Archive for Johnny Damon
Is Johnny Damon really that bad on defense?
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Johnny Damon went through a transition in 2007. He left Spring Training pondering retirement. While nothing came of that, he faced many problems early in the season. By the end of April he was hitting .229/.349/.329, a far cry from his impressive pinstriped debut a year earlier. He then battled calf issues in May, eventually missing a few games at the end of the month, but ultimately missing the disabled list. By June, Joe Torre had seen enough. He installed Melky Cabrera as the everyday center fielder, relegating Damon mostly to designated hitter duties — made easier because of Jason Giambi’s foot injury. Damon played just 10 games in center field from June through September.
After spending most of June and July as a one-way player, Damon started seeing more time in left field later in the season. This made sense. Johnny was, by reputation, a good defender in center field. Having to cover less ground in left field, Damon could be a defensive asset to the Yankees. According to UZR, he was. In 271 innings over the season’s final two months, Damon accumulated a 7.5 UZR. That stood in contrast to his numbers in center field, -7.6 in 377 innings in 2007. It also brought to light Damon’s UZR deficiency in center field — he’d been in the negatives since 2003.
When Joe Girardi took over in 2008, it was clear Damon would play left field every day. His bat played well enough for left field, and his range at that position would give the Yankees a boost on defense. Sure enough, Damon posted another great defensive season according to UZR, posting a 6.7 mark (11.6 per 150) in 659.1 innings in left field. Because the team struggled to score runs, and because they demoted Melky Cabrera in August, Damon slid over to center for 285 innings, and again posted a negative UZR figure, -7.8. Damon clearly wasn’t a good center field option for 2009, but it stood to reason that he’d once again be an asset in left.
The plan didn’t work out how the Yankees expected. From the start Damon looked shaky in left field. That he dropped a few balls early in the season, including in a June game against the Red Sox, did him no favors with the fans. Soon after the drop against the Sox Damon revealed he was having eye trouble, a “fluttering” issue that doctors connected to his caffeine intake. Still, fans tend to remember players who drop fly balls. No one forgot Damon’s infractions.
Not only was there visual evidence of Johnny’s deficiencies in left field, but the go-to defensive stat, Ultimate Zone Rating, ranked Damon among the worst left fielders in the game. After posting a 11.6 UZR/150 in 2008, Damon fell into the negatives in 2009. He ended with a -12.1 per 150 mark in 2009, which seems to confirm the eyeball test. Damon just wasn’t that good in the field in 2009, and at age 36 it’s difficult to project an improvement for 2010.
Still, it’s possible that Damon wasn’t as bad in the field as fans and UZR say. A fan’s opinion is often skewed by a few standout memories, and nothing stood out about Damon’s defense more than his dropped balls and “happy feet” as he got under fly balls. That will leave a negative impression for sure. And while it might be the best known measure of defense — at least of those publicly available — UZR has its shortcomings as well. For instance, it rated Juan Rivera, Carlos Lee, and Raul Ibanez in the positives this season. Those aren’t three players generally considerd good defenders.
I haven’t seen many scouts comment on Johnny Damon’s defense, and even so I’m not inclined to believe an anonymous scout quoted for an article. We’ve seen that too many times, and it often seems like the opinion offered is not of a consensus, but rather just the quote that best fit the writer’s article. The closest thing I’ve seen is Tangotiger’s Fan Scouting Report. The idea is to get a good feel for a player’s defense through a huge sampling of fans. Yet that system seems flawed, though that could just be from underexposure. Damon ranked fairly low on the left field scale, ahead of only the players with terrible defensive reputations: Ibanez, Alfonso Soriano, Manny Ramires, and Delmon Young, etc.
There is one more defensive statistic to consider, and it’s a bit more kind to Damon than UZR. Revised Zone Rating, developed by John Dewan. Like all defensive stats it has its ups and downs, but Dewan did some hard work concocting this metric. There are two aspects to consider. First is the straight RZR, or how well a fielder did on balls hit into his zone. Damon’s mark in 2009 was .906. For context, Carl Crawford, tops in UZR, was at .914. The top left fielder in the league was David DeJesus, at .927. Of course, criticism will flow because Ryan Braun, considered a poor defender by scouts and by UZR, ranked second at .919. Damon ranked fourth in the majors.
The other aspect of RZR is OOZ, plays made out of the player’s zone. This is an important aspect. Players might be able to make all the plays within his zone, but it takes a very good fielder to make plays on balls outside his zone. Crawford is king in this stat, making 105 plays outside his territory. DeJesus follows, and Braun ranks fourth. Again, this will open the number to criticism. In any case, Damon ranks 11th in this stat, making 46 plays out of his zone. The only players below him with 1,000 or more innings in left field are Garret Anderson, Raul Ibanez, and Chris Coghlan.
It appears that any way we look at it, Johnny Damon was not a good fielder in 2009. This came as a surprise during the season, since Damon was so good in left field just a year before. We know, however, that certain skills decline with age, and by most measures Damon’s fielding range dropped off a cliff. This is no guarantee that he’ll continue to patrol the outfield poorly in 2010, but given his age it’s not wise to predict a turnaround.
The best we can hope for, I think, is that some component of UZR unfairly judged Damon, and that fan sentiment towards his defense was skewed by a few egregious plays early in the season. RZR didn’t think that poorly of Damon in 2009, and I thought that while his range wasn’t quite what I remembered it, it wasn’t as bad as the general perception. Damon is no longer a superior defensive outfielder, but I think that given an opportunity to start 75, 80 percent of games, he can patrol his position serviceably in 2010.
Photo credit: Associated Press
Who would you rather: Matsui or Damon
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Decisions, decisions, decisions. For the Yankees, with a few key older players hitting free agency, this winter is chock full of them. None of the choices the team will have to make is more fraught with emotion and potential impact than the one that looms regarding Hideki Matsui and Johnny Damon.
By many accounts, the Yankees will try to bring back one of their two left-handed bats but not both. Right now, Matsui is the sentimental choice. Rebounding from an injury-plagued 2008, he had a stellar 2009 and single-handedly beat Pedro Martinez and the Phillies to help the Yanks clinch the decided Game 6 of the World Series. Damon, on the other hand, stole two bases on one play earlier in the World Series. He is in better physical shape than Matsui and represents a combination of speed and power atop the Yankee lineup.
So let’s try to answer it: If we had to pick one, which player would we resign: Hideki Matsui or Johnny Damon?
Offense
To start, let’s look at these two players’ offensive contributions this year. Although their individual contributions differ in style, in sum these two players are nearly identical. On the season, Damon hit .282/.365/.489 with 24 home runs and 36 doubles in 626 plate appearances. Matsui hit .274/.367/.509 with 28 home runs and 21 doubles in 526 plate appearances. Matsui outslugged Damon, but the Yanks’ left fielder went 12 for 12 in stolen base attempts. Eleven of those were steals of second, and as Matsui stole no bases this year, Damon’s speed is a plus.
On a contributory level, the numbers are awfully identically. Damon had a runs created per 27 outs of 6.8 while Matsui produced a 7.1 mark. Damon was 25.3 batting runs above average while Matsui was at 22.1, mostly due to the variance in playing time. Since that number is position-neutral though, we can’t gloss over the fact that Matsui is limited to DH duties. More on that later.
Drilling down on their respective positions through Baseball Prospectus’ Positional Marginal Value rate (PMLVr), Matsui’s offensive production begins to take the lead. His PMLVr was 0.164 while Damon’s was 0.124. The Yankees may want to use the rotating DH as a way to rest aging regulars next year, but Matsui as a good full-time DH offered the Yankees a lot of offensive value in 2009. However, on the position-dependent VORP scale, Damon (39.3) bested Matsui (33.4), but Matsui’s total was 11 VORP points above Jim Thome. Johnny was among the elite-hitting left fielders last year, but with Matt Holliday and Jason Bay out there, it’s far easier to replace Damon than it is Matsui.
Defense
On the defensive scale, the pendulum swings toward Matsui simply because Damon’s defense created a liability in left. Joe will have more about Damon’s defense later tonight. For now, I will just note that Damon’s fielding runs above average was -9.2. That total ranked him seventh worst among all Major League left fielders. Matsui, on the other hand, never had to play defense. The Yankees may have gained roster flexibility with Damon, but the numbers suggest that he shouldn’t be out in the field too often.
Damon’s defense, though, did not drop his value below that of Matsui’s. According to Fangraphs’ value figures, Damon gave the Yanks $13.6 million in production in 2009 while Matsui gave the team $11 million. The left fielder outperformed his contract value while the DH underperformed, albeit slightly.
Age and a Conclusion
Finally, we arrive at the age analysis and a few final thoughts. As hard as it is to believe, Damon is actually seven months older than Hideki Matsui. Yet, he hasn’t had the same physical problems with his knees as Matsui had and still has. Both players are at the age, though, where they can easily fall off a cliff production-wise. In fact, PECOTA pegged Damon for a 278/.352/.420/8 HR season, and he beat his 75th percentile projections. Matsui beat his 90th percentile projections. What this means for the future is more uncertainty. The two could stil be productive or they could crash and burn in 2010.
If the Yankees, then, are committed to keeping one, logic would lead me to take Damon over Matsui even if my emotions say otherwise. (I have, after all, always been a fan of Matsui’s.) Although a liability in the field, Damon is still physically capable of playing left, and he can still run. His 12 stolen base attempts were the fewest he made since 1995, but that has more to do with his role as a two hitter than anything else. His 12-for-12 mark in that category is what counts.
There is, however, a rub. I wouldn’t sign Damon to be the left fielder. Instead, I would ask Damon to DH. His production is in line with that of Matsui’s, and at Yankee Stadium, he has the power to man the DH spot and could fill in at left when needed. The right replacement left fielder could help the team recover from the loss of Matsui as well.
In the end, though, if the Yanks are thinking properly and Damon is expected to DH, there isn’t a wrong choice. The team shouldn’t go into Spring Training without a big bat in the DH spot. A lineup sporting one of Francisco Cervelli, Ramiro Pena, Jerry Hairston, Jr., or Brett Gardner every day would represent a significant downgrade over the 2009 team. So pick your poison. Just pick it for the designated hitter spot.
Damon, Boras not on the same page
Posted by: | CommentsThroughout the course of the 2009 season, Johnny Damon spoke, seemingly without his agent Scott Boras’ permission, about his desire to stay in New York and continue to play for the Yankees. “I know where I want to be next year,” Damon told 1050 ESPN New York in early May. “I want to be here in New York.
Two weeks later, he expressed similar sentiments to MLB.com’s Bryan Hoch. “This would definitely be the best place for me,” he said. “I’d sure love to keep taking advantage of that right-field porch.”
Finally, in August, he again made a similar statement. “I don’t know where else I would want to go to,” Damon said. “Obviously, that’s not the right thing to say when you’re about ready to approach free agency, but I’m very happy with playing in New York, and my family’s happy I play for New York. There’s no bigger place to go.”
For a Scott Boras client, Damon wasn’t exactly toeing the party line, and by noting that it’s not “the right thing to say” as a free agent, he acknowledged as much. As the Yankees, then, have been dreaming of wrapping up Damon to a short deal on something of a hometown discount, Scott Boras has tried to take control of the story. Yesterday, the superagent expressed his desire for a three- or four-year deal for Damon at market rate. At that price, consider the Yankees out of the picture.
Yet, this story is far from over, and two competing interviews — one by Damon and one by Boras — suggest to me that Damon and his agent are not on the same page. First, we have David Waldstein’s piece on Boras. Holding forth at the GM Meetings, Scott spoke about all of his clients, including Damon. “I think every player wants his fair market value,” Boras said, “and I think the New York Yankees have a history of paying players their fair market values.”
Damon meanwhile was far more forthcoming about his desire to stay in the Bronx. Speaking with Reggie Jackson and Bill Pidto on Sirius XM last night, the Yanks’ free agent left fielder was unequivocal in his love for pinstripes and his desire to come back:
Host, Bill Pidto: “So all things being equal, Johnny, you’d like to come back to the Yanks?”
Damon: “Why not? I mean, we just won a championship. That new stadium is incredible. The Steinbrenners have been the best owners in the game as long as I can remember. They want to win and they proved it last offseason…So, that being said, I’ve loved playing for New York these past four years.”
He also talked about taking less to stay:
Host, Bill Pidto: “When you look to the financial aspects of your future do you maybe say, ‘You know what? I’ll play for a little bit less if I can stay with the Yanks?’”
Johnny Damon: “Well, we have to go through the system and start negotiating if that’s what it’s going to take. We just need to start talking. We know New York has all the resources in the world but they also know I want to come back. So I’m sure it wouldn’t be too much of a problem. I’m sure there’s something we can work out.”
It’s clear that Damon isn’t being as free-spirited with his mouth as he was in May and August, but the desire is clearly there. He wants to come back to New York, and the Yankees, for the right price, will have him back. Although these quotes don’t push the story of a contract forward, it does highlight a Boras-driven tension. Scott Boras wants the most for his clients while his clients sometimes just want to stay where they are. We saw this tension flare up between Boras and A-Rod in 2007, and now it seems as though Damon is pushing back on the Boras rhetoric.
All things being equal, Boras should find a way to get Damon back on the Yanks. After all, that’s his job. But if it means fewer dollars for Matt Holliday, another top Boras client, Scott may be less willing to accommodate Damon and his lower future earnings potential.
Scott Boras will have none of this ‘hometown discount’ nonsense
Posted by: | CommentsReporting from the GM meetings, Joel Sherman says that superagent Scott Boras indicated that he’s looking not for a short-term deal for Johnny Damon, but possibly a three or four year commitment. “Greg Maddux was the unique pitcher when it came to durability,” said Boras. “And (Damon) is the Greg Maddux of position players when it comes to durability.” That’s certainly true; Damon’s played at least 140 games in 14 straight seasons. But Damon is the kind of guy that always seems to be on the brink of breaking down.
One year plus an option? Fine. anything more than that, then have fun in San Francisco.
Could the Yanks keep all three free agents?
Posted by: | CommentsWhen discussing the pending free agencies of Hideki Matsui and Johnny Damon, the refrain all season long was that the Yankees would probably keep one and cut loose the other. On the surface, that seemed to make sense. Both players will be 36 next year, so they don’t fit with the Yankees’ supposed plan to get younger. Yet they’re both productive players, so holding onto one makes sense.
The problem is of replacing production. The Yankees got a lot out of Matsui and Damon, and it’s unlikely that an internal candidate could replace their production. In 2009 Nick Swisher and Mark Teixeira replaced Jason Giambi and Bobby Abreu. But if the Yankees are leaning away from entering another long-term contract, who will replace Matsui or Damon?
The answer, as Joel Sherman notes this morning, could be themselves. Not only that, but they’re looking for a way to retain all three of their major free agents, which includes Andy Pettitte. Sherman quotes a team executive, who says, “I hope we can figure out a way to have them all back.” According to the exec, the Yankees are more focused on those guys than external free agents.
This makes sense to me. No, retaining all three veterans would not make the Yankees younger, but getting younger for the sake of getting younger is not a productive strategy. The Yankees need offensive output and solid pitching, and their own guys can provide that. Why go out on the market when the solution stands right before you?
The key to bringing back all three is getting them on one-year deals. That doesn’t seem to be a problem for Pettitte, who will likely only want a one-year deal anyway, and Matsui, who enters a free agent market flooded with DH types. It’s unlikely another team would give Matsui multiple years, so his return to New York could come at one year and a reduction to his $13 million 2009 salary. For Pettitte, it could be a one-year deal at perhaps double his $5.5 million 2009 base salary. If the Yankees bring him back, I doubt it will be a heavily incentivized deal.
Damon is a bit tougher a case. His defense declined markedly in 2009, and at his age it’s tough to call that a blip. He could certainly recover in 2010 — he was, after all, one of the top devensive left fielders in 2008 — but that’s not a given. Still, his bat is still valuable, especially in Yankee Stadium, and his postseason run shows that is season-ending slump isn’t too big a worry. Another team might be willing to offer Damon more years and money than the Yankees, though again I’m not sure other teams will be so apt to take the risk on an older player.
The Yankees could find themselves in a good position in these three negotiations. Bringing back Matsui, Damon, an Pettitte on one-year deals, perhaps one plus and option for Damon, seems like the best possible solution this off-season. That brings little risk to the Yankees, since these are short deals. It also reduces payroll because Damon and Matsui would not make the $13 million they did in 2009. The Yankees could then use their remaining resources elsewhere, rather than tying up money in a long-term contract for a player in his 30s, or trading prospects to fill a hole.
Getting younger is nice, but it is not a goal unto itself. The idea behind it is to get more flexible and more durable. The Yankees, however, could bring back these three veterans and still have a strong club for 2010. There aren’t many, if any, better options on the market that don’t come with their own sets of risk. I think it’s a good idea to bring back the guys they know, conserve their resources, and reassess after the 2010 season.
Matsui noticeably absent from Elias Rankings
Posted by: | CommentsElias Sports Bureau’s free agent rankings were released earlier this afternoon, and they contain a few surprises. Despite numerous projections placing him firmly in the Type B bracket, Yanks’ DH Hideki Matsui is an unranked free agent. Although Matsui missed much of 2008 with injuries, he rebounded to have a stellar 2009 regular season campaign, and over the last two years — the period considered by the rankings — he hit .282/.368/.473 with 37 home runs and 135 RBI. Meanwhile, Xavier Nady, who played in just seven games this year, is a Type B free agent.
In unsurprising news, Johnny Damon is a Type A free agent, and Pettitte is a Type B. As Joe wrote earlier, the Yanks will most likely resign Pettitte for 2010. The remaining Yankee free agents — Eric Hinske, Jerry Hairston and Jose Molina — are also unranked.
How the Abreu contract affects the Yanks
Posted by: | CommentsYesterday afternoon, word got out that Bobby Abreu had agreed to a contract extension with the Angels, signing on for two more years in Anaheim. After having to wait until damn near Spring Training to find a job last year, Abreu jumped all over the $19M the Halos offered him. The deal even includes a vesting option for 2012 worth $9M, when Abreu will be 38. I mentioned this yesterday, but in two years I’m sure we’ll be hearing about ways the Angels can prevent that option from vesting.
Anyway, the entire reason I brought this up is because it indirectly affects the Yankees. Now we have a blueprint for what a new contract for Johnny Damon might look like, something we didn’t have before. The similarities between the two players are obvious: both will be 36 on Opening Day 2010 yet have proven to be extremely durable, both are former All Stars with a strong pedigree within the game, and both are defensively challenged corner outfielders. Their offensive styles are different – Abreu is more of an on-base guy with gap power, Damon offers more over-the-fence power – but in the end they’re both ~.850 OPS and ~2.8 WAR players.
Bobby’s deal will pay him $9M annually, which is about as good of a deal as he could have expected. Despite all the talk about how he “transformed the Angels lineup,” Abreu simply was not going to pull in eight figures annually on the free agent market, and the same holds true for Johnny. It’s almost inconceivable that the Yankees would offer Damon arbitration even though he qualifies as a Type-A free agent, because the risk of him accepting a getting a raise over his current $13M salary is just too great, even if it’s just one year.
It’s no secret that the New Yankee Stadium somewhat helped resurrect Damon’s career in 2009. He set a new career high with a .207 IsoP, tied his career high with 24 homers, and posted the second best slugging percentage (.489) of his career. On the road he was Jorge Cantu (.284-.349-.446), but at home he was Jason Bay (.279-.382-.533). All that makes him more valuable to the Yankees than anyone else.
Timing certainly plays a huge part of it. A few weeks ago, the thought of even re-signing Damon seemed like madness because he was slumping so badly. Now, after some late inning World Series heroics, we wonder how the team could survive without him. But two guaranteed years? I can’t see how you can lock yourself into that kind of commitment. One year plus an option? Absolutely. But you’re asking for trouble, and reducing your flexibility for next year, by bringing him back for two.
As for the money, obviously $9M a year is nothing for the Yankees. It’s overpaying, but not by an absurd amount. If you could talk him down to $7M with some incentives, you’d obviously prefer that. The bottom line is that it would behoove the Yankees not to lock themselves a commitment with Damon as long as the Angels did with Abreu. Just don’t underestimate the power of Scott Boras.
Heyman: Yanks may be willing to offer Damon two years
Posted by: | CommentsVia MLBTR, Jon Heyman mentions that the Yankees “were believed willing to go for two years and $16 million” for Johnny Damon, but that was before the postseason. Damon’s recent heroics surely have bumped up his price just a bit. Regardless, two guaranteed years for Damon is nuts because just a week or so ago he looked fried amidst a two-month long slump. The Yanks would be wise to limit their offer to one guaranteed year, with an option, to not only reduce risk but to maintain roster flexibility beyond 2010.
Two years at $8M per for Johnny D? That one doesn’t pass the sniff test.
When Johnny comes running home again
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Because of the way FOX produces baseball games, when Johnny Damon slid safely into second, popped up and then started heading for third, my heart dropped. “What are you doing?” I thought. How could Damon, already in scoring position for Mark Teixeira, dream of taking third when Pedro Feliz was covering second and had the ball?
It was then that I realized Pedro Feliz, the Phillies’ third baseman, had the ball. If he had the ball, well, then no one was covering third. And why was no one covering third? Because Mark Teixeira was up from the left side, and all year teams have put a drastic shift on for lefty Teixeira.
So when Feliz fielded the ball in front of the base, Damon raced him to third. Says Jayson Stark:
Damon admitted afterward he had never done this before. And, in fact, it wasn’t immediately clear the last time anyone did this. But Damon said he’d been talking about it and thinking about it all year, since it became clear The Shift was going to be a regular feature of Teixeira’s left-handed at-bats.
Damon had to be safe. He had to know he would be safe because with Phil Coke, and not Mariano Rivera, warming up for a tie game, the Yankees couldn’t afford to take chances. After the game, Damon chuckled disbelievingly at the play. “If it was Chone Figgins,” he said, “that might have been tough. I just went off of instinct. And fortunately, it worked out.”
Once on third base, Damon was firmly inside the heads of Brad Lidge and Carlos Ruiz, the Phillies’ battery. Lidge hit Mark Teixeira with the next pitch and refused to throw Alex Rodriguez a slider for fear that a wild pitch would give the Yanks the lead. A-Rod and Jorge Posada made that slider a moot point, and before the dust had settled, the Yanks were sitting pretty on a 7-4 lead.
While thinking about the play as the post-game show unfolded last night, I remembered 2003 and so did Derek Jeter. On Opening Day, the Yankees were in Toronto, and Jeter had a lead off first base. Jason Giambi hit a bouncer to Roy Halladay, and Doc threw to Carlos Delgado at first. Jeter knew that, with the Giambi shift on, third base was unoccupied, and he didn’t stop. Delgado threw across the diamond as Ken Huckaby, Toronto’s catcher, raced up the line. Huckaby caught the ball and crashed into Jeter. Derek’s shoulder was dislocated, and he would not play again until May 13.
Last night, there was no Ken Huckaby, no Carlos Ruiz, no Brad Lidge awaiting Johnny Damon at third base. The Yanks’ left fielder caught everyone off guard, and as the Yankee bench, millions of fans, and Carlos Ruiz watched the play unfold, Damon beat Feliz in a dash to third. It was a race for ages.
“You know how people always tell you that they’ve been in baseball for 40 years, 50 years, and things happen every game that they never saw?” Yankees bench coach Tony Pena said last night. “Well, I’ve never seen that before. I never saw that before in my life.”
‘If stem-cell research were around, you’d want to tap into that gene pool’
Posted by: | CommentsThat gem of a quote was delivered by none other than Angels’ season ticket holder, and noted player agent, Scott Boras. Who was he talking about? None other than Johnny Damon. Boras, of course, was setting the stage for Damon’s impending free agency, noting that Johnny plays pretty much every day, something you can’t say for most 35-yr olds. He even goes so far to say Damon “has a 30-year-old’s body. He plays much younger.” I can’t say I’d go that for, but Damon did have a big year and set himself up well for the open market.
