SF Giants: How much will Carlos Rodón cost this offseason?
While the SF Giants have fallen out of the playoff race over the past couple of months, starting pitcher Carlos Rodón has solidified himself as one of the best pitchers in MLB. However, with a contract that will likely make him a free agent at the end of the season, fans are wondering how much it will take to sign him to an extension.
Rodón was a consistent mid-rotation arm at the start of his career with the Chicago White Sox. From 2015-2018, Rodón had a 4.01 ERA in 494.1 innings pitched (86 games) with 473 strikeouts and 211 walks. Then, injuries began hampering the southpaw. Rodón underwent season-ending shoulder surgery in 2018, considered by many to be the hardest injury for pitchers to return from.
In 2019 and 2020, Rodón continued struggling with concerning health issues, missing time with multiple elbow injuries. He made just 11 appearances over those two seasons, posting a 5.74 ERA in 42.1 innings pitched.
Then, out of nowhere, Rodón was a dominant force in 2021. In 24 starts, Rodón struck out 185 hitters in 132.2 innings pitched with a 2.37 ERA and finished fifth in American League Cy Young voting alongside his first All-Star game selection.
So why did Rodón settle for a two-year, $44 million contract with the SF Giants last winter? Well... his durability questions remained after hitting the injured list with shoulder soreness. That combined with a late-season velocity left teams hesitant to make long-term offers.
This year, Rodón is showing no signs of slowing down early in September. The southpaw went to his second-straight All-Star game and is currently leading the NL in strikeouts (201) in 157.1 innings pitched alongside a 2.92 ERA and similarly excellent ERA estimators (2.82 xERA, 2.33 FIP, and 3.03 xFIP).
While Rodón is technically under contract through next season, his deal includes an opt-out after this year. On the heels of the best season of his career, Rodón is almost guaranteed to use his opt-out to return to free agency. So how does he compare to other starters who have signed big deals in free agency?
Here are five of the best comps:
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Yu Darvish: six-years, $126 million
Yu Darvish is a part of a surprisingly long list of pitchers who received nine-figure contracts that have worked out well for teams. Darvish was one of the best Japanese players to ever make the move to MLB and immediately became one of the best pitchers in the league.
However, by the time Darvish hit free agency, questions about his durability raised questions about his long-term viability. Darvish only amassed 150 innings pitched in one of the four seasons before he hit the open market, including a year he missed with UCL surgery.
Darvish had a 3.86 ERA in his final season before hitting free agency. He recorded 209 strikeouts in 186.2 innings pitched (31 starts) but faded as the season went on, capped off by a pair of ugly starts in the World Series.
Darvish was going to be 31 the following season, but the Chicago Cubs were still willing to bet on his upside and signed him to a six-year, $126 million contract. Each team is obviously going to evaluate injuries differently, but Darvish had dealt with minor shoulder injuries multiple times during his professional career on top of UCL surgery. While that is not quite as severe as Rodón's shoulder surgery, it's more comparable than any player in this group. Given Rodón's superior performance in the two seasons before he hit the open market and relative youth (he will be a year younger than Darvish was as a free agent), it's easy to envision scenarios where teams are willing to offer a similar deal.
Patrick Corbin: six-years, $140 million
Patrick Corbin's massive free-agent deal with the Nationals has not worked out great for Washington. However, I wanted to include Corbin's six-year, $140 million contract because it probably marks the ceiling for Rodón's contract this offseason.
Like Rodón, Corbin was primarily a mid-rotation starter early in his career, undergoing UCL surgery in 2014. He struggled to replicate his pre-injury numbers for the first few years following surgery, but in 2018, Corbin had the best season of his career. In 200 innings pitched, Corbin had a 3.15 ERA with 246 strikeouts, and finished fifth in Cy Young voting.
While Corbin was less proven than almost every other player on this list when he hit free agency, he was youngest of the group. Heading into his age-29 season, the Nationals bet on Corbin to replicate his exceptional 2018. It worked for a year when Corbin helped lead the Nationals to the franchise's first-ever World Series title, but his performance has fallen off a cliff in the three years since.
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Kevin Gausman: five-years, $110 million
Rodón is not the first starting pitcher to play his way into a massive contract with the SF Giants under president of baseball operations Farhan Zaidi. I imagine since most of our readers are Giants fans, that you are probably already familiar with Kevin Gausman, but I will quickly rehash his career arc.
Gausman was drafted and developed by the Baltimore Orioles, where he was a consistent mid-rotation starter from 2013 until they traded him to Atlanta at the 2018 deadline.
Gausman was fantastic to close out the 2018 season but was hit hard in 2019. In fact, he struggled so mightily that Atlanta unloaded him in a deal that sent him to Cincinnati where the Reds moved him to the bullpen. Gausman's peripherals suggested he had suffered from plenty of bad luck, but his 5.72 ERA in 102.1 innings pitched hampered his free-agent market. The Giants inked him to a one-year deal where he emerged as their best pitcher in the pandemic-shortened 2020 campaign.
Gausman accepted a qualifying offer from the Giants to stick around in 2021 and was the clear co-ace of the team with Logan Webb as they won 107 games. Last offseason, heading into his age-31 season, the Blue Jays signed him to a five-year, $110 million contract.
Gausman has been fantastic with Toronto this year. While Gausman suggested earlier in the year that the Giants never made an effort to re-sign him, it's worth wondering if the front office will look at Gausman thriving elsewhere as a reason to try and not make the same mistake twice by letting Rodón walk.
Robbie Ray: five-years, $115 million
While Carlos Rodón followed Gausman's path to a breakout season with the Giants, Robbie Ray was actually the free-agent starter in last year's class with the trajectory of on-field performance most in common with Rodón. Ray was a strikeout-heavy, left-handed mid-rotation starter early in his career with the Diamondbacks before his on-field performance fell off a cliff as he lost his command late in 2019 and 2020.
Ray had a 6.62 ERA in the pandemic-shortened 2020 season, walking 45 hitters in just 51.2 innings pitched. With no semblance of control, the Diamondbacks traded Ray to the Blue Jays at the deadline for a minimal return.
Ray put up better numbers in Toronto than Arizona, but he was far from fixed. He decided to re-sign with the Blue Jays on a one-year deal, and in 2021, it all came together. Ray won the American League Cy Young last season, achieving a more analytical version of a pitcher's triple crown (leading the league in ERA, innings pitched, and strikeouts). Ray had a 2.84 ERA in 193.1 innings pitched with 248 strikeouts.
Needless to say, several teams were interested in adding Ray to their rotation when he hit free agency last winter. Like Rodón, Ray was entering his age-30 season and had a mixed bag of recent performances. While Ray's free-agent case was mostly built on just one breakout season, he also never had Rodón's durability issues. Those countering factors lead me to believe that both pitchers will have similar markets.
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Zack Wheeler: five-years, $118 million
A former SF Giants top prospect, Zack Wheeler's career got off to an impressive start, but he struggled to stay healthy. Sound familiar?
He missed the entire 2015 and 2016 seasons after undergoing UCL surgery on his elbow and returned to the injured list multiple times in 2017 with injuries to his arm.
Wheeler was finally able to stay on the field in the two seasons before he hit the open market. In his final two years with the Mets, Wheeler made 60 starts and amassed 374 strikeouts in 377.2 innings pitched with a 3.65 ERA. Entering free agency heading into his age-30 season, the Phillies shelled out a five-year, $118 million offer to bring him to the City of Brotherly Love.
Wheeler's deal has turned into one of the best decisions any team has made in free agency over the past few years. Since he joined the Phillies, Wheeler took his performance to another level and is likely going to receive Cy Young votes for the third consecutive year.
It seems like Philadelphia believed there was some untapped potential in the righty when they signed him, something that is less likely to be true for Rodón. Rodón's injury history is also more alarming than Wheeler's, but Rodón has been significantly better in 2021 and 2022 than Wheeler ever was prior to hitting the open market. Since they hit free agency at roughly the same age, it seems well within the realm of possibilities that Rodón receives comparable offers.
Average contract: 5.4 years, $121.8 million ($22.5 million AAV)
Median contract: five-years, $118 million ($23.6 million AAV)
Median AAV: $23 million
My prediction: six-years, $125 million ($20.8 million AAV)
It may be surprising to see me predict Rodón will get a better contract than the average player in this group of big names. However, this year's free-agent class should put the southpaw in an excellent position to capitalize on his career year.
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While Ray and Gausman only received five-year deals, they were in a much deeper free-agent class that featured both of them and other starters like Max Scherzer, Verlander, Marcus Stroman, and Rodón. Even the next tier of depth included mid-rotation options like Eduardo Rodriguez, Jon Gray, Anthony DeSclafani, Alex Wood, Yusei Kikuchi, and Alex Cobb. There were several top-flight starting pitchers on the open market, including multiple options still in their 20s. Last winter's free agency was also overshadowed by impending CBA negotiations, which likely further suppressed their market.
This offseason's free-agent class may have some stars that should interest the Giants, but it has far fewer starters under the age of 30. 11 starters were ranked in The Athletic's recent ranking of the top 30 impending free agents, but there is a clear drop off after the top three.
Here is a list of those players (in order of ranking) with how old they will be on Opening Day next season in parenthesis: Jacob deGrom (34), Justin Verlander (40), Rodón (30), Clayton Kershaw (35), Chris Bassitt (34), Adam Wainwright (41), Luis Severino (29), Charlie Morton (39), Nathan Eovaldi (33), Noah Syndergaard (30), and Sean Manaea (31). With several of those players likely to agree to extensions before free agency, this year's group of free-agent starters could get very thin very fast.
Rodón is the only impending free-agent starter under the age of 34 coming off an above-average season. Furthermore, deGrom and Verlander are both prime candidates to re-sign with their current teams. If they do, Rodón will be the only viable ace available in free agency. Even with his injury history and short track record of top-end play, several teams will be willing to bet that he can replicate his success over the past two seasons with them.
It could work against Rodón if all of the older veterans hit the open market. Front offices could be content betting on players like Kershaw, Bassitt, Wainwright, and Morton since they will likely settle for deals in the 1-3 year range. However, it only takes a couple of teams looking to make a splash for Rodón to get paid, and the odds of that will go up with every veteran who re-signs over the next month.
The comparatively weak free-agent market leads me to believe that some team will offer the Giants lefty a sixth year despite his injury history. However, I believe a team will use the questions about Rodón's long-term health to bring the average annual value of his deal down around Darvish's.
Regardless of the specifics, it is hard to envision a scenario where Carlos Rodón signs a contract worth less than $100 million this offseason. The biggest remaining question facing the SF Giants front office is whether they will make a run to keep him in San Francisco beyond this season.
