SPORTS
Monday, August 31, 2015 11
How J.P. Ricciardi got Sidetracked from
executing Moneyball in Toronto
kenneth cheak kwan lam ›
sports editor
W
hen j.p. ricci a rdi was hired as the
General Manager (GM) of the Toronto
Blue Jays, he was given the initial mandate to slash payroll because his predecessor Gord Ash had constructed an eighty-eight
million dollar roster that failed to make the postseason. More importantly, Ricciardi was supposed to create “mini-Oaklands” by following the
“Moneyball” philosophy of his mentor, Billy Beane,
who preaches emphasis on analytics. This emphasis
was supposed to translate into strong drafting and
player development as well as locking up young and
promising players to club-friendly long-term contracts. Unfortunately, during his eight-year tenure as
the captain in charge of the ship from 2001–2009, the
apprentice got sidetracked.
Whereas Ricciardi initially collected young players with good upsides (e.g., acquiring Rookie of the
Year third baseman Eric Hinske
along with starting pitcher Justin
Miller
from
the
Oakland
At h let ics for
closer Billy Koch), he went on to hand out numerous long-term contracts that stripped the team of
its financial flexibility. These contracts ranged from
extensions given to up-and-coming players who
(despite their upsides) had yet to prove they could
produce on a consistent basis (e.g., inking both center
fielder Vernon Wells and Hinske to five-year deals
even though both were still under team control) to
overly generous contracts supposedly meant to influence unrestricted free agents (e.g., signing both closer
B.J. Ryan and front-of-the rotation starting pitcher
A.J. Burnett to five-year deals for forty-seven million
dollars and fifty-five million dollars respectively).
Ricciardi also went all in by first trading pitchers
Dave Bush and Zach Jackson along with outfielder
Gabe Gross to the Milwaukee Brewers for sweet swing
first baseman Lyle Overbay (and pitching prospect Ty
Taubenheim), then following up that deal with shipping mid-rotation starting pitcher Miguel Batista
and second baseman Orlando Hudson to the Arizona
Diamondbacks for slugging third baseman Troy Glaus
(and Sergio Santos). In an attempt to end Toronto’s
twelve-year playoff drought, Ricciardi also signed
gold-glove catcher Bengie Molina to a one-year contract worth five million dollars with a mutual option
for a second year.
With an assembly of such high-end talent, why
did the club fail to overtake powerhouses like the
New York Yankees and the Boston Red Sox and recapture the American League East title for the first time
since 1993, or at least win the wild card? Simply put,
some of the moves Ricciardi made were very much
the “high-risk, high reward” type, and they backfired. For instance, although Ryan was a highlysought after and aggressively recruited unrestricted
free agent, he was coming off a career year after
saving 36 games for the Baltimore Orioles in the preceding season (2005) as a first-time closer. Prior to
this breakout season, Ryan had been used predominately as a middle reliever (1999–2003) until he was
elevated to the setup role in 2004. In other words,
it was a risky gamble to ink Ryan to such a lucrative
long-term contract when he had not proven he could
be a dominant closer for a sustained period of time.
Likewise, even though Burnett was heavily pursued by several teams (mostly because of his ability
to throw a fastball with the highest velocity among
all starting pitchers in Major League Baseball in both
the 2002 and 2005 seasons at an average of 94.9 and
95.6 miles per hour respectively) before agreeing to
terms with the Blue Jays, he had never won more than
twelve games in a single year over the seven seasons
as a Florida Marlin. Beyond this, Burnett missed significant playing time in both the 2003 and 2004 seasons due to a serious injury that required surgery.
Essentially, Ricciardi was gambling on Burnett being
able to translate his raw talent into wins.
Similarly, despite Ricciardi’s high praise of
Overbay’s ability to hit for a high average with gap
power (he held
the Brewers’ club
record for most
doubles in a single
season with fiftyth ree), Overbay
only batted over
.300 once in three previous seasons prior to being
traded to Toronto, hitting .276, .301 and .276 in 2003,
2004, and 2005, respectively. While a batting average
in the mid .270s is not bad, it is by all accounts quite
pedestrian and certainly nowhere near elite, especially knowing that Overbay had never hit more than
nineteen home runs in a single season at that point in
his career even though he plays a traditional power
position as a first baseman. The fact that Ricciardi
dealt for a player who ended up being a career .266
“. . . some of the moves Ricciardi
made were very much the
‘high-risk, high reward’ type . . .”
hitter indicated that the Blue Jays GM was gambling
on Overbay being able to become the next Mark Grace
when the former was more suited to a reserve role as a
defensive replacement.
Finally, Ricciardi’s decision to sign both Wells and
right fielder Alex Rios to seven-year contract extensions for $126 million and $69,835,000 respectively
did not pan out as both players lacked consistency
and failed to perform to expectations. In fact, Wells
regressed to such a degree, both offensively and
defensively, that he was widely considered to be
“untradeable” at the time because his contract was
heavily back-loaded. As for Rios, he became so inconsistent that he was eventually placed on waivers on
7 August 2009 before being claimed by the Chicago
White Sox three days later. In losing Rios to an opposing team and receiving no assets in return (with the
only consolation being that Rios’s contact is now off
the Blue Jays’ books), Ricciardi’s shortsightedness is
clearly exposed.
All in all, Toronto never really came close to winning the American League East title under Ricciardi.
The team’ ́