I will generally go to Bref, because it comes up first when I google player stats. I would argue that it’s more useful to look at his numbers from 26 on. I was watching him for the 2008 season, and he was clearly still finding his way as an everyday MLB player.

Seen as numbers accumulated over 4 years instead of 7, he looks a lot more valuable. All of his WAR is over those years. His OBP moves up to about .350 and his slugging about .375.

Still marginal for a large multi-year contract, but very solid. But you do have a point on durability. The six years part will be the key with him.

I expect Hunter to bounce back next year, so they will be okay. But Bourn is still better.

But he’s an excellent player, and if all baseball skills could be properly valued and weighted, he’d be one of the better players in the game.

Are we talking about the same Michael Bourn here? He’s a career .272/.339/.365 hitter, so while he has a decent BB% (career 8.8%), he doesn’t have a lot of power (.093 ISO). His defense is good, but one season it’s great, another it’s just good. With defensive metrics varying wildly, I’d say he’s an above average defender with a below average bat. How that’s one of the better players in the game, is beyond me.

Also, as far as rWAR goes (and when quoting WAR #s, please let us know which you are using, bref or fangraphs), he’s got a career 19.0 over essentially 7 seasons, and of that 19, 8.6 is from defense. He’s also entering his age 30 season, so we’ve likely seen the peak of his abilities, and he’s only going to decline.

But, in retrospect, I think almost anyone would have rather had Bourn for the last two years.

Wait, that wisdom doesn’t apply here…

Never feel bad for a man who gets paid to write about baseball in his pajamas.

There, that one works. Craig is living the dream, I suspect he appreciates that and doesn’t mind putting up with us “fringe” fans.

Craig…I feel for ya bud.

Wow, is that ever a lazy, inaccurate comparison.

Bourn has had a higher bWAR in each of the last four years than Roberts had in the best season of his career. His bWAR of 6.0 in 2012 tied for 11th best among MLB position players. His bWAR of 19.0 for 2009-2012 ranks 13th among position players.

If you want to argue that he’s going to drop off due to his age or something, and can support your claim, great, but to throw out such a poor comp is sloppy and misleading.

That does sound bad, Craig. However OPS+ isn’t nearly as effective at evaluating offensive production as wRC+, because OPS+ doesn’t properly value OBP like wOBA or wRC+ do. And his wRC+ for the past two years has been 104.

And as a CF who can hit better than league average while playing plus defence, Bourn is a very valuable player.

But I’m not sure it’s wise to give a 12 year contract to a 29 year old player.

1. You can always do a bit of selective time frames, but he struggled in his first year in Houston (2008, after the big trade). But from 2009 on, avg. OPS+ is 97. Still not stupendous, but allows you to look more at his other skills.

2. I saw a number once that suggested you pay roughly 4 MM$ per WAR point. Since 2009 B. Ref. has him with WAR=19, or an average of 4.75 over four years. That is barely short of All-Star quality on their scale. So if you buy the payment scale, then 6 years 100 MM$ is fair. Unless you think his skills are going to erode quickly.

Bank on it.