Rapid Reaction: Prince Fielder Signing

Ed. Note: I wrote the title when i started the blog. 2 days isnt a very rapid reaction but hey it's still faster than some bloggers. 

So the Prince Fielder saga has come to an end. The most eligible bachelor on the free agent market left, and some would argue the most eligible bachelor in the whole free agent market to start with has finally signed.  It took a freak injury for a team to become desperate enough to pony up the dough for Prince. Last week Victor Martinez, lineup protection for Miguel Cabrera and clutch hitter extraordinaire went down with a torn ACL in an offseason workout. Needless to say this left a gaping hole in the Tigers lineup and championship aspirations. So how do you patch that hole? By shoving 214 million dollars in it, that's how.

My initial reaction when i heard the news while commuting to Merced for a pointless court appearance was how can anyone pony up 9 years, 214 million for Prince Fielder? Nearly 24 mil a year? For Prince Fielder? Sure he is probably the premier pure power hitter in the league, sorry Ryan Howard and Jose Bautista, but I mean we are bordering on in-his-prime A-Rod money. So what are the Tigers really getting for their money here, both this next season and the following 8?

Last year Victor provided a lot of things for the Tigers, a catcher to platoon with Alex Avila, a 1B to give Miguel Cabrera some rest, and most importantly a run producing bat. The traditional numbers show 100 RBI, .330 avg and .850 ops. Good, not great. Victor lacked that 20+ HR power he had shown throughout his career.

Of course if you use sabermetrics a la Moneyball, you find that Victor is basically a decent starting player. His wins above replacement (WAR) - which basically means how many more wins he is worth to a team over a replacement level player, which is usually considered a minor league call up player, someone who excels in AAA but struggles in the majors (another term is AAAA player) - was 2.9 wins he added to the team. A rough standard for a starter in the majors is 2+, an all star is 5+ and an MVP is 8+. WAR measures offensive and defensive contributions. If you are curious his oWAR (offensive WAR with his defensive rating excluded) was 3.1 meaning hes a little bit of a defensive liability. But since he only spot starts on defense it wasn't a huge concern.

Last year, and throughout the course of his career, Prince Fielder has been a pure masher, but he has been at least an average to above average contact hitter as well, posting averages ranging from a career low .261 in 2010 to a tie for career high at .299 in 2009 and 2011. Last year he posted 38 home runs, 120 RBIs, .299 avg and .981 ops. Prince's WAR was also 5.2 (oWAR was 5.9 meaning he is even more of a D liability than Martinez) putting his at that All-Star threshold. I think most importantly, Prince played the same lineup protection role in Milwaukee that Victor did so you doubt there will be any problems with production because of a lack of protection.

Also Prince is coming from Miller to Comerica Park, similar climates and similar dimensions, except Comerica plays 20 feet longer to center and about 10 feet to right-center and right and equidistant in left. Prince sprays his home runs across the whole park and most of his home runs are no doubters anyway, meaning they cleared the fence by at least 20 feet. Lastly, Comerica in general ranks right behind Miller Park in offensive ratings.


So with all that mumbo jumbo the conclusion is the Tigers are getting a better player to replace Martinez (duh) and a player who they can expect to continue his trend without worrying about his home park and lineup protection. Great. For this year at least though the Tigers are hardly better. Sabermetrically they are 2 wins better,which isnt much of a concern since they won 95 games last year and have to be the overwhelming favorites again in the AL Central. Might have replacing Martinez with Fielder (assuming Martinez stayed healthy the whole series) helped them beat Texas in the ALCS? Maybe, but probably not. First Prince couldnt help his own team beat the Cardinals who were ostensibly beaten twice by the Rangers (i dont think ill ever forget Game 6), Second Texas won that ALCS in 6 with only one close win in Game 1 when rain ruined any semblance of rhythm in that game. Again, I think for this year the Tigers are hardly better.

Going forward though it is the right move to replace Martinez with Fielder. There is a 5 year age difference and with Martinez going to be 34 by the time he sees the field again and coming off of an ACL and a year of declining power numbers, i dont think he has much of a future left in the league. But at 24 million a year? I feel the Tigers grossly overpaid by probably 30-35 million on that contract. The reason Prince was out there was because he was holding out for this contract and teams knew he wasn't worth that much. The Tigers could have gotten a better deal but this is nitpicking, Prince was a the right move at this time.

Other people have wondered what they will do defensively with Cabrera and Fielder in tow through 2016 (when cabreras contract expires), which is pretty simple. Platoon DH, 1B, sprinkled in with a move to 3B by Cabrera in the early going.

Finally this move was important because there is a rare window here where the Yankees may be tailing off (although adding Pineda makes me uncomfortable), and the Red Sox are a mess. The Tigers have 3 of the best players in the league in their primes this year in Verlander, Cabrera and Fielder and that aligning of the stars rarely happens. The Tigers had to make the move to overpay and it may payoff.

The only problem is the AL is loaded this year. The Angels added Pujols and CJ Wilson without losing anyone. The Rangers may have gained in their rotation without losing in their bullpen after adding Joe Nathan, moving Feliz to the rotation and adding possibly the best free agent pitcher this year in Darvish. The Rays essentially add Matt Moore to their team now that he is going to get a full year look (plus they added some pop back resigning Carlos Pena for the year). The Yankees sent a bat that dont need in Jesus Montero for an arm they desperately needed in Pineda and despite the dysfunction, the Red Sox still have a very potent lineup with Ellsbury, Pedroia, Gonzalez, Ortiz, Youkilis, and if Crawford returns to form they basically add a new offensive weapon to a rotation that still sports Beckett and Lester at the top. Plus the Red Sox have got to have a chip on their shoulder to remove the embarrassment of last years collapse.

If the Phillies don't win the NL next year I will be shocked. The Cardinals lost their best player and manager. The Brewers lost at the minimum their 2nd best player and lost their other best player for probably 50 games. The Giants still have no offense, unless you consider the return of Buster Posey their saving grace, which when you're avg leader last year was Aubrey Huff at .246 its going to take more than 1 guy to save your offense. The D-Backs still lack any real killers in the rotation (despite Ian Kennedy's good year), the Braves have a weird combination of relying too much on old players (Chipper and Hudson) with waiting on youth to really emerge in Jason Heyward and Freddie Freeman while crossing their fingers their best pitcher Tommy Hanson can stay healthy. There are too many X-Factors for this team.

If you are in AL fan it should be an exciting season, for now the rich either get richer or stay rich and its annoying to have to deal with Adrian Gonzalez, Albert Pujols, and Prince Fielder, three of the five best NL hitters over the last several years, for the next decade in the AL.