which is not significant.
But anyways, my og point stands, Haren’s better than replacement level.
Yes your original point stands if you use fWAR, and my point stands using my preferred stat, in the end the OG poster is correct in how bad this deal was to begin with, which we both agree on.
In this case you can combine fWar and brWar and he’s still 3 wins over replacement level since 2012. So I’ll say it once again, he’s definitely better than replacement level.
It’s really not that bad of a deal. He’s likely going to be their 5th starter and he’s not preventing them from going after another starter.
Using a hybrid RA9-WAR/FIP-WAR (I don’t know why we’re touching bWAR with a ten foot pole) he’s been worth about 2.5 WAR since 2012 began. Still under a win a year, but certainly a better picture.
We’re at the point where his collective ~1 RA9-WAR from 2012 to 2014 is probably more predictive going forward than his ~4 FIP-based WAR. He is no longer noticeably better than replacement level, and rang up a negative RA9-WAR last year. I understand runs allowed is not very good, and if his runs allowed comes crashing back to his xFIP/SIERA (which were exactly league average) he could still be useful, but at this point I don’t expect them to. His 112/125/114 ERA- stretch is simply very bad. Everyone used to say Ricky Nolasco and Edwin Jackson were due regression because of their superior fielding-independent numbers, but sometimes the pitcher is just a poor contact manager. That is a thing; we’re just not amazing at measuring it, yet.
This whole “replacement level” thing is where I have the biggest problem with the stat heads. It isn’t like those “replacement level” players are hanging on trees and you only have to pick one off and stick them on the roster instead of someone else. What we are really talking about is here is minor leaguers who may or may not play at “replacement level” if they are promoted.
Is just a baseline to compare players. It often seems like it’s too high, because of the replacements you get, but what is important is that you have a basis where you can then attempt to compare players contributions.
Exactly, which is one reason I don’t see the practical value of this information, especially when it is used to argue that a player doesn’t have a role on a team. If the Dodgers don’t have Haren at the bottom of the rotation, who then? If that question can’t be answered, then the “replacement value” argument is generic and pointless.
If Coletti hadn’t made this deal then Haren would be gone and there a lot of options to choose from, Dan Haren is basically a replacement level player now, plenty of more options on the FA market that Friedman could choose from, or heck even sign Haren to a better deal financially since he’s motivated to stay on the west coast. There is no argument to be had that Haren is worth 10 million per. and since its the off season lots of ways to replace him..
Again, I have zero interest in how much he is paid. I am only interested in the team they field. If Haren was clogging up the roster and blocking better talent coming up, then I’d agree. I don’t see that as a problem at the moment, do you?
Yes, the Dodgers would be better off going into the offseason with Haren off their roster. More financial flexibility to sign a better pitcher. So yes that’s a problem to me. Coletti screwed up on this deal like he so often did when signing pitchers.
Financial flexibility is simply not an issue, so there’s really no point in coming back to this as an argument. Again, talk rosters and we have something worth discussing. Who is Haren blocking?
Any number of potential free agent pitchers who have performed better in the past and project to perform at a higher level this coming off season. Again had Coletti not made this deal… And why many of us are calling it a bad deal.. Do you really think the Dodgers would be choosing to sign Haren to be a 5th starter had he not exercised his option??
Name them.
You’re just being stubborn now, have a great night.
No, you just aren’t answering the question.
Actually I agree with BlueSkyLA on this one. I’m interested to see who you think would be a significant upgrade and would accept a $10M one year deal…or who you would think would accept less money but provide the same results. Really, the only guys who would go for significantly less have significant question marks
He suggested Hammel, Harang, and Volquez. They are all suppose to be “better” than Haren, though really, they are all quite a bit worse. The real argument is that they are cheaper. I don’t get why it’s so difficult to get some fans to forget about salary for even a moment and simply evaluate the players. And it isn’t like we necessarily have to agree on who is a better solution, but at least we’d be talking about baseball instead of money.
I actually disagree with this in the big picture. Haren off the roster means they have a 3 man rotation. Suddenly they have to fill 2 holes instead of one. You might save $2M, but you can’t tell me you would sign a respectable starting pitcher for less than $8M AAV. On the other hand, you have 3 overpaid OF, one of which is a 4th OF when you factor in Puig. Plus, the 4 of them are blocking your best prospect in Joc Pederson. It seems as though the Dodgers have bigger financial fish to fry than Haren
I would see that as an issue, because there are better options you could get for less money on the open market today. Jason Hammel is due to get the same AAV as Haren, and is much better. Harang is predicted to get 3 MM less per year than Haren will make next year, and is better. Volquez’ ceiling is Haren’s current AAV. These are all better pitchers than Dan Haren. 10 MM is a silly use of money on Haren, IMO. Haren simply isn’t good anymore. He’s not good enough to be guaranteed a MLB rotation spot on a contender in October of the previous year, that’s for sure.
Hammel has a 4.60 ERA and 1.39 WHIP over his career. Harang is 4.21/1.36. Volquez is 4.44/1.45. Haren is 3.77/1/1.19. So obviously, those three are better than Haren.
I think you are reading a bit much into it. The baseline really doesn’t mean that much. It is just a point at which to reference. We could set the replacement level player at 5 war less, and it would essentially be the same thing. The WAR number isn’t hugely important, it is just the theoretical attempt to try to compare players that have completely different skillsets, and see which ones have greater impact on their team.
WAR is far from perfect, but it is a decent attempt to create one number where fans can go and compare 2 players.
Aaron Harang was pretty good for half that price. Didn’t they trade him because of someones signing? That’s the type of #5’s most teams want with unlimited funds.
No. Harang was traded to Colorado at the beginning of the 2013 season when it looked like the Dodgers had a glut of starting pitching. He was quickly flipped to Seattle where he stunk up the joint and was released. Haren was signed by the Dodgers in 2014.
I didn’t imply they traded Harang because of Haren’s signing. I made the comparison that a guy who’s provided more than 3.0WAR the last 3 years is getting paid half as much money as Haren to be other teams #5 starter.
He was the Dodgers #5 starter at one point wasn’t he? All you have to answer is was he better than Haren right now? If you say he was than you lose the argument because you can get serviceable replacements like Aaron Harang for much less money than you got Haren to be much more effective.
This is what you said originally: “Aaron Harang was pretty good for half that price. Didn’t they trade him because of Haren’s signing?”
The answer to that question is no. Then you edited your post to change the question. Nice.
Aaron Harang was released by multiple teams in the last year. He was signed as a desperation move by a team who had lost multiple arms within one month to TJ. Hindsight is 20/20. He is hardly a good example of how to construct a roster. That would be the equivalent of saying the Dodgers would be better off signing Cahill if the D-backs release him than having Haren
Dan Haren took that player option for a reason, it was probably because he felt someone wasn’t willing to give him a multi-year deal like some have suggested. Trevor Cahill has had one good season in 3 years(2012) where he put up 2.6WAR. He’s actually better than Haren(-1.1WAR) over a 3 year stretch(1.7WAR) if he was released.
Clearly you haven’t watched much NL West Baseball. Take it from someone who worked for the Diamondbacks. We are talking about a man who had to be sent down to high A ball and couldn’t get out of the second inning in his first start there
Yeah he had a horrible year this year, he was still way better than him in the last three seasons combined regardless of what you say.
That doesn’t mean he’s comparable to Haren. If this was an open market Cahill wouldn’t get more than a minor league contract. You can throw out any stat you want. It’s not going to change the fact that, when he pitched, he had absolutely nothing
It’s psychological more than it is analytical. One person shouts it out loud and another follows suit, and then another and another until you have what I call the Joseph Goebbels Scenario. People will believe anything you tell them as long as you have a mob yelling the same thing. Point being, the new school stat heads have followed new age analysis to the point where they’re fanatical about it; and are just as narrow, rigid, and stubborn as the old school.
The anti-bunting argument is a perfect example. Their position is always about allowing room for the big inning. Well, if you look at the total number of innings played by all 30 teams in a given season, you’ll find that the big inning is a rather rare occurrence. Bunting really depends on the hitter, the pitcher, infield defense, and the teams playing each other. It’s a situational analysis. Not dogma.
The real point regarding Haren’s worth, as that regardless of replacement level, he is paid $10 million because he is all but a guarantee for those 180 innings from the #4 spot in the Dodgers rotation. That’s the difference. Most equivalent arms (in terms of WAR, ERA+) won’t give the Dodgers those innings. That’s why no matter what kind of statistical analysis we’re using, the word “solidify” is always a constant term in this situation.
I’m not going to touch the first part, but I agree with the second. It makes no sense to examine players in a test tube as if they weren’t on a roster where they have a role to fill. What do you want from a 4/5 starter? You want 30+ starts and lots of innings. You want him to keep your team in games, so you have a good chance to win half of them. Haren did all that last season. Whether he was “paid too much” for that role, I don’t know, and don’t care.
First part is more theory. I think it’s ridiculous in most cases to even begin to worry about player salaries. Overall, the Dodgers have been willing to pay Haren $10 million a season because they can afford it. I can’t count how many times the word “handcuffed” has been used when regarding my Angels, yet they kept managing to add marquee names. They did it because they can afford it.
Exactly. Too much baseball discussion these days is fixated on salaries, as if the goal of a team isn’t so much winning as cost effectiveness. Granted a lot of smaller market teams have little choice but to be cost effective, but that’s a function of the lopsided revenues MLB has allowed to persist. Larger market teams can afford to pay more for what they need, plain and simple.
The goal is winning, obviously. And Dan Haren doesn’t help that goal at all anymore. He’s not good. Financials don’t matter as much when we’re talking about LAD paying Matt Kemp 10, 15, or 20 MM because he’s actually good. LAD can overpay Crawford, Gonzalez, Kemp because they’re actually good. Haren isn’t helping them win. Going out every fifth day and giving the other team a great chance to win isn’t helping the Dodgers win.
From every single one of my pitchers I want them to prevent runs at the best rate they possibly can. That’s it. I don’t care about #1, #3, #4 or any other labels. You shouldn’t aim to have mediocrity tossing 12.5% of your innings, if you have plans on contending.
I don’t think this is necessarily a bad thing. $10M for a solid #4 isn’t bad. I see the Dodgers making a lot of moves this year and using addition by subtraction. An ideal offseason would see 2 out of Crawford/Kemp/Ethier moved to make room for Pederson. Hanley walks to make room for Seager. Suddenly a lot of money is freed up to bring back a guy like Martin to upgrade the catcher position and even potentially bring in another elite rotation piece.
You’re right in some of the things you said, but Seager isn’t coming up yet and I really doubt they’ll try to move Kemp. It’s probably gonna be Arruebarrena at SS, or they trade for someone to play the position.
I wasn’t necessarily saying everything happens overnight. If they were willing to run Hanley out at short I’m not sure they wouldn’t be willing to run out Seager
I’d expect them to mark Ethier down to $4-5M a year to move him. He’s got no role on the team now. I don’t see them trading any of the other three OFers. Pederson will likely get some more audition time during the season but for now he just doesn’t seem ready. Unless something changed that I haven’t heard about, Seager is being primed to play 3B in 2016 after Uribe leaves.
Well I also think they trade those outfielders to free up cash. All of those guys are overpaid, regardless of what you think of their production. I think Friedman would also get good return for someone. Regarding Seager: I think it depends. Ideally they have someone at SS but if Uribe puts up good numbers and wants to resign and they have a hole at SS, he can’t be much worse than Hanley
One thing the Dodger don’t need to do is free up cash. Any analysis that starts with that assumption is bound to miss the point. The point being, a team has only 25 roster slots no matter what they pay those players, so a team with the resources will want the best players they can find for each of those roster slots.
I know you want to think that and you have made that point a lot but it’s simply not true. The Dodgers are a business. They are around to make money. Having Van Slyke in left instead of Crawford is not going to hurt ticket sales. The initial payroll increase was never a long term plan. It was a short term plan to create a competitive core. Now they are going to shed a significant amount of money
Can’t we all just get along…..actually since this seems to be a whining session…here’s my 2 cents….What’s the deal with Zach Lee???
Great news for the Dodgers. Haren is a fine person and role model and the best back-end starter in baseball.
Congratulations Dan! Say Hi to your Dad for me.
Please, clean out that underperforming bullpen.