Want to work for BTV? We have an opening for a part-time data analyst. This is a paid position. We're looking for someone who can help update our model behind the scenes, run updates, and contribute ideas to make the site -- and our data -- even better. If interested, please email us at: baseballtradevalues@gmail.com In your email, let us know about your relevant experience (include a resume if possible), and why you're interested.

Now that we’re at the tail end of the offseason, it’s time to reflect: How closely did our free agent estimates correlate to the market? Let’s find out.   The numbers By our count, there have been 126 free agent signings so far. Sure, there are still a few stragglers out there (David Robertson, Alex Verdugo, et al), but we’re at the point where we’re close enough to an endpoint to start self-evaluating our model. The tricky question is, what’s a good...

In 2023, Brandon Belt put up 2.2 fWAR, a 138 WRC+, and a slash line of .254/.369/.490. He was also known for providing quality defense at 1B. Despite those numbers, not a single team signed him to a deal last year. He remains unsigned now, and is assumed to be retired – albeit not of his own volition. This year, there are still dozens of veteran major leaguers without a deal – as there were last year, and as there are every year around this time. Behind the scenes, in our...

You may have noticed that in recent years, teams seem more and more reluctant to fork over big, long contracts to even the most proven players. Despite speculation about longer-term offers, Alex Bregman signed only a three-year deal with opt-outs. Pete Alonso, Jack Flaherty, and many others got two years or less.  One reason? Front offices hate getting stuck with underwater contracts. The longer the term, and the bigger the contract, the greater the chance you may get stuck with an...

We recently updated the values on our site, which is normal for us around this time of year. The purpose is to correlate to the market, using free agent contracts as a kind of going rate for our dollars-per-projected-WAR calculations. If the first batch of free agents is skewing high, it may be an indication that our initial assumptions were low on that basis. Why is that? Most of it is inflation. We assume a 3% inflation rate, which is the long-term average. However, as you probably know,...

On Dec. 30, 2023, the Red Sox traded Chris Sale to the Braves for Vaughn Grissom, and sent $17M to cover Sale’s salary to boot. Here’s what that trade looked like in our model at the time:     So it was accepted by our model, albeit as a major overpay by Atlanta. --------- Fast-forward one year: Sale has won the Cy Young Award, after producing 6.4 fWAR in a remarkable comeback season. Grissom has struggled badly, producing -0.7 fWAR. So from today’s perspective,...

Here’s an interesting twist: The A’s will be players in the trade market, but not the way you might suspect.  After selling off the core of their last competitive team (Chapman, Olson, Murphy et al) for questionable prospects (most of whom didn’t pan out), GM David Forst recently disclosed that the team will be actively looking to augment their major-league club in the trade market. He also mentioned that they’re keeping Brent Rooker, who, after a 5+ fWAR season,...

The Cardinals have reportedly told their veteran players they will look to trade them as the team pivots younger. So who could they trade, and what could they get for them? Let’s focus on four players who are all in their 30s, with at least one year remaining on a fixed contract, who can still be productive on the field. All four are overpaid and in various stages of decline, but they can still help another team. Let’s take them one at a time.   Nolan Arenado Arenado has...

Which MLB organizations are better at winning more with less? Who gets the most bang for the buck?  One feature of our site that is available to GM subscribers is our Team Rankings page, which lists all 30 teams in various categories, including field value, salary, and surplus value. Surplus value, in turn, can be filtered by levels – majors, minors, and total.  Majors Surplus Value measures the degree to which teams are maximizing their budget to win at that level. After all,...

How did our model do at the deadline?   Starting with the Aaron Civale trade in early July, here’s the scorecard:   Number of trades: 72 Number accepted by the model: 60  Acceptance rate: 83.3% Average value variance per deal: 3.7   Not bad, but we’ve done better.    Wins: Significant trades on which our model was very close – aka “fair deals”:   Hunter Harvey, Austin Slater, A.J. Puk, Randy Arozarena, James Paxton, Austin...