Looper signs with the Cards

by Laaaaazzz on Dec 15, 2005 11:52 PM EST Comment 1 comment

Branden Looper signed a three year deal with the Cards. It was well-reported that the Phillies were pursuing him strongly.

The deal is 3 year, $13.5M. The breakdown is $3.5 million in 2006, $4.5 million in 2007 and $5.5 million in 2008 with performance incentives. At that price, I don't think I'd have wanted the Phillies to sign him. It's pretty hefty for a reliever coming off a bad year and I don't like more than 2 years for any reliever.

Year after year, I'm shocked at how much money is spent at bullpen pitchers, whose performance is often wildly fluctuating. It's a poor allocation of resources and I hope Gillick continues to get cheap, decent upside guys like Santana and Booker.

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this year is the worst

I don't think the Looper deal is anywhere near as bad as what the Cubs gave Scott Eyre. But I'm 100 percent with you on the general principle. I'd love to see a study that compares the performance of groups of relievers who see a certain minimum level of action (say 50 IP in a season), classified by salary. My strong guess is that those pulling down <$800,000 or so are statistically indistinguishable from those in the $1.5m to $3.5m/year range.

I'm sure the top-dollar earners--the Wagners, Riveras, Gagnes and Hoffmans--are dramatically better, but my strong guess would be that the "gap" between cheap and mid-priced relievers would be vanishingly small.

by dajafi on Dec 16, 2005 1:24 PM EST reply actions 0 recs