Transactions: Indians Sign Kerry Wood

by Ryan on Dec 19, 2008 9:03 PM EST in Transactions

Signed RHP Kerry Wood to a Two Year, $20.5M Contract ($11M 2011 Option)

The 2011 Option will vest if Wood completes 55 games in 2009 or 2010. If he doesn't, the Indians can still pick up the option. Meeting the vesting option certainly isn't a given; 10 closers topped that mark in the majors last season, including Wood (with 56). Finishing games isn't the same as making 30 starts; teams can be playing either too or well or too poorly to use their closer that often. And if Wood would happen to miss as little as a week due to injury, he might not be able to make that milestone; he barely made it last year as the closer for the best team in the National League.

Paying $10M to a pitcher who probably won't throw more than 65 innings in a season looks like overkill if you figure that Wood is going to be worth about 1.5 wins to the Indians. Of course, consider the contributions that Joe Borowski and company made in the ninth inning last year, your perspective changes a bit. On a marginal basis, the improvement should be substantial.

Wood's 2008 peripherals (66.3 IP, 54 H, 84 SO, 18 BB, 3 HR) were among the best in baseball. His average fastball last season was 95 mph, and his slider sat around 83 mph. In other words, he can blow his fastball by a hitter even if he's looking for it, and if he throws his slider to a hitter expecting his fastball, that ball isn't going to be hit. The Indians usually don't have an opportunity to sign these types of players.

The elephant in the room is, of course, Kerry's extensive injury history. Shoulder problems derailed his promising career as a starter, and he's going to be pitching the rest of his career, however long that is, with a torn rotator cuff. The last two players the Indians have given quasi-market contracts to (Jake Westbrook, Travis Hafner) have sustained major injuries soon after signing, so although this contract isn't a long-term risk, the team doesn't have the financial wherewithal to shrug off another 10 million dollars' worth of non-productive talent during the middle of a season.

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Wait, when did this happen?!

Burn on, big river, burn on...

by Turkmenbashi on Dec 19, 2008 9:17 PM EST reply actions

“Kerry Wood”, huh? That name sounds like an opportunity for penis jokes.

by Logodaedalus on Dec 20, 2008 2:21 AM EST up reply actions

Come on, I don’t think anyone here would be that tasteless…

hehe… “wood”…

by painaxl on Dec 20, 2008 11:46 AM EST up reply actions

As A Cub and Woody fan

It is sad to see him gone from the Cubs. He not only works his ass off to get back onto the field, but he leaves it all out there. He is a class act, and did a lot of amazing things in the community, which Cleveland will now be blessed with.

I am glad he is an Indian, as he will be able to visit Chicago a lot and I am sure you will see a lot of my fellow Cub fans at US Cell cheering him on vs the Sox (grins). He was a clubhouse leader, not just for pitchers, but the entire team. The Indians will benefit a lot IMO on and off the field with him, and I wish both the Indians and Woody all the best this coming season (excpet for three at Wrigley Field 6/19-6/21 of course).

Now Cub fans, we will still wear his jersey, hell you still see Sosa and (gasp) Prior jerseys at the games all the time.

"I like coconuts, you can break them open and they smell like ladies lying in the sun" Widespread Panic

by Cubbie-Tim on Dec 20, 2008 1:41 PM EST reply actions

I don’t want to get sucked in too deep into the fangraph discussion, but it really doesn’t seem too difficult to me. I know the posts there on the issue are written as though the Indians made some kind of massive mistake, and that Wood has to “vastly” outstrip his projection, but it’s really not so far off. It can just be simply a matter of Shaprio thinking that Wood is worth 2 wins, rather than 1.5. Even then, Shapiro could be faulted if he overpaid, but the contract was right in the ball park of what was being suggested, so that seems unlikely. Or, of course, it could be that Shapiro is just taking wild guesses and the front office doesn’t have the analytical capability of pulling off an extremely simply projection equation. Regardless, it’s still a risk, as everybody involved understands a thousand times over, even though this one time there was a totally awesome relief pitcher and then later he was not very awesome.

by dgcambridge on Dec 22, 2008 11:56 AM EST reply actions

You sort of hinted at the inferred absurdity of some of these critiques. One of two things is happening here:

These authors are privy to important sabermetric knowledge that the Indians just don’t understand, or have failed to act on.
The Indians know something analytically that these authors are just missing completely.

Now, seriously … which one do you think is actually happening? In my experience, it’s very common for young, semi-pro sabermetricians to assume that they understand an issue completely, based on having constructed one complete framework. They fail to grasp that there are other perspectives that can be represented by other frameworks, just as compelling. The Halladay-for-Cy-Young articles showed a similar pattern. It’s like, you’ve constructed on elaborate and very solid argument … but that doesn’t make it the only solid argument, or even one of the better ones.

by Jay on Dec 22, 2008 3:14 PM EST up reply actions

I said this earlier, but I think those articles – and other commentators – thought that they had a level of resolution that was greater than they actually had. A linear equation is simplistic and kind of dumb.

by joeee on Dec 22, 2008 5:35 PM EST up reply actions