Valuing Oliver Perez
Via MetsBlog, according to speculation reported by John Delcos, Scott Boras is seeking a big payday for Oliver Perez after the 2008 season.
Speculation has the starting parameters at five years and $60 million, but whatever it turns out to be, Boras said it is not weighing on Perez.
So, I decided to estimate Perez’s future worth. Assuming that 2007 represents his accurate level of talent for his age-25 season, from 2009–2013 Perez can be expected to generate $54.7 million in revenue.
Five years and $60 million? I don’t think so. Even with the ridiculous assumption that 2007 represents Perez’s true ability, he is still not worth that much. In 2005 and 2006, he was worth about $1.5 million and $2.5 million, respectively. Five years and $30 million is more like it.
Addendum: Thanks to Baseball Musings for the initial pointer.
J.C. Bradbury is an economist and associate professor at Kennesaw State University in metropolitan Atlanta. He is the author of The Baseball Economist and has operated Sabernomics.com since March 2004.
May 7th, 2008 at 3:46 pm
I think you’re drastically overestimating the supply of decent starters. The reason that he’ll go for 5/60 (and maybe even more) is because there are so few free agent starters available.
Every year, there are about a half dozen decent starters on the market. And every year, like clockwork, there are at least a dozen teams that desperately need starters- even one with track records as spotty as Perez’. The demand is always outpacing supply, and that will drive prices up yet again this offseason.
May 7th, 2008 at 5:27 pm
Boy, I hope Omar Minaya gives Perez his $60 million extension before the Mets figure out that 2007 was just a fluke season. This guy is basically a Damian Moss who stayed healthy.
May 8th, 2008 at 7:25 am
If I was a GM, I wouldn’t be interested in paying what Boras wants. When Perez is good, he’s very very good, but if you look at his career, “inconsistent” would be the number one word to describe it. When he’s bad, he’s very very bad and he’s bad more often than he’s good. So far it looks like he’s in the middle of a typical bad year for him, although based on his career numbers I’d expect that ERA to eventually get over 5.00 if past performance holds true.
May 8th, 2008 at 11:28 am
Any thought of posting a java script tool to figure out player worth over a certain contract length?
May 8th, 2008 at 3:22 pm
C.D. says:
Any thought of posting a java script tool to figure out player worth over a certain contract length?
I’d certainly appreciate that! Of course I think he goes over that in his book so perhaps that isn’t a realistic request.