A Yu-ge Investment

In roughly three weeks, the Texas Rangers should sign Yu Darvish to a contract that will represent their largest ever investment in a pitcher, likely nine figures when combined with the $51.7MM posting fee to acquire his rights. That kind of money for a pitcher is very rare in baseball and gives us an idea on how much production the Rangers are hoping to get for their investment*. It's difficult to compare Darvish to other pitchers that teams spent over $100MM to acquire because of his age. Highly talented pitchers entering their age 25 season just aren't available for teams to acquire by just spending money; it wouldn't surprise me to see close to $200MM spent if Felix Hernandez or Clayton Kershaw could be acquired for money alone.

* I've seen discussion that the cost of Darvish is offset in some way by additional revenue from being a superstar. I agree with Dave Cameron in that big ticket signings don't drive attendance, and while Darvish's specific starts will garner tremendous attention at first regardless of winning, I don't expect it to continue if the team is playing poorly and in a terribly inexact way I'm going to brush any small gains as offset by the time value of paying $51.7MM upfront.

A comparison I find more interesting is imagining the Rangers have a time machine and can pick a 25 year old pitcher from 1990 to now and get their production for the next five years for their age 25 to 29 seasons* and see how that measures against the range of the expected cost of Yu Darvish.

* Active pitchers currently in that range are included with their average production beginning at age 25.

We can come up with a reasonable range based on some of the rumors we've heard and Daisuke Mastuzaka's contract from 2007. At the high end, we've heard Darvish's camp is seeking a 5 year, $75MM deal. That works out to a $15MM AAV which is almost double the $8.7MM AAV that Daisuke received from the Red Sox in a 6 year, $52MM deal. It's possible that the Rangers will agree to that amount, but I'm guessing the AAV will be in the $10-12MM range, an amount still a step above Daisuke's contract. The other key negotiable element is the length of the contract, likely either five or six years with Darvish likely seeking the shorter term and immediate free agency to allow for his next contract sooner.

High End: $51.7MM posting fee + $75MM contract over five years = $25.3MM AAV

Low End: $51.7MM posting fee + $60MM contract over six years = $18.6MM AAV

That gives us a range of $18.6MM to $25.MM in annual cost if you prorate the posting fee over the length of the contract to compare to. For determining value, I'll use the $4.7MM Dan Szymborski of ESPN and BBTF provided us in his ZIPS projection of Darvish* for the cost per WAR. The tables below show groups of pitchers with their average year from ages 25 to 29.

* ZIPS projected 22.4 WAR over five years for a total of $105.3MM in value or $21.1MM in AAV.

The Elite

This group of pitchers represents some of the very best pitchers in the game and if Darvish produces at this "Ace" level the Rangers will have received surplus value (and made Rangers fans weep with joy). As a reminder, Pedro Martinez was ridiculous.

The Very Good

The next group falls into the expected range that Darvish will cost and is filled with mostly top of the rotation pitchers in the #1 to #2 range. This is probably the range that ZIPs and many of the scouting reports we've heard put him in and if he performs at this level I would feel it was a good investment. The two pitchers at the bottom of this list are an odd pairing, one is only one year into his age 25 to 29 seasons and had surprisingly good season, the other is three years in and considered one of the best in the game.

The Just "Good"

The final group of pitchers are all valuable starters, but not the sort you'd want to pay $100MM+ for their age 25 to 29 seasons (though some blossomed into fantastic pitchers). Rangers fans level of disappointment would increase the closer to the bottom of the list you got and if you fall of the list altogether then words like "colossal" and "bust" come into play.