Time For Matt Kemp To Take A Break?

Coming in to the 2013 Dodgers season, as most Dodgers fans were busy ordering playoff tickets and getting fitted for Championship t-shirts, I was saying to myself that I didn't want to "win this way" and more importantly I didn't want to "lose this way".  Well, here we are only at the end of May but the Dodgers are definitely "losing this way".  Yeah, there are lots of problems, too many for me to cover but the one that really sticks out is Matt Kemp being a shell of his former self at the plate.

2013 Matt Kemp
- wOBA 0.285
- OPS 0.656

Those are awful numbers.  Those are the numbers are number four hitter has been putting up for the first two months of the season.  And apparently Matt Kemp is not in a slump.  He is not unlucky.  He is just not good at hitting for the time being.

What's wrong with Matt Kemp?  Who knows.  I will leave that for the medical staff, hitting coaches and sports psychologists out there.  But what I do know, is that you cannot have your number three hitter putting up an OPS of 0.656 over a two month period with NO sign that a turn around is on the horizon.

Here are some options, and there are likely a few more.  In draconian order.

1. Put Matt Kemp on the DL and send him to the minors to rehab.

Pros: Matt Kemp is "hurting" this team and the team with its payroll is in a win now mode.  Matt Kemp is weighting down this ship.  Call up Joc Pederson who is tearing up AA and let Skip Schumaker back him up.

Cons: Nobody seems to know for sure what is causing Matt Kemp not to hit and nobody seems to know what course of action will help him rebound.  Matt's ego.

2. Bench Matt Kemp

Pros: He can rest a little bit and still see the occasional major league pitcher while working on his swing in the cages with hitting coach Mark McGwire.  He won't be making as many outs.  Joc Pederson or someone from the minors gets a chance.

Cons:  Nobody seems to know for sure what is causing Matt Kemp not to hit and nobody seems to know what course of action will help him rebound.  Matt's ego.

3. Drop Matt Kemp in the batting order.

Pros: Matt Kemp still gets to see major league pitching but perhaps does less damage to the Dodgers offense batting 7th or 8th in the order.

Cons:  Nobody seems to know for sure what is causing Matt Kemp not to hit and nobody seems to know what course of action will help him rebound. Matt's ego.

The biggest problem to me is the fact that nobody seems to know for sure what is Matt Kemp's problem at the plate.  Is it physical or is it mental or somewhere in between.  And if so, what is the right path to take.  This team was built to win NOW.  The payroll is enormous.  The pressure to win is enormous.  This team already has enough dead weight.  We have two very good outfielders in the minor leagues.  There would obviously be some risk in calling them up to play a tough defensive position and Carl Crawford can probably no longer play CF due to his weak throwing arm.  I would start at #3 on my list and every 7-10 days move up a notch.  Moving him down in the lineup will not help him get better but if you are going to play him every day just because he supposedly needs to play to get better/feel better (w/e that means) then for the love of God drop in the batting order.  If no improvement is made (which there likely won't be) then bench him and let him rest and work out the kinks out of the batting order where he cannot hurt this team.  If that doesn't work then send his butt down to the minors to work it out.  I wish him the best, but this team needs to win now and it isn't likely to happen with Matt Kemp playing every day and batting fourth in the lineup.

May 29th Simulations

2012 MLB Simulations

Visitors	Home	Probable Pitching Matchup	Favorite	Vegas Win Prob	Simulator Win Prob	ML Units
CHA	TB	Phil Humber vs James Shields	TB	60.55%	57.24%	1.0
DET	BOS	Justin Verlander vs Daniel Bard	DET	59.60%	56.25%	1.0
KC	CLE	Wil Smith vs Justin Masterson	CLE	59.60%	55.81%	1.1
MIL	LAN	Michael Fiers vs Nathan Eovaldi	LAN	52.94%	56.08%	1.1
NYA	LAA	Andy Pettitte vs Dan Haren	LAA	55.85%	53.84%	0.5
SEA	TEX	Jason Vargas vs Scott Feldman	TEX	64.85%	65.77%	0.3
STL	ATL	Jake Westbrook vs Randall Delgado	STL	51.10%	48.50%	0.8
SD	CHN	Eric Stults vs Jeff Samardzija	CHN	60.24%	59.77%	0.9
CIN	PIT	Homer Bailey vs Charlie Morton	CIN	53.60%	56.22%	---
BAL	TOR	Jake Arrieta vs Ricky Romero	TOR	57.36%	52.18%	1.7
PHI	NYN	Joe Blanton vs Jeremy Hefner	PHI	51.10%	50.28%	---
WAS	FLA	Edwin Jackson vs Anibal Sanchez	FLA	57.36%	59.46%	0.8
OAK	MIN	Jarrod Parker vs Cole DeVries	OAK	50.74%	48.64%	0.3
ARI	SF	Joe Saunders vs Ryan Vogelsong	SF	54.02%	60.64%	2.7

Current ROI: 4.65%

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Pick Your Poison, A Sad Fan's Guide To The Dodgers Off-Season

Many people have railed against the off-season signings Ned Colletti has made for the Dodgers. Colletti was quick to fill out most of his roster this off-season. And in doing so made a few questionable signings. None of the signings as a single entity really hurt the Dodgers chances, but in aggregate they have possibly kept the Dodgers from making the big splash they need to compete for a playoff chance in the next two years.

Instead of signing the likes of Mark Ellis, Juan Rivera, Aaron Harang, Chris Capuano, Adam Kennedy and Tony Gwynn Jr., the Dodgers could've used in house replacements making close to league minimum like Jerry Sands (LF), Justin Sellers (2B) and Nathan Eovaldi (P) plus probably few other replacement level players or NRIs. The savings many argued would allow the Dodgers to bid on such high profiled sluggers like 1B free agent Prince Fielder and maybe there'd be enough left over to sign Kuroda for a one year $13M deal (or along those lines).

Sure, the short-term money may come close to adding up - but all you are really doing is giving yourself a shot at making a bid for a player like Fielder. There is no gaurantee that you would win the bidding for him. And no gaurantee that he'd even want to come to play for the Dodgers. If he didn't there would be a mad scramble to put together the pieces of a team that would have some reasonable depth like the team currently assembled does. Depth is an important and often overlooked part of a team. The Dodgers as currently constructed have depth, perhaps not assembled in the most financially efficient way - but they have depth.

The Dodgers really have three possible big fish they can land. Two in-house and one in the free agent market. That being Matt Kemp, Clayton Kershaw and Prince Fielder. In my opinion there is NO WAY the Dodgers are signing all three to big long-term deals. And there is really no way you can plan for a Prince Fielder short-term deal. Thus if I had to take my choice of two out of three of these players signing long-term with us it has to be Kemp and Kershaw. Kemp has already signed and now Kershaw is headed to arbitration a few months after winning the 2011 Cy Young award. There is a possibility that the Dodgers and Kershaw will use this process to ink out a long-term contract with Kershaw buying out his remaining three years of arbitration and a few of his first free agency years.

Which scenario would you rather have?

Scenario A: Sellers starting 2B, Fielder signed to 8 year deal, Loney traded for scraps, Sands/Gwynn platoon in LF, Kuroda ($13M), Eovaldi 5th starter. With neither Kemp nor Kershaw signed to long term deals.

Scenario B: What has happened so far with Kershaw extended for 6 years at some fair but pretty high amount.

Yes, there are probably other scenarios but none much different than the two above in terms of landfall off-seasons for the Dodgers. And in the end I am not defending all of Colletti's moves, but there has been nothing done this off-season to harm the Dodgers long-term (2+ years) chances of competing. And lastly, one other thing to keep in mind is that the Dodgers are up for sale (finally!!!). McCourt wants to maximize the price he can get for the Dodgers. And in doing so he appears to be making an attempt to limit the risk of the Dodgers ability to compete in the win column in the long-term - thus all the short term non bargain contracts. In other words... be patient and cross your fingers that the new ownership puts people in place that more than half-way know what they are doing.

Matt Kemp, Rich Dude

The Dodgers signed Matt Kemp to an impressive contract this afternoon. Kemp will make $160M over 8 years. Is this a good deal for the Dodgers? I sure hope so. A lot can go wrong in 8 years. Some of the things that should worry Dodgers fans about this contract are Kemp regressing, defense in center field and of course the always unpredictable injury bug. As good as Matt Kemp is, he by no means is an 8.7 WAR player. His "true talent" level may be unknown but the most likely level is probably around 5.5 WAR. A sizeable chunk of Kemp's value comes from his ability to play a scarce position (center field). Kemp is likely an average to slightly above average center fielder. As he gets older he may be moved out of CF to one of the corner outfield positions where more will be expected out of his bat (if not, he gets docked). The injury bug hasn't been a problem for Kemp, so he gets a pass on this one, but of course fluke injuries can happen to the most healthiest of players. That is a risk you just can't mitigate and comes with every player.

In the table below, I take a look at how I value this contract. It of course is a swag but a fun exercise nevertheless. Please feel free to ad your opinion to the mix. In this exercise I am going to start Matt Kemp off as a 5.5 WAR player for 2012 and 2013 before I slowly drop his WAR value down in each of the subsuquent years. I am setting the initial $/WAR value at 4.5M per WAR and assuming a salary inflation rate of 4%.

Year	$/WAR	WAR	Value
2012	4.5	5.5	24.75
2013	4.68	5.5	25.74
2014	4.87	5	24.34
2015	5.06	4.5	22.78
2016	5.26	4	21.06
2017	5.47	3.5	19.16
2018	5.69	3	17.08
2019	5.92	2.5	14.80
Total		33.5	169.71

Assuming my parameters are correct, Kemp's value comes in close to what he is getting paid. There is a total surplus of around $9.7M but a slight adjustment here and there to my input parameters can easily move that up or down another $10M or so. From the looks of things, this does look like a very fair deal to me.