K-Rod claimed on revocable waivers, pulled back by Brewers

[AdvantageSchneider]

http://hardballtalk.nbcsports.com/2015/08/29/francisco-rodriguez-was-claimed-on-waivers-but-the-brewers-pulled-him-back/

 

K-rod can't be traded until the offseason now. Wonder who claimed him. The Mets just traded for Addison Reed. Would be funny if they claimed K-rod, altough I kind of doubt it given their history with him.

 

K-rod's had a great season with us, but I would have traded him for a low level prospect. His value with the team is basically zero, unless the front office thinks they can get something for him this offseason. I'm not exactly sure who would be in the market for an aging closer this offseason. No one comes to mind.

[DHonks]

it's likely a team that wanted him, but didn't want to give up anything.

[Invader3K]

it's likely a team that wanted him, but didn't want to give up anything.

 

That's the speculation on Twitter, at least as of last night.

 

It's possible the Brewers just keep him around next year. It's looking more and more like K-Rod is Hall of Fame bound, and he's been pretty much stellar this season (last night aside). They'll need someone in the back end of the bullpen, regardless of how bad the team is in 2016, and $5.5 million isn't a huge salary these days for a proven closer.

[dlk9s]

After the blown save, Brewers are 51-1 when leading after 8 innings this season, 0-72 when trailing after 8 innings. That's nuts.

[Baldkin]

Should've just let him go. Don't want, don't need next year.

[LouisEly]

Kimbrel, Papelbon, and Robertson are all getting >$11M/year, and Chapman will very likely join that list this offseason. Holland, Street, Miller, Uehara, Soria, Jansen, and others are getting >$7M/year. I have a hard time believing that K-Rod has zero trade value with his contract.

[QuevedosTongue]

Should've just let him go. Don't want, don't need next year.

 

But don't you think he's worth something? It doesn't seem smart to just let an asset go without getting something in return.

[Thurston Fluff]

Should've just let him go. Don't want, don't need next year.

 

There seems to be a lot of negativity about him. Not just here but around baseball he doesn't seem to get his due for how good he's been. Justifiably so considering his off field issues. It's hard to like someone who hits women. That said we don't have to like him to understand he is a very good player and has been for quite a while. On the field he is an elite closer on a reasonable contract. That certainly has value in and of itself. Add to it, by all accounts he is a positive influence on the rest of the relievers. He is pretty much universally viewed as the leader of the bullpen. That has value too. Even to a team who may not need an elite closer next season. While we may not be in contention during the life of his contract there is nothing that says he cannot be extended after it. He obviously likes it here and is willing to work on short term contracts for less money than his production says he's worth. He's already reinvented himself from a flame thrower to an effective soft tosser who knows how to pitch so the fear of him becoming ineffective shouldn't be all that high. Given his ability to pitch with average stuff and the willingness to work on short, team friendly contracts he isn't likely to be a waste of payroll for any significant amount of time.

To sum up my feelings about his future here, I understand he won't help us win a pennant next year but we do need people like him to help develop the young players who will help us win one down the road. Maybe even be good enough himself three years down the road to help us directly.

[MNBrew]

Should've just let him go. Don't want, don't need next year.

Several people have talked about this sort of thing, whether it's in regard to considering trading K-Rod at the July or August deadline or this coming winter, or simply in regard to good closers on lousy teams. . . . On the surface, I understand the logic ("We're no good, so a good and/or expensive closer is an unnecessary luxury."). But in thinking deeper -- and, to give an example, with a jog down memory lane of the Brewers' 2012 (I think) -- I think it's just plain foolish and short-sighted.

 

Regardless of whether a team is good or not, you need a closer who does his job well at the end of a game. When you get to the 8th & 9th inning with a lead, to continually lose it because of an inept closer (or closers, as the Brewers experienced big time in July 2012 (or was it 2013?)) can completely demoralize a team -- the effects of those failings are even worse on a team's psyche if wins are tough to come by to begin with. How does a young team gain confidence and swagger in winning when they can't consistently rely on their closer to hold a lead and preserve a win? I'd think the negative effects of that scenario inhibit the whole "building a winning culture" that's so important with young, hopefully upward-trending teams with impressionable young players -- in part because it says the organization doesn't value preserving wins enough that it's not worth investing in a closer.

[Baldkin]

Don't care. Want him gone. Him wearing the uniform is a disgrace, and getting rid of him for nothing would be preferable to watching him pitch again next year in my mind.

 

I'd also rather see if someone can fill the role going forward.

[AdvantageSchneider]

This goes back to the old trope of a proven closer. Personally I think there are several pitchers on the brewers that could close games. If we could get a guy that could help us long term we should trade K-rod. Hopefully they will do that in the offseason.

[Roderick]

and $5.5 million isn't a huge salary these days for a proven closer.

 

Even if part of the salary is deferred, you still have to pay it - so his salary is $7.5M. If you want to mess around with time value of money, then call it $7.4M in current dollars.

 

And a $2M buyout for the following year if he falls apart in 2016.

 

So potentially $9.5M was the cost to keep KRod when someone wanted him now.

 

Not saying I would have just let him go for nothing on a August waiver wire deal, but I really think Melvin did us a disservice when he didn't trade him in July for whoever put up the best deal.

[FVBrewerFan]

After the blown save, Brewers are 51-1 when leading after 8 innings this season, 0-72 when trailing after 8 innings. That's nuts.

 

Wow, that is nuts.

[torts]

After the blown save, Brewers are 51-1 when leading after 8 innings this season, 0-72 when trailing after 8 innings. That's nuts.

 

what that tells me is that their bullpen has been fantastic, but their offense has been awful in coming up in the clutch late in the game.

[pacopete4]

After the blown save, Brewers are 51-1 when leading after 8 innings this season, 0-72 when trailing after 8 innings. That's nuts.

 

what that tells me is that their bullpen has been fantastic, but their offense has been awful in coming up in the clutch late in the game.

 

And/or that they have been down too far in quite a few games because their pitcher blew up.

[Invader3K]

and $5.5 million isn't a huge salary these days for a proven closer.

 

Even if part of the salary is deferred, you still have to pay it - so his salary is $7.5M. If you want to mess around with time value of money, then call it $7.4M in current dollars.

 

And a $2M buyout for the following year if he falls apart in 2016.

 

So potentially $9.5M was the cost to keep KRod when someone wanted him now.

 

The problem with this logic is that it can be applied to multiple players on the team. Braun, Lucroy, and Lind all come to mind. I don't think any of us would want to see any of them traded must for the proverbial "bag of balls". I'm not saying I don't want to see them traded...just that I wouldn't give them away just to clear salary. I feel the same way about K-Rod.

 

re: the domestic violence aspect, I literally never hear anyone around baseball talk about that. The only time I hear about it is from people here and on Twitter (and I mean specifically Brewers fans only). I really don't think it's as big a deal as some on this message board make it out to be. He was never prosecuted for it, so maybe it's time to let it go. Or does it have to be like Paul Molitor and someone still has to bring up his cocaine use, decades later?

[monty57]

re: the domestic violence aspect, I literally never hear anyone around baseball talk about that. The only time I hear about it is from people here and on Twitter (and I mean specifically Brewers fans only). I really don't think it's as big a deal as some on this message board make it out to be. He was never prosecuted for it, so maybe it's time to let it go. Or does it have to be like Paul Molitor and someone still has to bring up his cocaine use, decades later?

 

Not that there is ever a time for domestic abuse, but with the recent issues the NFL has had with domestic abuse issues, it is certainly a bad time to add a multiple-time girlfriend/wife-beater to a roster. Owners and GMs probably know better than to say anything outright about why they aren't signing him... they just aren't signing him or trading for him. Maybe in this instance Attanasio is fortunate that his team is in such a small media market, because it's kind of surprising that he hasn't been slammed in the media for continually signing this guy when no one else will.

[Roderick]

and $5.5 million isn't a huge salary these days for a proven closer.

 

Even if part of the salary is deferred, you still have to pay it - so his salary is $7.5M. If you want to mess around with time value of money, then call it $7.4M in current dollars.

 

And a $2M buyout for the following year if he falls apart in 2016.

 

So potentially $9.5M was the cost to keep KRod when someone wanted him now.

 

The problem with this logic is that it can be applied to multiple players on the team. Braun, Lucroy, and Lind all come to mind. I don't think any of us would want to see any of them traded must for the proverbial "bag of balls". I'm not saying I don't want to see them traded...just that I wouldn't give them away just to clear salary. I feel the same way about K-Rod.

 

But to me KRod is much closer to not playing up to his contract as soon as next year. I can see him hitting a cliff at any point in time and having negative value. Hence I would have moved him in July for best deal on table. Or another way to put it, if KRod was a free agent today, would you sign him to a $7.5M contract for next year? I guess I wouldn't, as I am punting next year anyways. The only good thing about having KRod next year is that Jeffress (or whoever ends up closing) will not be accumulating closer stats now and he will be cheaper in the arby years.

 

I have much more confidence that the other three players, Braun, Lucroy, and Lind, barring injury, will play to a minimum to their contract cost next year.

[Thurston Fluff]

But to me KRod is much closer to not playing up to his contract as soon as next year. I can see him hitting a cliff at any point in time and having negative value. Hence I would have moved him in July for best deal on table. Or another way to put it, if KRod was a free agent today, would you sign him to a $7.5M contract for next year? I guess I wouldn't, as I am punting next year anyways. The only good thing about having KRod next year is that Jeffress (or whoever ends up closing) will not be accumulating closer stats now and he will be cheaper in the arby years.

 

I have much more confidence that the other three players, Braun, Lucroy, and Lind, barring injury, will play to a minimum to their contract cost next year.

 

What about him makes you think he is close to falling off a cliff as early as next season? He has already shown he can be effective without a great fastball. He's 33 not 38. He's been a legitimate all star two years running. His ERA+ is the exact same as it was 10 years ago. Outside of a lack of velocity there is nothing about him that screams ready to implode. Considering he has been working without that velocity for several years, not to mention a couple all star appearances, I don't see how that makes him ready to implode. As far as the value of his contract being more likely than the others to be underwater next year I just don't see that either. Lucroy is likely to be a better value but not Braun. Sure Braun has come back to being a well above average player at his position. But K-Rod never left those ranks. And he makes less than half of what Braun will make next season.

[paul253]

I think closer is the most overrated position in baseball. I would have traded him for cash and then next year figure out between Smith Jeffress and Knebel who can close games. I don't see any need for a rebuilding team to have a "proven closer" on the roster.

[Thurston Fluff]

Closers are overrated but relievers who don't flame out in a year or so aren't. In fact I would argue they are one of the more underrated assets in baseball.

[danzig6767]

I think closer is the most overrated position in baseball.

My view on closers has long been that they are overpaid when it's a veteran long time closer, but for teams who are a legit contender and/or clearly in the playoff race, if you don't have an effective closer, it can be crushing to those type of teams. On bad or below average teams, closers being effective or not is largely irrelevant except maybe team morale if your closer blows a lot of games.

 

Baseball has been changing for awhile now as pretty much all teams limit the innings of their starters, even elite ones and in turn put quite a bit more importance on the back end of their bullpens. Because of that, teams who don't have effective 7th/8th/9th inning guys in their bullpen, it can badly hurt the hopes of their teams and on the flip side, more and more teams are having success without a great rotation, but instead just a solid one that is offset by a great bullpen. Those type of pitching staffs have also had success in the playoffs by having dominant bullpens.

 

Given the extremely high cost of upper tier starters once they near free agency and beyond, along with how hard they can be to develop in general, i think quite a few teams are seeing the cost/benefit of trying to put together a top notch bullpen. When i watch games today, it's amazing how many good and even weaker teams have at least 3-4 guys in their pens with an ERA number slightly above 3 or under 3, good to great WHIP numbers, good to great K/9, and good to great K/BB numbers.

 

So that old agenda of try to work counts so as to get into the bullpens/get the starter out of the game earlier is often a negative today unless a great starter is on the mound. Instead, getting the starter out by say only six innings will often mean having to face multiple one inning specialists out of the bullpen with better to far better stats than the starter leaving the game.

[LouisEly]

I don't know about excelling under pressure; I'm sure there are guys who maybe have more focus or an extreme competitive nature that may help them in pressure situations. But I really believe that there are people who fold under pressure. And that is what a closer is - someone who can handle the pressure of the last inning.

 

While the last inning isn't any more important than any other in determining the outcome, there is more pressure in the last inning. Fans standing and cheering, knowing that you are the last thing standing between the team and victory. There isn't as much pressure in earlier innings because you know you have several innings left to get those runs back. But in the bottom of the ninth you have no chances to get those runs back. You have to come through. And if you don't come through - and believe it or not, the best closers in the game don't come through a handful of times each year - you have to shake it off and come back the next night/time.

 

I don't know about paying closers eight figures, but I do believe that they warrant more pay than other relievers if they can continually perform under pressure.

[jerichoholicninja]

Closers are incredibly overrated. Sure there's some pressure when you have a 1 run lead but any reliever who can't consistently get through an inning without giving up a 2 or 3 run lead doesn't deserve to be in the majors anyway.

[pacopete4]

With all the data and statistics we have now, managers should really be using that to his advantage when looking at match ups. It's no secret that some hitters do well against a pitcher while others do not. Use the data to help you decide when and where to use your relievers. When it comes to closers, maybe that falls true as well but if you have 2-3 guys you're running out there in the 9th, you better be ready for those to always question you when it doesn't fall your way. If a closer blows up, its on the closer. If you're closer "x" blows up and you didn't use closer "y", now you have people going after you.