Paying for Potential

Brandon Morrow signed a three-year, $20 million deal with the Blue Jays that could turn into $30 million over four years. This buys out his last two years of arbitration and at least his first year of free agency. Given that FanGraphs rates him as being worth $30 million over the last two seasons, it looks like a good deal for the Blue Jays. Note that Baseball Reference and FanGraphs differ greatly on Morrow’s value. fWAR awards 7.1 wins to Morrow over the last two years, bWAR comes in at 2.9. How one judges the deal depends on which of those number you believe. Morrow’s career FIP and xFIP are much lower than his career ERA. It’s possible that he played in front of poor defenses his entire career, or it’s possible that FIP is not capturing something about Morrow’s ability to get hitters out. He gives up a high rate of line drives, which usually means more hits. The good news is that even if the bWAR is the more accurate number, the contract is...