Rotoprofessor

As we close in on the start of 2008 free agent season, I think now is as good a time as any to go back one year and look at the 10 worst signings from 2007.  Like any year, there are plenty of teams left kicking themselves, but these are the moves that probably are bringing on the biggest buyers remorse one year later.

These aren’t the only questionable signings, however.  Deals like Taduhito Iguchi (1 year, $4 million from the Padres), Kazuo Matsui (3 years, $16.5 million from the Astros), Yorvit Torrealba (2 years, $7.25 million from the Rockies), Aaron Rowand (4 years, $60 million from the Giants) and several others certainly could have ended up on this list.  Still, these are the deals that I felt were the worst for their teams.

So, without further adieu, let’s take a look at the major dollars teams wasted last season:

10. The Nationals sign Paul Lo Duca for 1 year and $5 million
The Nationals don’t spend a lot of money.  Just looking at the names on their roster tells you that.  So, when they decide to open up their pockets last winter, what do they do?  Hand out $5 million to Paul Lo Duca, while also giving Johnny Estrada $1.25 million, when they already had a promising youngster in Jesus Flores.  I can justify giving one of them a contract similar to Estrada’s to battle Flores and maybe win the job, but investing $6.25 million?!?  Lo Duca did manage to earn his money with a .243 average and 15 RBI over 173 AB this season.  Oh yeah, did I mention that come August, he was out of Washington and signed by Florida on a minor league deal?  These smaller market teams have to spend their money wisely, and this certainly does not fall into that category.

9. The Rangers sign Jason Jennings for 1 year and $4 million
Jennings had once been a very good pitcher, well for one season in 2006, anyways.  Since then, injuries have certainly played a role, but the Rangers decided to take a shot with him anyways, and not a small one.  They gave him $4 million hoping that he would be a major cog in their rotation.  That worked out to about $666,666.67 per start, as he took the mound just 6 times for the Rangers in 2008, and they certainly weren’t pretty.  He went 0-5 with an 8.56 ERA.  Let this be a lesson, if you want to take a gamble on a starting pitcher coming back from injury, be my guest, but do it with an incentive laden, low guarantee contract.  Otherwise, you are likely to repeat the mistakes of others.

8. The Athletics sign Keith Foulke for 1 year and $7 million
I know it was just a 1-year contract, but the A’s are a smaller market team who already had Huston Street on the roster as the closer (yeah, I know how that turned out this season, but still).  I guess that they were banking on him resurrecting his career so they could deal him at the deadline for a prospect or two.  Still, that’s an awful lot of money to gamble with.  Unfortunately for the A’s, it completely backfired, as they got just 31 innings out of Foulke, to the tune of a 4.06 ERA.

7. The Twins sign Livan Hernandez for 1 year and $5 million
Did anyone expect this signing not to appear on this list?  The team needed someone to replace the innings they lost when the sent Johan Santana to the Mets so they signed Hernandez hoping that he could provide that stability.  The problem is what kind of results could they really have expected considering his WHIP’s of 1.50 and 1.60 in 2006 and 2007, respectively.  Hernandez succeeded in taking the ball every fifth day, but the results were down right ugly.  With a team with so much pitching depth, they stuck with him way too long, instead of turning things over to Francisco Liriano.  Could that have cost them a chance to be in the playoffs?  Very likely, actually.  Plus, the Twins could have used the $5 million they spent for much better things then for a player who finished the season in Colorado with a 6.05 ERA and 1.67 WHIP.

6. The Braves sign Tom Glavine for 1 year and $8 million
Five years earlier, the Braves took a hard stance and allowed one of the franchises best players to walk to the rival Mets.  In his last game in the Mets blue and orange, Glavine went out, with the entire season on his shoulders, and gave up 7 earned runs in just 0.1 innings to the Marlins.  So, of course, the Braves decided to bring him back, but the results certainly did not justify the sizable contract he received.  A pitcher who had been durable over his career, Glavine finally broke down at 42-years old, pitching just 63.1 innings and posting a 5.54 ERA.  I know pitching is at a premium, but you have to be a bit smarter then giving so much guaranteed money to a pitcher who is in his early 40’s.  It’ll be interesting to see how teams handle Randy Johnson, and the contract offers he gets, in a few weeks given his history of injury problems and the results the Braves got from Glavine.

5. The Brewers sign Eric Gagne for 1 year and $10 million
The Brewers, seeing an opportunity to compete, knew they needed an established closer to replace Francisco Cordero who jumped ship to the division rival Cincinnati Reds for a fat contract.  With the pickings being limited, they turned to a player who had struggled after a trade to the Red Sox in ‘07 (6.75 ERA over 18.2 innings) and had recently been named in the Mitchell Report.  I know some people thought that being slotted back into the closers role would help him return to form, but that clearly wasn’t the case.  I can understand giving him a shot, but a $10 million shot was a little bit excessive, and it ultimately cost the team.  Many people are going to want to see this one in the Top 3, and maybe it should be, but it was a gamble a team with a shot to win felt like they needed to make.

4. The Dodgers sign Andruw Jones for 2 years and $36.2 million
I know people are going to question why this signing is just #4 on the list, considering how little the Dodgers got for their $18 million in ‘08.  The truth of the matter is that the team was smart enough not to allow Scott Boras to convince them into a deal longer then 2 years.  It clearly was a terrible signing, one that is costing the Dodgers dearly in their checkbook, but with just 1 more season under contract, it really isn’t going to be as bad for them as it is for the three signings ranked above it.

3. The Mets sign Luis Castillo for 4 years and $25 million
A contract we all knew was bad right at the signing, it seemed like the Mets panicked seeing some of the other contracts being handed out.  Instead of waiting out the market, they felt the need to overpay in order to have a player signed to fill the position.  If they had waited things out, David Eckstein could have been had for 1 year at $4.5 million.  That deal looks so much more appealing then being stuck with Castillo, who hit all of .245, for another 3 seasons.  One of the bigger questions this off-season is what the Mets are going to do with that bloated contract, considering they are considering using Daniel Murphy at 2B, or signing someone like Orlando Hudson in free agency.  One way or another, the Mets are going to have to eat a sizable piece of that contract.

2. The Yankees sign Jorge Posada for 4 years and $52.4 million
Granted, he has long been a cornerstone of the franchise.  A homegrown star who was there for the glory years.  The problem is that at 36-years old (he turned 37 in August), how many more years did he really have left behind the plate?  That alone made the contract so questionable, right from the start.  With the way the roster was configured, if he was forced to do anything but catch, there was going to be a problem.  That’s exactly what happened in ‘08, as Posada ultimately had just 168 AB before he was shut down for the season.  At $13.1 million per season over the next 3 years still on the contract, you have to wonder if he broke down in Year 1, will he be able to catch much over the rest of the contract?  If not, there’s a whole new problem as to where they are going to play him, on top of the amount of money they are going to have to pay.  You have to think the Yankees would have rather given him a shorter deal, as now they are completely stuck.  The talk is that he doesn’t want to move from behind the plate, but that may not be an option moving forward.  Who knows where the Yankees go from here with him, but there is no doubt that they are going to be stuck with that contract.

1. The Mariners sign Carlos Silva for 4 years and $48 million
After the Kansas City Royals had some success with the signing of Gil Meche, the Seattle Mariners hoped to follow suit, giving a lot of money for a pitcher who had not shown too much success but had plenty of promise.  The thing is, when a pitcher has just 2 seasons with a sub-4 ERA (one of which he threw just 84 innings in), the signs do not point towards suddenly putting things together.  Silva, collecting $12 million per year went out and made 28 starts for the Mariners, the only real quality number in his line.  He went 4-15 with a 6.46 ERA and just 69 strikeouts over 153.1 innings.  This team has some serious problems, and carrying Silva’s bloated contract over the next 3 seasons is certainly one of them.  Do you really think anyone is going to be willing to take this contract off their hands?

Picture courtesy of Icon Sports Media, Inc.