Tenth-highest payroll in MLB
Many folks, including us, have discussed the expectations surrounding ARod - given his (perceived) status as “the highest-paid player in MLB”. Now a closer look at the list reveals that ARod is actually #2 this year behind Giambi (at least according to USA Today’s figures) - and as discussed, when one considers that the Yankees specifically are “only” paying him around $16 million this year, he’s actually a bargain.
But before you look at the rest of USA Today’s list of top player salaries for 2007, can you guess who the top ten are? And specifically, who is #10? For a small hint, I’ll tell you that three pitchers and seven non-pitchers comprise the top ten.
http://asp.usatoday.com/sports/baseball/salaries/top25.aspx?year=2007
If you haven’t clicked already, Richie Sexson is #10. Richie Sexson. Seriously. He gets paid more than guys like Jim Thome, Carlos Delgado, and David Ortiz. I’m not including the likes of an Albert Pujols, who hasn’t had at least the opportunity to hit true free agency yet.
My first thought was simple: Richie Sexson is freakin’ Dave Kingman… except a little taller. A review of career numbers indicates that’s perhaps that’s a slight exaggeration… or perhaps its not.
Kingman (16 seasons): 115 career OPS+ (career high: 146 OPS+, at age 30), 442 HR, 1575 hits, 1816 K (1.15 K/hit ratio); Kingman’s age/OPS+ for his last five seasons - 33/99, 34/79, 35/132, 36/103, 37/89
Sexson (now 32, into his 11th season): 124 career OPS+ (career high: 140 OPS+, at age 30), 275 HR, 1138 hits, 1133 K (1.00 K/hit ratio)
Depending how long he plays (although for many millions each year, I expect it’ll be awhile), he should start regressing closer to Kingman’s career OPS+ mark - although barring a total collapse of hitting ability, I wouldn’t think he’d match Kingman’s rather impressive K/hit ratio. Course, stranger things have happened I suppose… like Richie Sexson getting paid $15.5 million this year to play baseball.
Now being as he’s a former Brewer, I suppose this is the part where Danny regales with his skewed reality that Sexson is actually worth that money.
Anyhow, I guess the age-old adage is true: Chicks (and some GMs) dig the long ball.
Okay, I’m done now.
April 12th, 2007 at 12:15 pm
I knew Dave Kingman. Dave Kingman was a baseball card of mine. Richie Sexson, you’re no Dave Kingman.
Their numbers looks fairly similar only because they played in such vastly different eras with respect to offensive production. Kingman posted only a slightly lower OPS and materially better K/hit ratio in an era when pitchers remained ascendant (1971-1986).
Kingman was an all-star 3 times and in the top 20 in MVP voting 4 times. Sexson was an all-star twice, if being the Brewers’ all-star actually counts, which it shouldn’t, and top 20 in MVP voting twice. Which is two more times than me, but still…
April 12th, 2007 at 2:45 pm
But that’s what’s so useful about OPS+ - is that its adjusted for era, so that you *can* compare players from different eras. OPS+ is the actual OPS divided by the league-average OPS i.e. in 1978 Kingman had an OPS of .878 for an OPS+ of 131, while in 2004 Sexson had an OPS of .915 for an OPS+ of 128. In absolute terms, Sexson’s 2004 season appears better… but in reality, when considered in context of the era, Kingman’s 1978 season was *actually* better. I didn’t look at their respective HR and hit totals, or career batting averages or slugging percentages. I started with OPS+, which shows that Sexson (at least to this point) has had a better career. Now, as Kingman’s last five seasons showed (and common sense dictates), we should expect a decline as hitters get more into their 30s… like Richie.
The K/hit ratio is a fun thing to point out just to highlight how one-dimensional these guys were as sluggers. Course, neither came *close* the career mark of Rob Deer - 1409 K, 853 hits… that’s right… a 1.65 K/hit ratio. Think about that, for every two hits Rob Deer got, he struck out more than three times. On a related note, their respective walk totals: Kingman (16 seasons) - 608 walks; Deer (11 seasons) - 575 walks; Sexson (entering 11th year) - 494 walks.
Oh and for comparison sake, Deer hit 230 HRs.
Actually, here’s each player - and his career numbers, per 100 plate appearances, of hits, HR, BB and K:
Deer: 19.14 hits, 5.16 HR, 12.90 BB and 31.62 K
Sexson: 24.08 hits, 5.82 HR, 10.46 BB and 23.98 K
Kingman: 21.62 hits, 6.07 HR, 8.35 BB and 24.93 K
Almost half the time (44.52%), Rob Deer would record a plate appearance and *not* put the ball in play. Sexson is the most prolific hitter [sic] of the three. Kingman is the most prolific slugger.
And two of the three played for the Brewers. So they’ve got *that* going for them… which is nice.
April 18th, 2007 at 10:41 pm
How can you not love Rob Deer? The year after Deer left Milwaukee to go to Detroit, he hit .179 with 175 strikeouts. How cool is that? How is it possible to let a guy like that play every day (and a couple more years after)? Anyway, I actually think that Kingman is the far superior player to Sexson. The HRs in his era were very impressive. Sexson was in the right place at the right time to sign that ridiculous contract. First, he was the key piece that Melvin used to revamp the team (The remnants left from that deal are Dave Bush, Chris Capuano, Tony Graffanino). Then he was hurt right from the get-go in ARI, and became a free agent right at the time that Seattle had a ton of money to spend on corner infielders (the Beltre signing is arguably worse than Sexson)
April 19th, 2007 at 7:08 am
Danny, you confuse me. I can generall count on you to take a reasoned and logical approach to things based on concrete analytical tools. Can you do better than “the HRs in his era were more impressive” in asserting that Kingman’s a better overall player than Sexson? If you want to say that he was a more prolific HR hitter, I agree - but Sexson is *clearly* the better player, as I’ve pointed out. Did you really mean to say Kingman was a better *player*?
April 22nd, 2007 at 2:31 pm
Duly noted….although it says far superior player, I meant that Kingman was a far superior home run hitter. The numbers seem to support that they were fairly equal players, although Sexson will likely age slightly better than Kingman did, due to advances in health/fitness