The righty-swinging Rooker has turn into not solely one of the profitable waiver claims in current reminiscence however one in all baseball’s finest hitters. He popped 30 residence runs in 526 plate appearances to earn an All-Star choice in 2023. Whereas he was snubbed from the Midsummer Traditional final season, Rooker took one other main step ahead. He linked on 39 homers, 26 doubles and a pair of triples with a large .293/.365/.562 batting line throughout 614 plate appearances.
Rooker completed tied for fifth in residence runs. Solely Aaron Judge, Shohei Ohtani, Anthony Santander and Juan Soto hit extra. Amongst hitters with at the very least 500 PAs, Rooker ranked within the prime 20 in all three slash stats. He completed sixth in slugging.
It’s now two seasons of borderline elite offensive manufacturing. Rooker has a .272/.348/.528 slash via greater than 1100 plate appearances in an A’s uniform. He’s within the prime 15 in slugging share and ranks ninth in homers for the reason that begin of the ’23 marketing campaign.
There’s a first rate quantity of swing-and-miss to his sport, as Rooker has fanned in additional than 30% of his plate appearances with the A’s. Final 12 months’s manufacturing was pushed partly by a .362 common on balls in play that’ll be troublesome to take care of. Rooker makes a ton of onerous contact, although, so he’s in all probability in line for a modest BABIP regression relatively than an enormous drop-off.
The ball-in-play normalization occurred on the finish of final season. Rooker carried an unsustainable .390 BABIP into the All-Star Break. That dropped to .333 within the second half. To his credit score, Rooker compensated by chopping his strikeout charge to a way more manageable 24.1% throughout that stretch. It stays to be seen whether or not he’ll preserve that stage of contact, but it surely’s an encouraging growth that presumably affirmed the entrance workplace’s confidence in his hitting acumen.
Even when he doesn’t hit .290 whereas pushing 40 residence runs on an annual foundation, Rooker ought to stay an impression bat. The A’s have made clear they envisioned him because the long-term anchor of their lineup. The group reportedly took him off the market prematurely of final summer season’s commerce deadline. That they had little interest in permitting commerce rumors to rekindle through the offseason. GM David Forst declared inside every week of the offseason starting that the A’s weren’t dealing Rooker. They’re doubling down by committing to him via at the very least the 2029 season.
Rooker surpassed three years of main league service final season. He was getting into his first of three arbitration seasons. MLBTR contributor Matt Swartz had projected a $5.1M wage for subsequent 12 months. Whereas the particular breakdown is unknown, Rooker will reportedly obtain $30M over what would have been his arbitration window. That leaves a mean of $15M yearly for the 2 free agent seasons. It’s not fairly a front-loaded contract, but it surely seems Rooker will make somewhat extra within the subsequent couple years than he would have had he gone via the arbitration course of.
The group makes that tradeoff for the possibility to maintain him at below-market charges through the 2028-29 seasons — that are scheduled to be their first two years in Las Vegas. The A’s didn’t have any cash assured past 2027. Severino and up to date commerce pickup Jeffrey Springs had been their solely gamers signed previous subsequent season.
The A’s income sharing standing has been a big storyline this offseason. Evan Drellich and Ken Rosenthal of the Athletic reported that the group may must push its aggressive steadiness tax payroll to roughly $105M to keep away from an MLBPA grievance. Groups are required to spend income sharing cash on the on-field product.
Extending Rooker will push their tax quantity up, although it’s not by an enormous quantity. The contract comes with a $12M common annual worth. The AAV is the quantity used for tax functions, so it wouldn’t matter how the salaries are distributed. Rooker had already been anticipated to make round $5M subsequent season. This provides roughly $7M to the group’s tax quantity, which can examine in round $97M (as calculated by RosterResource).
The tax quantity isn’t finalized till the tip of the 12 months, so the rest of the A’s offseason and in-season exercise can push that additional. Tax issues are related however are removed from the one motive for the A’s to make this deal. In the event that they had been solely involved about pushing subsequent season’s CBT quantity, they might have signed a handful of mid-tier free brokers to one-year contracts.
Rooker turned 30 in November. A five-year dedication runs via his age-34 season. There’s some threat in a five-year deal for a participant in his 30s who doesn’t present a lot defensive worth. But if Rooker continues hitting at anyplace close to this stage, his arbitration price ticket would have climbed shortly anyhow. He may have put himself in place for an AAV within the $20M-25M vary as soon as he hit free company, a quantity that the A’s could have been disinclined to match.
On the similar time, it’s simple to see the enchantment for Rooker of locking within the safety. It wasn’t that way back that he seemed like a fringe roster participant. He wouldn’t have gotten to free company till his age-33 season, when a three- or four-year deal would possibly’ve been the ceiling. Sacrificing somewhat little bit of long-term incomes upside to keep away from damage threat over the subsequent couple seasons is comprehensible.
This must also solidify Rooker’s spot in what seems to be an up-and-coming A’s lineup. Lawrence Butler, Jacob Wilson, Tyler Soderstrom, Shea Langeliers, JJ Bleday and rebound candidate Zack Gelof have promise as an offensive core. Final summer season’s fourth general choose Nick Kurtz may transfer shortly as a cultured school hitter. The A’s nonetheless want quite a bit to interrupt proper to contend in 2025, however issues are beginning to come into focus. Soderstrom and Kurtz match finest at first base, so maybe there’ll be a logjam down the road with Rooker locked in at designated hitter. That’d be a superb drawback to have if each younger first basemen attain their offensive ceilings and Rooker continues to hit at an All-Star stage.
