The Diamondbacks are a Symptom of MLB’s Worst Feature
The Arizona Diamondbacks are not a good baseball team. This is not a surprise to anyone who follows baseball, but it is a bit of an understatement. It’s not that they’re “not good”, it’s that they’re awful to an extent to which most fans are unaware. A closer examination of the team’s ineptitude both on the field and behind the scenes may be irritating to D’Backs fans and humorous to other baseball fans – but we all may learn a few lessons from their predicament.
First, it’s not that the Diamondbacks are bad – they are very, very bad. They currently have a 45- 93 record and their winning percentage of .326 puts them on pace for 53 wins for the season. For some historical perspective, since 1998 when the Diamondbacks joined the National League, only one NL team has been worse, excluding the 2020 shortened season (ironically, the 51-win 2004 Diamondbacks were the one team that was worse).
Alas, there’s no reason to abandon all hope as there’s still reason to be optimistic about their chances of being the worst National League team this century. Of the 24 games that remain on the D’Backs schedule, 21 of them are against teams with a better than .500 record and 12 of them are against the Astros, the Giants, and the Dodgers. Going 5-19 down the stretch seems completely within reach and would give them the title of worst NL team this century.
The turning point in Arizona’s season came when the Diamondbacks’ Josh Rojas took a first pitch called strike from the Padres’ Yu Darvish leading off the game on Opening Day. Since then, it all went downhill as the Diamondbacks have had serious trouble with the bats.
They currently rank 11th in the NL in runs per game, which may seem surprising as they rank 13th in OBP, SLG and OPS+. Statistics based on results can be misleading sometimes as they don’t factor in some of the randomness and luck involved in baseball – perhaps the D’Backs hitters have just run into some misfortune?
Actually, no. The Arizona batters currently rank last in the NL in average exit velocity, xSLG, and second to last in both barrel percentage and hard hit percentage. Numbers like that suggest that if anything, they’ve been beneficiaries of randomness not victims. Whether or not they’re using wiffle ball bats is a question we’ll tackle another day, perhaps urgently since online sports betting is coming to Arizona this week. With an expected launch date of Sept 9, which will tie in perfectly with the current MLB season and upcoming NFL season.
If you think it couldn’t get worse than that, let me tell you about how the Diamondbacks have played when they’re the ones in the field trying to prevent runs: They’ve allowed the most runs per game in the NL and their pitching staff sports the league’s worst ERA+ and FIP. Once again, if you question if randomness or luck is a factor, they’re dead last in the NL in expected batting average against and wOBA – so that’d be a hard “no”.
What could be the root cause of such ineptitude?
Let’s start with the roster. To be clear, when I write “the roster”, I’m not referring to the players – the players work their rear ends off and care exponentially more about this subject than you or I do – I’m referring to roster construction.
The Diamondbacks’ payroll is lower than the payroll of the team whose stinginess is so legendary it spawned a best-selling book and a movie that starred Brad Pitt. The Diamondbacks’ payroll is so low, that according to MLB’s proposal for a new collective bargaining agreement even other MLB owners are strongly suggesting the Diamondbacks spend more money on players. Imagine being so bad at roster construction that the teams who are competing against you, are telling you to try harder and do better.
Of course there are far too many specific examples of roster mismanagement for us to cover today, but we have to acknowledge the glaring exception to the team’s frugality: In July of 2019, the Diamondbacks were 3.5 games out of the Wild Card race. The organization decided that because Zack Greinke was on the wrong side of 30 and was still owed $95 million dollars, it’d be best to part ways with the pitcher who was second in the NL in fWAR and FIP at the time. So they sent Zack – and cash – to the Astros for a few minor leaguers.
The following year, feeling they needed a starting pitcher, the Diamondbacks signed Madison Bumgarner (who was also on the wrong side of 30) to an $85 million dollar contract. Since then, among the 45 NL pitchers with a minimum of 150 innings pitched, Bumgarner is 43rd in FIP, 41st in opponents’ OPS+ and 40th in ERA+.
Well played, Arizona, well played.
To be fair, the Diamondbacks actually using their checkbook for a player is an exception. Currently, Arizona has only four players with an annual salary that exceeds $2 million dollars. If you’re wondering why that’s significant, let’s put a pin in that – we’ll come back to it in a second.
For now let’s address the common, but misguided notion that the Diamondbacks are among the poor “have nots” of baseball teams and market size, and simply can’t afford to invest in players. The keyword here is “invest”, as opposed to “spend.” Players are far more likely to generate a positive return on the investment than not.
The Diamondbacks play in the 11th biggest market in MLB. Ken Kendrick paid $238 million in 2004 to become the principal owner – the team is now worth $1.3 billion. (That’s over 500 percent return on the investment and an average annual appreciation of 11 percent, if you’re doing the math at home.) Chase field was built using $238 million dollars of taxpayer money, then in 2017, the Diamondbacks asked taxpayers for $187 million more for renovations. Furthermore, if Arizona taxpayers didn’t pony up, the team threatened to “look for an alternative” elsewhere according to Kendrick and MLB commissioner Rob Manfred.
Now let’s return to the issue of Arizona paying 20 something of their players less than $2 million dollars: Ken Kendrick once paid $2.8 million…for a baseball card.
Having taken the scenic route, we now arrive at my point,: The Diamondbacks are certainly the NL’s answer to the Baltimore Orioles, and are Exhibit 1A as to why MLB needs a European soccer style relegation system. But they are a symptom – they are not the problem.
The problem is that MLB’s financial system is broken, and it’s not broken in the way that the simpletons on sports radio claim it is with the “rich teams and poor teams” drivel. It’s broken because it’s rigged in favor of team owners to the detriment of everybody else involved in baseball, especially the fans. MLB’s financial system ensures that MLB teams and their owners will turn a profit regardless of whether or not they win. Heck, they’re guaranteed to turn a profit whether or not they even try to win, let alone actually win.
Of course it’s easy to laugh at the misfortunes of the Diamondbacks from a distance if you’re not a Diamondbacks fan. But if you step out of the trees for a moment to look at the forest, you’ll see something that affects all baseball fans. Wherever you watch baseball, there’s a local oligarch who uses tax payer funded infrastructure, anti-trust exemptions, and labor loopholes to his benefit, with no obligation to make the sport or experience better for you – i.e., to give you a return on your investment.
Does this mean we should all cut off our noses to spite our faces and stop watching baseball? Heck no, I can’t imagine what it would take for me to stop watching MLB players play baseball. But it does mean that the vitriol, boo birds, and condescension we often direct at players for not meeting our standards is misguided. It’s the Ken Kendricks of the world that do far more damage to the sport than a few underperforming players could ever do.
