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Comparing Contracts: Parnell and Gee January 20, 2014

A few days ago, Bobby Parnell and Dillon Gee both re-signed with the Mets; though there are some incentives in Parnell’s deal, he’ll be making $3.7 million to Gee’s $3.625 million. Those numbers were oddly close (and the contracts similar despite the difference in position), so I decided to check out the players’ recent statistics. Since the players are each negotiating one-year deals, and these players are neither very old or very young, it seems reasonable to treat the best predictor of future performance as the players’ most recent performance.

Gee started 32 games (almost exactly every fifth game) in 2013 to a 3.62 ERA and a .301 opposing BABIP. The median numbers for starters with 162 or more innings pitched were about 3.51 and .295, so Gee is performing almost exactly like a full-time starter (and thus presumably a bit better than your average pitcher). Gee’s performance corresponds to 2.2 wins above replacement, a shade below the median of 3.0 for full-time starters.

I’m not Parnell’s biggest fan, and his season was shortened by an injury (causing him to miss all of August), so I expected the numbers not to operate in his favor. However, his 2.16 ERA is well below the median of relievers with 40 appearances or more, and his 0.7 WAR is right on the median. Oddly, his BABIP at .268 is much lower than the median of .290, indicating that he’s benefiting, to some degree, from good fielding behind him. If we restrict the numbers to only pitchers with 15 saves or more (all 32 of them), those medians adjust to 2.645, 1.4, and .277, respectively, keeping him on the good side of ERA and BABIP but cutting his WAR performance considerably. Let’s see if we can extrapolate – in 104 team games, Parnell played 49, meaning that he played in about 47% of the team’s games. At that pace, he probably would have been put into about 27 more games, meaning his current stats are about 65% of what his season stats might have been. In that case, let’s hold his BABIP and ERA constant and extend his WAR to 1.08 (by dividing by .65). That would have ranked him with Huston Street and Addison Reed – much better company than his current competition. It also, interestingly, would have put him much closer to Gee’s WAR, at a higher-leverage position.

Again, I’m not Parnell’s biggest fan, and I was skeptical about this deal. Assuming that the injury hasn’t harmed him, though, Parnell’s contract really does make sense compared to Gee’s.