Yesterday I rolled out a simple player payroll spreadsheet.  Such instruments are useful to the organization to help form soft plans and goals.  To us fans, a rough payroll estimate gives us an idea of the strengths and weaknesses of future rosters.  With that in hand, we can speculate which direction the organization envisions and even make suggestions.  We already took a quick look at 2011 and saw that pretty much everything was decided.  21 of the 25 guys I listed will be returning to the Phils.  This doesn’t even include guys like Antonio Bastardo who are all but certain to play a role this year and in the future.  This makes space on the 25 man roster tight for all comers in 2011.  Now it’s time to extend our sights out another year to 2012.

Artist's Rendering

The Phillies have a lot of good things figured out for 2012 already.  Franchise cornerstone and Hall of Fame 2b Chase Utley (15m) will be returning along with catcher Carlos Ruiz (3.7m), 3b/2b Placido Polanco (6.25m), and CF Shane Victorino (9.5m).  The starting rotation remains in good shape, returning Doc Halladay (20m) and Joe Blanton (8.5m).  Cole Hamels will be entering his final year of arbitration and should see a raise from the 9.5m that he will earn in ‘11.  The club holds a 12.5m option on Brad Lidge that should be declined regardless of his performance the next two seasons (1.5m buyout).

That leaves the club with 6 guys set to make about 63 million.  Assuming no major additions in 2011, the Phillies will need a SS, 2 OF, 1B, 7 relievers, 4 bench hands, and last but not least, a manager.  That last spot can be ignored for now.  In the OF, Tyson Gillies and Dom Brown should be making their full-season MLB debuts at league minimum.  Gillies will be in CF with Brown in RF and Victorino in LF.  SS is likely to be manned by Rollins based on recent comments, probably at about the same cost as ‘11.  The entire bullpen could be making close to league minimum, led by lefty killer Antonio Bastardo, oft-injured Scott Mathieson, and a plethora of talented, potentially high impact arms like Phillippe Aumont.  I expect a vet or two in the 3 mil range to get brought in for a bullpen unit cost of about 7.5 mil.  They’ll probably need to look outside the organization for backup C (2ish) and util INF (2ish).  Ben Francisco will be earning about 2.5 to be 4th OF with a guy like Quintin Berry or John Mayberry the likely 5th guy at league minimum.  That leaves 1b, 25th man, and arbitration to 2, 4, and 5 starters Cole Hamels, JA Happ, and Kyle Kendrick (I’m estimating about 18m for the three of them) to solve with payroll sitting comfortably at about 105.5 mil for 23 players.

For a franchise that’s finally entered the budgetary heights expected from the 4th largest market in baseball, 105.5 mil for 23 guys is a nice deal for a roster of this quality.  Working with the 140 mil budget (it’s likely to inflate to around 150 by 2012), the Phillies have about 35 mil to re-sign Howard or scrounge up another quality 1b.  Of course there are places where marginal gains can definitely be made.  Kyle Kendrick is a serviceable, yet mediocre starter and JA Happ is due quite a bit of regression from last season’s rookie campaign.  However, the pitching market in 2012 looks decidedly weak, with Matt Cain the top potential FA.  Other quality arms include Mark Buehrle (supposedly pondering retirement), Jeff Francis, Aaron Harang, Rich Harden, Eric Bedard, Edwin Jackson, and Wandy Rodriguez.  None of those talents seemingly fit as a top of the rotation stalwart to couple with Halladay, but they seem to be fine choices to slot in between Hamels and Blanton and it’s likely some of them would sign for 3 years or less.  Adding one of those guys still leaves a solid 22 million to play with.

At 1b, Howard could be joined with a monster class as Adrian Gonzalez, Prince Fielder, Lance Berkman (if his 2011 option is taken), and Todd Helton (if/when his 2012 option is declined) are all set to become free agents.  The other more princely Prince (Albert by name) is set to become a free agent too, but I don’t see the Phillies throwing a 10 yr/250 mil contract at him even if the Cards do fail to extend him.  It seems likely that laziness will turn into a 3yr/60m offer to Howard and the remaining money will be wasted in the bullpen and on useless bench players (see Gload, Ross).  Still, there’s plenty of flexibility in this 2012 payroll, which is something I will outline in my next post in this series, How to Get Creative With Next Year’s Payroll.

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