Brewers Decline Looper's Option

[logan82]

If they offer arby and he accepts, he'd be guaranteed at least 80% of last year's salary

 

That only applies to players who are pre-free agency.

 

even things as simple as talking with John Lackey's agent go a long way.

 

I wouldn't read to much into that. My guess is that if you are an agent and have a pitcher as a client, Melvin talked to you. Lackey is 31 and a type A free agent. I want no part of a $10M+ per year deal for a guy that age over the next 4-5 years while having to give up our 2nd round pick.(We are in the top half of the draft order so our 1st is protected.)

[filthyfrog]

If they offer arby and he accepts, he'd be guaranteed at least 80% of last year's salary

 

That only applies to players who are pre-free agency.

 

I wondered about that after I typed it - thanks for the correction. The point still stands that Looper could potentially earn a raise through arby and even if not, the risk is very real that his arbitrated salary plus the $1M buyout would be more than $6.5M.

[trwi7]

Can't imagine anyone being upset about this. He was awful last year, even if we want him back, there's no way we should've paid that much. He's going to be getting much less than that.

[davego]

My only real concern with this is DM has to come up with someone that is equal to Looper for about the same cash. That certainly can be done, but to me he is putting himself a bit behind the 8-ball in trying to replace Looper (I assume Suppon) and still build more depth then we had in '09.

[logan82]

If they offer arby and he accepts, he'd be guaranteed at least 80% of last year's salary

 

That only applies to players who are pre-free agency.

 

I wondered about that after I typed it - thanks for the correction. The point still stands that Looper could potentially earn a raise through arby and even if not, the risk is very real that his arbitrated salary plus the $1M buyout would be more than $6.5M.

Just for future reference, Cot's Contracts has a link to the CBA and crib notes on it.

 

My only real concern with this is DM has to come up with someone that is equal to Looper for about the same cash. That certainly can be done, but to me he is putting himself a bit behind the 8-ball in trying to replace Looper (I assume Suppon) and still build more depth then we had in '09.

 

I know, before we probably wanted 2 guys for depth and now we need one more to fill out the rotation. 3 pitchers unless we are counting on Burns, Narveson or some other minor league guy.

[thebruce44]

Looper wasn't one of the worst pitchers in the majors last year...he was the worst. And nothing about his peripherals suggests he will bounce back or that it was bad luck. He was just all around horrible.

[RockCoCougars]

Smart move. By the end of year, he looked Suppan-esque out there. Looked like he was throwing batting practice, and a good chunk of his outs were atom balls and line drives. This is a great move as long as the money isn't wasted on a guy like Washburn or Davis.

[TooLiveBrew]

Glad to see this move. Like others have stated, sure it's great to free up more salary room, but there's no guarantee said salary room will be used properly. If this moves winds up essentially making room for Doug Davis, I'll pull my hair out. However, if you look at the cumulative $ freed up from the Hardy/Gomez swap & this move, it's ~ a touch under $20M at this point. Melvin has surely given himself a good amount of wiggle room to make things happen, and that's of course the first step.

[joepepsi]

Over his last 196 starts (2004-2009) Davis' ERA is 4.12. Last year his ERA was 4.12. He averaged 6 ip over those 196 starts. Yes, his peripherals stink in general, but they always have. That's what makes him difficult to project. Despite the high walk rate, the middling K rate, the hit per inning pitch rate, he is remarkably consistent, annually proving his peripherals wrong.

 

In short, he is no Braden Looper. Nor is he a "Suppan-type". Suppan's ERA from 2004-2009 is 4.43, but the last 3 years his ERA is 4.93. Davis' is 4.22 over the last 3. Davis is still an effective pitcher.

 

I honestly don't know if he'd be a good choice for the Brewers, but I wish people would quit lumping him with replacement level performance. Just saying Davis is another Suppan doesn't make it so.

[pitchleague]

I want no part of a $10M+ per year deal for a guy that age over the next 4-5 years while having to give up our 2nd round pick.(We are in the top half of the draft order so our 1st is protected.)

Correct me if I'm wrong but aren't most free-agent pitcher about "that age?" Since they can't be free-agent until after 6 years in the bigs, and many pitchers reach the big at age 24, on average, then wouldn't most (note: I didn't say all) free-agent pitchers be, on average, 30 years old (or older, with a sprinkling of younger ones)?

 

With that said, 31 years old for Lackey is not all that bad. Plus, look at all the top-notch pitchers that have continued to pitch well into their mid-30s. Yes, he has an injury history but he's the best there is this season in a very weak free-agent market.

 

Next year is supposedly a much better year for free-agency. But won't that also mean that the big-market teams will be gobbling up those players even faster with even bigger offers that Milwaukee won't be able to top? I fear that the 2010 free-agency period (next November thru January) is going to be rough for the Brewers to get any of those bigger-named free-agents because of this. I hope that I am wrong.

 

On topic, I'm pretty glad that they got rid of Looper, too. He was servicable but he just allowed too many long balls, in my opinion. And offered them up in the most inopportune times (I still can't believe he gave up that big lead in Florida back in June.) I think we all knew he was going to be average at best but more likely mediocre; and that's what we got.

 

I've heard he's a heck of a guy, though so I hope that everything works out for him. I'm sure he will land a job. Whether it is Kansas City or Pittsburgh is the question. But don't be surprised if he were to return to St. Louis in one way or another.

[endaround]

The issue is that if you want two starters you need room for two starters. That means that even if you're willing to move Suppan to the bullpen as your #6 starter you have to make a decision between keeping Bush or Looper since their cost is basically the same. To me that's Bush easily given his age and his K rate.

[Hate those Rodents]

Over his last 196 starts (2004-2009) Davis' ERA is 4.12. Last year his ERA was 4.12. He averaged 6 ip over those 196 starts. Yes, his peripherals stink in general, but they always have. That's what makes him difficult to project. Despite the high walk rate, the middling K rate, the hit per inning pitch rate, he is remarkably consistent, annually proving his peripherals wrong.

 

In short, he is no Braden Looper. Nor is he a "Suppan-type". Suppan's ERA from 2004-2009 is 4.43, but the last 3 years his ERA is 4.93. Davis' is 4.22 over the last 3. Davis is still an effective pitcher.

 

I honestly don't know if he'd be a good choice for the Brewers, but I wish people would quit lumping him with replacement level performance. Just saying Davis is another Suppan doesn't make it so.

Agreed with the above. I am basically bypassing all of the Davis negativity posts. I'm confident that I personally and probably most all brewer fans will be happy with what he does for us if signed.

[Ennder]

Looper wasn't one of the worst pitchers in the majors last year...he was the worst. And nothing about his peripherals suggests he will bounce back or that it was bad luck. He was just all around horrible.

Loopers xFIP was more or less exactly the same as the 5 previous seasons, his peripherals didn't change just randomness in ERA did.

 

His 5 year run of xFIP is now...

 

4.85

4.33

4.93

4.59

4.90

 

He is a 4.50-5.00 ERA type so no big loss, but to say that last year he was somehow much worse than previous years just isn't true.

 

As for Doug Davis, he isn't a very good pitcher. He is basically Suppan right before we signed him, same basic peripherals(more K, more BB of course but same composite ERA). His xFIP pattern is 4.91, 4.72, 4.46, 4.78 the past 4 years. Davis has had a lot of luck stranding runners which might just be random, might be that he is one of the rare players who have a skill for it. Riske was one of those rare types too and that didn't work out so well, usually it is just luck or playing on teams with good RP.

 

If we are signing Davis for significantly more than we would have given Looper it isn't helping the team at all. He is probably a little better but not by much. Using ERA to talk about how good or bad a pitcher is, is about the same as using RBI or AVG for hitters. A good defense, good bullpen, pitchers park, easier division etc is going to have a huge effect on ERA. It is a team stat, not an individual one.

[Team Canada]

Agree with many of the above posts, I was hoping Doug would do this. Looper is bad and I'm glad I won't have to watch him give up homerun after homerun next year.

[endaround]

Yes if we pretend that Looper giving up so many home runs was being "unlucky" instead of him losing velocity and control then he's only far below average instead of the worst starting pitcher in the major leagues not named Suppan.

 

Neyer on the move:

 

http://espn.go.com/blog/sweetspot/post?id=1376

 

EDIT: Activated link

[silversurferr]

Cannot stand Davis (as a pitcher. Very nice man, however). Davis is as bad as Suppan and Looper. Trade for Vazquez. Sign Harden or Sheets. Do not sign Davis or Washburn.

[rluzinski]

Yes if we pretend that Looper giving up so many home runs was being "unlucky" instead of him losing velocity and control then he's only far below average instead of the worst starting pitcher in the major leagues not named Suppan.

 

He hasn't lost velocity, according to data on fangraphs. His walk rate jumped up last year, though. I wouldn't call his HR rate strictly unlucky but I don't think it represents his true abilities either. As usual, it's probably somewhere in between.

 

And there's plenty of starting pitchers who were worse than Looper last year. They just aren't usually given the chance to pitch a bunch of innings. http://forum.brewerfan.net/images/smilies/smile.gif

[BREWCREW5]

Cannot stand Davis (as a pitcher. Very nice man, however). Davis is as bad as Suppan and Looper. Trade for Vazquez. Sign Harden or Sheets. Do not sign Davis or Washburn.

Want to back up your statements with some form of proof or stats or is this just your opinion? Either way, its false.

[Ennder]

Yes if we pretend that Looper giving up so many home runs was being "unlucky" instead of him losing velocity and control

 

It isn't pretending anything, when everything else stays pretty much 100% the same and HR/FB jumps it is just an outlier. Kind of like Hoffman when everyone said he was 'done' after 2008. A HR spike is something that happens to every pitcher in baseball at some point. If you agree that something like BABIP is luck/variance I don't see how you can argue HR/FB isn't, they are the same exact theory.

[Oldcity]

I'm also hesitant to say Looper wasn't any worse than in previous years. He's only been a starter for the last three years. Out of those three years, 2009 was his worst walk rate by far (and obviously home run rate). From 2008, his walk rate and home run rate increased drastically, and his k rate also declined a bit.

[EauClaireNWL]

Don't really blame the Brewers for not picking up the option. I think there would have been a good chance it would have been exercised had we not had Suppan's ridiculous contract still on the books for '10. I suppose it does help water down the available FA pitching pool that much more, and there's always a chance we could re-sign him for less than the $5.5 million additional he would have been due on top of his $1 million buyout.

 

Hopefully they'll be looking at better options in both FA and trades now. Can't do much worse than a 5.22 ERA while leading the bigs in dingers given up.

[Ennder]

Loopers K/9 was higher than in 2007, his BB/9 was right around the same as in 2007 and was better than 2005, 2003, 2001, 2000. It isn't like this was some big jump. His FB% was right in line with the previous 2 seasons as well. His K/9 was better than in 2007 or 2005 so that isn't out of line. The only number that jumps out in his stats at all is HR/FB%, that is pretty much 100% of what caused his ERA to be abnormal. Now he was also one of those 'lucky ERA for multiple year' guys so we should have known his ERA was not the proper expectation, same with say signing Doug Davis or Jeff Suppan. If you know how to judge pitchers you don't make these mistakes as often.

[tigerbrew]

I wasn't expecting Looper back, even when McCalvy and Haudricourt seemed to think it was a lock the Brewers were going to pick up the option, but I do wish he pitched better while he was here.

I had been hoping DM would decline Looper's option and he did, good move. I don't get why McClavy and TH wants DM to pick up Looper's option in their articles. We desperately need to upgrade our rotation and keeping Looper would be keeping status quo. We'd end up struggling next season whilst our key players get more expensive.

 

I think 2010 and 2011 are the Brewers chance to shine whilst we still have Prince, and Yo and Braun are still cheap. We need to be aggressive this offseason in upgrading our rotation. Our starting pitching is holding us back, not our offense, and upgrading our rotation would certainly help our bullpen.

 

In the NL, only 4 out of 16 teams make it to postseason, that's the top 25%. We need better than average starting pitching to have a realistically shot. With some teams looking to cut payrolls such as the Tigers and Jays, and a down market for FAs this year, we have a good opportunity to get the pieces we need in trades or FA.

[tigerbrew]

Cannot stand Davis (as a pitcher. Very nice man, however). Davis is as bad as Suppan and Looper.

Totally agree, Davis is definitely not what we need. I really hope DM stays away from DD.

[endaround]

Looper did lose velocity going from 90.2 to 89.4. But even more than that he stopped using on his fastball. He went from throwing it about 65% of the time to less than 50% of the time. That's a huge warning sign. Either his fastball stunk and was getting hammered or got so slow that it wast thought to be a split fingered fastball.