Matt Holliday is clearly the cream of the free agent crop, but there are a lot of other candidates for the Mets' supposed left field vacancy. Here they are, in the same format as the starting pitchers from yesterday.
Player | 2010 Age | WAR 2009 | WAR 2008 | WAR 2007 | 5-3-1 | WAR $ |
---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
Matt Holliday* | 30 | 5.7 | 6.2 | 7.9 | 6.1 | 27.5 |
Mike Cameron | 37 | 4.3 | 4 | 2.2 | 4.0 | 17.9 |
Johnny Damon* | 36 | 3 | 3.6 | 2.3 | 3.1 | 14.1 |
Jason Bay* | 31 | 3.5 | 2.9 | 0.1 | 2.9 | 13.2 |
Marlon Byrd | 32 | 2.4 | 3.5 | 2.5 | 2.8 | 12.5 |
Randy Winn | 36 | 1.7 | 4.5 | 2.7 | 2.7 | 12.4 |
Hideki Matsui | 36 | 2.4 | 0.8 | 2.4 | 1.9 | 8.4 |
Vladimir Guerrero | 35 | 0.8 | 2.4 | 3.5 | 1.6 | 7.4 |
Rick Ankiel | 31 | 0.1 | 2 | 1.4 | 0.9 | 4.0 |
Andruw Jones | 33 | 0.8 | -0.9 | 3.6 | 0.5 | 2.5 |
Mike Cameron is the bargain on this list, as he will surely sign for far less than he is worth. Of course, if the Mets did sign him and move him to a corner (again) he'd lose some (possibly considerable) value due to the negative relative positional adjustment from center to left or right.
Johnny Damon and Jason Bay are fine players, but both are Type-A free agents and even though the Mets' first round pick is protected I don't think they want to give up a top-forty selection for the 36-year-old Damon. They might be inclined to do so for Bay, but he's likely make just a few million less than Holliday despite being the clearly inferior player, all-around.
Marlon Byrd is an interesting option, as he won't cost nearly as much as anyone above him, but he too loses some value by switching to a corner.
Fernando Tatis is also looking for work, so there's that.