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Thursday Notes: Franchise Values, Roki Sasaki, Mock Drafts, Broadcast Rights

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(Ezra Shaw/Getty)

The Yankees continue their nine-game, three-city West Coast trip with the series finale in Anaheim later tonight. Until then, here are some miscellaneous links and notes to check out.

Yankees again ranked MLB’s most valuable franchise

Once again, Forbes has ranked the Yankees as the most valuable franchise in baseball. The franchise is valued at $4.6 billion right now, up from $4 billion last year. The Dodgers are a distant second at $3.2 billion. The gap between No. 1 and No. 2 is the same as the gap between No. 2 and No. 8. Here’s part of the write-up:

The New York Yankees are the most valuable team ($4.6 billion) and had local revenue of $712 million last year, the most in MLB and more than the bottom six teams (Miami Marlins, Tampa Bay Rays, Oakland Athletics, Kansas City Royals, Cincinnati Reds and Baltimore Orioles) had combined. The Dodgers ($3.3 billion), Boston Red Sox ($3.2 billion), Chicago Cubs ($3.1 billion) and San Francisco Giants ($3 billion) round out the list of teams worth at least $3 billion.

Forbes estimates the Yankees’ revenue at $668M and operating income at $28M last year. If you believe the Yankees (or pretty much any team, for that matter) only made $28M in profit last year, I have a few bridges for sale in Brooklyn. Forbes has been compiling their estimated franchise values more than 20 years now, and the Yankees have topped the list every single year. If they ever slip into second place, someone’s doing something wrong.

Yankees among team scouting Roki Sasaki

According to Yahoo! Japan (via NPB on Reddit), the Yankees are among the many MLB teams scouting hard-throwing Japanese high schooler Roki Sasaki. Sasaki’s fastball was recently clocked at 101 mph, according to Dylan Hernandez, which broke Shohei Ohtani’s national high school record. Here’s some not great video of the kid in action. Sasaki reportedly throws a slider, curveball, and splitter. No word on the quality of his secondaries or his command.

Japanese high school players can sign with MLB teams as international free agents after they graduate, though it never happens because Nippon Pro Baseball would freak out. They want the best Japanese players to play in Japan before coming to MLB. MLB goes along with it to help maintain a good working relationship between the two leagues. Will Sasaki change that? Who knows. Is he even good? Who knows! Teams are already scouting him though. They’re starting to build the information bank.

Baseball America’s mock draft v1.0 and v2.0

Draft season is heating up and Baseball America (subs. req’d) posted their first and second mock drafts in recent weeks. For whatever reason they’ve decided to have one mock draft page that gets updated, not separate pages for each mock draft version. That’s … weird. Also kinda inconvenient.

Anyway, both mock drafts have the Orioles taking Oregon State C Adley Rutschman with the top selection. He’s such a stud. Switch-hitting catcher with a .420/.584/.821 batting line who projects to be an above-average defender. Baseball America had the Yankees taking New Jersey HS RHP Jack Leiter in their first mock draft and Florida HS 3B Rece Hinds in their second mock draft.

Imagining Hinds playing in Yankee Stadium in a few years is fun, and New York’s gamble on a previous large, righthanded-hitting power hitter with swing-and-miss concerns paid off nicely—RE: Aaron Judge.

Leiter is indeed Al’s son and he’s arguably the best prep pitcher in the country. Not huge velocity, but great secondaries and excellent command. The question is signability. Leiter is strongly committed to Vanderbilt and he and his family presumably do not need the money. The Yankees have a big bonus pool and can offer a huge overslot bonus, but it may not matter. Leiter may be an impossible sign.

I have no real opinion on Hinds at this point. He does fit the Yankees’ profile as a very athletic and very toolsy high schooler with unteachable power though. It’s a little too early to start matching teams and targets, especially late in the first round. Instead, I recommend sifting through MLB.com’s top 50 draft prospects list. Southern California kids are always a good place to start with the Yankees.

MLB wants to gain control of local broadcast rights

According to Ron Blum, Major League Baseball has put in a bid to purchase regional sports networks from Disney in an effort to gain control of local broadcasting rights. The Yankees have right of first refusal and already have a deal in place to buy back controlling interest in the YES Network. MLB is trying to purchase the remaining networks. From Blum:

“There’s tremendous revenue disparity in our game, and I think that if we had more of a national model closer to where the NFL is it would solve a lot of those competitive issues for us, kind of level the playing field.” baseball Commissioner Rob Manfred said Wednesday. “I think that all of the difficult issues for baseball, if you took that revenue disparity out of the picture, would be easier.”

Long story short, MLB wants to pool all the local television money together, then distribute it evenly among the 30 teams. That’s how the various national television contracts (FOX, ESPN, etc.) work and that is the long-term goal locally. Doesn’t seem all that close to happening, but MLB is working on it. The good news? Such a broadcast model would likely mean the end of local blackouts. That would be a huge plus for cord-cutters everyone.

Yankees’ bonus pools set for the 2019 draft and 2019-20 international signing period

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(MLB)

We’re well into April now and the weather is starting to heat up, which means we’re approaching draft season and the annual international signing period. I don’t anticipate much draft or international free agency coverage here given our looming shutdown (sorry), but here is this summer’s amateur bonus pool information, via Carlos Collazo and Ben Badler.

2019 Draft Pool: $7,455,300

Despite finishing with the third best record in baseball last year and thus picking near the end of the first round, the Yankees have the 20th largest draft bonus pool this summer after adding a pick in the Sonny Gray trade. Going from the 27th largest pool to the 20th largest pool with the trade ain’t too bad. Last year the Yankees had no extra picks and the sixth smallest pool at $6,115,100.

As always, the bonus pool money is spread across picks in the top ten rounds. Here is slot bonus value assigned to each of the Yankees’ picks this year:

30. $2,365,500 (first round)
38. $1,952,300 (Competitive Balance Round A — pick from Sonny Gray trade)
67. $976,700 (second round)
105. $554,300 (third round)
135. $414,000 (fourth round)
165. $309,500 (fifth round)
195. $241,000 (sixth round)
225. $190,100 (seventh round)
255. $160,800 (eighth round)
285. $148,900 (ninth round)
315. $142,000 (tenth round)

Teams can take money from one pick and spend it on another, and the Yankees (and pretty much every team) have done that aggressively the last few years. They take college seniors with no negotiating leverage in rounds 6-10, pay them small bonuses ($10,000 or so), and use the savings on other players. Fail to sign a player and you lose the slot money associated with the pick, however.

Penalties for exceeding the draft pool are pretty harsh. Exceed your pool by 5% or more and you have to give up next year’s first round pick, and the penalties only get worse from there. The Yankees have routinely exceeded their draft pool right up to that 5% threshold (last year they exceeded their pool by 4.8%) which incurs a 75% tax on the overage. Their “maximum” pool this year (bonus pool plus 4.9% overage) is $7,820,609.

The Diamondbacks have the largest pool this year at $16,093,700. That is more than $2M more than any other team. Arizona gained extra picks for losing Patrick Corbin and A.J. Pollock to free agency, and also for failing to sign last year’s first rounder. The Red Sox have the smallest draft pool at $4,788,100.

2019-20 International Bonus Pool: $5,398,300

Unlike the draft pool, international bonus polls are based on market size. Teams get dropped into one of three buckets (small market, medium market, large market) and each bucket carries its own bonus pool size. The Yankees are of course in the large market bucket, so they get the smallest bonus pool. The international pool is a hard cap, though bonuses no larger than $10,000 do not count against the bonus pool.

Teams can trade for additional bonus pool space — they used to be able to add an additional 75% of their bonus pool, though this year it drops to 60% — and the Yankees have aggressively traded for international bonus pool space the last few years. They traded for the maximum and I expect them to do the same this year. The additional 60% means the Yankees can max their bonus pool out at $8,637,280 this signing period.

The 2019-20 international signing period opens July 2nd and the Yankees have already been connected to two high-profile prospects: Dominican OF Jasson Dominguez and Dominican OF Jhon Diaz. Dominguez is said to be a significant prospect, so much so that the Yankees are expected to give him a $5M bonus. That would be the largest international bonus they’ve ever given out, and also the largest bonus of the hard cap era overall.

Small market teams have a $6,841,200 pool this year. The Phillies, Dodgers, and Nationals have smaller pools than the Yankees because they forfeited bonus money to sign qualified free agents over the winter. Also, the Braves are limited to $10,000 bonuses the next two signings periods as part of the penalties for past international signing period violations.

Minor League Notes: System & Prospect Ranks, Diaz, Stowers

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Abreu. (Jennifer Stewart/Getty)

Major League Spring Training opened last week but minor league camp is still a few weeks away. Minor league camp doesn’t open until early March. A bunch of prospects are already working out at the complex in Tampa though. Anyway, here’s one last link back to my Top 30 Prospect List and here are some minor league notes.

Baseball America, Keith Law release farm system rankings

Both Baseball America (subs. req’d) and Keith Law (subs. req’d) released their annual farm system rankings in recent days, and they both have the Padres and Rays ranked first and second, respectively. Their lists diverge from there. They ranked the Yankees similarly:

  • Baseball America (20th): “After graduating Aaron Judge, Gary Sanchez, Gleyber Torres and Miguel Andujar the last two years, the system has dropped without an elite, near-ready prospect, but they are deep in young pitching.”
  • Keith Law (19th): “The Yankees’ top end has thinned out significantly, but from low-A down they at least have a strong collection of guys who show enough to grab your attention — elite speed or power, big velocity, huge spin rates — and create some potential trade value.”

Readers ask me where I think the farm system ranks every week in our chat, and I’ve been saying the 15-20 range since the Justus Sheffield trade. Bottom half of the league but closer to middle of the pack than last. The Yankees are loaded with high-end kids in the low minors, so the potential is there for rapid improvement. That’s also a risky profile. There is lots of boom or bust potential in the system and the rankings reflect that.

Law, FG, BP release top Yankees prospects lists

FanGraphs, Keith Law (subs. req’d), and Baseball Prospectus (subs. req’d) all released their top Yankees prospects lists recently and they go well beyond the top ten. FanGraphs ranked 38 (!) prospects and their list is free. Go read all the scouting reports. Law ranked 20 players and mentioned ten others. Baseball Prospectus ranked 15 and mentioned another four. Here are the top tens:

FanGraphs
1. OF Estevan Florial
2. RHP Jonathan Loaisiga
3. RHP Deivi Garcia
4. OF Antonio Cabello
5. RHP Roansy Contreras
6. RHP Albert Abreu
7. OF Everson Pereira
8. C Anthony Seigler
9. RHP Luis Gil
10. RHP Clarke Schmidt

Keith Law
1. RHP Deivi Garcia
2. OF Everson Pereira
3. OF Estevan Florial
4. RHP Jonathan Loaisiga
5. C Anthony Seigler
6. RHP Freicer Perez
7. RHP Clarke Schmidt
8. RHP Albert Abreu
9. OF Anthony Cabello
10. SS Thairo Estrada

Baseball Prospectus
1. RHP Jonathan Loaisiga
2. OF Estevan Florial
3. OF Antonio Cabello
4. RHP Deivi Garcia
5. OF Everson Pereira
6. RHP Luis Gil
7. RHP Mike King
8. RHP Roansy Contreras
9. RHP Clarke Schmidt
10. RHP Chance Adams

Law picked Cabello as his sleeper for 2019. “Cabello has so much upside that I even had suggestions to put him in my top 100, although I think that would have been premature. But he could belong in a year,” says the write-up. He also notes the big money 2014-15 international signings (3B Nelson Gomez, OF Juan De Leon, OF Jonathan Amundaray, etc.) have flamed out. “Only (SS Hoy Jun) Park looks like he might ever even see a day in the majors,” he writes. The spending spree was a good idea but wow did it not work out as expected. Lotta money for nothing.

FanGraphs posted their top 132 prospects list last week, which had Blue Jays 3B Vlad Guerrero Jr. in the top spot, and included only one Yankee: Florial at No. 106. Why is Loaisiga above Florial in the Yankees top ten but not on the top 132 list? Beats me. In a separate piece FanGraphs looked at players they expect to be a top 100 prospect next year. Cabello, OF Kevin Alcantara, and RHP Trevor Stephan are among them. The Yankees gave Alcantara a $1M bonus last summer and all indications are he is about to become a Very Big Deal.

Yankees connected to another top international free agent

Last week we learned the Yankees are expected to sign Dominican OF Jasson Dominguez when the 2019-20 international signing period opens July 2nd. Dominguez is considered the best available player this summer and he’s expected to receive a massive bonus in the $5M range. Ben Badler (subs. req’d) now connects the Yankees to another top international player, Dominican OF Jhon Diaz. From Badler:

Diaz is smaller than the other top players in the class, but he’s one of the most skilled game players for 2019. He’s a lefty who consistently performs well in games with a quick, simple swing and a knack for barreling the ball against live pitching. He’s a center fielder with good defensive instincts and one of the smartest baseball IQ players in the country.

Diaz looks like he’s about nine years old in the video embedded above. Total opposite of Dominguez, who looks like a grown man (in the very limited video I can find).

Badler says the Red Sox were expected to sign Diaz but “more recently there’s been buzz” about the Yankees signing him. That’s not as firm a connection as Dominguez, but it is a connection nonetheless. The bonus pools will be announced in a few weeks and the Yankees figure to be in the $5M to $5.25M range. They’ll have to trade for additional pool space to sign anyone other than Dominguez. (Teams can trade for an additional 60% of their pool. It used to be 75%. Now it’s 60%.)

Yankees were ready to draft Stowers

In the least surprising news ever, George King (subs. req’d) reports the Yankees were ready to select OF Josh Stowers with their second round pick last summer. The Mariners beat them to the punch and grabbed Stowers with the 54th overall pick. The Yankees held the 61st overall selection and used it on C Josh Breaux. They got their man last month when they acquired Stowers from the Mariners in the Sonny Gray three-team trade.

“We had him rated in the vicinity of 50th (overall), close to the bottom of the second round. He can run and is a basestealer who plays center field and has power. He is a very good athlete. The ceiling on him is he has power and speed,” said scouting director Damon Oppenheimer to King. As soon as the trade went down, I figured Stowers was someone the Yankees had targeted in the draft last year. I assume the LHP Ronald Roman situation is similar. He’s a 17-year-old kid the Diamondbacks signed as an international free agent last summer. The Yankees got Roman, who has yet to play a pro game, in the Tim Locastro trade last month. They probably tried to sign him last summer.

Badler: Yankees expected to sign top Dominican outfield prospect Jasson Dominguez

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According to Ben Badler (subs. req’d), the Yankees are expected to sign Dominican outfield prospect Jasson Dominguez when the 2019-20 international signing period opens July 2nd. With international amateur free agents, “expected to sign” is usually code for “the two sides have a deal in place and are waiting for the signing period to open so they can make it official.”

Badler says Dominguez will receive a signing bonus in the $5M range, which is absolutely massive. The largest signing bonus the Yankees have ever given an international amateur is the $3.2M bonus they gave Dermis Garcia in July 2014. To the best of my knowledge the Yankees have only ever given four amateur players a signing bonus worth $3M or more:

  1. Andrew Brackman: $3.35M (2007 first round pick)
  2. Blake Rutherford: $3.282M (2016 first round pick)
  3. Dermis Garcia: $3.2M (international free agent in July 2014)
  4. Gary Sanchez: $3M (international free agent in July 2009)

Brackman’s bonus was part of a four-year Major League contract worth $4.55M. The largest bonus given to an international amateur during the hard cap era (2017-present) is the $3.825M bonus the Rays gave shortstop Wander Franco in July 2017, so yeah, Dominguez’s upcoming bonus is enormous. Here’s a snippet of Badler’s scouting report, which explains why the bonus will be so big:

Dominguez has an exciting level of explosiveness, athleticism and loud tools, with 60s and 70s (on the 20-80 scouting scale) scattered across his tool set. He’s a bursty athlete with well above-average speed and arm strength, excellent bat speed and big power from both sides of the plate coming from his muscular, 5-foot-11, 195-pound frame. Scouts highest on Dominguez raved not only about his tools, both about his ability to both hit and hit for power in games.

The international bonus cap is tied to market size, which means the Yankees have the smallest available pool. Last year they had a $4.9835M international bonus pool, up 5% from $4.75M the year before. Another 5% increase puts them at $5.23M for the 2019-20 signing period. MLB will officially announce the bonus pool sizes sometime in April.

Teams can trade for an additional 75% of their bonus pool — that means the Yankees will be able to add an additional $3.9M or so — and the Yankees maxed out their pool each of the last two years. They traded for the max allowed and spent it all. I have no reason to believe they won’t do that again this summer. That means they’ll be able to give Dominguez his massive bonus and sign other players as well, possibly to seven-figure bonuses.

Update: Turns out teams can only trade for an additional 60% of their bonus pool starting with the 2019-20 signing period. Assuming another 5% increase to a $5.23M pool, the Yankees will be able to trade for an additional $3.2M this year rather than $3.9M. Not a huge difference, but a difference.

Tuesday Links: MLB-Cuba Deal, Streaming Rights, Prospects

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Aroldis Chapman, Orlando Hernandez, and Cuban catcher Jorge Saez. (@YankeesPR)

The holidays have arrived and hot stove news has come to a crawl, so here are some miscellaneous — but not insignificant — links and bits of news to check out.

MLB announces agreement to bring Cuban players to MLB

Last week MLB and the MLBPA announced an agreement with the Cuban Baseball Federation that “will provide Cuban baseball players with a safe and legal path to sign with a Major League Club.” Here’s the press release. Many players, including Yasiel Puig and Jose Abreu, defected from Cuba by being smuggled off the island by criminals, and were later threatened and shaken down for money. This new agreement helps prevent that.

“Establishing a safe, legal process for entry to our system is the most important step we can take to ending the exploitation and endangerment of Cuban players who pursue careers in Major League Baseball,” said MLBPA chief Tony Clark in a statement. “The safety and well-being of these young men remains our primary concern.”

Under the MLB-CBF agreement, players who are at least 25 years old and have played six years in Cuba must be made available to MLB teams. CBF clubs can also choose to make younger players available. When a player signs with an MLB team, the MLB team must pay his former club in Cuba a release fee that follows the same formula as Japanese players (explained here). This is, truly, great and historic news for baseball. There is now a safe and proper channel for bringing Cuban talent to MLB.

MLB may transfer in-market streaming rights to teams

This is potentially huge. According to Josh Kosman, MLB “favors a plan” in which in-market streaming rights would be transferred from the league to individual teams. The Yankees and several other teams have been pushing hard for this for years. This means that, if you live in the Yankees’ home market, you would no longer have to be a cable subscriber to watch the YES Network. You could cut the cord and subscribe to the team’s streaming service instead.

The catch here is that when MLB transfers in-market streaming rights to teams — “when” is more appropriate than “if” here because this does feel inevitable, if not now then down the road — the teams will probably turn around and sell those streaming rights to the highest bidder (Amazon, Google, Netflix, etc.). Amazon is reportedly making a big push to secure regional sports streaming rights and I’m sure they’d love to get their hands on the Yankees. So, rather than buy an in-market streaming subscription straight from the Yankees or MLB, you’d have to sign up for Amazon’s video service. We’ll see. None of this has happened yet but things are heading in this direction.

Three Yankees make top GCL prospects list

I missed this a few weeks ago. Baseball America (subs. req’d) wrapped up their annual look at the top 20 prospects in each minor league with the rookie Gulf Coast League. Three Yankees made the list: OF Antonio Cabello (No. 7), OF Anthony Garcia (No. 12), and RHP Yoendrys Gomez (No. 14). Baseball America posted Cabello’s full scouting report on Twitter, so check that out. He ranked one spot ahead of Orioles RHP Grayson Rodriguez, the 11th overall pick in the 2018 draft, on the GCL list.

The 6-foot-5 and 204 lb. (and 18-year-old) Garcia led the GCL with ten homers in 53 games this year. He also struck out 40.6% of his plate appearances. The Baseball America scouting report gives him 70 power on the 20-80 scouting scale and, in the chat (subs. req’d), Ben Badler compared him to Domingo Santana. That’d be a nice outcome for a $500,000 international signee. Here’s part of the scouting report on Gomez:

Gomez ran his fastball up to 96 mph this season in the GCL, parking in the low-to-mid-90s. He throws with downhill angle and locates his fastball well to both sides of the plate for his age. Gomez had 10 strikeouts per nine innings in the GCL thanks in part to a tight, sharp curveball in the mid-to-upper 70s with good depth that flashes above-average to freeze hitters or gets them to chase. He showed feel for a mid-80s changeup that he’s willing to throw to both lefties and righties.

The Yankees signed the 18-year-old Gomez for a mere $50,000 two years ago and now he’s showing three pitches with good velocity and a potential swing-and-miss curveball. The Yankees seem to turn two or three of these small bonus kids into legitimate prospects each year. Domingo Acevedo ($7,500), Freicer Perez ($10,000) and Jonathan Loaisiga (not sure he even got a bonus) all fit in this group.

2019 Draft top prospects list released

With the college and high school seasons only a few weeks away, MLB.com released their first top 50 draft prospects list for 2019. Oregon State C Adley Rutschman is the consensus No. 1 player in the draft class and he’s probably the most locked in No. 1 pick this far out from the draft since Gerrit Cole in 2011. That doesn’t mean Rutschman is a lock to go first overall to the Orioles. It just means he’s the most clear cut No. 1 guy in quite some time.

The Yankees hold the 30th overall selection next year and they’ll keep that pick even if they sign a qualified free agent like Bryce Harper. Baseball America (subs. req’d) put together a super early 2019 mock draft recently and they have Rutschman going to the O’s with the top pick. Here’s who they have for the Yankees and that 30th overall selection:

3B Brett Baty (Lake Travis HS, Austin)
Why It Makes Sense: Baty will get talked about for both his prodigious strength in the lefthanded batter’s box and also the that he will be 19 and a half years old on draft day. This might not bother the Yankees as much as other teams, as New York just took high school catcher Anthony Seigler in the first round last year, who was also old for his class.

One, “Brett Baty” is an outstanding baseball name. And two, a 19-and-a-half-year-old high schooler in the first round? I can’t imagine that’s happened often. And geez, Seigler didn’t turn 19 until after the draft last year. He wasn’t that old for his class. Anyway, at this point in the draft season (i.e. it hasn’t started yet), any mock draft is almost certainly speculation more than hard “this team is on that guy” reporting. Lots can and will change between now and the draft.

As long as Damon Oppenheimer is the Yankees scouting director, the best place to start with potential draft targets is Southern California. He has an affinity for prospects who play where he grew up. One name to watch: California HS 1B/LHP Spencer Jones. Go check out the (free) MLB.com scouting report and tell me that kid doesn’t scream “future Yankees prospect.”

Scouting the Free Agent Market: Yusei Kikuchi

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(Kyodo)

The Yankees came into the offseason needing three starting pitchers. They’ve since added two: James Paxton and CC Sabathia. Paxton and Sabathia join incumbents Luis Severino and Masahiro Tanaka. Well, Sabathia is an incumbent himself. You know what I mean. Point is, the Yankees needed three starters, they’ve added two, and that means they still need one more.

“Once we had CC in the fold we felt we had to at least get two more guys back into this as imports, and so obviously Paxton now is one of those,” said Cashman during a recent radio interview. “We’ll continue our focus on the rotation, whether that’s a free agent or trade … I don’t know how much longer it’s going to take between the free agents or trades and stuff like that, but we’re going to stay engaged.”

The Yankees have remained connected to the usual suspects (Patrick Corbin, J.A. Happ, Corey Kluber, etc.) since the Paxton trade and I’m sure they’ve checked in on some not-so-usual suspects (Wade Miley? Gio Gonzalez?) as well. It seems the Yankees have their sights set fairly high though. They’re not looking for a back-end innings guy. They want an impact pitcher like, well, Corbin or Happ or Kluber.

Among the other pitchers the Yankees have at least discussed internally this offseason is lefty Yusei Kikuchi of the Seibu Lions in Japan’s Nippon Pro Baseball. “I saw film on him during the pro scouting meetings. We talked about that individual,” said Hal Steinbrenner recently, which hardly qualifies as interest or an endorsement. Kikuchi will be posted this offseason though, so he’s a potential target. Let’s dig in to see whether he’s a fit for the Yankees.

Background

Kikuchi, 27, flirted with skipping NPB entirely and signing with an MLB team as an international free agent out of high school back in the day. The Yankees were among the teams to touch base with him. NPB is very much against Japanese high schoolers jumping straight to MLB, that’s not a precedent they want set, and they were able to convince Kikuchi to stay in Japan. The Lions drafted him and he’s been with Seibu ever since. Kikuchi owns a career 2.81 ERA in 1,035.1 innings in parts of eight NPB seasons.

Performance

Because of injuries and general young player struggles, it took a few years for Kikuchi to settle in and establish himself as one of the top pitchers in NPB. Here are his 2016-18 numbers (with a big shoutout to 1.02 – Essence of Baseball):

IP ERA FIP K% BB% GB% HR/9 WAR
2016 143 2.58 3.66 21.3 11.3 48.7 0.44 +3.7
2017 187.2 1.97 2.87 29.5 6.7 50.3 0.77 +6.6
2018 163.2 3.08 3.50 23.4 6.9 53.2 0.88 +5.6
2018 NPB AVG
 – 3.90 4.21 18.6 8.5 46.9 0.97 –

Context time! First and foremost, Kikuchi played in NPB’s Pacific League, the DH league, so his numbers have not been skewed by facing the opposing pitcher. Secondly, park factors indicate MetLife Dome is the most neutral park in NPB. It is slightly pitcher friendly but not enough to be significant. Kikuchi’s park adjusted ERA and FIP this past season were both about 20% better than league average.

Third, there are way more balls in play in NPB than MLB. Generally speaking, the obsession with launch angle has yet to catch on in NPB. Because of that, the league average strikeout rate is still relatively low. Kikuchi’s 23.4% strikeout rate this past season was 26% better than league average. That’s like an MLB starter putting up a 28.1% strikeout rate.

Fourth, Kikuchi has played in front of some strong defenses. In 2018 the Lions led NPB in UZR (+68.5) and ranked third in Defensive Efficiency (.703). Last year they led in UZR (+41.7) and were second in Defensive Efficiency (+.708). It’s hard to know exactly how much that helped Kikuchi — he is high strikeout pitcher, after all — but I reckon it did help to some degree. Just something to keep in mind.

And fifth, Kikuchi did not allow much hard contact in 2018. This past season he had a 27.7% hard contact rate, which is comfortably below the 32.1% league average. Kikuchi had a 34.7% hard contact rate last year and a 31.2% hard contact rate the year before, so this season is the exception rather than the rule. He’s been closer to the league average throughout his career. Overall though, the numbers are good. Not overwhelming, but good.

Current Stuff

Relative to pro baseball players, Kikuchi is short and stocky at 6-foot-0 and 220 pounds. Since 1990, a completely arbitrary endpoint, only 15 lefties standing no taller than 6-foot-0 have racked up at least +10 WAR. Huh. Four of them were full-time relievers. Maybe that’s why the Yankees traded the 6-foot-0 Justus Sheffield? Eh, whatever. I guess this means height is not on Kikuchi’s side.

Anyway, the scouting reports (including this one, this one, and this one) say Kikuchi is a fastball/slider guy who also mixes in a curveball and a changeup. A few weeks ago Jon Morosi spoke to former big leaguer Frank Herrmann about Kikuchi. Here’s what Herrmann said about playing against him in Japan:

“When we have faced him, we have hit him pretty well, and that’s with a heavy left-handed lineup,” Herrmann told MLB.com. “The [velocity] and sharpness of the slider seems to be down from last year. The one positive I’ve seen from him is that is he’s becoming more than a [two-pitch] guy, which he predominantly was last season. He will now flip in a curveball early in the count and uses his changeup to guys that [are] on his fastball. Last year, there was never a need to get away from the [fastball/slider] combo.

…

“They all mention that his work ethic and competitiveness are top-notch,” Herrmann said. “It’s also known that he really wants to go to MLB and compete against the best.”

The comp game is dangerous because it creates unrealistic expectations, but, for what it’s worth, Patrick Corbin has been the most common comp for Kikuchi these last few weeks. It fits. They’re both lefties who rely heavily on their fastball and slider, and will flip in a curveball and changeup from time to time. Corbin is three inches taller though, which is not nothing. The extra downhill plane helps.

There is not as much velocity in NPB as there is in MLB. Not even close, really. The average NPB fastball clocked in at 89.4 mph in 2018. Kikuchi averaged 91.5 mph and that was the third highest in the league. That’s all well and good, but 91.5 mph plays much differently in MLB as it does NPB. The MLB average fastball this past season was 93.2 mph overall and 92.2 mph for lefties. Crazy. A 91.5 mph fastball looks very different to MLB hitters than it does NPB hitters.

That isn’t to say Kikuchi can’t succeed in MLB with a 91 mph heater. Lots of guys do it, including Corbin. Everything works together and the slider helps keep hitters off the fastball. Here are some numbers on Kikuchi’s arsenal over the years:

Fastball Slider Curveball Changeup
% Velo R/100 % Velo R/100 % Velo R/100 % Velo R/100
2016 55.9 91.4 -0.24 27.7 82.8 +1.43 10.6 71.2 +1.96 5.8 78.4 +2.03
2017 56.3 92.3 +1.66 28.5 85.6 +1.13 9.3 73.3 -0.40 4.0 81.3 +0.32
2018 48.6 91.5 +0.45 34.7 85.7 +1.16 11.1 74.1 -0.50 5.3 79.3 +0.08

Kikuchi’s fastball velocity was down in 2018 compared to 2017, but it was right in line with 2016, so is 2017 the outlier? Also, he used the fastball less than 50% of the time in 2018 — not coincidentally, his slider usage has been ticking up — so he’s embracing the anti-fastball lifestyle. Bottom line, Kikuchi has thrown roughly 85% fastballs and sliders the last three years. They are his go-to pitches.

The run values (R/100 is runs above average for every 100 pitches thrown) indicate his slider has been a true plus pitch the last three years. The fastball has been up-and-down — it’s not a coincidence his fastball posted its highest run value the year he had his best velocity — while the curve and change have been kinda okay. They’ve hovered right around average the last two years in small samples.

There are shockingly few videos available of 2018 Kikuchi. Instead, here’s video of an August 2017 start in which he struck out eleven and set a new NPB record by throwing a 98 mph fastball, the fastest ever by a left-hander. (I have no idea if the record still stands.) Come for Kikuchi looking nasty, stay for former Yankee Zelous Wheeler striking out three times on three different pitches:

If nothing else, the video shows that Kikuchi threw quite hard at one point and that his slider can be a devastating pitch. The slider Wheeler struck out on at the 0:54 mark is as nasty as any left-handed slider you’ll find in MLB. That’s an Andrew Miller at his best slider. A slider that good helps a fastball play better than its velocity.

Also, Kikuchi is into analytics, which is pretty cool. Specifically, he uses Trackman data (Statcast) to make sure his mechanics are where they need to be. Here’s what he told Jim Allen back in June:

“Now I check each game’s data with our analysts, three or four points, my release point, my extension and so on,” he said Saturday, a night after he threw seven scoreless innings against the Pacific League-rival Lotte Marines. “It allows me to make adjustments, and as I make adjustments and see how they go in games, I get a sense for where I need to be.”

“My release point has been higher recently. I noticed in my game against the Giants (on June 8). It turned out to be 9 centimeters higher than a year ago. I worked on that by tilting my torso slightly and got it down to around 3 cm higher than last year in my last start against Chunichi (June 15). I haven’t seen the data for last night’s game, but I would bet that in my final inning, I was within a centimeter of the release point I want, which is 167 cm.”

“In the past, all I had to rely on was video. This is completely different because just looking at a video didn’t give you an exact figure. In the end it was always about feel.”

Based on the written scouting reports, the numbers, and the little video we have, Kikuchi works with an average-ish MLB fastball that might even be a touch worse when he goes from the once-a-week NPB schedule to a once-every-fifth day MLB schedule, a knockout slider, and a show-me curveball and changeup. The slider is the key pitch. That’s the moneymaker.

Given the difference in styles of play, it is not unreasonable to expect Kikuchi’s strikeout rate to tick up once he moves to MLB. All the recent Japanese imports struck out more batters in their first MLB season than they did in their last NPB season:

  • Masahiro Tanaka: 22.3 K% to 26.0 K%
  • Kenta Maeda: 21.3 K% to 25.0 K%
  • Shohei Ohtani: 27.6 K% to 29.9 K%

The consensus is Kikuchi is a notch below Tanaka and Ohtani (and Yu Darvish) and closer to Maeda. Tanaka and Ohtani (and Darvish) were seen as potential aces. Maeda was more of a mid-rotation starter. That’s where Kikuchi is believed to fit. A mid-rotation guy rather than a rotation headliner. Mid-rotation starters are important! You need those guys. And hey, everyone could be wrong. Maybe Kikuchi will be an ace. It seems he’ll be something less than that though.

Injury History

MLB injury data is readily available. NPB injury data is not. Kikuchi does have an injury history — an arm injury history at that — and here’s what I’ve been able to piece together:

  • 2010: Missed entire season with shoulder trouble.
  • 2013: Missed part of the season with shoulder trouble.
  • 2016: Missed two months with a right side injury.
  • 2018: Missed time with shoulder tightness.

When the Yankees made the Paxton trade last week, he said the “good news, so far, is all the injuries I’ve had haven’t reoccurred.” Kikuchi’s injuries have been reoccurring. He’s missed time with shoulder problems in three different seasons now, including 2018, and they date all the way back to 2010. The side injury seems to be one time thing. Maybe he pulled an oblique or something? It happens. Ongoing shoulder trouble though? Eek.

I guess the good news is Kikuchi has not had surgery, as best I can tell. Once you start cutting into shoulders, things get messy. I’ve said this countless times before and I’m going to say it again: The best predictor of future injury is past injury. A guy like Kikuchi, who’s had shoulder trouble throughout his career, is probably going to have shoulder trouble again at some point going forward.

It’s worth nothing that, according to Joel Sherman, Kikuchi came to the United States two weeks ago to take a pre-signing physical. That’s standard nowadays. Tanaka, Maeda, and Ohtani all took a physical before being posted. That allowed teams to review their medical information up front and also save time later. The two sides won’t have to squeeze in a physical before the end of the negotiating period. Kikuchi’s shoulder will surely be scrutinized.

How Does The Posting System Work?

Late last week the Lions announced Kikuchi will be posted on Monday, December 3rd, and his 30-day negotiating period will begin on Wednesday, December 5th. It’ll end on Thursday, January 3rd. “My talks with my agent are moving forward, and we’ve concluded this is the best day to do it,” said Kikuchi to the Japan Times last week.

The posting system has undergone several revisions in recent years that have made it more favorable to MLB teams and more favorable to the player. NPB teams got hosed. Now the player gets 30 days to negotiate with all 30 teams like a true free agent. And the release fee, rather than be set by the player’s former team in Japan, is now a percentage of his contract. The release fee breakdown:

  • Contract worth $25M or less: 20% of total guarantee
  • Contract worth $25M to $50M: $5M plus 17.5% of guarantee over $25M
  • Contract worth $50M or more: $9.375M plus 15% of guarantee over $50M
  • Additional 15% of all bonuses and escalators earned, and options exercised

Let’s say that, hypothetically, Kikuchi signs a six-year deal worth $60M with $5M in bonuses per season and a $15M club option for a seventh year. The Lions would receive a $10.875M release fee up front ($9.375M plus 15% of the guarantee over $50M) plus potentially an extra $750,000 per year (15% of the $5M) if he maxes out his bonuses. And, if the $15M option is exercised, that’s another $2.25M down the line (15% of the option).

Long story short, Kikuchi will be able to negotiate with any team for a 30-day period, and the team that signs him has to pay a release fee as laid out above. Every team can afford it. They’re just really good at pretending they can’t. As far as the Yankees are concerned, only the contract counts against the luxury tax. The release fee does not. The same was true with Tanaka back in the day.

Contract Estimates

I don’t think any of the recent Japanese imports set a contract benchmark for Kikuchi. Tanaka was very highly regarded and that led to a seven-year, $155M contract. Maeda settled for eight years and $25M guaranteed with $81.5M (!) in workload bonuses due to a preexisting elbow injury. Ohtani was limited to a minor league contract because his age made him subject to MLB’s international spending rules. None fit as a Kikuchi benchmark.

It’s possible Hyun-Jin Ryu’s original six-year, $36M contract with the Dodgers could serve as a contract benchmark for Kikuchi, but keep in mind that contract was negotiated under a different posting system. Los Angeles placed the high bid for Ryu’s negotiating rights and he could only talk to them. He had limited leverage. Here are some Kikuchi contract estimates:

Two very different predictions! One is basically double the other in terms of annual salary. Split the difference and it’s five years and $10M per season. That would be a bargain for a 27-year-old lefty with a swing-and-miss slider who put up Kikuchi’s NPB numbers in MLB. Kikuchi didn’t put up his numbers in MLB though. He put them up in NPB and there’s an element of the unknown here. And there’s his history of shoulder trouble too.

I should mention that, because he was subject to the international spending rules, the Angels will get six years of control with Ohtani like any other rookie. I don’t believe that will be the case for Kikuchi, however, because he is not subject to those international rules. My reference here is Tony Barnette. Texas acquire Barnette from the Yakult Swallows through the posting system in December 2015 and signed him to a two-year deal with an option. They declined the option last offseason and he became a free agent despite having only two years of service time.

Because of that, I think Kikuchi will become a free agent after the contract he signs this winter expires regardless of service time. If he signs a four-year deal, he’ll become a free agent in four years, etc. Not counting Ohtani, five NPB starting pitchers have come to MLB through the posting system. All five received at least four years and four of the five received at least five years. Kikuchi’s going to get good term this offseason. His contract will have some length to it. The dollars? Who knows.

Does He Make Sense For The Yankees?

Man, I don’t know. On one hand, a 27-year-old southpaw who misses bats would fit nicely into that open rotation slot. Especially since his contract could be (will likely be) a bargain compared to what a similar MLB pitcher would get in free agency. Even if Kikuchi is a third or fourth starter long-term, a guy who settles in around +2 WAR per year, that’s someone worth bringing into the organization. Those guys are tougher to find than you’d think.

On the other hand, Kikuchi has no MLB track record and a history of shoulder problems, and that’s always scary. And the Yankees wouldn’t just be bringing him over into MLB either. They’d be bringing him into Yankee Stadium and the AL East, and that might be the most pitcher unfriendly environment in baseball. Every pitcher is risky. Kikuchi carries additional risk given his injury history and lack of an MLB track record. For a guy who might top out as a mid-rotation starter, it might be a little too much risk for a win now team.

The Yankees did scout Kikuchi this past season. How much? We don’t know, exactly. The Yankees were all over Tanaka in the weeks and months leading up to his posting. The rumors started in May 2013, eight months before Tanaka was actually posted. We haven’t seen nearly as many reports about Kikuchi now as Tanaka back then. That doesn’t mean the Yankees aren’t interested in Kikuchi. It just means there are fewer reports about it. They might be keeping things closer to the vest.

Also, we don’t know anything about Kikuchi’s preferences. Does he want to go a contender? The West Coast? A small market? Wherever the largest contract offer comes from? I’m not sure anyone except Kikuchi, his family, and his agent (Scott Boras), know that. As we learned with Ohtani last year, the Yankees could be ruled out before the chase even begins. Kikuchi may prefer an entirely different situation. I guess we’ll find out.

Personally, I prefer signing Corbin or even Happ to signing Kikuchi. I am intrigued by the possibility of nabbing a younger Corbin on a smaller contract, but, ultimately, the history of shoulder trouble scares me, and I think the Yankees need more of a sure thing. They are ready to win and need players they are reasonably certain can help them win right now. Kikuchi is too much of an unknown for my liking.

Saturday Links: Severino, Corbin, Kikuchi, Stanton

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(Getty)

This is one of my least favorite times of the year. The Yankees have been eliminated but other teams are still playing baseball. Sucks. Anyway, here are some notes to check out.

Yankees believe Severino was tipping pitches

According to Jon Heyman, several people with the Yankees believe Luis Severino was tipping his pitches in Game Three of the ALDS earlier this week. “The Red Sox had his pitches,” said one Yankees official. Heyman adds the Yankees heard “chatter” from Red Sox people about Severino tipping his pitches, presumably after the series. Ben Harris (subs. req’d) found evidence of the pitch-tipping. With a runner on second, Severino would pause to look at third base when throwing a fastball, even when there was no runner at third base to check. Huh.

There has been on-and-off speculation about Severino tipping his pitches for weeks now. Basically the entire second half. I usually shrug at this stuff because it seems every time a good pitcher struggles, the first explanation is “he must be tipping his pitches.” It’s possible Severino was tipping! I mean, Harris found evidence of it. That said, tipping pitches doesn’t explain the decline in velocity, the crummy command, and the sudden lack of bite on his slider. Tipping pitches would be the best possible outcome here. That is an easy fix, theoretically. It seems to me something else was going on though.

Yankees expected to pursue Corbin

We can file this under no duh: The Yankees are expected to pursue free agent lefty Patrick Corbin this offseason, reports Heyman. They’ve been after him for a while — the Yankees tried to get him at the Winter Meetings last year — and Corbin is a native (upstate) New Yorker who has been pretty open about wanting to play for the Yankees. This isn’t the first time we’ve heard the Yankees like Corbin and it won’t be the last.

Corbin, 29, just wrapped up his best season in the big leagues. He threw 200 innings on the nose with a 3.15 ERA (2.47 FIP) and excellent strikeout (30.8%), walk (6.0%), and ground ball (48.5%) rates. His home run rate dropped from 1.30 HR/9 (16.6 HR/FB%) from 2016-17 to 0.68 HR/9 (11.1 HR/FB%) in 2019. Also, weirdly enough, Corbin was second in MLB in hard contact allowed. That’s generally a bad thing. We’re going to look at Corbin more in-depth at some point for sure. I think 2018 was likely his career year. I also think that he’s very good, that he’s the best starting pitcher on the free agent market, and that he would unquestionably make the Yankees better.

Kikuchi will be posted


The Seibu Lions in Japan will indeed post southpaw Yusei Kikuchi this offseason, report Sankei Sports and Sports Hochi. Kikuchi has not been posted yet. He can’t be posted until after the World Series. Technically, he can only be posted between November 1st and December 5th. Once he’s posted, he gets a 30-day window to negotiate with any and all MLB teams, and the signing team pays Seibu a release fee. Here’s the new release fee system:

  • Contract worth $25M or less: 20% of total guarantee
  • Contract worth $25M and $50M: $5M plus 17.5% of amount over $25M
  • Contract worth $50M: $9.375M plus 15% of amount over $50M

The Yankees have reportedly been scouting Kikuchi. The 27-year-old threw 163.2 innings with a 3.08 ERA and a 23.4% strikeout rate this past season, and that’s in a league with an 18.9% average strikeout rate. (The MLB strikeout rate was 22.3% in 2018.) Kikuchi has a history of arm problems and he’s not considered a potential ace on par with Yu Darvish, Masahiro Tanaka, and Shohei Ohtani when they were posted. He is quite good though, and he is only 27, and the Yankees need starters. The Kikuchi situation will be something to watch this offseason.

Stanton among finalists for Hank Aaron Award

Earlier this month MLB announced each team’s finalist for the 2018 Hank Aaron Award, which is given annually the top hitter in each league. Giancarlo Stanton is the Yankees’ finalist. Here are all 30 finalists. The winner will be announced during the World Series and is selected through a combination of fan and media voting. (The fan voting closed already. Sorry I didn’t pass along the link sooner.)

The Hank Aaron Award was introduced in 1999 and so far only two Yankees have won it: Derek Jeter (2006, 2009) and Alex Rodriguez (2007). Would’ve have guessed Jeter won it twice and A-Rod once, but here we are. Stanton won the Hank Aaron Award in 2014 and 2017 with the Marlins. The Hank Aaron Award tends to favor old school stats like hits and runs and batted in. My guess is J.D. Martinez or Mike Trout will win it in the American League.