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Tuesday, February 07, 2012
How much is winning a Cy Young worth to a young pitcher?
Oh, about 4MM$ a year for the next 3-4 years. Kershaw signed two years, to forego his first two arb years. How much would he have gotten, had he had the same performance, but not won the Cy?
I think Matt would be in a better position to answer that. However, if we look at the big four (Felix, Verlander, JJ, Weaver), we see a pretty typical pattern for one year deals, and what we should consider as the upper limit: 3-4MM$ the first year, 7-8MM$ the second year, 13-14MM$ the third year, and 20MM$ if it gets there for a 4th year.
As Dave reminds us, young guys sign away their early years as well. Lincecum got 2/23 for his first two years, but he came off TWO Cy Youngs.
Cole Hamels signed 3/20.5, which is a discount had he gone year-to-year like the Big 4 did (25MM$ or so for their first 3 years).
Kershaw just signed 2/19, and one would think that if he signed for a third year, he’d have gotten another 15MM$ or so to come in at 3/34. Signing multi-year also means you are getting a discount, so, that probably means he’d have expected to get say 38MM$ had he gone year-to-year, compared to the 25MM$ the Big 4 got. That’s a 13MM$ bonus for Kershaw over the Big 4 for those 3 years. Or 15MM$ bonus over Hamels.
Basically, a Cy Young really takes the sting out of arbitration, and accelerates a pitcher’s service clock by one year. What Lincecum did for his year 1 and year 2 arb deal (of 2/23) makes more sense to think of it for his year 2 and year 3 arb deal. (The Big 4 for example were paid about 21MM$ going year-to-year.) Same thing with Kershaw, who signed for 2/19, which is very much in line with thinking that his Cy Young accelerated his service time, since it matches to the Big 4’s year 2 and year 3.