How much do UFAs and RFAs cost per win?
by Hawerchuk on Jan 6, 2010 9:00 AM EST
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PrintI was puzzling over this a bit at Tyler Dellow's blog, and I don't think I've seen the answer anywhere. Feel free to chime in if you have a different calculation. Here's the process I followed: for every RFA and UFA who signed in the 2009 off-season, I added up their 2009-10 salaries and their projected win values from Tom Awad's VUKOTA projections. I then subtracted the league minimum salary from each player's total salary (VUKOTA is already with respect to replacement value) to determine the marginal cost per marginal win.
The results:
| # | Salary | Marg. Sal. | Wins | $M/Win | |
| RFA | 70 | 89.9 | 54.9 | 41.3 | 1.33 |
| UFA | 106 | 216.9 | 163.9 | 73.4 | 2.23 |
| Total | 176 | 306.8 | 218.8 | 114.7 | 1.91 |
So an RFA takes a 40% discount relative to a UFA. I think that's actually very close to the discount that baseball players take in their arbitration years.
At any rate, I'm interested in hearing differing takes on this question.
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What do you think is the $M/win value for guys on entry level contracts with bonuses? Much cheaper than RFAs I’m assuming. I’m just wondering what ratio of UFAs, RFAs, and entry level guys is best for a team given a particular salary. With the current Kovalchuk contract negotiations some bloggers are saying it probably won’t be worth it.
by ThrashersRecaps on Jan 6, 2010 10:10 PM EST reply actions
Well, you’d have to decide how many wins Kovalchuk is worth. If he’s 4 WAR, then $8.5-$9M is a fair contract, and Atlanta would have to spend to the cap. It’s not necessarily the most efficient way to spend the money, but most star players are actually worth more than their contracts. It really just depends on how much you think he could possibly be worth.
Nice work Hawerchuk.
I have a few thoughts:
1. I would be curious to see the AVG $/win for the RFA/UFA split since the lockout. My guess is that RFAs get shorter contracts, but that’s just a guess.
2. Your analysis assumes a linear relationship between $ spent and wins, but not all wins are created equal. For example, if Kovalchuk is traded to LA, and they win a playoff series, then those wins are worth more to LA than if he was traded to Team X that doesn’t make the playoffs. NHL teams make more $ from the playoffs on a per game basis, and since every extra playoff game = win, teams may feel their ROI is better based on the “playoff payoff” (say that three times fast) they may get, thus “overpaying,” but in reality it is a good investment.
3. VUKOTA does take into account “replacement” level, but I am not sure replacement level is the same in baseball (where it originated) as it is in hockey. In hockey, time is just shifted around to other players, it isn’t given to just the replacement. In baseball, ABs can’t be distributed. I am also not sold on VUKOTA as a eval tool, but that’s a discussion for a different day.
4. Players like Ovechkin, Kovalchuk, Crosby, etc. are the extremes which I don’t think lend themselves to this type of analysis. They carry so much more intrinsic value to a team aside from just wins. Kovalchuk is a perfect example: He could very well be the deciding factor in if Atlanta even HAS a team.
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