Joe Nathan, MVPs, and the CBA

Joe Nathan signed with the Rangers on Monday night. The deal is two years, with a optional third year, and will pay Nathan $12.5 million. Nathan will probably be the new closer in town, with Mike Adams staying in his setup role. I like the addition for the team, but don't like the contract. Nathan will be 37 by the time next season begins, and although he came back from Tommy John surgery, and looked good in 2011, that's a lot of money for a guy in his late thirties.

One statistic that jumps out at me from 2011 is Nathan's ground ball rate. Last season his ground ball rate was 35%, his worst mark since 2004. This was mostly due to a jump in his jump in his line drive rate, which was 17.8% in 2011, and only 12.3% in 2009. His fly ball rate remained constant from 2009 to 2011, at just over 47%. Nathan posted a HR/FB ratio of 11.5% in 2011, and if he doesn't generate more ground balls in 2012, he could end up giving up too many long balls to be effective. 

Nathan's strikeout rate in 2011 was 22.5%. While that's not bad, he hadn't posted a mark below 26% since moving to the bullpen. One would think that some of those extra balls that are being put into play are going to wind up as hits, although they didn't in 2011 (.250 BABIP). Extra base runners are never a good thing, especially when you can't rely on a ground ball double play. Nathan should be a solid reliever in Texas, but I don't expect him to get back to the dominant state form his past. 

The move makes it a certainty that Neftali Feliz will be in the starting rotation when 2012 rolls around, which is the best move for the team. One of the biggest wastes of talent in the majors is when a starter comes up through the minors as a successful starting pitcher, but is put in the bullpen at the major league level because there's no room in the rotation or to manage their innings. Then, when they're successful in their bullpen roll, they never get a chance to move to the rotation because the teams don't to mess with something that's working. Just to do a quick comparison, when Neftali Feliz has his great rookie year, with 40 saves, and his more than a strikeout per inning, he had a WAR of 1.8. That's the same as Josh Tomlin had this past year, and he is the Indians fifth starter. The move to the rotation is beneficial to the team, even if Feliz is only a league average pitcher. Feliz showed the ability to hold his velocity through multiple innings in the minors, but with his control issues this past season, I would think that Texas night have him ease up in an attempt to make him more efficient. 

The other big news item from Monday was Justin Verlander winning the American League MVP. Verlander beat out Jacoby Ellsbury and Jose Bautista among others. I have no problem with pitchers being considered and winning the MVP awards, but I didn't think Verlander deserved it. He started getting MVP backing in August, and although all of his numbers faded as the season ended, he still got wins, and ended up with the awards. 

One thing that I thought was amusing was that the Jacoby Ellsbury supporters who were using the, "must be a playoff team," argument when backing him in the regular season, changed that to "he was on a premium team," or something like that when talking about it on Monday. 

On Tuesday, it was announced that Ryan Braun was the MVP of the National League. I thought Kemp was the more deserving player because with their offensive numbers being so similar, Kemp played center field as opposed to Braun in left, and that tipped the scales towards him. But I guess Ryan Braun had the better teammates, so his performance was more valuable. 

From some of the ballots, it's clear that the BBWAA isn't qualified to vote for these awards. When you have a Rangers writer putting Michael Young at number one, and leaving Kinsler off of the ballot, it shows that while the BBWAA might be able to report about baseball, they aren't very good at actually analyzing it. From the voters, to the inconsistent opinion of what "Valuable" means, it's clear that the system needs to be changed. These awards are important because in arbitration hearing and contract negotiations, these awards do come up, and could end up costing a deserving player money, or forcing a club to spend extra on a undeserving player. 

The new CBA was announced Monday, and I didn't like a lot of what I heard. The worst part about it is the strict limiting on spending in the draft. Teams that go over the recommended amount to sign picks risk losing picks in the next years draft. It's a terrible idea, which hurts organizations which are trying to make themselves better. A lot of high school players, and especially two sport athletes, are going to end up going to college whether it's to play baseball or football. Under the new rules, both Bubba Starling and Zach Lee would probably be playing college football right now. I'm not saying that all college players get improper benefits, but I bet players can make a better living playing college football than professional baseball. 

If I got to be Judge Landis for a day, here's how I would have constructed the new CBA:

1. No limit on draft spending or international spending, it's stupid. 
2. As far as HGH/Steroid testing goes; if you get caught once, it's a five season suspension. 
3. Some sort of in season HGH testing needs to be done though, along with the proposed test in Spring Training 
4. Expansion to 32 teams. Maybe add teams in Portland and somewhere in the Carolinas. Then set up the divisions like football, four divisions with four teams each per league. No interleague. 
5. No wildcards. Win your division, and you're in. That way the unbalanced schedule isn't a problem. 
6. No social media policy, let the players have a voice. 
7. No mandatory participation in All-Star game. That's just going to be impossible to enforce.