Measuring the cost of injuries over the last five seasons
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Measuring the cost of injuries over the last five seasons
David Murphy, Daily News Staff Writer
Hard to believe that I'll be flying down to Clearwater in a little over a week for this year's edition of spring training. I'm in the process of organizing my notes in an attempt to identify some of the plotlines that need to be explored early in camp.
Here's one:
Last year, nearly 1/5th of the money that the Phillies paid in player salaries went to somebody who was on the disabled list. Phillies players combined to log more than 1,400 days on the disabled list, at a combined cost of about $32.98 million. In other words, about 19.1 percent of the team's opening day payroll ended up as dead money. Ryan Howard spent 92 days on the disabled list while being paid about $109,000 per day in salary, for a total of about $10.1 million.
Teams can carry insurance on player contracts, but the practice is not as common as you might think because of the cost of the premiums that such policies usually require.
As you can see below, the percentage of payroll investment lost due to injury has increased in each of the last four seasons:
| Year | Total $ Lost | Opening Day Payroll | % Payroll Lost | Avg. Hitter Age | Avg. Pitcher Age |
| 2008 | $6.936 million | $95.200 million | 7.29 | 29.9 | 30.3 |
| 2009 | $10.938 million | $113.680 million | 9.62 | 31.2 | 31.0 |
| 2010 | $18.917 million | $135.398 million | 13.97 | 31.9 | 30.9 |
| 2011 | $31.573 million | $170.893 million | 18.48 | 31.6 | 29.4 |
| 2012 | $32.982 million | $172.535 million | 19.12 | 31.3 | 29.3 |
These numbers are based on the figures I have in my records. The average ages are from Baseball-Reference.com and are weighted for playing time. This year, the average age of the Phillies' eight projected regulars is 31, and the average age for the five projected starting pitchers is 31.
Comments (42)
Take 20% of any teams starters out and they will not win as consistantely as when all are healthy. The Phils are not too od or untalented. They need to be healthy to play and they need to play to win.— jjthree- Wow nice stat and shows the importance of injuries to this team, the injury payroll percentage is inversely proportional to how far the Phils have gone in that given year, 2008 World Series Champs (7.29%), 2009 World Series Runnerup (9.62%), 2010 NLCS loser (13.97%), 2011 NLDS loser (18.48%), 2012 no playoffs (19.12%). That's all you need to know right there. Stay healthy Phils!— kse
- Health is always the #1 factor in any professional sport. Unfortunately, these are professional athletes and most of them are not wimps, well, except for Polanco. They will play hurt, sometimes with various injuries all through the season that we don't even know about because we see them go out there on a nightly basis and play. The athlete understands this. It's their job, hurt or not. If you were to go down the 53 man roster of each Super Bowl team on Sunday and ask each of them if they were healthy, 98% of them would say no....but adrenaline counts for a lot, so do the PEDs. It usually is the healthiest teams that win. That's why some coaches lke to rest players that last week or two of the season. Get them a little fresher, less achy for the playoffs.— Mark1npt
- old ... injured .. can there be a correlation? nah, rube must suffer from bad luck.. who woulda thunk Contreras, Polanco, Ibanez, Howard, Utley, Halladay woud be getting old and their ability decline? the mysteries of the world puzzle the imbeciles among us— warbiscuit
- @kse....you are exactlt right....the best column to look at is the %payroll on the dl each year. The more the payroll on it, the worse the Phils end up....5 years running!!!!! That's more than a coincidence. It reflects how the Phils have allocated their payroll to those players who are their best, proportionately. Not all teams have their payroll aligned like this but the Phils do and it makes that one column tell the true story. It may not be the column that tells the story for other teams, but it is for the Phils.— Mark1npt
- Good posts Mark. I think the fact that they have played more games than anyone else in baseball from 2008-11 has something to do with their health as well.
— zubzub - This is an interesting table for showing that the Phils have not grown enormously older over the years although losing Jamie Moyer at one point might give the stats a bounce they might not deserve.
I don't know how to capture or put into perspective two phenomenon: 1) older players in the starting lineup who miss considerable time due to injury are replaced by younger players who lower the age stats and 2) the fact that on the Phils the older players are penciled in to the starting lineup while the younger players are depended on less because they are bench players.
There is a comparison that I saw of man games missed by team which for 2012 showed the Phils near but not at the top. The Nationals were actually higher even though they are a younger team. This suggested both that younger isn't always better when it comes to resisting injury but also that the Nats were better at overcoming injuries since they finished 17 games ahead of the Phils.— Claudio Vernight - @Claudio, your logic is flawed. The Nats weren't better at overcoming injuries just because they had more games on the dl and finished higher in the standings. All injuries are different in severity and in whether they are to your core players or not. If you compare apples to apples, the Phils probably did ok last year given the top players they lost and the lack of production from the 2nd and 3rd stringers, except for Kratz and Frandsen.— Mark1npt
- Apparently, Ruby and Chollie "the living fossil" just love Geritol eligable players, after all, Chollie is on the doorstep of 70 if he isn't already and the travesty of all this is....this cretin has input on who the Phillies acquire which would be like allowing Regis Philbin to select all the winners for American Idol. Example, to slap Domonic Brown in the face (again) by signing the anti-semitic, bush league Delmond Young......it says it all in florescent lettering....this organization is either inept beyond comprehension OR they are 100% corrupt. I vote for the latter because not even Monty, Giles or Ruben could really be THAT stupid:-)— daystrum
- Show any chart you want it won't change the fact that this team is OLD. No one gets younger after four ('08-'12) years.Only one young signing (C F )in four years STOP this is just aging.— tobyjoe
- Whether Howard is in the lineup or on DL, it's the same. No production.— 4thand10
- daystrum....this is the way it works.....the brass including Charles have a meeting. They discuss team needs, rp, lh pinch-hitter, etc......Amaro goes out and gets Charles a player in a category they need, boom. Charles has no say in who they trade for, who's traded out, etc.......this is all organizational stuff from the back room.....they get Charles the stuff, they go back in their room and they let it play out. Maybe they have another meeting the end of spring training and yet one more at the trade deadline. That's it.— Mark1npt
- Vathi - You use fancy words because you figure Philly fans won't understand you? You don't need to guess. Take 3 seconds and you would realize the only way replacing Moyer on the roster would result in a 2 year drop in average age would be if he was 50 and his replacement was zero.— NMPartners
- WOW you actually think I used fancy words? lol
No wonder you did't get what I was saying. BTW, last time I check Moyer was close to 50. Please educate yourself my friend so you don't believe the lies you read. Good luck.— vathi - When the player can't perform, he develops an "injury" that is aided and abetted by docs too scared to call the player a faker.— Ouwachon
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High Cheese is your place for the best Phillies coverage from the Daily News.
David Murphy
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