The history of relievers signing four-year deals is, to put it mildly, terrible. I’ve found 13 such contracts for relievers, one of them for five years (B.J. Ryan with Toronto) and the rest for four.
While some are still in progress, I think we could charitably say three worked out or are working out so far: Andrew Miller’s current deal, Jonathan Papelbon’s four-year deal with the Phillies, and Mariano Rivera’s deal with the Yankees that began in 2001.
As for the others, Ryan and Justin Speier were released before their deals ended. Joe Nathan blew out in Year 3 and was awful in his first year back. Steve Karsay produced 2.5 WAR in Year 1 and literally produced 0.0 afterward, missing one year due to injury. Scott Linebrink produced 1.8 WAR over his four years. David Robertson and Darren O’Day have had rough starts in their ongoing deals. Even Craig Kimbrel, now entering the final year of his deal, has lost value in each year of his contract and has been traded twice.
So why are the St. Louis Cardinals going long on Brett Cecil, the No. 44 free agent on my rankings? Well … I’m not sure. He’s better than he showed in 2016, when the Blue Jays misused him a bit as a lefty specialist even though he has always been effective against hitters on both sides of the plate. They lost Zach Duke to injury, so they had a clear need for someone in that role, and Cecil is good. Is he $7.5 million a year good?
Cecil has never produced much more than about 4.0 WAR of value in any four-year span of his career, and given the historical volatility of reliever performance, I’m not willing to bet on him beating that in the next four seasons. I think the Cardinals are hoping for him to be about what he was in 2013-15, and if that’s the case, the deal will be an adequate but not great value deal. If he follows in the path of most relievers who have signed deals of this length, however, they’ll get maybe two good years out of him and be looking for the exit before it’s over. The Kenley Jansen-grade talents in this market will probably get four-year deals, but I think most teams shy away from reliever contracts this long, as a matter of policy. I don’t expect the Cecil deal to change that.
• The Texas Rangers need to bolster their rotation, especially with Derek Holland leaving via free agency. They chose to sign talented but oft-injured Andrew Cashner to a one-year, $10 million deal, limiting their risk but perhaps showing more optimism about his ability to start than I have.
I have long argued for Cashner to move to the bullpen, and he has still only managed to have two full, healthy seasons in his career as a starter, even seeing his stuff diminish this year around some injuries. The Rangers could catch lightning in a bottle here, as a truly healthy Cashner can show three above-average-to-plus pitches, but sightings of that creature in the wild are rare and probably apocryphal.
• The Minnesota Twins made two surprising deletions from their roster this month, jettisoning Trevor Plouffe and Adam Brett Walker from their 40-man roster. Plouffe hit 24 homers in 119 games in 2012, but that was his high-water mark in the big leagues, and he leaves the Twins with a .247/.308/.420 career line in nearly 3,000 plate appearances. Thanks to his mediocre defense, he has become a 30-year-old replacement-level player. He was due to get over $8 million in arbitration and isn’t worth a fraction of that, so ditching him made sense for the Twins.
What will be interesting to see now is whether the Twins return Miguel Sano to the hot corner, which was his primary position in the minors before Tommy John surgery cost him the 2014 season. Sano has the arm for third, but he was never a good defender there -- he lacked range and often seemed apathetic about his defense -- and no player in MLB history at or above Sano’s listed weight of 260 has played even half his games in a season at third base.
Walker was less surprising, in a way, because he had never reached the majors and struck out 202 times in Triple-A this year. I’ve never been a believer in Walker as a prospect despite his raw power -- he has hit 25-31 homers in each of his four full seasons in the minors -- because he makes contact so infrequently, and he can’t play anywhere but first base. But this decision to outright and lose him -- Milwaukee claimed him, another perplexing move given the overall strength of the Brewers’ system -- also signals that the new front office won’t be wedded in any way to past decisions. I view it as a small, positive step for the Twins.
• Finally, the Mariners and Rays made a trade, with the main name in the mix belonging to Richie Shaffer. Shaffer has power but a lot of swing-and-miss in his game at the plate. He’s played third and right, but the only spot where he’s at least average right now is at first base. The Mariners now have a bunch of spare-parts guys who can play around the corners or at DH, including Shaffer, Danny Valencia (also a right-handed batter), Dan Vogelbach (DH-only, bats lefty), Seth Smith (lefty) and Ben Gamel (lefty), so they have a number of ways they can mix and match these players depending on the opposing starter. However, they probably don’t have room on the Opening Day roster for everybody. The M’s also got Taylor Motter in the deal, a 27-year-old Triple-A utility man and someone probably not worth the 40-man roster spot right now.
The return for the Rays revolves around 19-year-old lefty Dylan Thompson, a projection guy who has not pitched much since signing, spending time with his ailing father, who was suffering from cancer. On the mound, he shows feel for three pitches and is still young enough for physical improvement. Andrew Kittredge is a performance reliever who showed an upper-80s fastball in the Arizona Fall League but had great numbers in Triple-A this year. Dalton Kelly is an organizational player, a 38th-round senior signee who is 22 and hasn’t reached high-A yet. It’s a disappointing return for Shaffer, the Rays’ first-round pick in 2012, but after he hit .227/.329/.367 while repeating Triple-A, his value had to be at an all-time low.