Right now, David Freese appears to have a healthy handle on the starting 3B job. There’s a substatial number of free agent third baseman who are better than average players over the course of a season: Beltre (3 WAR), Troy Glaus (3 WAR), Mark DeRosa (2.5 WAR), Joe Crede (2.5 WAR). These players and many of their less valuable associates have various concerns that come with them (most often health) but David Freese isn’t a sure product either. Assuming the Cardinals acquire Matt Holliday, and I sincerely hope they do, I expect Freese to be the Cardinals starting third sacker. What should we expect from him?
Freese’s 2009 season was delayed by a foot injury but when he did return to health at Memphis, he posted a line nearly identical to the 2008 campaign. Despite my repeated protests that “I just don’t see it” when I’ve watched him live and on camera, he continues to produce. I’ve always tried to balance what the objective measures tell me with my subjective senses and Freese just happens to be one of those guys who likes to stick it to my senses.
The sunny projection from Baseball Prospectus takes his AAA numbers (good for a .380+ wOBA) and claims that Mr. Freese would have hit a .261/.327/.473 line in the majors. That’s a better line than most projections for Adrian Beltre and would equate to a .350 wOBA. It’s also a healthy bit better than average offensive production (.330 wOBA) for a player.
The less optimistic translation comes from Minor League Splits but even that comes out above average if only by a hair. A .332 wOBA from a (essentially) free player is nothing to sneeze at. The statistical consensus surely seems to be that Freese is decent bet to hold his own in the big leagues offensively.
Assuming that Freese hits the optimistic projection about 20% of the time, the moderate projection about 70% of the time and flames out 10% (.300 wOBA – i.e. Pedro Feliz), you’d wind up with a league average offensive profile. Statistically, I’m having a hard time arguing with those numbers but they don’t feel like a substantial enough risk. Even assuming a much higher downside for Freese, you’re not going to drive his numbers much further south than .315 wOBA. He’s posted very good power numbers with reasonable walk rates — it’s a classic offensive profile.
Rally’s projections regress Freese to a neutral defender at the hot corner despite posting consistently better than average numbers in the minors. The Cardinals have shown that they consider Freese’s glove at third an asset and I’d be willing to (grudgingly) assess him an above average defender. To be conservative, we’ll stick with Rally’s neutral projection.
Putting it together: Offense + Defense + Position + Replacement = 0 + 0 + 2.5 + 20 = 22.5 runs above replacement
The gains between David Freese and any of the 3B free agents seems to be marginal at best. The incremental cost associated with these players is going to be very high. Of the list above, Mark DeRosa makes an immense amount of sense for the Cardinals as someone who offers a failsafe at multiple positions. The wrist injury is a concern and his cost may be prohibitive but he represents a decreased opportunity cost relative to players that are restricted to third base.
Maybe this is a dose of cold water for those clamoring to sign Beltre should Holliday find greener (or more expensive) pastures. Beltre is likely to sign for upwards of 3 years and $25M. His production indicates that he’s worth that in a vaccuum but for the Cardinals, well, not so much. You’d basically be gaining 1 WAR at a $8M cost beyond what Freese would produce for you. Downgrading the projection for Freese and you could get the incremental gains to be at the market rate ($4-$5M per win) around 2 WAR but that may restrict the Cardinals from making additions in other areas where they have a lower baseline to work from (5th starter, LF).
I’m not a David Freese advocate. Never have been and until he produces in the majors, I’m probably going to stubbornly stick with my gut. It’s important to remember that most aging studies presume that Freese is at his peak now so he’s a reasonable bet for the next 3-4 years to hold par but not really see any major improvements. That said, I can’t construct a reasonable argument* for the Cardinals to spend big on 3B given the baseline above. David Freese, regardless of the Holliday signing/non-signing, should play 3B for the Cardinals.
*Unreasonable argument: I don’t want to see the gifs/jpegs that come from having a Mr. Freese on the team.
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What’s the equivalency between wOBA and Wins? That is, how many points of wOBA equal 1 win above replacement? .020? .030? Just looking for a quick and dirty way to estimate offensive value with a glance at wOBA. Given that .330 is average, what wOBA equals, say, one win above average?
Secondly, I’m sure I’ve seen this before, but what’s a replacement level wOBA? I want to say it’s around .270, but I’m not sure.
Arch,
Jeff Zimmerman at BtB did some good work on exactly the questions you’re asking.
http://www.beyondtheboxscore.com/2009/11/10/1123343/woba-to-war-conversion-spreadsheet
Replacement wOBA sorta varies by position if you want to include the position adjustment in the calculus…
For some reason, when I think of Freese, visions of Scott Cooper (another local product) dance in my head.
The big factor that I think makes Beltre look more appealing is his great great defense. MLBTraderumors quoted someone from Boston as saying it was game changing.
If we had Ryan and Beltre on the left side of the infield with Pujols and Molina we have a GREAT defensive infield. Shumaker isn’t going to be great but I think he proved last season he could hold his own and was a liability. He should only get better or at least stay the same.
Despite the appeal of having Ryan and Beltre I think it is wise to play Freese at 3B until he proves he can’t do it. Then try some other options (Tyler Greene, Allen Craig) or trade for someone.
i’ve never been sold on Freeze or Beltre for that matter.
Good analysis. I’m very high on the Cardinals giving him the shot, not because his ceiling is exciting but because it seems to make so much sense for them right now. I think the projections for him to be a slightly better than average player over the next few seasons are about right. The thing is that that would be a huge improvement over what we competed with this last year at the position, it would save us money to fill in other positions and it would give us time to develop a more exciting option. I’d love to have a more exciting closer, starter or left fielder than to spend big money for a slightly better third baseman.
Something I’ve long suspected about the numbers for freese – that they would show pretty marginal gains over the expensive free agents out there. My gut is he ends up a plus fielder (5-10 UZR) and underperforms his offensive #s a bit but comes in right at 2 WAR.
The depth at third is not terrible either – any guesses on the value of craig at third? I’d think 0 to 1 WAR with a (not much)subzero UZR, off the top of my head. Not great but ok.
I think he’ll perform similar to what we could expect if we signed Joe Crede, and for the minimum, with backup options in Mather and Craig, I’ll take it. If we don’t sign Holliday, however, that’s a different story.
I agree. Crede hasn’t played more than 100 games per season for a while now, while still being a 2 WAR player. Crede is a bargain, however. He signed for $2.5M w/some incentives last season. That’s just about 1.5 M for win. Freese would make the league minimum, but if AZ’s gut is right about Freese, Crede wouldn’t be a bad insurance policy.
Crede could start w/ Freese either in Trip-A or the bench until Crede inevitably gets hurt again.
I don’t understand Matt’s comment about “if we don’t sign Holliday.” I think the point of this posting, which I wholeheartedly agree with, is that we should go with Freese whether we sign Holliday or not. Allocating good money (like $8M+ a year it would take to sign Beltre or DeRosa) for a small marginal gain doesn’t make sense when you have more room for improvement in other areas.
I also have to disagree with the idea of DeRosa making sense for this team, due to his versatility. His bat doesn’t play that well at third; playing him in LF would be even worse. I think the better move would be simply to sign a leftfielder, whether that be Holliday or someone else, and stick with Freese at third.
DeRosa’s bat plays just fine at 3B, and his defense in the outfield corners has been very good over his career. His value at 3B (about 2 WAR) is the same in LF.
DeRosa peaked with the Rangers and Cubs. With a 2 year deal, he will be 35 and 36. He’s not exciting for LF or RF, best at 3B and utility. The Cards should let him leave, collect a draft pick.
I strongly believe that Freese should get first shot at third base whether or not we sign DeRosa. Therefore we would be signing DeRosa as a starting left fielder with options to use him elsewhere if needed. I kind of agree with some of the posters that, at his age and with his recent surgery, he might not be worth the money and the years that it would take to lure him away from the other suitors. If we do sign Holliday (I’m hoping not) it would surely be silly to try to sign DeRosa. If we don’t sign either I’d like to have Freese at third and a platoon of Craig and a veteran lefty hitting outfielder who creams righties in left field. The problem would getting TLR to go to war with a couple of rookies in the lineup.
CardfaninGA- If we don’t sign Holliday, we’ll need to make more than one upgrade to the offense, IMO. Getting 2 WAR for a good price is great, but not if you need to replace 5 WAR.
It’s like the 5th starter. Having Boggses and Garcias are great when you have one spot to fill for the minimum, and you may be getting more than you pay for with each one, but a rotation full of them can only take you so far.
To be fair AZ, the argument had nothing to do with freese. GDM and I were simply arguing for the title of Batman.