Ben Sheets: done for year? (Merged: Sheets with a torn flexor mass muscle? / reply#15ish)

[Ennder]

Yeah I would say they still offer him arbitration for sure. It just increases the chances that he is a Brewer next year and not a Yankee or whatever.

 

There is obviously some conflicting information here. Is it no big deal and just needs rest or is it a career threatening injury. Seems like there is a pretty huge gap between those two opinions, heh.

[twobrewers]

Losing those draft picks would really hurt.

This significantly increases the chance of Sheets being a Milwaukee Brewer next year.

[DHonks]

what about Sheets as closer? Then he can go 98 mph all the time, and only have two pitches.

[SoCal Brew Crew Fan]

I would think he'd still get arby. The question is will anyone still sign him. He may be looking at a much lower deal...especially in length. In that case, he might be better off accepting arby or signing a 1 year deal with the Brewers and improving his worth for the next contract. I'd love to keep him for another year...the upside is huge if he stays healthy. He would once again be pitching for a contract.

[DuWayne Steurer]

But since it's different from all his other injuries, it's not a big deal.

[JJHardy7]

So they knew he was hurt and Yost sent him out for 120 pitches and then 113 pitches(in only 6 innings so they were high stress pitches) and then he wasn't able to finish another start. Is this a smart game plan? I'm so glad Yost is gone.

 

Did him pitching hurt him more? I'm not a doctor and I didn't stay at a Holiday Inn Express last night so I have no clue. If it did hurt him more (ie went from a minor thing to a career type thing), than we need some new trainers/medical staff. I don't blame Yost for it too much because my guess is he just asked Sheets/training staff what the deal was. If he was told it could potentially ruin his career, he's an idiot and to a certain degree Sheets is too.

[Hate those Rodents]

I'm not gung ho on the draft picks anyway. I'd much rather offer him arby and have him accept and deal with the uncertainty than offer him arby and have him sign elsewhere (with the decent chance that he pitches like the ace we will be without or overpaying for in prospects/players).

[rousieboy]

He gets arby'd and more than likely signs a one year deal for 12 million plus 3 more tied to IP...he might not get 15mil annually elsewhere but might after 2009...

[clancyphile]

I'd still offer him arby.

I'll go further - I'd give him a Suppan-type deal before it came down to arby.

 

The Crew would have to be VERY DARN careful, but 30 starts of sheets is still a good bargain at $10 million per year.

[cbsquirrel]

Ok, there are really 5 superficial flexor muscles in the forearm: pronator teres, flexor carpi radialis, palmaris longus, flexor carpi ulnaris, flexor digitorum superficialis. All of these muscles have a common point of attachment in the elbow, the medial epicondyle of the humerus - When your palm is facing up, the bump on your elbow closest to your body. Your palmaris longus is pretty worthless, so let's forget about that for now.

Your flexor digitorum is a flexor of your digits (fingers), and it flexes the proximal interphlangeal joint, the first joint in your fingers past your palm.
The flexor carpi radialis, flexor carpi ulnaris (and palmaris longus) flex your wrist.
The pronator teres pronates your forearm, that is rotating your hand from palm up to palm down.

If Sheets completely tore the common tendon insertion, that is a huge deal. If it is just a partial tear, obviously less of a concern. The other big problem is that these muscles stabilize your Ulnar Collateral Ligament, which is the ligament fixed in TOMMY JOHN. http://forum.brewerfan.net/images/smilies/frown.gif

[RobertR]

Assuming that it's not completely torn and can heal short-term, I'm not so sure that the best case scenario for the Brewers isn't Sheets accepting arby and a one year deal. Who are you going to get that's even close to as good as Sheets that's not going to want 4 years, $40+ (50+?) million? Heck, Kyle Lohse probably sets the baseline and I'll take Sheets on a one year deal over that any day.

 

Sheets, Gallardo, Parra, Suppan, Bush and no reason to push Jeffress is a good situation to start a season in.

 

Robert

[WisconsinSportsRule]

Knowing that he has had this torn mucle since late August and him trying to work through it, gives me some new found respect for Ben. He did whatever he could to fight through it, but he couldn't quite hang on. Here we thought he couldn't pitch because he broke a nail, but he actually had a torn mass muscle.

 

Hats off to Ben for his effort.

[mothershipconnection]

I think we can still safely offer arbitration (without being a doctor who fully understands his outlook) as someone with deep pockets will want to lock him up and offer a multi-year deal which pays much less in 09 than in subsequent years.

[JJHardy7]

I think we can still safely offer arbitration (without being a doctor who fully understands his outlook) as someone with deep pockets will want to lock him up and offer a multi-year deal which pays much less in 09 than in subsequent years.

 

I'm starting to wonder if there was some type of 'agreement' between Sheets and the Brewers about at least getting offered arby. I haven't heard it from any of the players yet, but my gut is telling me the Brewers gave Sheets some level of security pitching with this. Again, I have no clue if him pitching 'hurt it more' in terms of a recovery. I'm down with offering Sheets arby or even a 3 year deal.

[dadofandrew]

It's a muscle tear that will heal with rest...just no chance to rest in October.

 

Arby is a no brainer. Why you'd offer him a long-term deal with yet another injury is beyond me.

[BrewCrewRising]

No way do I offer him a multi year deal. I think it's safe to say he is injury prone by now. You can say that X% of the injuries were flukes, but after enough stints on the DL, I think the type of injury becomes insignificant. It becomes harder and harder to insure the guy against loss of services based on loss of service time alone.

 

The best case scenario is to offer him arby and hope somebody else signs him. He won't be ready by opening day next year I'm guessing, so any contract is not going to have a good return on investment if it is short term (< 3 years).

 

Second best case secnario is he accepts arby, nobody signs him and he heals fairly quickly. Then we have a good pitcher for a year to help compete next year, or else we have somebody to trade at the deadline.

 

I think any signing over a year is just a risky move. Even if you're still thinking in terms of trade bait, you're still exposed to a great amount of risk there based on the injury, and the history of injuries.

 

All of course in my humble opinion.

[Fatter than Joey]

Assuming that it's not completely torn and can heal short-term, I'm not so sure that the best case scenario for the Brewers isn't Sheets accepting arby and a one year deal.

 

Exactly -- I would be all for Sheets at 1 year for any dollar amount. -- If we can give Gagne $10M for one year, I am not sure why we can't give Sheets $15M+ -- The other thing to keep in mind, is that Sheets contract would not be guaranteed either -- they could cut him in Spring Training if they had to.

[TheCrew07]

Boo... combining the threads cost me my post, I'll give it another go.

 

How is this even remotely Ned's fault? Dale just pitched him on Saturday as well, and I'm sure he wouldn't do it again knowing how that turned out. This is on the training staff, and like the Yo topic from earlier this year, the training staff has all the power. The Brewers are paying their team physician and training staff quite a sum of money to make these calls, and make them 100% accurately. In my opinion this is squarely on the shoulders of the training staff and Ben himself. I grow weary of this revisionist history pitch count theory... any of those extra innings that Sheets or Sabathia pitched may have been the difference in getting to the playoffs. We simply don't know what the outcomes would have been, nor will we ever, and we can't have it both ways, it came down to Playoffs or not? I was firmly in the camp that 2008 didn't have to be the year, and I was in the minority. Ultimately the difference was a single win... yea the bullpen was okay, but they weren't leaned on all that heavily, and the guys in the pen were awfully inconsistent over the course of the season save Torres, who faltered in September. It's easy to say this 4 run lead would have held up or that 3 run lead would have held, but we simply don't know if that's true or not. Would any of us honestly go back and possibly change the outcome now? Would it have even made a difference?

 

The only reason this was even discussed initially was because of lame PAP, which is the most backwards metric in all of sports as it penalizes players for being healthy and effective. Look at the list, all of the top pitchers in baseball are "abused"? Really? PAP is the poster child for the down side of sabermetrics... it's an arbitrary metric tossed around like it's "truth" when the only thing PAP really tells anyone is who the most effective SPs in baseball are and nothing more.

 

From where I'm sitting this isn't good for either side, and I sincerely hope it works out for both parties. I wouldn't mind Ben back on a 1 year deal, but I don't want him back for 4. He hasn't been healthy in 4 years and I don't see any logic in the Brewers paying 16-18 million for 170 innings... no matter how good they are. Furthermore as this team has the chance to be a contender in the immediate future, Ben's first half greatness doesn't help the team in crunch time or the post season if he's unable to take the ball. I'm not saying wins in April don't matter, I'm saying the end goal is a championship, and there's no team in Baseball that can afford to go to the World Series without their best talent.

[JJHardy7]

Arby is a no brainer. Why you'd offer him a long-term deal with yet another injury is beyond me.

 

I don't know what you consider long-term Al. I'd do 3 years...if the money was right (ie Brewers potentially get a type of bargain and Sheets gets some type of security). It's all speculation know, but a 3 year deal under $30 million would be fine by me if he's going to recover in a decent amount of time. Is there a chance of this? Who knows.

[rluzinski]

Was there other information that said this could potentially hinder him in 2009? The quote from earlier in the thread seems pretty clear:

 

"It's a very easy heal -- it just takes time," Ash said.

 

"Short-term, it's not good," Sheets said. "Long-term [estimate] would be fine. I was glad it wasn't something that it's short- and long-term. ...

 

If the Brewers are lucky, teams don't want to give Sheets a long term deal and he decides to accept the arbitration. I don't want Sheets in a long term deal but I sure as heck would take him on a one year deal, though.

 

If he's good for 175 innings and 3.25 ERA, he'll earn his money.

[DuWayne Steurer]

If he's good for 175 innings and 3.25 ERA, he'll earn his money.

How much longer can Ben avoid the crippling injury that ends a season? I think at this point it's safe to say that Benny's dodging bullets, and he's about to be on the wrong side of 30. He can't keep having these "fluke" injuries and expect to just miss a start here or there.

 

The Brewers will always have to spend carefully, and I wonder how much longer Ben's risk/reward meter will swing on the favorable side. We're not always going to have the luxury of having a 7 deep rotation (with someone like McClung or Villy in the pen) to fill in.

 

I absolutely agree that 175 innings of what Benny gives you is worth 13-14-15 mil per, but I'm hesitant to believe that we can expect those kinds of innings from Benny going forward.

[sbrylski]

Everyone seems to be assuming he'll be ready to go for OD next season. Is this the case? It sounds like he could be out longer than that, hence my assumption that arbitration is a route we won't take.

[rluzinski]

I absolutely agree that 175 innings of what Benny gives you is worth 13-14-15 mil per, but I'm hesitant to believe that we can expect those kinds of innings from Benny going forward.

 

I'm hesitant to just assume that a pitcher with a checkered injury history has a higher probability of a catastrophic injury. It's a reasonable theory, so you may be right. I know that projection systems generally just use some kind of average IP from previous years to estimate the following season. That might be a lazy guestimation or it might be the best way to do it.

 

I know that any pitcher runs a risk of blowing out his arm. There are countless examples of guys who were the model of health ending their careers in as second. I also know that there are players who get the dreaded "injury prone' label at some point in their career and go on to be the model of health. I guess I'm not willing to presume anything with regard to injury history. It seems terribly unpredictable.

 

175 IP might be too high an assumption on my part, though. Let's adjust that down to something more conservative. A year and a half ago, one of the authors of "The Book" said this about Sheets:

 

"This guy would be the best 30-and-under pitcher to hit the free agent market since.... I don't know when.* The injury factor is huge. He's basically a +.25 WAR [wins above reserve]per 9IP pitcher. Multiply that by something between 14 and 22 "full games", making him between +3.5 and +5.5 WAR .

 

* Sabathia? http://forum.brewerfan.net/images/smilies/smile.gif

 

I don't think Sheets has done anything to hurt that WAR projection, so lets run with it. 14 full starts is 126 innings. I think that is pretty conservative, so we'll use that. Look up 1 year, 3.5 WAR here:

 

http://www.tangotiger.net/salary2008.html

 

Add about 10%, since that was for last off season, and you get that production being worth about $17 mil on the the open market in a 1 year deal. If the Brewers could get him for that, I'd be be very happy. And if he ends up pitching 175-200 innings, he's an absolute steal. If the Brewers flop, you could still trade him.

 

I wouldn't even consider signing him to a long term deal.

[TheCrew07]

When I mentioned 170 innings, I was thinking that was an average best case scenario for the 4 years, I should have made that more clear. I'm on board for a 1 year deal as already mentioned, 1 year doesn't bother me at all.

[DuWayne Steurer]

Russ, I agree (again) that a part time Benny is a lot better than a lot of the guys that will give you 30 6 inning starts. And you're right, some guys that are injury prone shake the label, and some guys who have avoided the DL for a long time will suddenly run into problems. The predictability factor is pretty shaky.

 

That being said, I still think you can look at Ben as *more* of a risk than someone who's been relatively healthy. Some people have pointed out that because all of his injuries are to different parts of his body that he's just been unlucky, and not necessarily "injury prone". I disagree with that, but I can at least see the merit of the argument.