Corey Hart avoids arbitration - 1 year, 3.25 million

[Crazyk1294]

Per TH...

 

http://www.jsonline.com/blogs/sports/39746477.html

 

EDIT: Details. -PF

[CportBadger]

Settles at midpoint of $3.25M.

[sgtcluels]

Will this some how make him more patient at the plate?

[brewtank34]

Three cheers for Hart! Where's the love? We got our squad now!

Congrats Cory!

[Tbadder]

I like that they got this done. I hate it when a player goes to arby. But I also think he got more than he deserved.

[DocLuna7]

Doug Melvin continues his streak of not going to arbitration while Milwaukee's GM. Congrats to both Cory and Doug. I was really hoping that we could avoid the drama of a hearing.

[BrewCrewRising]

I understand the benefits of not going to arby, but I wonder if it gets to a point that it allows the players' agents to take advantage of you a little bit. You could almost hedge by asking for a little more than you normally would, knowing Melvin will meet you half way.

 

Of course, I'm assuming that the club always offers the figures before the players do, and that you can never ask for an exorbitant amount knowing that the team could call your bluff and ensuring you'd lose in the arbitration hearing.

 

I'm glad for the lack of drama, but I'm still annoyed with Hart for how much he sucked at the end of last season.

[Invader3K]

I think Corey could end up earning that this year. Discounting the last month and half or so of last season, he had a pretty good year. I chalk up part of last season to the usual sophomore slump most guys go through. I mean, last year was really only his second full season in the majors.

[CheezWizHed]

My hats off to Melvin. I thought for sure that this was the year to break his string of non-arby hearings.... Of course, I was sure it was going to be Fielder to do it, but Hart sounded pretty set on going also.

[MessiahRp]

Okay so now that all of the arby stuff has been figured out do we know how much the payroll is going to be? I'm interested to see how much it was last year vs. what it will be this year.

 

Rp

[And That]

I have the salary total at ~$88.6 mil, which includes a $3.5 mil salary for Gagne. If he doesn't make the team, or get his $2 mil of reachable incentives, the total would go down by that amount. I also included the $750K that Looper is likely to receive between starts 19 and 30.

 

http://images.yuku.com/image/jpeg/b753524d40bf9ea2df5b96eb20741c5291eb2e2.jpg

 

The listed opening day payroll last year was $80.9 mil, though figuring in salaries likely to be paid during the year, it was closer to $84 or 85 mil.

[Invader3K]

Hard to complain about an $88 million payroll. I imagine this puts them roughly in the middle of the pack? Hopefully they still have some flexibility to make a mid-season move if the right opportunity comes along.

[MJLiverock]

Now hopefully he doesn't fall in a well like the entire perioed after the all star break, he wasn' t just bad in September it was July, August, and September. If he hadn't hit 8 HR in June that month would have looked bad too with the .292 OBP he put then as well.

 

G AB R H 2B 3B HR RBI BB K SB CS AVG OBP SLG OPS

Pre-All Star 93 357 48 103 26 3 15 58 17 66 13 3 .289 .327 .504 .831

Post-All Star 64 255 28 61 19 3 5 33 10 43 10 4 . 239 .263 .396 .659

[Tbadder]

About the salaries as they stand (thanks for listing And That). Boy, there's food for thought here. Would you trade Kendal for Looper if they were on different teams? Just how bad is Suppan's contract? Couldn't Villy do Hoffman's job? Wouldn't salary dumps be advisable for Hall and Riske (assuming one could do that)? For the money, Weeks is still worth looking at, but what about next year? If the right trade comes along aren't the Brewers obligated to trade Cameron (just in terms of financial stability)? Just think what Melvin could do if Cameron, Suppan, Riske, and Hall weren't on the team!

 

(edit: excessive punctuation --1992)

[Invader3K]

Obligated to trade Cameron? No. If he performs similar to last season, he will actually be worth about what his contract is.

 

Riske isn't that expensive...and while it would be nice to trade Hall, I doubt any team would take him right now without the Brewers eating a good chunk of his salary. I won't even bother talking about Suppan, since his contract has already been discussed ad nauseum on this forum.

[liveforoctober]

Seriously... Suppan's contract kills me.

 

I hear Suppan is a nice guy, and $12.5 million dollars is a lot of money. Can't he give a portion of that back to the club to give us some room to make some in season moves? Making 12.5, he won't miss 3 million dollars... but it would help the club immensely.

 

I wish players would do that... turn around and offer the ballclub an incentive laden deal. "If we have the division lead June 1st, I'll give $500,000 back to the team. If we are in the NL top 5 in team ERA at the all-star break... I'll give back 1 million..."

 

Wishful thinking.

[Ennder]

Just think what Melvin could do if Cameron, Suppan, Riske, and Hall weren't on the team!

 

Well he'd have to sign a SP and a CF and that would probably either eat half of the money or we'd be downgrading at the postiion. Then he'd have to find a 3B. In the end we'd have something like $4M-5M extra dollars sitting around.

 

Cameron earned his salary last year and Suppan when healthy earns at least part of his. Hall could easily earn his with even a small improvement at the plate. Riske I dunno what to think since he's had such odd peripheral stats to ERA in his career.

[1992casey]

I understand the benefits of not going to arby, but I wonder if it gets to a point that it allows the players' agents to take advantage of you a little bit. You could almost hedge by asking for a little more than you normally would, knowing Melvin will meet you half way.

 

It's a pretty objective science. Agents and GMs both know what a player is worth, and they know which figures they can get away with submitting. If a player asks for too much or a GM offers too little, their side would be hurt in a hearing. They're going to be careful with their figures.

 

The wild card is that an arbitrator awards a non-guaranteed contract. I think you often see settlements just below the midpoint because the player will end up being guaranteed. In this case, I don't think whether or not the contract was going to be guaranteed was much of a factor. I think everyone knows that Corey is going to stick with the team through spring training.

[Invader3K]

I wonder if the Brewers could approach Suppan about possibly deferring some of his current salary. Of course, that would only be if they had to do that, like if the opportunity came up to sign someone who would be an obvious immediate improvement to the current ball club. I can't see something like that playing out at this juncture.

 

Frankly, the thing about Suppan is that his salary this year doesn't look bad if he's at least adequate...they still have to pay him the same amount next season.

[jhpc12]

Now hopefully he doesn't fall in a well like the entire perioed after the all star break, he wasn' t just bad in September it was July, August, and September. If he hadn't hit 8 HR in June that month would have looked bad too with the .292 OBP he put then as well.

 

G AB R H 2B 3B HR RBI BB K SB CS AVG OBP SLG OPS

Pre-All Star 93 357 48 103 26 3 15 58 17 66 13 3 .289 .327 .504 .831

Post-All Star 64 255 28 61 19 3 5 33 10 43 10 4 . 239 .263 .396 .659

It just irrates me when people don't look at the whole pitcure.

 

I agree if you take his numbers from all star break til the end of the season that's what you get. But the kid had a three week slump, not a from all star break slump. Now I agree I hope he works on plate discipline during Spring Training to bring up is OBP, but everything else seems to work out to at or above league average.

 

His actual numbers from all star break to Sept 5th were actual pretty good.

AB R H 2B 3B HR RBI TB BB K SB CS AVE. OBP SLG OPS

179 25 51 16 2 5 25 87 7 11 9 2 .285 .312 .480 .792

So pretty much everyone on this forum wants to give up on him for 3 WEEKS.

 

I just don't see it. He is dedicated player who works to improve constantly. Was in camp without a contract because it was the right thing to do.

 

And everyone on here remembers 3 weeks.

[Roderick]

I assume the $5.4M of salaries unlikely to be paid represents the people sent to the minors that will not make $400K. Confirm?

 

What represents the $6.75M of salaries likely to be paid this year other than Gagne? September callup pay? Incentives? - you mentioned Looper and I see you put Hoffman's total pay assuming incentives earned already.

[MJLiverock]

I guess I just don't call a .312 obp good. He put up a .292 OBP for the month of June. I just don't agree he had a bad 3 weeks. He had a horrible 3 weeks and a pretty weak 3 or 4 months. His OBP for June through September was .277, even throwing out his atrocious September he only averaged an OBP of .302 for June, July, and August. Those are pretty terrible numbers for a corner outfielder and for a lot longer than just a 3 week period.

 

I still can't believe I see posts where people want this guy to lead off over Weeks.

[And That]

I assume the $5.4M of salaries unlikely to be paid represents the people sent to the minors that will not make $400K. Confirm?

Yes, but it's a rough guess.

 

What represents the $6.75M of salaries likely to be paid this year other than Gagne? September callup pay? Incentives? - you mentioned Looper and I see you put Hoffman's total pay assuming incentives earned already.

 

I estimated $2.5 mil for contracts for call-ups and new contracts, which is probably on the high side when combined with the contracts unlikely to be paid. The rest of it is Gagne and Looper's incentives. I put Hoffman's incentives in with his salary, but they shouldn't be there. I just work on this as I get a few moments here and there. This season I'm going to try and see how closely I get what the Brewers actually spend on players, as opposed to just a snapshot of the team salary at any given moment.

 

Anywho, back to Corey Hart.

[TooLiveBrew]

So pretty much everyone on this forum wants to give up on him for 3 WEEKS.

 

While I understand there's some hyperbole being employed here, the biggest stretch imo is claiming it was just 3 weeks. Hart struggled for much of the 2008 season in terms of not making outs. .310 OBP or worse for 4 of the 6 months of the season.

[Ralph Wiggum]

I think everyone can agree that this is a HUGE year for Corey. He needs to improve several areas of his game in order to reach the high potential he has. Obviously OBP is the biggest, and much of that is a lack of plate discipline. Hopefully Svuem can get through to Hart (and Bill Hall, and Rickie Weeks) and get him to wait for his pitch, instead of flailing away at pitches outside the zone. I believe that Hart has the potential to be a 30-35 HR, 110 RBI, 30 SB player, which would make him a perennial All-Star and one of the most valuable OFs in the game.