Figuring Out the Super Two Class of 2018

UPDATE ON OCTOBER 20:  MLB Trade Rumors reports that the cutoff for Super Two status will be 2.123.

Their information shows Dominic Leone with 2.123 in service time as the last man on the list.  Leone started the season with reportedly 1.123 in service time.  As best I can tell from Leone's information, he spent 18 days in the minors.  That would give him 165 days of service time in 2017.  That makes his total of 2.116.  It doesn't look to me like Leone is a Super Two, but I don't have all of the information. 

UPDATE ON OCTOBER 15:  I just found out that Jorge Soler is under contract through 2020.  My understanding is that he still takes a Super Two spot despite his contract status.  If this is not a correct understanding, I will update as necessary.

UPDATE ON OCTOBER 14: MLB Trade Rumors has added Eddie Rosario and Jorge Soler to their projections.

UPDATE ON OCTOBER 12:  MLB Trade Rumors  posted their projection of arbitration salaries a few days ago.  This list includes a good portion of the Super Two class I projected.

One thing that caught my eye was the fact that Nick Martinez shows up on this list with only 2.149 in service time.  Cot's Contracts has him with over three years of service time.  I showed him with 2.171.  It will be interesting to see what his official number is.

Also, Eddie Rosario and Jorge Soler, both of whom I project as Super Twos, don't show up on the MLB Trade Rumors list.

UPDATE ON OCTOBER 7:  So, Cot's Contracts has posted its listing of service times through the 2017 season.  I found a few corrections to ponder.

First, their listing shows Nick Martinez with 3 years and 2 days of service time.  This amount of service time would take Martinez out of the Super Two running. He'd become a full-fledged three-year arbitration player. I have looked at Martinez's transactions for the season numerous times and cannot see my error.

Second, a few of my calculations were off by a day or two compared to Cot's listing for a few other players.  None of them seem to affect the Super Two class.

Lastly, I miscalculated the service time of Joe Rickard.  According to my calculations, Rickard, Baltimore, had 2 years of service time.  However, Baltimore had optioned Rickard to AAA for 15 days at the end of August.  This means Rickard ended the 2017 season with 1 year and 168 days of service time.

The result?  Based on Cot's numbers, Rickard and Martinez would not be a part of the pool used to determine the Super Two class.  Under their data, only 115 players are included.  This means only 25 players would  receive Super Two status.  Not the 26 I had projected.

Nick Martinez moves off the list if his 3.002 service time number is accurate.  In this case, the other 25 players that I listed below with Martinez remain as the Super Two class.

I have posted the following list which shows the upcoming off-season's projected Super Two class several times.

1. Kris Bryant-2.171
1. Nick Martinez-2.171(see update above)
3. Maikel Franco-2.170
4. Carlos Rodon-2.168
4. Keone Kela-2.168
6. Addison Russell-2.167
7. Chasen Shreve-2.165
8. Hunter Strickland-2.163
8. Mike Foltynewicz- 2.163
10. Felipe Rivero-2.162
11. Michael Lorenzen-2.159
12. Raisel Iglesias-2.154
13. Cam Bedrosian-2.153
14. Corey Knebel-2.151
15. Andrew Heaney-2.150
16. Noah Syndergaard-2.149
17. Jorge Soler-2.141
18. Lance McCullers, Jr.-2.140
19. J.C. Ramirez-2.139
20. Matt Szczur-2.134
20. Yolmer Carlos Sanchez-2.134
22. Eduardo Rodriguez-2.130
23. Blaine Hardy-2.129
24. Hansel Robles-2.128
25. Ryan Rua-2.127
26. Eddie Rosario-2.120

Here is a look at the data I used to identify these 26 Golden Ticket winners, who are in line to gain an extra year of participation in MLB's arbitration process.

During the second half of the season, I maintained the spreadsheet found at this link.  

Included in this database are all players who will complete the regular season with at least 2 years and less than 3 years of MLB service time.

^Players with less than 86 days of service time this season are not included.
^Players who are not on a 40-man roster are not included.


As you can see on the spreadsheet, 117 players fell into this category.  This number is multiplied by .22 to determine which players fall in the top 22% in service time accrued.

The product of this computation is 25.74.  My understanding is that MLB rounds this number to the nearest whole number to determine the number of players who are included in the Super Two Class.

26 is the nearest whole number to 25.74, so 26 is the number of players I project to be in the class.


I'll be back after the Super Two class is revealed to critique my projection.

Huge World Cup Qualifying Window

Between October 5 and October 10, at least 13 teams(and possibly a few more from Africa) will qualify for the 2018 World Cup field.  By the end of this time frame,  at least 21 of the 32 slots for the event will be filled. Here is a running tally of the qualifiers.

Countries in bold qualified during the October 5-10 window.

Panama
Colombia
Uruguay
Argentina
France
Portugal
Serbia
Iceland
Egypt
Poland
Costa Rica
Nigeria
Spain
England
Germany
Russia
Belgium
Iran
Japan
South Korea
Saudi Arabia
Mexico
Brazil