Three Surprising MLB Non Tenders

Major League Baseball’s Non Tender deadline recently came and went. That is the offseason date by which teams can decide whether or not to tender contracts to players under initial team control. So these players tend to be fairly young and have not yet established themselves on veteran contracts.

Those who are not tendered contracts are free to test the market and perhaps sign with other teams. The reasons teams give up on them usually has to do with their performance, but salary and age also play roles. If a club feels that it can get similar or better replacement performance from a younger player at the same position, it might no longer need a player who has a few years of seniority and already a somewhat higher salary. Often, the team will attempt to trade these non-tender candidates before making the decision to cut them loose.

As always, the non-tender list is filled with utility players, marginal pitchers, and players who become slightly older or more expensive than the team’s needs. The fit can change, for example, when there is a utility player who can play 2B and 3B, but isn’t very effective at shortstop; if the team has someone else in mind who can fill a utility role including being able to play shortstop, maybe that makes the earlier player expendable. Also, the non-tender list usually includes some players who are a little too old or expensive for the roles their teams would use them in.

This year, there were several surprises among the list of players who were not tendered contracts by their respective teams.

The Chicago Cubs' Wrigley Field. Public domain.

Ronald Torreyes, Chicago Cubs

This player might have been the weirdest addition to the non-tender list because the Cubs acquired Torreyes in a trade from the Yankees just two days before deciding not to tender him a contract. He cannot have worn out his welcome that quickly. His salary is only $900,000, which is not that high in baseball terms.

But most likely, the Cubs thought they could get him for less than that, probably because they envision him spending some time in the minor leagues. So they cut him loose and probably will try to re-negotiate a contract with him that better fits the team’s needs. Of course, there is always a risk that another team will jump in and offer him something better.

The team's depth chart is a little thin on the left side, especially with Russell out. Source: MLB.com

Going into the non-tender deadline, there was more speculation about what the Cubs would do with shortstop Addison Russell. He’s currently serving a long league-imposed suspension for domestic violence. Russell was a highly touted prospect a couple of years ago but, in addition to the suspension, he has somewhat underperformed on the field, leading to speculation the Cubbies might cut him loose this time. (They didn’t, perhaps because the team’s home stadium is located on Addison Street.)

In the end, the team chose to tender Russell a contract, even knowing he will miss some games for the suspension. This, in turn, affected some of the other players in utility roles further down the depth chart and it may have contributed to the team’s belief that Ronald Torreyes may be useful, but probably will spend some time in the minors as well. It certainly looked strange to trade for a guy and then not offer him a contract just two days later, though.

Hunter Strickland, San Francisco Giants

Good relief pitching has gotten more expensive and late inning, shut-down guys are highly sought after. Strickland fits the bill. His numbers were pretty good and he was closing for the Giants just last year. Strickland was projected to earn around $2.5 million in arbitration this year, which is not at all unreasonable for a late innings reliever. So why on earth was he not tendered a contract, when the Giants may very well have to spend more money to replace his performance in that roster spot?

First, the Giants have a new head of baseball operations. There is no doubt that Farhan Zaidi’s roster will look much different than past Giants teams. Strickland may not have fit with Zaidi’s vision for the team. Strickland is a bit of a head case and has displayed some public anger issues in the past which put his own interests ahead of the team’s.

Here is a video clip of Strickland throwing at the Nationals’ Bryce Harper in 2017 and the resulting fight. Strickland was suspended by the league for six games and Harper for four. In the unwritten law of baseball, there are times when it is acceptable to throw at an opposing team’s batter or to start a fight, but he was out of line here; you can see that even Strickland’s veteran catcher didn’t stand up for him. His manager and teammates have had difficulty defending his actions at times, though he did seem to get his anger under better control after this.

Second, despite good career numbers, Strickland wasn’t all that good last season. His ERA was 3.97, which is nothing special for a back-end reliever. He saved 14 games, but also blew 4, which isn’t a great ratio. He was out for a while with a hand injury. After returning in August, Strickland allowed earned runs in all but one of his relief appearances. His ERA over the last month of the season was over 9.00.

So even though Strickland is a young, hard-throwing reliever, who no doubt will get another chance elsewhere, a close look at his performance makes this non-tender decision less of a surprise. Apparently, Zaidi thinks he can do better. Time will tell.

When some of us hear the name Strickland, we still think of this guy.

Billy Hamilton, Cincinnati Reds

Some other team will gladly take a chance on Billy Hamilton. It was a surprise to see the Reds cut ties with him after all he’s accomplished there. But Hamilton’s skill set may not have been worth a roster spot for them anymore, given that he’s had trouble offensively.

Let’s start with the good stuff. Hamilton is probably the fastest person in major league baseball. He is a rabbit on the base paths. That means he can steal and it also means that he puts pressure on the other team to hurry a play, even when he has hit a simple infield ground ball. Defensively, a guy this fast can cover a lot of ground in the field.

Here is a video of a game where Hamilton was able to show his speed:

But you have to get on base before you can steal another. The downside of fast players is that few of them are effective major league hitters. That’s just because the average person on the street could not hit major league pitching, and neither can many minor league players. When a player shows such speed, though, he becomes an intriguing addition to a major league roster.

Billy Hamilton. Source: espn.com.

As we have seen time and time again, some of these fast guys are marginal hitters when they come up to the big clubs. Do the names Tom Goodwin, Dave Roberts, Rajai Davis, and Dee Gordon ring a few bells? Some of those guys learned to hit well enough to stay in the majors, but first and foremost, they had jobs because of their speed. For each of those guys, hitting was a much bigger struggle. Hamilton is as fast as lightning, but the Reds were always hoping he’d become better at the plate and maybe they felt it was time to move on.

These were only a few of the non-tenders that surprised me this year.

Non-tendered? Try some tenderizer.

It seemed to me that some teams were doing what the Cubs probably were thinking with Ronald Torreyes, which is that they may non-tender the player but then try to work out a new contract. I can understand if teams do not want to play a major league salary to someone who probably is destined to ferry back and forth between the majors and the AAA club all year. And that brings me to my next point: why doesn’t MLB expand the roster size? If teams could carry 2-3 more players, then some utility players and one- or two- tool players (such a raw power hitters) would have better chances. And I think it would make the game a little more interesting.

References:
http://www.espn.com/mlb/story//id/25419392/chicago-cubs-tender-contract-suspended-shortstop-addison-russell
https://www.mercurynews.com/2018/11/30/giants-non-tender-hunter-strickland-gorkys-hernandez-sign-joe-panik-mlb-trade-rumors/
https://670thescore.radio.com/chicago-cubs-clear-roster-spot-surprise-ronald-torreyes
https://cubbiescrib.com/2018/11/29/chicago-cubs-acquire-ronald-torreyes/
http://www.espn.com/mlb/story//id/25421206/billy-hamilton-cut-loose-cincinnati-reds