Bo Bichettes Earning Power Spectru

Last month, MLB Trade Rumors published an early looking ahead to the upcoming free agent cla s. was an obvious choice for the top spot and ended up pretty comfortably in second. The next few entrants were tougher to separate, but ended up third. Bichettes free agency was and is tough to peg. He has a strong track record of succe s, but his 2024 season was awful. His bat has been strong on the whole, though with a swing-happy profile that lacks walks. His defense has been pa sable enough to stick at short, but hes not great there. Of the potential top free agents this coming winter, he seemingly has some of the widest error bars. This post will take a look at the spectrum, using as a guide. As you can see in that screenshot ( ), Ive used the dropdown bars to search for free agent deals for shortstops over the past five years. Ive then ranked them by the total guarantee on the contract. There are some pretty clear tiers in earning power, so lets see where Bichette could fit in. From 2019 through 2023, his production was quite consistent. He splashed onto the scene with a 143 wRC+ in 46 games in his debut season but then his wRC+ finished in the 120 to 130 range in each of the next four seasons. His home run total in the three full seasons from 2021 to 2023 fell between 20 and 29. His walk rate was on the low side in each of those campaigns, falling between 4.5% and 5.9%, but he also struck out le s than average and ran batting averages near .300. The defensive reviews have been mixed. Defensive Runs Saved has him at -11 for his whole career, though a big chunk of that is a -16 in 2022 alone, which looks like a clear outlier. Apart from that, hes generally been near average, give or take a few runs on either side. Outs Above Average, however, doesnt like his glovework at all. Bichette has -22 OAA for his career and has been below average in almost every season. The only campaigns in which hes finished with a positive OAA were the shortened 2020 season and his injury-marred 2024 campaign. Still, the bat was enough to produce plenty of value. FanGraphs had him between 3.9 and 4.9 wins above replacement in each season from 2021 to 2023. Baseball Reference pegged him between 3.7 and 5.9. Things went off the rails last year. Bichette seemingly battled leg injuries all year, twice going on the IL due to right calf strains. He got into just 81 games, hit only four home runs and produced an ugly .225/.277/.322 batting line, 71 wRC+. Turning to 2025, Bichette seems to have bounced back to his old self. Through 211 plate appearances, he has a .292/.341/.431 and 121 wRC+. Thats despite a slow start. Through the end of April, he still hadnt hit a home run, leading to a decent but powerle s .295/.328/.364 line and 97 wRC+. Since the calendar has flipped to May, he has finally gone over the fence four times, helping him hit .288/.365/.561 for a wRC+ of 163 Rudy Gay Jersey this month. Turning to the Contract Tracker list, at the top is a level that Bichette shouldnt be able to get to, with at $325MM followed by at $300MM. Seager got his deal going into his age-28 season, the same age Bichette will be next year. However, Seager was simply better. His power output was fairly close to Bichettes but with far more walks, leading to a 142 wRC+. His defense was also graded higher. Seager had 19.8 fWAR at the time he signed with the Rangers. Bichette could actually go past that since hes at 17.2 fWAR right now, but thats mostly due to Seagers injuries (most notably, Tommy John surgery). Seager produced that WAR total in just 514 regular season games as a Dodger, whereas Bichette already has 655 games under his belt. There was some injury risk with Seager but he was far better on a rate basis and thats what the Rangers paid for. Turner was a bit older, going into his age-30 season, but his combination of offense, defense and speed gave him a ma sive ceiling Bichette cant match. In his final two seasons before free agency, he produced 7.1 and 6.4 fWAR. As mentioned, Bichette has topped out at 4.9. The next two names on the list are a bit unusual. getting $280MM registered as a huge surprise at the time and the deal hasnt worked out for the Padres so far. In the industry, that one is chalked up to the Friars going a bit wild. Owner Peter Seidler was in poor health and was allowing the front office to spend like never before, seemingly throwing caution to the wind with the knowledge that he didnt have much time left. s deal is also an unusual data point. His earning power was initially far higher. He had agreed to a 13-year, $350MM deal with the Giants before they got scared by his physical and walked away. The Mets agreed to a 12-year $315MM deal with Correa before they, too, balked at his medicals. The $200MM deal with the Twins was therefore the product of a fairly unprecedented situation. The unique quartet of vesting options in the deal reflect the odd circumstances and could add millions more to Correas bank account. Theres a case for Bichette to be in the next tier. Ill circle back to in a second and focus first on , , and . Each signed his contract going into his age-29 season and earned between $23.3MM and $26MM annually. Adames and Swanson got a seventh year, pushing their total guarantees to $182MM and $177MM respectively. Bez and Story were each capped at six years and $140MM total. Bichette will be one year younger than everyone in that group, theoretically giving him a bit more earning power. The question will be whether hes ranked as highly apart from that. Adames is a better defender, with 11 OAA and -3 DRS in his career. That latter figure is a bit odd, as he was clearly in positive range before posting -16 DRS 2024 and -7 so far as a Giant. Offensively, he had often been similar to Bichette. He had a 126 wRC+ in 2020 and a 120 in 2021, with 25 home runs in the latter season. His power remained in 2022 and 2023 but low batting averages dropped his wRC+ to 109 and 94 in those seasons. He bounced back in 2024 with 32 home runs and a 119 wRC+. His fWAR totals have generally been in the Bichette range of three to five per season. Swanson was always a glove-first shortstop with questions about the bat. Through 2021, he still had a career 88 wRC+. But in 2022, his walk year, he hit 25 home runs and produced a 117 wRC+. Thanks to his excellent defense and 18 stolen bases, he was able to produce a 6.6 fWAR season. That was a tier above anything Bichette has done, but he had only done it once. Still, it was enough for the Cubs to buy in. Bez and Story were more erratic. Bez was a subpar hitter in his first few seasons but provided enough on defense and the basepaths to be useful. His offense improved as he neared free agency but wasnt consistent. His wRC+ spiked to 131 in 2018 and dropped to 112 the year after. The shortened 2020 season was a disaster, with a wRC+ of 57, before he bounced back to 117 in 2021. At his heights, he was almost a six-win player, getting to 5.8 and 5.6 fWAR in 2018 and 2019. Those were higher than any Bichette season, but he was also well below at times. Somewhat similarly, Story hit a higher peak than Bichette by producing 6.0 fWAR in 2019. He hit 35 home runs, though playing in Denver during the juiced ball season surely helped him a bit in that regard. Still, the 122 wRC+, 23 steals and strong defense led to a six-win season. He also had 2.0 fWAR in the shortened 2020 campaign with similar production. But in his walk year, 2021, his wRC+ dropped to 98 and he only produced 2.2 fWAR. That tepid platform season and some concerns about his elbow health knocked him down a bit. Here is the fWAR total for each in the six seasons leading to free agency, including the shortened 2020 season for all in the name of fairne s: Baez: 21.9 in 782 games Story: 20.3 in 745 games Adames: 20.1 in 795 games Bichette: 15.8 in 609 games Swanson: 15.1 in 789 games Bichette is right in the thick there. As mentioned, Swanson bloomed in his walk year, so it makes sense he would be at the bottom of this six-year list. If Bichette has a typical year for him, he could add another three or four wins and get fairly close to the other shorstops on the list. Factor in some inflation and that hes a year younger than everyone in that pack and he has a case to earn something around $200MM. What will also work in his favor is that hell be the clear top shortstop this winter, as Adames was in the most recent offseason. Alongside Bichette, the only other potential everyday shortstop this winter would be . He is still recovering from last years shoulder surgery and needs to both recover and play well enough to opt out of the second season of his two-year deal with the Rays. Even in a best-case scenario where that all happens, his earning power would be below a healthy and productive Bichette. This is all still somewhat hypothetical. As mentioned, Bichette seems to be getting back to his 2021-23 pace this year, but in a fairly small sample. Theres still lots of time for the season to turn on him. If he ends up having more 2024-style struggles, he could certainly fall. Lets turn to the Contract Tracker again. These are the top deals for second basemen by average annual value in the past five years ( ). This perhaps paints a picture of Bichettes floor. Given his questionable defense, its po sible that clubs may view him as someone whos likely to move to second base fairly soon. And the earning power of second basemen is clearly le ser than that of shortstops. Semien did get $175MM from the Rangers, though thats an outlier. At the time, the Rangers were five years into a deep rebuild and were eager to speed up the proce s with aggre sive spending. is an interesting comp for Bichette, as there are some parallels. Torres was once a highly-touted shortstop prospect, but with a better bat than glove. Unlike Bichette, he couldnt stick at short. The Yankees moved him to second base for good in 2022, his age-25 season. His offensive production has been somewhat comparable to Bichettes on the whole. He went into free agency with a .265/.334/.441 line and 113 wRC+, a bit below Bichettes typical range. He also had a tepid platform year, slashing .257/.330/.378 for a 104 wRC+ in 2024. He settled for a one-year, $15MM prove it deal with the Tigers. It currently seems unlikely that Bichette would fall quite that far. His career wRC+ of 120 is a few ticks above what Torres brought to the open market last fall. Bichette also has a leg up defensively, as he will be going into free agency as a viable shortstop, at least for the short term. But a soft finish in 2025 could hamper Bichette. In that scenario, hed be going into free agency on the heels of two fairly disappointing seasons in a row. That was the situation was in going into 2023. After two injury-marred seasons with the Dodgers, he was non-tendered and settled for a one-year, $17.5MM pact with the Cubs for his age-27 season. He bounced back that year and went into the open market ahead of his age-28 campaign. But there were enough question marks from his inconsistency, health and defense that he settled for a three-year, $80MM deal to return to the Cubs, well below initial expectations. He earned opt-out chances after each season in that deal but declined the first chance after a good-not-great 2024 season. Time will tell where Bichette ultimately puts himself on this earning spectrum, but it appears to be quite wide. Anything from $20MM to $200MM seems somewhat plausible, depending on his performance over the four-plus months, which will make him a fascinating player to track. A qualifying offer would be something of a footnote when talking about a $200MM deal but would certainly become noteworthy if Bichette finds himself on the other end. The QO was $21.05MM in the most recent offseason and will surely go up for the coming winter, after a number of recent mega deals. The QO is calculated by averaging the salaries of the 125 top-paid players. Each of , , , and earned AAVs of $35MM or higher recently. Though there are some deferrals in those deals, the QO value is sure to rise. Bichette would only be eligible to receive a QO if he sticks with the Jays until the end of the season. Players traded midseason are not eligible to receive one. If the Jays fall out of the race and trade Bichette at the deadline, the QO wont be a factor for him yet another detail that could sway a volatile free agent case with many factors at play. Photo of Bichette courtesy of Dan Hamilton, Imagn Images Derrick White Jersey