Giants Able To Sign Matt Cain

The Giants signed Matt Cain to a 6 year $127.5M deal. Is he worth this kind of money? No, probably not. He did amass 5.2 fWAR last year and if for some reason you think that is his new baseline then one could probably make an argument in his favor. But let's keep in mind that he did so putting up an unsustainable 0.37 HR/9, 70.6 LOB% and a low BABIP against of 0.260. The Giants bought high on Matt Cain. Let's take a look at three of the main skill stats (K/9, BB/9, GB/FB) that a pitcher can control and compare Matt Cain to his recent peers. The comparison will not take into consideration age, as I am just looking at current skill comparables. I looked at 2010 and 2011 data only.

	Matt Cain	7.2	2.51	0.91
Rank	Name	K/9	BB/9	GB/FB
1	Shaun Marcum	7.34	2.27	0.88
2	Daniel Hudson	7.18	2.18	0.98
3	Jake Peavy	7.59	2.43	0.99
4	John Danks	6.97	2.72	1.18
5	Roy Oswalt	7.34	2.27	1.25
6	Gavin Floyd	7.15	2.44	1.36
7	Bartolo Colon	7.18	2.18	1.24
8	Ervin Santana	6.92	2.89	0.98
9	Javier Vazquez	7.24	2.97	0.74
10	Travis Wood	6.85	2.83	0.68
11	Joe Blanton	6.97	2.15	1.22
12	Ted Lilly	7.55	2.21	0.64
13	Alexi Ogando	6.68	2.32	0.92
14	Homer Bailey	7.69	2.73	1.07
15	Brett Myers	6.93	2.53	1.41
16	Phil Hughes	6.88	2.96	0.76
17	Hiroki Kuroda	7.23	2.19	1.41
18	Jordan Zimmermann	7.07	1.92	0.99
19	Jeff Niemann	6.79	2.86	1.21
20	Matt Garza	7.77	2.8	1.04
21	Ricky Nolasco	7.3	1.91	1.22
22	Chris Capuano	7.88	2.61	1.05
23	Johan Santana	6.51	2.49	0.76
24	Chris Carpenter	7.05	2.25	1.59
25	Ian Kennedy	7.92	2.7	0.91
26	Ryan Vogelsong	6.99	3.14	1.34

So, not exactly a stellar group of comparables. Good but not elite or record breaking good.