We’re just a few days away from the beginning of February, and James Shields is still a free agent. Shields is far and away the best free agent left on the market, and while we’ve seen pitchers dangle in the wind this deep into the offseason before (Matt Garza, Ubaldo Jimenez, Kyle Lohse, Ervin Santana to name four), they all had more red flags than Shields.
Yet, Shields still sits by his phone, waiting for an offer that’s to his liking. And as his free agency continues to roll along, I’m wondering whether or not Shields and agent Page Odle made a mistake trying to market Shields in the same class as Jon Lester and Max Scherzer, who got a combined $365 million this winter from the Cubs and Nationals, respectively.
In December, Shields turned 33, two years older than Lester and two and a half years older than Scherzer. That immediately takes the possibility of a six or seven year deal off the table – if teams were hesitant to give Lester six years or Scherzer seven years, there’s no way they’d give a pitcher much older than those two six or seven years. You’re also looking at the future potential of a breakdown with Shields, though I’m not sure that was a significant factor in his market not developing. He’s made at least 31 starts and thrown 200 innings in every full season of his career, going all the way back to 2007.
But despite all those innings that Shields has racked up, his performance hasn’t been nearly as dominant as you might expect. He’s thrown more innings than any pitcher in baseball since 2007 (just a third of an inning more than Felix Hernandez), and he ranks 12th in fWAR in that time period, sandwiched right in between Dan Haren and Jered Weaver. If you move the goalposts and only look at the last four seasons (which conveniently excludes Shields’ disappointing 2010), Shields once again lands at the top of the charts in innings pitched…and tenth in fWAR, between Anibal Sanchez and Chris Sale (who has thrown 300 fewer innings). Moving the goalposts once again, during his two years as a Royal, Shields ranked second in baseball in innings pitched (behind Adam Wainwright) and 13th in fWAR, between Justin Verlander and Cole Hamels.
Now obviously, there are a lot of variables here, but one thing is immediately clear to me – Shields isn’t in the same class as Lester and Scherzer, despite his advantages on them over the last four and eight years. Instead of shooting for a contract in the same class as those two, why not try for deals closer to the ones that Wainwright, Weaver, and Sanchez got in recent years? Wainwright’s deal with the Cardinals was an extension and not a free agent deal, but he got $97.5 million over five years for his age 32-36 seasons. Weaver’s deal with the Angels was also an extension, and he got $85 million for five years for his age 29-33 seasons. Sanchez got five years and $80 million from the Tigers as a free agent (though he did re-sign with Detroit) for his age 29-33 seasons. Matt Cain’s six-year, $127.5 million contract is another possible comparison, but that deal covered his age 28-33 seasons, and given that Cain has been pretty bad two years into that contract, maybe it’s best to not bring up the comparison.
Something like five years and $75-90 million is likely going to be the best possible deal that Shields gets at this point. And quite frankly, it might be hard for him to get more than that. At 33, the team that signs him will be gambling with his mid to late 30s. He’s more of a second or third starter that can eat innings by the bucketload at this point, and I’m sure teams are worried that he’ll soon start devolving into a back-end innings eater. Considering his age and how poorly many long-term contracts to pitchers start to work out in year four or so, I doubt that a savior team is going to swoop and give Shields the nine figure deal he desires.
