With Jeremy Hellickson, R.A. Dickey and Bartolo Colon off the board this early in free agency, an already bare cupboard has become barren. If you want a starting pitcher on the market now, you're looking at about five options, and only two of them managed to be average Major League Baseball players last year.
Suddenly, the second-best starter behind Rich Hill is Ivan Nova, the same Ivan Nova who spent 2014 and 2015 alternating between hurt and terrible, the same Nova who lost his spot in the Yankees' starting rotation last year.
Despite his flaws, the FanGraphs crowd projected that Nova will sign a three-year, $43 million deal. Dave Cameron upped that to four years and $56 million but admitted, "In a year, it's either going to look like genius or foolishness, with the in between options looking less likely."
Here's a bet that it will look foolish.