Just sayin'
Many a laugh has been had at Ryan Howard's new five-year, $125 million contract, all deserved. A lot of people have compared Howard to Albert Pujols to show how bad the deal is. I prefer a humbler comparison.
Howard was born November 19, 1979. Adam Dunn was born November 9, 1979. Since 2007 Howard has hit .266/.360/.560 with a 134 OPS+ and 10 steals. Dunn has hit .255/.390/.528 with a 136 OPS+ and 11 steals. Howard is a kind of tolerable defender; Dunn isn't.
This contract would, then, seem to imply that being a Subway pitchman and a better defender than Adam Dunn is worth about $15 million per year, which bears out given that CC Sabathia, also a Subway pitchman and a better defender than Dunn, also makes about $15 million more than Dunn.
I look forward to Michael Phelps, another Subway pitchman who plays better defense than Adam Dunn, signing a $25 m/year contract sometime soon.
6 Comments
Reader Comments (6)
I was amazed that no one went after Dunn in the off-season. Do all the GMs come from the Ricciardi school of Dunn lovin? No one wants a guy that hits 40 HR 100 RBI, and gets on base? How's that working out for Ricciardi now?
I like the Baseball Reference list of similar through age 29 because it always looks to me like a best/worst case list. Dunn's list includes Reggie Jackson, Harmon Killebrew, and Ralph Kiner, but also Strawberry and Boog Powell, who both went down hill at 30 years old. Howard's has one HOFer with Willie McCovey but also Mo Vaugh, Cecil Fielder and Richie Sexson who all fell of the ledge at 32. Just for giggles, Pujols' list has 8 HOFers and Ken Griffey Jr., so he's got that going for him, which is nice.
Seriously. Dunn obviously has his flaws, but a guaranteed 40 home runs and 100 walks coming at the tolerable price of $10 m/year would seem to make up for a lot. He'd look awfully good in a White Sox uniform, that's for sure.
Actually, you might want to look at Dunn's defense now that he's been moved to first. He's actually pretty close to adequate. He doesn't have great range, but he's a big (read: huge) target and digs throws out very well.
Do you take requests? I have a question about MMA, prefaced by a lot of words. In every sport, a competitor that is destroying its opponent is under an unwritten obligation to show some mercy. In football, the team with a huge lead runs the ball only or takes a knee. In baseball, you stop stealing & taking pitches and generally relax on offense, but without a clock, you're still obligated to get outs on defense. In basketball, you empty your bench and stop playing defense. In hockey you mostly stop shooting (and I thought that was true in futbol, but Bayern didn't slow down yesterday with a 4-0 aggregate lead).
What about MMA? If you're fighting a guy who you can't tap out, but also is not competing, what does the better fighter do? I've seen Manny Pacquiao stop hitting after it was obvious against David Diaz, does that happen in MMA? And what happens in cycling? Cricket?
I'd be lying if I said I've seen enough of Dunn at first to have a really good idea of how good he is there, but his UZR is pretty lousy there and I've seen enough of him generally to honestly wonder if Michael Phelps wouldn't be a better outfielder given a few weeks of training. That said, if we can assume Dunn has worked his way up to being mildly offensive rather than historically bad in the field, it just makes the Howard contract all the goofier.
That's an interesting MMA question—I have an idea of the answer, but I want to check it against some stats from actual fights...
As a Cincinnati native and huge Reds fan I have seen Dunn play for years in the recent past. Dunn's offensive numbers are good but he always seemed to hit his HRs in games that were out of reach (when the mop up releiver was throwing straight balls down the pipe). Also, if he were to get a $25M contract he would definitely lose all motivation and end up out of shape. In Cincinnati once he got a medium size contract he got somewhat fat and just tried to swing for the fences. He is also not a great clubhouse guy and he never hustles on the field. If I were an MLB GM I would not over pay for Adam 'the Donkey' Dunn. That being said, it was fun to see him hit a few 500 foot blasts into the Ohio River once in a while...