The SS that just went through arb, getting 6.5 mil was making 1 mil a year, had 3 automatic renewals.
His numbers last year: 48 HRs, 136 RBIs, .337 Avg, .394 OBP, .639 SLG.
He led SS that year in everything except games, ABs, 2Bs, Walks and strike outs.
Comparable service time, one far lesser player has signed an extension deal for 13 mil a year.
29 HRs, 107 RBIs, .304 Avg, .335 OBP, .522 SLG. Was making 1 mil a year, 3 automatic renewals. Now has a 6.8 mil contract through arbitration.
Making less through arbitration than they were will probably equal out as the league progresses... the problem was these guys were free agents at start up instead of being minor leaguers somewhere so they got big money, arbitration just brought them down as though they were minimum paid players getting a raise.
The problem is that ownership won every case.
Arbitration, as I understand it, the player makes a demand (in this case would have been 14.5 mil), the team makes and offer (in this case obviously it was 6.5) and the arbitrator decides who wins... in these cases the team is always winning... even when this guy puts up the best stats for a SS the league has ever seen.
Or in the case of my RF, a guy that leads every offensive category for the last 4 years, the team won the case.
Here's some real numbers:
1987, Don Mattingly requested 1.975 mil, team offered 1.7 mil, award was 1.975.
1992 Palmeiro requested 3.85, team offered 2.35, award was 3.85.
1990 Jeter requested 5 mil, team offered 3.2, award was 5.
2001 Andruw Jones requested 8.2 mil, team offered 6.4, award was 8.2.
The team wins 59% of the time as of 2004. In these cases I've brought up, the team has won 100% of the time in the game.
It has to look at how good the player is compared to everyone in the league, as well as how he compares with players of his service time.
In some cases, in the game, comparable service time put him in the right salary range, but comparable to everyone in the league at his position he blows EVERYONE away. Soriano didn't get 10 mil this last year because he was unbelievably better than every other 2B that had 5 years service time, it was because his offense output was in the top tier of everyone in the league at his position. Same with Andruw Jones in 2001, it's not just how he compares to others with the same service time, it's also how he compares to everyone (1 year service time to 15 year service time).
Beyond that, here's some pages to read over.
http://www.hardballtimes.com/main/ar...t-arbitration/
Here's a quote from that page, exact wording from the current basic agreement:
"The arbitration panel shall, except for a Player with five or more years of Major League service, give particular attention, for comparative salary purposes, to the contracts of Players with Major League service not exceeding one annual service group above the Player's annual service group. This shall not limit the ability of a Player or his representative, because of special accomplishment, to argue the equal relevance of salaries of Players without regard to service, and the arbitration panel shall give whatever weight to such argument as is deemed appropriate."
It takes into account all salaries of players of equal service time... so those guys that had signed extensions for 13+ mil a year with the same service time should have come into play.
Same page:
"The player's contribution to his team
His previous salary
The salaries of players in a similar class"
It has to look at his previous salary. It makes no sense at all that if a guy is making 9 mil a year that he's suddenly worth less because he's in arbitration. This would work itself out in my league as I get away from the players that were free agents with low service time upon creation... but could this be a continuing problem in some more elaborate universes? If the team was willing to pay him 9 mil for what he did last year, it shouldn't be looking at lowly minor league up and comers to determine his worth for the next year... it should never be a 50% drop in salary.
This page is just a history of arbitration, what the player asked for, what the team offered, and what the award was:
http://roadsidephotos.com/baseball/A...ionresults.htm