The Worth of Werth (Split from Offseason Transactions)

[bmfc1]

SOB Jayson Werth stays in the NL East--Nationals, 7 year deal.

[metirish]

7 years at $126 million....I guess you need to overpay if you are the Nats.......Crawford must be throwing a party seeing that deal.

[MFS62]

bmfc1 wrote: SOB Jayson Werth stays in the NL East--Nationals, 7 year deal.

Crap!
I had heard rumors from one of the talking heads on ESPN that he might sign with Boston. He would have been a real pain in the butt to the MFYs.

Later

[Frayed Knot]

metirish wrote: 7 years at $126 million....I guess you need to overpay if you are the Nats.......Crawford must be throwing a party seeing that deal.

32 y/o in May

[seawolf17]

Wow, they better hope they start selling tickets. It does balance out the division a bit, though.

[Guest John Cougar Lunchbucket]

WoW.

Holy shit.

Woah.

[metirish]

The Nats right now remind me of the Mets circa. '04/05" needing to overpay for the splash. Rizzo says they are not done and will be very aggressive going forward, hopefully that means offering Lee $160 million and jacking the price up for the yankees.

Word is the Red Sox would only go a sensible four years for Werth.

[Guest John Cougar Lunchbucket]

Can we put this in a real thread? Thanks.

[Guest Edgy DC]

They'll make extra money on Phillies phans driving down the interstate just to boo him.

But this keeps him out of Yankendom. Hopefully it hurts them more than it helps the Nats. I'm not sure, but I expect I'd've rather put my money into matching the offer for Dunn.

[Guest LeiterWagnerFasterStrongr]

Wow. That's, like, Jeter money.

This smells in the present the way Bonilla's Mets deal did in retrospect. I take it they'll be trading Harper or Strasburg in 4-5 years?

(Also, it means that the Phils get a significantly worse compensatory pick for him. So, double-win!)

[Frayed Knot]

metirish wrote: The Nats right now remind me of the Mets circa. '04/05" needing to overpay for the splash. Rizzo says they are not done and will be very aggressive going forward, hopefully that means offering Lee $160 million and jacking the price up for the yankees.

The Nats are under some pressure from the local media and what fandom exists to spend money in an attempt to at least get out of 'also-ran' status and establish an identity that still eludes them six years into their Washington stay and a brand new stadium.

For a while last spring things were looking good. They got off to a decent start, Strasburg was on the way and another #1 overall was in hand. Add to that that the Redskins sucked, the Wizards sucked worse (and both had off-field and front office issues) and even the top-rated Capitals fished out early in the playoffs giving the Nats April to July all to themselves before the town (and especially the media) inevitably turned its attention back to the 'Skins in late July for training camp.

And then the hot streak stopped, Strasburg got hurt and any attendance momentum was lost with him.
Now Strasburg is invisible until 2012, Harper probably a year after that, and, while Dunn may have stayed had they offered him in mid-season what they belatedly tried in October, they didn't and he didn't leaving them with Ryan Zimmerman and some young semi-promising infielder types. This Werth deal at least buys them an 'E' for effort even as it looks like it'll bite them in the ass before it's over.

[metirish]

Alderon on the Werth deal

It makes some of our contracts look pretty good," Alderson said. "That's a long time and a lot of money. I thought they were trying to reduce the deficit in Washington."


Ouch

[DocTee]

That's Barry Zito money, there. Hope it works out as well for the Nats as that one did for SF.

[smg58]

metirish wrote: 7 years at $126 million....I guess you need to overpay if you are the Nats.......Crawford must be throwing a party seeing that deal.

That depends on how reasonable the other bidders were. And why is anybody bidding like this on Werth with Crawford still on the table?

[smg58]

metirish wrote: It makes some of our contracts look pretty good," Alderson said.

They may have a hard time prying Minaya out from under the bus.

[Guest John Cougar Lunchbucket]

smg58 wrote: metirish wrote: It makes some of our contracts look pretty good," Alderson said. They may have a hard time prying Minaya out from under the bus.

No shit. Did he really say that?

[metirish]

John Cougar Lunchbucket wrote: It makes some of our contracts look pretty good," Alderson said. They may have a hard time prying Minaya out from under the bus. No shit. Did he really say that?

Sure did


http://proxy.espn.go.com/blog/new-york/mets/post/_/id/12659/alderson-werth-that-money

[Valadius]

It makes me wonder why they didn't lock up Adam Dunn.

[Ceetar]

hehe..

yeah, the Nationals are wise to make a push to be at least interesting in the immediate future with Baltimore sucking. Try to steal some fans for real. Even in NY there is a large contingency that jumps back and forth, and I Orioles fans don't have 50 years worth of animosity or anything. Being interesting will draw them fans.

Of course, they still suck and will probably finish last unless Hanley or Josh Johnson gets hurt, but whatsever.

[nymr83]

this is a very good deal for Werth... and for the Mets, Marlins, and Braves. The Phillies still have to be "losers" here unless they replace him, but it won't be to hard to tell the fan base that some crazy owner overpaid and they weren't just being cheap letting him walk.

[Frayed Knot]

Valadius wrote: It makes me wonder why they didn't lock up Adam Dunn.

As said above, Dunn wanted to stay but by the time they got around to making anything other than a token offer it was FA time and so he opted to shop around as it's almost certainly his last big pay day (ditto Werth).

Besides, I don't think they wanted Dunn for long term. They got great value out of him for the 2 years just ended but they're probably thinking that when a guy is essentially a DH by age 30 what's he going to be later on?

[nymr83]

Did Dunn sign somewhere yet? (I'm less focussed on baseball this offseason than I ever have been befoere, part of why I haven't been around here much lately) if not I'd have to see what he eventually gets before I decide how dumb i think the Nationals are. he is 2 years younger than Werth though, so i have a feeling his deal comes out looking better.

[Frayed Knot]

Nymr83 wrote: Did Dunn sign somewhere yet? (I'm less focussed on baseball this offseason than I ever have been befoere, part of why I haven't been around here much lately) if not I'd have to see what he eventually gets before I decide how dumb i think the Nationals are. he is 2 years younger than Werth though, so i have a feeling his deal comes out looking better.

ChiSox - 4 years.

[Guest Edgy DC]

Ceetar wrote: hehe.. yeah, the Nationals are wise to make a push to be at least interesting in the immediate future with Baltimore sucking. Try to steal some fans for real. Even in NY there is a large contingency that jumps back and forth, and I Orioles fans don't have 50 years worth of animosity or anything. Being interesting will draw them fans. Of course, they still suck and will probably finish last unless Hanley or Josh Johnson gets hurt, but whatsever.

The Oriloes were pretty excellent the last third of the season under Buck Showalter. If the Nats are competing with them and not Philadephia, Atlanta, Florida, and the Mets, I'd say they were being foolish.

[Guest sharpie]

Nats were sold for $120 million in 2002. Werth gets $126 million.

[A Boy Named Seo]

metirish wrote: metirish wrote: It makes some of our contracts look pretty good," Alderson said. They may have a hard time prying Minaya out from under the bus. No shit. Did he really say that? Sure did http://proxy.espn.go.com/blog/new-york/mets/post/_/id/12659/alderson-werth-that-money

Fuckin' bam. Funny & true statement, but agreed that it's a little unchill to Omar. Love how cock-sure he is, tho. Now go sign us up the most bad-ass re-tread there is!

[Guest The Second Spitter]

Harsh as it is, Sandy's the one who's going to have a large chunk of his 2011 calendar devoted to trying to prevent Frankie's $17.5M option from vesting.

[metirish]

Rarely has a deal gotten this roundly panned , I can't find anyone that thinks it's a good deal. These numbers don't say "elite" player do they?, but I suppose that matters little to Rizzo although he used the word elite.



http://www.baseball-reference.com/players/w/werthja01.shtml

[HahnSolo]

If I'm gonna go crazy on years and $$ for an outfielder, my first choice would be Crawford.

Irish, I want to say the Howard contract last year was panned pretty much across the board

[batmagadanleadoff]

Check out Werth's home road splits. Last year, Werth batted 50 points higher at home, and hit twice as many HR's at home than on the road.

Playing half his games in D.C. nest season, there's a very good chance that Werth won't hit 20 HR's.