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2016 MLB thread. THE CUBS HAVE BROKEN THE CURSE! Chicago Cubs are your 2016 World Series champions
- Thread in 'Sports & Training' Thread starter Started by proshares,
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Oakland should have traded Ces for Price. Could have at least had Price for another year or traded him during the offseason.
Surprised the Dodgers didn't trade for Price. Could have given them a batboy apparently.
This Price trade is still blowing my mind. I just don't get it.
Cliff looks THROUGH.
Surprised the Dodgers didn't trade for Price. Could have given them a batboy apparently.
This Price trade is still blowing my mind. I just don't get it.
Cliff looks THROUGH.
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Yeah I can't believe that's all that was needed for price. Such a steal by Seattle and Detroiy
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Puljos is going to see Manny Machado in his nightmares.
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Tough one for the O's to lose last night, but I'll take the series win.
Not too worried about the Jays because their winning coincided with playing cupcakes. O's did their thing vs. a murder's row in the AL West squads. Still got Seattle on the horizon then a big series vs. Toronto.
*Can't think of anyone in MLB who has a stronger arm from 3rd than Manny Machado..
Not too worried about the Jays because their winning coincided with playing cupcakes. O's did their thing vs. a murder's row in the AL West squads. Still got Seattle on the horizon then a big series vs. Toronto.
*Can't think of anyone in MLB who has a stronger arm from 3rd than Manny Machado..
I cannot think of one off top.
I was surprised I never heard this comparison but he reminds me a bit of '04 Beltre minus the huge power surge. Defensively, definitely reminds me of LAD Adrian.
Bigger update coming with all the stuff from yesterday.
I was surprised I never heard this comparison but he reminds me a bit of '04 Beltre minus the huge power surge. Defensively, definitely reminds me of LAD Adrian.
Bigger update coming with all the stuff from yesterday.
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Hmmm...Beltre. Not bad. I think, in time, Manny can develop into a perennial 25-30 HR threat. The defense is there.
Speaking of Beltre...who would have thought this man was ever going to be a lock for the HOF? He'll finish with over 3000 hits (if he can stay moderately healthy) and probably be close to 500 HRs. Still going strong at 35.
Don’t Write Off The Rays End Of The David Price Deal Just Yet.
In Austin Jackson, Mariners Land Decent Player and Massive Upgrade.
Tigers See the A’s Jon Lester, Raise Them David Price.
Cardinals Improve by Adding Lackey, Subtracting Craig.
The Red Sox Second Trade Affirms 2015 Focus.
The Dark Side Of Booming Local TV Deals.
Yankees Gain Flexibility in Landing Prado, Drew.
Five Versions of Cleveland’s New Prospect, Zach Walters.
Orioles Land Andrew Miller from busy Red Sox.
Nationals Take a Small Risk in Dealing Risky Prospect.
Brewers Bet on a Different Sort of Regression.
Chris Denorfia: Improvement By Not Being Endy Chavez.
Today was quite the deadline spectacle, with two of the best pitchers in baseball, Jon Lester and David Price, changing uniforms. The Lester deal hit early, and it was an eye-opener, with the “buyer” A’s “selling” their #4 hitter, Yoenis Cespedes in the process. The movement of established players, such as Cespedes, Allen Craig and Joe Kelly, by buyers in pursuit of their needs came to be one of the themes of the day.
As they often do, however, the Tampa Bay Rays zigged while everyone else zagged, and “sold” ace lefty David Price to the Tigers in a three-team deal that sent Austin Jackson to the Mariners, and lefty starter Drew Smyly and infielders Nick Franklin and Willy Adames to the Rays. The reaction of many media outlets to the Rays’ take had a quizzical or even disappointed tone. It takes a little more analysis – and an understanding of the way the underfunded Rays need to do business – to see what they’re up to here. To put it simply, the Rays are trusting their solid organizational evaluation skills as they have many times in the past, and see an abundance of talent and team control in this three-player package.
The most immediate help received by the Rays will be provided by Smyly, 25, who was drafted on the second round out of Arkansas in 2010. His contributions have been lost in the considerable shadows of his Tigers’ rotation compatriots, but he has fashioned a solid beginning to his career. He rocketed through the minors in about two calendar years, and struck out about a batter per inning in his rookie 2012 season. He was nails as a multiple inning reliever last season, posting a 6-0, 2.37, mark with a sterling 81/17 K/BB ratio in 76 innings. That’s an awful lot of innings in this day and age for a relief pitcher. This year, he slid into the back of the Tiger rotation and has been quietly effective, going 6-9, 3.77, with a solid 87/31 K/BB in 100 1/3 IP. He has a career 84 ERA-, and has absolutely destroyed left-handed hitters to the tune of a career .192/.234/.297 career line.
The Rays would not be making this trade, however, if they believed that Smyly was a finished product, a #4-5 starter to whom they would begin paying arbitration wages next season. They have to think he is going to become more than that, and a deeper look offers some evidence that they could be correct.
Smyly’s K and BB rates, which were exceptional last season out of the pen, have receded a bit this season, but are both still slightly above the MLB average at 20.6% and 7.3%, respectively. He has also shown a fairly strong popup tendency, which has intensified a bit this season, as his popup rate has risen from 8.5% in 2013 to 9.6% this season. Most importantly, however, Smyly has absolutely stifled fly ball authority, allowing average velocity of 80.3 MPH and 80.6 MPH in the air over the past two seasons, way below the MLB mean. Hitters are batting .215 AVG-.613 SLG on fly balls this season (and .197 AVG-.492 SLG in 2013) – again, well better than his peers.
He’s actually been a bit unlucky to allow 14 homers already this season, as he’s yielded some cheapies. He has a real chance to be the rare fly ball pitcher that can yield 20 or fewer homers over 200 innings in a typical season as he moves forward. Also, his 2014 numbers have been hurt by some bad luck on grounders – he’s allowed a .317 AVG-.347 SLG on grounders this season, way above the MLB average, and will now have much better defenders all over the field in Tampa than he did in Detroit.
Of course, there are some obstacles in Smyly’s road to becoming an above average MLB starting pitcher. Chiefly, there is his inability to handle right-handed hitters, who have batted a lusty .270/.330/.459 against him for his career. Smyly has good arm speed on his change-up, but he simply has not located it that well to this stage in his career. In addition, he has never averaged six innings per start in any of his professional seasons, in the minors or majors.
This is the way the Rays get their high-end starting pitchers, however. They can’t afford the free agent rates, so they target guys who do something exceptionally well, or prospects whose value has fallen from its peak. Think Jake Odorizzi, Chris Archer, etc.. Smyly has an out-pitch slider, locates his fastball well, and throws tons of strikes. If he can increase the quality of those strikes, and settle into a starting role now that he has no fear of ever again moving into the bullpen, the Rays very well could have a #3 starter at a bargain price on their hands. With four years of control, of course, compared to one more year of Price.
There are two other significant pieces headed in the Rays’ direction in this deal. Nick Franklin, 23, heads over from the Mariners. Franklin’s stock has fallen a bit thanks to his struggles at the major league level in Seattle, but there is still a lot to like here. A switch-hitter, Franklin has been a dramatically superior performer from the left side. He got increasingly power-happy as he advanced through the Mariner system, and has evolved into almost exclusively a dead-pull hitter. There is a lot of head movement in his swing, and he tends to open his front side at times, but he can hit the ball a country mile for someone his size.
Franklin has been ranked on my minor league position player prospect list in all five of his full pro seasons, ranking in the top forty three times, peaking at #19 in 2013. Players with such a track record generally become big league starters, and possess star potential. That wasn’t going to happen in Seattle, as the holes in his offensive game had worsened and gone unaddressed.
Defensively, his best spot is likely second base, which is held down by Ben Zobrist in Tampa. Like Zobrist, Franklin is quite athletic and should be yet another flexible piece on the Rays’ roster. If Franklin can improve his pitch selection and re-learn how to use the entire field, while deciding once and for all whether switch-hitting is in the cards for him, he can put up Zobrist-like numbers for the Rays. In fact, he is likely Zobrist’s eventual replacement. And he’ll make much less than him, with multiple years of cheap team control, of course.
Then there’s the wild card, Low-A shortstop Willy Adames. At any given moment in time, there aren’t too many 18-year-olds holding down full-time gigs in full-season leagues. There are materially fewer who hold onto such a gig once the short-season summer leagues start, and perform well against much older competition from wire to wire. Adames would be one of those chosen few, batting .269/.346/.428 with 14 doubles, 12 — count ‘em, 12 — triples and six homers in the pitcher-friendly Midwest League. He’s a pretty big kid who might eventually have to move over to third base, but kids like this don’t grow on trees. He ranked #48 on my mid-season minor league position player prospect list, which is based on both performance and age relative to one’s level. A whole lot can happen between West Michigan and the big leagues, but Adames’ upside is certainly significant.
From the Rays’ perspective, this might not be the sexy deal that gets all of the accolades in the here and now. It just might be the one that looks really, really good at the 10-year reunion. On paper, the Rays are a little worse for this season without David Price; let’s not kid ourselves. They still are very much in the wildcard race, however, and have added short and long-term talent, with extra helpings of cost certainty and years of control. This is the hand that the Rays have been dealt, and they tend to play it well.
As they often do, however, the Tampa Bay Rays zigged while everyone else zagged, and “sold” ace lefty David Price to the Tigers in a three-team deal that sent Austin Jackson to the Mariners, and lefty starter Drew Smyly and infielders Nick Franklin and Willy Adames to the Rays. The reaction of many media outlets to the Rays’ take had a quizzical or even disappointed tone. It takes a little more analysis – and an understanding of the way the underfunded Rays need to do business – to see what they’re up to here. To put it simply, the Rays are trusting their solid organizational evaluation skills as they have many times in the past, and see an abundance of talent and team control in this three-player package.
The most immediate help received by the Rays will be provided by Smyly, 25, who was drafted on the second round out of Arkansas in 2010. His contributions have been lost in the considerable shadows of his Tigers’ rotation compatriots, but he has fashioned a solid beginning to his career. He rocketed through the minors in about two calendar years, and struck out about a batter per inning in his rookie 2012 season. He was nails as a multiple inning reliever last season, posting a 6-0, 2.37, mark with a sterling 81/17 K/BB ratio in 76 innings. That’s an awful lot of innings in this day and age for a relief pitcher. This year, he slid into the back of the Tiger rotation and has been quietly effective, going 6-9, 3.77, with a solid 87/31 K/BB in 100 1/3 IP. He has a career 84 ERA-, and has absolutely destroyed left-handed hitters to the tune of a career .192/.234/.297 career line.
The Rays would not be making this trade, however, if they believed that Smyly was a finished product, a #4-5 starter to whom they would begin paying arbitration wages next season. They have to think he is going to become more than that, and a deeper look offers some evidence that they could be correct.
Smyly’s K and BB rates, which were exceptional last season out of the pen, have receded a bit this season, but are both still slightly above the MLB average at 20.6% and 7.3%, respectively. He has also shown a fairly strong popup tendency, which has intensified a bit this season, as his popup rate has risen from 8.5% in 2013 to 9.6% this season. Most importantly, however, Smyly has absolutely stifled fly ball authority, allowing average velocity of 80.3 MPH and 80.6 MPH in the air over the past two seasons, way below the MLB mean. Hitters are batting .215 AVG-.613 SLG on fly balls this season (and .197 AVG-.492 SLG in 2013) – again, well better than his peers.
He’s actually been a bit unlucky to allow 14 homers already this season, as he’s yielded some cheapies. He has a real chance to be the rare fly ball pitcher that can yield 20 or fewer homers over 200 innings in a typical season as he moves forward. Also, his 2014 numbers have been hurt by some bad luck on grounders – he’s allowed a .317 AVG-.347 SLG on grounders this season, way above the MLB average, and will now have much better defenders all over the field in Tampa than he did in Detroit.
Of course, there are some obstacles in Smyly’s road to becoming an above average MLB starting pitcher. Chiefly, there is his inability to handle right-handed hitters, who have batted a lusty .270/.330/.459 against him for his career. Smyly has good arm speed on his change-up, but he simply has not located it that well to this stage in his career. In addition, he has never averaged six innings per start in any of his professional seasons, in the minors or majors.
This is the way the Rays get their high-end starting pitchers, however. They can’t afford the free agent rates, so they target guys who do something exceptionally well, or prospects whose value has fallen from its peak. Think Jake Odorizzi, Chris Archer, etc.. Smyly has an out-pitch slider, locates his fastball well, and throws tons of strikes. If he can increase the quality of those strikes, and settle into a starting role now that he has no fear of ever again moving into the bullpen, the Rays very well could have a #3 starter at a bargain price on their hands. With four years of control, of course, compared to one more year of Price.
There are two other significant pieces headed in the Rays’ direction in this deal. Nick Franklin, 23, heads over from the Mariners. Franklin’s stock has fallen a bit thanks to his struggles at the major league level in Seattle, but there is still a lot to like here. A switch-hitter, Franklin has been a dramatically superior performer from the left side. He got increasingly power-happy as he advanced through the Mariner system, and has evolved into almost exclusively a dead-pull hitter. There is a lot of head movement in his swing, and he tends to open his front side at times, but he can hit the ball a country mile for someone his size.
Franklin has been ranked on my minor league position player prospect list in all five of his full pro seasons, ranking in the top forty three times, peaking at #19 in 2013. Players with such a track record generally become big league starters, and possess star potential. That wasn’t going to happen in Seattle, as the holes in his offensive game had worsened and gone unaddressed.
Defensively, his best spot is likely second base, which is held down by Ben Zobrist in Tampa. Like Zobrist, Franklin is quite athletic and should be yet another flexible piece on the Rays’ roster. If Franklin can improve his pitch selection and re-learn how to use the entire field, while deciding once and for all whether switch-hitting is in the cards for him, he can put up Zobrist-like numbers for the Rays. In fact, he is likely Zobrist’s eventual replacement. And he’ll make much less than him, with multiple years of cheap team control, of course.
Then there’s the wild card, Low-A shortstop Willy Adames. At any given moment in time, there aren’t too many 18-year-olds holding down full-time gigs in full-season leagues. There are materially fewer who hold onto such a gig once the short-season summer leagues start, and perform well against much older competition from wire to wire. Adames would be one of those chosen few, batting .269/.346/.428 with 14 doubles, 12 — count ‘em, 12 — triples and six homers in the pitcher-friendly Midwest League. He’s a pretty big kid who might eventually have to move over to third base, but kids like this don’t grow on trees. He ranked #48 on my mid-season minor league position player prospect list, which is based on both performance and age relative to one’s level. A whole lot can happen between West Michigan and the big leagues, but Adames’ upside is certainly significant.
From the Rays’ perspective, this might not be the sexy deal that gets all of the accolades in the here and now. It just might be the one that looks really, really good at the 10-year reunion. On paper, the Rays are a little worse for this season without David Price; let’s not kid ourselves. They still are very much in the wildcard race, however, and have added short and long-term talent, with extra helpings of cost certainty and years of control. This is the hand that the Rays have been dealt, and they tend to play it well.
In Austin Jackson, Mariners Land Decent Player and Massive Upgrade.
In one of the smaller moves of the day, the Mariners dealt Abraham Almonte and another minor leaguer to the Padres for Chris Denorfia. It wasn’t a trade that caught much attention, because neither of the younger guys is of any real consequence, and Denorfia is a rental having a down season. It was just something that flew by, completely under the radar, and now something you should consider is that Almonte began the season as the Mariners’ starter in center field.
So it could be said that, later on Thursday, the Mariners addressed a need that was ever so desperate. They didn’t end up with David Price, but they did get themselves involved in the deal, adding Austin Jackson and subtracting Nick Franklin. Jackson has only another eight months of team control, and it would appear he might’ve peaked in 2012. But while Jackson hasn’t been playing like a star-level player, for the Mariners he ought to be an upgrade of some very real significance.
Let’s look at the familiar FanGraphs leaderboards and split for center fielders. You know which team has been the best? Of course you do. Angels center fielders — Mike Trout — have provided a WAR of 5.7. In the middle, we have the Twins and Cardinals, at 1.9. Way down toward the bottom, the Braves are at a paltry 0.3. Then you have the Cubs and the Mariners. Both teams are tied for last, at -0.8. Both teams, to date, have gotten performances out of center field you might expect from a random decent Double-A glove guy. The Mariners are trying to make the playoffs!
When the Mariners demoted Almonte, they did so without any good alternatives. The first guy to get more playing time was Stefen Romero, who is bad. Then came James Jones, who is also bad. It’s an outfield picture that’s involved entirely too much Endy Chavez, but as easy as it is to pick on the Mariners for Chavez’s presence, Jones has been a younger equivalent. He’s also been getting worse and worse, putting the Mariners in position of needing to find what outfield help they could.
Hence Jackson, who’s going from one contender to another. It’s always easier to go from bad to decent than from decent to good. Around deadline time, not very many contending teams have bad positions, because bad positions indicate bad rosters. You could say the Mariners are fortunate, then, because for them Jackson is a bigger upgrade than he ought to be. He’s a good deal better than Jones right now, and since he’s only 27, he should be good again in 2015, for an organization with almost zero outfield depth. This is a definite move out of short-term interests, but just because the Mariners aren’t the A’s or the Tigers doesn’t mean they shouldn’t try to seize whatever kind of opportunity this is.
Jackson is going to be reunited with Lloyd McClendon, his former hitting coach. Just a couple years ago, Jackson posted a 134 wRC+, that dropped to 107, and then to this year’s 100. He’s long been something of a tinkerer, and what he’s missing right now is a bit of power, but he projects as a slightly above-average hitter and early in his career he’s been one of the better BABIP hitters in baseball history. Instead of driving balls over fences, he’s more of the spraying-line-drives sort, and in theory this ought to be his career prime. At least, there isn’t much risk that Jackson is going to fall flat on his face.
Of maybe greater concern is Jackson’s defense in center. We know that defense starts to decline from an early age, but Jackson’s numbers have gotten worse each year from 2011. Since the start of last season, Jackson has been average by DRS and below-average by UZR, and it’s possible he’s just lost some of his range. Yet, he should be flanked by capable defenders, and there’s no reason to believe Jackson is a defensive liability. What he seems like is an average or above-average player, who’s been a 5-win player before and who’s joining a team with a desperate need.
Leaving is Nick Franklin, who’s been undeniably obvious trade bait for the better part of a calendar year. It was a small miracle Franklin survived the winter without getting dealt, and then it seemed like a move in spring training was all but inevitable. At last, Franklin’s going somewhere where he isn’t blocked, as he just didn’t have a future with the Mariners.
Obviously, second base is taken care of. Shortstop is a little more up in the air, with the struggling Brad Miller and the unknown Chris Taylor, but few believe Franklin is a shortstop anyway, and then you’re thinking about a full-on switch to the outfield. So the Mariners almost had to trade Franklin, to get something out of him. Which wouldn’t justify just any deal — Franklin would have value to most other teams — but front offices have known about Franklin’s availability for months. No one was offering anything elite, so the Jackson return seems reasonable.
It’s important to understand that Franklin’s stock is down. He hasn’t hit in the majors, and he hasn’t hit in the minors for two months. It’s also important to understand that Franklin is still a valuable piece, given that he’s 23 and has a Triple-A OPS over .800. He destroyed Triple-A last year, he destroyed Triple-A earlier this year, and there was talk that he was disappointed to be demoted in early June. He’s a fairly disciplined hitter with surprising power for someone his size, and he’s twice been ranked a top-100 prospect. Even if he isn’t a shortstop, he has tools that could translate somewhere else, and it’s within the realm of possibility that he can be Tampa Bay’s Ben Zobrist after Ben Zobrist.
Years and years ago, Shin-Soo Choo was obvious trade bait. Eventually, he got traded, and the Mariners missed him. The likelihood is that Choo’s skillset back then was underrated, and Franklin profiles to be somewhat underrated as well, but then Austin Jackson is better than Ben Broussard. The Mariners, probably, are prepared for Franklin to be an okay player for a while, but they don’t seem to think he’ll be a star, and they do seem to think that Jackson will help them be a lot better for the next year and change.
The Mariners have dropped out of playoff position, but Jackson’s a big improvement, and Franklin had no role. Jackson will also be around for a similar team in 2015, so this isn’t a one-time shot. The Mariners had no hope of making themselves as good as the best teams in the American League, but that doesn’t mean you just fold up shop, and they upgraded without subtracting too much of the potential future. If Jackson returns to 2012 levels, he’ll be outstanding. If Franklin hits like he hit when he was first promoted to the majors, he’ll be highly valuable. Obviously, there are ways for both sides to come out of this deal a winner. If Jackson plays like he’s expected to, and if Franklin plays like he’s expected to, then it’ll look almost perfectly fair. For the Mariners, they had some real good players and a real bad position. This doesn’t fix them completely, but they’ve at least taken care of one embarrassment.
So it could be said that, later on Thursday, the Mariners addressed a need that was ever so desperate. They didn’t end up with David Price, but they did get themselves involved in the deal, adding Austin Jackson and subtracting Nick Franklin. Jackson has only another eight months of team control, and it would appear he might’ve peaked in 2012. But while Jackson hasn’t been playing like a star-level player, for the Mariners he ought to be an upgrade of some very real significance.
Let’s look at the familiar FanGraphs leaderboards and split for center fielders. You know which team has been the best? Of course you do. Angels center fielders — Mike Trout — have provided a WAR of 5.7. In the middle, we have the Twins and Cardinals, at 1.9. Way down toward the bottom, the Braves are at a paltry 0.3. Then you have the Cubs and the Mariners. Both teams are tied for last, at -0.8. Both teams, to date, have gotten performances out of center field you might expect from a random decent Double-A glove guy. The Mariners are trying to make the playoffs!
When the Mariners demoted Almonte, they did so without any good alternatives. The first guy to get more playing time was Stefen Romero, who is bad. Then came James Jones, who is also bad. It’s an outfield picture that’s involved entirely too much Endy Chavez, but as easy as it is to pick on the Mariners for Chavez’s presence, Jones has been a younger equivalent. He’s also been getting worse and worse, putting the Mariners in position of needing to find what outfield help they could.
Hence Jackson, who’s going from one contender to another. It’s always easier to go from bad to decent than from decent to good. Around deadline time, not very many contending teams have bad positions, because bad positions indicate bad rosters. You could say the Mariners are fortunate, then, because for them Jackson is a bigger upgrade than he ought to be. He’s a good deal better than Jones right now, and since he’s only 27, he should be good again in 2015, for an organization with almost zero outfield depth. This is a definite move out of short-term interests, but just because the Mariners aren’t the A’s or the Tigers doesn’t mean they shouldn’t try to seize whatever kind of opportunity this is.
Jackson is going to be reunited with Lloyd McClendon, his former hitting coach. Just a couple years ago, Jackson posted a 134 wRC+, that dropped to 107, and then to this year’s 100. He’s long been something of a tinkerer, and what he’s missing right now is a bit of power, but he projects as a slightly above-average hitter and early in his career he’s been one of the better BABIP hitters in baseball history. Instead of driving balls over fences, he’s more of the spraying-line-drives sort, and in theory this ought to be his career prime. At least, there isn’t much risk that Jackson is going to fall flat on his face.
Of maybe greater concern is Jackson’s defense in center. We know that defense starts to decline from an early age, but Jackson’s numbers have gotten worse each year from 2011. Since the start of last season, Jackson has been average by DRS and below-average by UZR, and it’s possible he’s just lost some of his range. Yet, he should be flanked by capable defenders, and there’s no reason to believe Jackson is a defensive liability. What he seems like is an average or above-average player, who’s been a 5-win player before and who’s joining a team with a desperate need.
Leaving is Nick Franklin, who’s been undeniably obvious trade bait for the better part of a calendar year. It was a small miracle Franklin survived the winter without getting dealt, and then it seemed like a move in spring training was all but inevitable. At last, Franklin’s going somewhere where he isn’t blocked, as he just didn’t have a future with the Mariners.
Obviously, second base is taken care of. Shortstop is a little more up in the air, with the struggling Brad Miller and the unknown Chris Taylor, but few believe Franklin is a shortstop anyway, and then you’re thinking about a full-on switch to the outfield. So the Mariners almost had to trade Franklin, to get something out of him. Which wouldn’t justify just any deal — Franklin would have value to most other teams — but front offices have known about Franklin’s availability for months. No one was offering anything elite, so the Jackson return seems reasonable.
It’s important to understand that Franklin’s stock is down. He hasn’t hit in the majors, and he hasn’t hit in the minors for two months. It’s also important to understand that Franklin is still a valuable piece, given that he’s 23 and has a Triple-A OPS over .800. He destroyed Triple-A last year, he destroyed Triple-A earlier this year, and there was talk that he was disappointed to be demoted in early June. He’s a fairly disciplined hitter with surprising power for someone his size, and he’s twice been ranked a top-100 prospect. Even if he isn’t a shortstop, he has tools that could translate somewhere else, and it’s within the realm of possibility that he can be Tampa Bay’s Ben Zobrist after Ben Zobrist.
Years and years ago, Shin-Soo Choo was obvious trade bait. Eventually, he got traded, and the Mariners missed him. The likelihood is that Choo’s skillset back then was underrated, and Franklin profiles to be somewhat underrated as well, but then Austin Jackson is better than Ben Broussard. The Mariners, probably, are prepared for Franklin to be an okay player for a while, but they don’t seem to think he’ll be a star, and they do seem to think that Jackson will help them be a lot better for the next year and change.
The Mariners have dropped out of playoff position, but Jackson’s a big improvement, and Franklin had no role. Jackson will also be around for a similar team in 2015, so this isn’t a one-time shot. The Mariners had no hope of making themselves as good as the best teams in the American League, but that doesn’t mean you just fold up shop, and they upgraded without subtracting too much of the potential future. If Jackson returns to 2012 levels, he’ll be outstanding. If Franklin hits like he hit when he was first promoted to the majors, he’ll be highly valuable. Obviously, there are ways for both sides to come out of this deal a winner. If Jackson plays like he’s expected to, and if Franklin plays like he’s expected to, then it’ll look almost perfectly fair. For the Mariners, they had some real good players and a real bad position. This doesn’t fix them completely, but they’ve at least taken care of one embarrassment.
Tigers See the A’s Jon Lester, Raise Them David Price.
The last two years, the Tigers have beaten the A’s in the American League Division Series. In both years, it went the full five games, with the A’s falling just short. The A’s have spent the last month trying to make sure that doesn’t happen again, loading up their rotation with Jeff Samardzija, Jason Hammel, and now Jon Lester.
Maybe the Tigers would have done this anyway. We’ll never know, of course, but what we do know is that the Tigers acquired David Price this afternoon, bolstering their own rotation to make a pitching staff that is unlike anything we’ve seen in a while.
This is what their current starting five has done over the last calendar year.
Name IP BB% K% GB% HR/FB LOB% BABIP ERA- FIP- xFIP- WAR RA9-WAR
David Price 254.0 3% 25% 41% 9% 73% 0.305 83 74 74 6.7 4.8
Max Scherzer 216.2 8% 28% 35% 7% 77% 0.296 76 73 86 5.7 5.7
Anibal Sanchez 191.1 6% 22% 47% 4% 70% 0.280 77 68 88 5.7 4.7
Justin Verlander 223.1 8% 20% 39% 8% 70% 0.306 103 93 105 4.2 2.3
Rick Porcello 198.0 6% 17% 50% 12% 74% 0.288 87 93 91 3.3 4.1
So you have a guy who has pitched at a +7 WAR level, two +6 WAR guys, a +4 WAR guy who has a Cy Young and an MVP in his trophy case, and a +3 WAR guy who is having the best season of his career. This is ridiculous. Even the mid-1990s Braves weren’t this deep.
Of course, as has been noted many times, pitching depth doesn’t actually help you that much in the postseason. The #5 starter is going to the bullpen — that’s probably Porcello, but it would be fun if it ended up being Verlander — and the #4 starter is only going to pitch once per series. So, in a sense, most everything I said about why the Dodgers didn’t need to push in for Price or Lester applies here too. The Tigers got a great pitcher, certainly, but he’s going to take postseason innings from a good starter. The upgrade is smaller than David Price’s name value would imply.
There’s an unless here, though. Because while Justin Verlander’s numbers over the last year look fine, his numbers this year look less fine. His velocity is down. His strikeouts have gone away. He’s giving up hits on balls in play. This isn’t just an ERA-blip; his xFIP- is 115, which puts him in the same range as Tom Koheler and Eric Stults. There is a non-zero chance that Justin Verlander is injured, and shouldn’t be counted on to be a significant impact starter in the postseason.
We can’t know that from the outside. The Tigers might not even know that with the information they have available. When it comes to pitcher health, all anyone can really do is guess, though a team’s guesses are far more educated than ours. That the Tigers pushed in on David Price seems to suggest that perhaps they aren’t 100% counting on Justin Verlander this October. At least, not as a starter.
Because there’s some precedent for taking formerly great starters with missing velocity and putting them in the bullpen for the postseason, to great success. In 2012, after a poor regular season, Tim Lincecum threw 18 really nasty innings for the Giants, most of them coming in relief, and was one of the reasons the Giants swept the Tigers in the World Series. In that series, Lincecum threw 4 2/3 innings, didn’t allow a hit, and led the team in strikeouts despite not making a start.
I don’t know that this is the plan for Verlander, but their bullpen is pretty mediocre even with Joakim Soria in the fold, and turning Verlander into a six-out, max effort bullpen ace might be a pretty nice side benefit of acquiring Price. Maybe he wouldn’t be interested in doing it. Maybe he won’t need to do it. This is all highly speculative, of course, but it’s certainly one possible outcome that could make the Tigers really difficult to match-up with in the postseason. If their bullpen goes Verlander-Soria in high leverage situations, with Nathan around for the low-leverage three-run saves, then Detroit won’t have to clench their fists every time a starter is removed from the game.
Of course, you don’t get David Price without giving up some real value, and the Tigers certainly did that here. Drew Smyly isn’t the highest upside guy around, but he’s been a league average starter as a 25 year old, and comes with four more years of team control. League average starters get something like $10 to $12 million per year on the free agent market, and even as a Super Two, Smyly will make a fraction of that next year, and remain underpaid for several years afterwards. There’s a reason that the Red Sox and Rays went after cheap average big league pitchers today, rather than focusing on higher upside prospects who are years away from contending; guys who can give you quality innings at the big league level without costing much in salary are extremely valuable assets.
The deal also cost the Tigers center fielder Austin Jackson, who is an above average player having a below average season. The emergence of J.D. Martinez gave the Tigers some outfield depth that allowed them to make a deal like this, but make no mistake, going from Jackson to Rajai Davis in center field is a downgrade. Davis is a nice role player who has outplayed Jackson in 2014, but we shouldn’t expect that to continue, and at the very least, this deal takes away some depth from the Tigers offense. And Jackson was under control for 2015 at what should be a reasonable enough price, so there’s some lost future value there as well.
And they also threw in an 18 year old shortstop prospect, Willy Adames, who might have some future value. But the Tigers aren’t playing for the future. Miguel Cabrera is only getting older, Max Scherzer won’t be back next year, and their window is closing. Price should help keep it open for both this year and next season, giving the Tigers two final good runs at a World Series title before they probably need to rebuild. Not having Drew Smyly around for that rebuilding process will make things a little bit tougher, but it’s not the kind of loss that can’t be overcome.
Like the A’s, the Tigers are in win-now mode, and this is a trade that makes them better for 2014. Especially if Justin Verlander ends up as a lights-out reliever in October.
Maybe the Tigers would have done this anyway. We’ll never know, of course, but what we do know is that the Tigers acquired David Price this afternoon, bolstering their own rotation to make a pitching staff that is unlike anything we’ve seen in a while.
This is what their current starting five has done over the last calendar year.
Name IP BB% K% GB% HR/FB LOB% BABIP ERA- FIP- xFIP- WAR RA9-WAR
David Price 254.0 3% 25% 41% 9% 73% 0.305 83 74 74 6.7 4.8
Max Scherzer 216.2 8% 28% 35% 7% 77% 0.296 76 73 86 5.7 5.7
Anibal Sanchez 191.1 6% 22% 47% 4% 70% 0.280 77 68 88 5.7 4.7
Justin Verlander 223.1 8% 20% 39% 8% 70% 0.306 103 93 105 4.2 2.3
Rick Porcello 198.0 6% 17% 50% 12% 74% 0.288 87 93 91 3.3 4.1
So you have a guy who has pitched at a +7 WAR level, two +6 WAR guys, a +4 WAR guy who has a Cy Young and an MVP in his trophy case, and a +3 WAR guy who is having the best season of his career. This is ridiculous. Even the mid-1990s Braves weren’t this deep.
Of course, as has been noted many times, pitching depth doesn’t actually help you that much in the postseason. The #5 starter is going to the bullpen — that’s probably Porcello, but it would be fun if it ended up being Verlander — and the #4 starter is only going to pitch once per series. So, in a sense, most everything I said about why the Dodgers didn’t need to push in for Price or Lester applies here too. The Tigers got a great pitcher, certainly, but he’s going to take postseason innings from a good starter. The upgrade is smaller than David Price’s name value would imply.
There’s an unless here, though. Because while Justin Verlander’s numbers over the last year look fine, his numbers this year look less fine. His velocity is down. His strikeouts have gone away. He’s giving up hits on balls in play. This isn’t just an ERA-blip; his xFIP- is 115, which puts him in the same range as Tom Koheler and Eric Stults. There is a non-zero chance that Justin Verlander is injured, and shouldn’t be counted on to be a significant impact starter in the postseason.
We can’t know that from the outside. The Tigers might not even know that with the information they have available. When it comes to pitcher health, all anyone can really do is guess, though a team’s guesses are far more educated than ours. That the Tigers pushed in on David Price seems to suggest that perhaps they aren’t 100% counting on Justin Verlander this October. At least, not as a starter.
Because there’s some precedent for taking formerly great starters with missing velocity and putting them in the bullpen for the postseason, to great success. In 2012, after a poor regular season, Tim Lincecum threw 18 really nasty innings for the Giants, most of them coming in relief, and was one of the reasons the Giants swept the Tigers in the World Series. In that series, Lincecum threw 4 2/3 innings, didn’t allow a hit, and led the team in strikeouts despite not making a start.
I don’t know that this is the plan for Verlander, but their bullpen is pretty mediocre even with Joakim Soria in the fold, and turning Verlander into a six-out, max effort bullpen ace might be a pretty nice side benefit of acquiring Price. Maybe he wouldn’t be interested in doing it. Maybe he won’t need to do it. This is all highly speculative, of course, but it’s certainly one possible outcome that could make the Tigers really difficult to match-up with in the postseason. If their bullpen goes Verlander-Soria in high leverage situations, with Nathan around for the low-leverage three-run saves, then Detroit won’t have to clench their fists every time a starter is removed from the game.
Of course, you don’t get David Price without giving up some real value, and the Tigers certainly did that here. Drew Smyly isn’t the highest upside guy around, but he’s been a league average starter as a 25 year old, and comes with four more years of team control. League average starters get something like $10 to $12 million per year on the free agent market, and even as a Super Two, Smyly will make a fraction of that next year, and remain underpaid for several years afterwards. There’s a reason that the Red Sox and Rays went after cheap average big league pitchers today, rather than focusing on higher upside prospects who are years away from contending; guys who can give you quality innings at the big league level without costing much in salary are extremely valuable assets.
The deal also cost the Tigers center fielder Austin Jackson, who is an above average player having a below average season. The emergence of J.D. Martinez gave the Tigers some outfield depth that allowed them to make a deal like this, but make no mistake, going from Jackson to Rajai Davis in center field is a downgrade. Davis is a nice role player who has outplayed Jackson in 2014, but we shouldn’t expect that to continue, and at the very least, this deal takes away some depth from the Tigers offense. And Jackson was under control for 2015 at what should be a reasonable enough price, so there’s some lost future value there as well.
And they also threw in an 18 year old shortstop prospect, Willy Adames, who might have some future value. But the Tigers aren’t playing for the future. Miguel Cabrera is only getting older, Max Scherzer won’t be back next year, and their window is closing. Price should help keep it open for both this year and next season, giving the Tigers two final good runs at a World Series title before they probably need to rebuild. Not having Drew Smyly around for that rebuilding process will make things a little bit tougher, but it’s not the kind of loss that can’t be overcome.
Like the A’s, the Tigers are in win-now mode, and this is a trade that makes them better for 2014. Especially if Justin Verlander ends up as a lights-out reliever in October.
Cardinals Improve by Adding Lackey, Subtracting Craig.
Wondering if the Cardinals felt good about Michael Wacha‘s shoulder or Shelby Miller‘s general existence? Wonder no more, because less than 24 hours after picking up Justin Masterson from Cleveland, they’ve now added John Lackey from Boston, for the not-insignificant price of Joe Kelly and Allen Craig.
Yesterday morning, the St. Louis rotation looked something like this:
Adam Wainwright
Lance Lynn
Joe Kelly
Shelby Miller
Carlos Martinez / Marco Gonzales
Now, it’s potentially a bit more like this:
Wainwright
Lynn
Lackey
Masterson
Miller / Martinez
Is that better? It’s certainly different.
Lackey, of course, has experienced something of a career rebirth after an awful 2011 and lost 2012 in Boston, providing 326.2 innings of 3.55 ERA / 3.74 FIP (and almost six WAR) since the start of 2013. Kelly, over the same time period, has missed nearly three months with a hamstring injury and given 159 innings of 3.06 ERA / 3.99 FIP baseball; he is, of course, nearly a decade younger and can’t be a free agent until 2019.
Since returning from that injury, he’s been awful, allowing at least four earned runs in three of his four starts. Long-term, there’s at least a chance that he’s a relief pitcher, since he doesn’t miss a ton of bats despite throwing hard, doesn’t have elite control, and absolutely requires a solid defense behind him in order to turn his grounders into outs. He’s a useful young pitcher, to be sure, but in an organization as full of young pitching as the Cardinals are, he’s not someone you can’t live without.
Were this simply “which pitcher is more likely to help the Cardinals this year,” it’s Lackey, pretty clearly, though perhaps only by about one WAR, which is the difference in their projections. Is that worth it? Maybe it is, because the Cardinals are 2.5 games out in the NL Central, yet in third place. The playoff odds have the Cardinals, Brewers and Pirates as all pretty even odds to win the division, and you can argue that with Milwaukee having played terribly this month, St. Louis sees themselves as the favorites.
If one extra win not only gets the Cards from being out to being in, but from being in the one-game playoff to being a division winner, then yes, getting a single extra win is absolutely worth it — and they also get the benefit of Lackey’s insanely valuable $500,000 contract for 2015, though it seems likely they’ll need to work something out with him rather than have him actually pitch for that amount. (For those unfamiliar, the Red Sox added a clause saying they’d get an extra year of Lackey for that price if he missed time with elbow surgery, which he of did.) If you buy into “playoff experience,” well, Lackey has that too, winning titles with the Red Sox last year and with the Angels in 2002.
Of course, it’s not just Lackey for Kelly straight-up, because the Red Sox also get Craig, one of the NL’s better hitters over the last three seasons, but who has been a total disaster this year. Craig has $26.5m guaranteed through 2017, is already 30, and has been absolutely atrocious this season. (81 wRC+, -0.4 WAR.) This can’t be seen as anything but an indication that the Cardinals considered his woes all but unfixable, and didn’t want to spend real money on a player who was contributing nothing, so it’s maybe also less that the Red Sox “get” Craig than it is the Cardinals don’t have to deal with him.
So when that math is factored in, Craig actually moves to the other side of the equation. The trade is really something more like:
Cardinals get 1.5 years of Lackey, $1.75m, 2013 fifth-round P Corey Littrell and the luxury of not paying Craig
——————-
Red Sox get Kelly and the prayer of finding 2011-13 Craig
Which is valuable, really. The Cardinals have a better rotation than they did yesterday, and they may have improved their offense — 17th with a 99 non-pitcher wRC+ — by subtraction, no longer needing to play Craig in the hopes that he’d rebound. Now, the Cardinals have opened up room for top prospect Oscar Taveras, who had been kicking around on the big league bench recently. There’s no guarantee that Taveras contributes, of course; he hasn’t yet, and Dave laid out nicely why he’s a risky player. If he doesn’t step up, then Jon Jay and Peter Bourjos (or someone like Randal Grichuk) are suddenly both starting outfielders, which isn’t a great situation, but again, Craig wasn’t getting the job done, either. The offense they get out of right field from here on out almost certainly can’t be less than it was before.
There’s also this: in the playoffs, in a short series, Martinez probably goes back to the bullpen. If Wacha can make it back this season, maybe he’s best utilized as a short reliever. Trevor Rosenthal is still there. Seth Maness and Pat Neshek are still there, and Randy Choate and Sam Freeman and Gonzales and Kevin Siegrist, too. A big part of last year’s postseason success was that bullpen, and that had been lessened somewhat this year by having some of those guys in the rotation. Now, they can move back, and that ripple effect improves the entire staff.
If Craig bounces back in Boston, this is going to look bad, that they gave up on him after four lousy months after several quality seasons. But it’s hard to look at Craig right now and think that he’s going to be the key part of a Cardinals team that badly wants to get another ring for aging players like Wainwright, Yadier Molina and Matt Holliday while they still have time. Lackey makes them more likely to win this year than Kelly does, and is probably more valuable in 2015 as well. Not having Craig makes them more likely to win than having Craig does. A huge part of this depends on what Taveras does, of course, but that’s unavoidable. This is one of those trades that seemed shocking at first, but the more you think about it, the more it makes plenty of sense for both sides.
Yesterday morning, the St. Louis rotation looked something like this:
Adam Wainwright
Lance Lynn
Joe Kelly
Shelby Miller
Carlos Martinez / Marco Gonzales
Now, it’s potentially a bit more like this:
Wainwright
Lynn
Lackey
Masterson
Miller / Martinez
Is that better? It’s certainly different.
Lackey, of course, has experienced something of a career rebirth after an awful 2011 and lost 2012 in Boston, providing 326.2 innings of 3.55 ERA / 3.74 FIP (and almost six WAR) since the start of 2013. Kelly, over the same time period, has missed nearly three months with a hamstring injury and given 159 innings of 3.06 ERA / 3.99 FIP baseball; he is, of course, nearly a decade younger and can’t be a free agent until 2019.
Since returning from that injury, he’s been awful, allowing at least four earned runs in three of his four starts. Long-term, there’s at least a chance that he’s a relief pitcher, since he doesn’t miss a ton of bats despite throwing hard, doesn’t have elite control, and absolutely requires a solid defense behind him in order to turn his grounders into outs. He’s a useful young pitcher, to be sure, but in an organization as full of young pitching as the Cardinals are, he’s not someone you can’t live without.
Were this simply “which pitcher is more likely to help the Cardinals this year,” it’s Lackey, pretty clearly, though perhaps only by about one WAR, which is the difference in their projections. Is that worth it? Maybe it is, because the Cardinals are 2.5 games out in the NL Central, yet in third place. The playoff odds have the Cardinals, Brewers and Pirates as all pretty even odds to win the division, and you can argue that with Milwaukee having played terribly this month, St. Louis sees themselves as the favorites.
If one extra win not only gets the Cards from being out to being in, but from being in the one-game playoff to being a division winner, then yes, getting a single extra win is absolutely worth it — and they also get the benefit of Lackey’s insanely valuable $500,000 contract for 2015, though it seems likely they’ll need to work something out with him rather than have him actually pitch for that amount. (For those unfamiliar, the Red Sox added a clause saying they’d get an extra year of Lackey for that price if he missed time with elbow surgery, which he of did.) If you buy into “playoff experience,” well, Lackey has that too, winning titles with the Red Sox last year and with the Angels in 2002.
Of course, it’s not just Lackey for Kelly straight-up, because the Red Sox also get Craig, one of the NL’s better hitters over the last three seasons, but who has been a total disaster this year. Craig has $26.5m guaranteed through 2017, is already 30, and has been absolutely atrocious this season. (81 wRC+, -0.4 WAR.) This can’t be seen as anything but an indication that the Cardinals considered his woes all but unfixable, and didn’t want to spend real money on a player who was contributing nothing, so it’s maybe also less that the Red Sox “get” Craig than it is the Cardinals don’t have to deal with him.
So when that math is factored in, Craig actually moves to the other side of the equation. The trade is really something more like:
Cardinals get 1.5 years of Lackey, $1.75m, 2013 fifth-round P Corey Littrell and the luxury of not paying Craig
——————-
Red Sox get Kelly and the prayer of finding 2011-13 Craig
Which is valuable, really. The Cardinals have a better rotation than they did yesterday, and they may have improved their offense — 17th with a 99 non-pitcher wRC+ — by subtraction, no longer needing to play Craig in the hopes that he’d rebound. Now, the Cardinals have opened up room for top prospect Oscar Taveras, who had been kicking around on the big league bench recently. There’s no guarantee that Taveras contributes, of course; he hasn’t yet, and Dave laid out nicely why he’s a risky player. If he doesn’t step up, then Jon Jay and Peter Bourjos (or someone like Randal Grichuk) are suddenly both starting outfielders, which isn’t a great situation, but again, Craig wasn’t getting the job done, either. The offense they get out of right field from here on out almost certainly can’t be less than it was before.
There’s also this: in the playoffs, in a short series, Martinez probably goes back to the bullpen. If Wacha can make it back this season, maybe he’s best utilized as a short reliever. Trevor Rosenthal is still there. Seth Maness and Pat Neshek are still there, and Randy Choate and Sam Freeman and Gonzales and Kevin Siegrist, too. A big part of last year’s postseason success was that bullpen, and that had been lessened somewhat this year by having some of those guys in the rotation. Now, they can move back, and that ripple effect improves the entire staff.
If Craig bounces back in Boston, this is going to look bad, that they gave up on him after four lousy months after several quality seasons. But it’s hard to look at Craig right now and think that he’s going to be the key part of a Cardinals team that badly wants to get another ring for aging players like Wainwright, Yadier Molina and Matt Holliday while they still have time. Lackey makes them more likely to win this year than Kelly does, and is probably more valuable in 2015 as well. Not having Craig makes them more likely to win than having Craig does. A huge part of this depends on what Taveras does, of course, but that’s unavoidable. This is one of those trades that seemed shocking at first, but the more you think about it, the more it makes plenty of sense for both sides.
The Red Sox Second Trade Affirms 2015 Focus.
An hour ago, we posted Paul Swydan’s review of the Jon Lester/Yoenis Cespedes swap from the Red Sox perspective, noting that Boston chose a shorter term big leaguer over a deal for prospects who were likely going to be several years off. And now, they’ve made a second deal — shipping John Lackey to the Cardinals for Allen Craig and Joe Kelly — that reaffirms that this is not a team looking to do any kind of rebuild.
This one isn’t quite as straight forward as the Lester-for-Cespedes deal, since that was a rental for not-a-rental, while the Red Sox could have held onto Lackey for 2015 due to the clause in his contract that gave the Red Sox a league minimum option on his deal due to his 2011 Tommy John surgery. However, there was legitimate concern that Lackey wouldn’t actually pitch for the league minimum next year, and given that he’ll be 36 in a few months, he had some leverage in the form of retirement. If Lackey really didn’t want to take the mound for the same salary as some guy from Triple-A, he could have walked away, leaving the Red Sox to either give him a raise/extension or to get nothing for the option.
That makes Lackey a very difficult asset to value, because we really don’t know what he’s going to cost for the next few years. The most reasonable outcome seems like some kind of short-term extension at below market rates that doesn’t offend him, so maybe something like 2/$20M keeps him on the field. But this is all speculative; we don’t actually have any idea what the Cardinals are going to pay Lackey next year. I’d bet it won’t be $500,000, though.
By moving Lackey now, the Red Sox dump that uncertainty, and get a starting pitcher in return who doesn’t have a say in how much he makes next year. 2015 will be Kelly’s final pre-arbitration year, and so he’ll make whatever the Red Sox decide he’s going to make, which will likely be something in the $500,000 range. In exchange for a guy who might pitch at the league minimum, the Red Sox got a guy who definitely will, and then they’ll control for three years beyond that.
Of course, Kelly isn’t as good as John Lackey, so this is a downgrade in talent, and the cost savings of dumping whatever Lackey might have demanded will now have to be reallocated to Allen Craig, who also is coming to Boston in this trade. So your opinion of this deal might very well hinge on what you think of Craig’s ability to bounce back and become something close to the player he was the last three years.
For two and a half years, Craig was one of the best hitters in baseball; this year, he’s been one of the worst. His power has disappeared, as he’s stopped pulling the ball with authority, which has sunk both his ISO and his BABIP. As an aggressive hitter who doesn’t walk much, he absolutely has to hit for power to be useful, and the 2014 version of Craig has been pretty terrible.
Theoretically, Fenway Park should be the perfect place for Craig to get his career back on track. A line drive right-handed pull guy who can bounce balls off the Green Monster? This is a recipe that has worked wonders before. But Craig hasn’t been a line drive pull guy this year, and if he keeps hitting the ball to right center, the park isn’t going to do him any favors. If the Red Sox think his issues are fixable, and he can get back to being the Allen Craig of prior years, then this is a pretty big win for Boston.
But it’s certainly a gamble, and one that is going to require some trade-offs for the Red Sox to explore. After all, Craig should probably be a first baseman or a designated hitter, but Boston already has Mike Napoli and David Ortiz. The team has had success putting limited range guys in left field before — hello, Manny — but they play on the road too, and Craig’s defensive issues and offensive question marks likely make him a downgrade from any of Cespedes, Jackie Bradley Jr, or a healthy Shane Victorino. It’s not even clear that Craig-as-an-LF is dramatically better than Daniel Nava, and he’s probably worse than Mookie Betts next year.
In some ways, Craig is a great fit for Boston. In other ways, he doesn’t fit at all, but the Sox have plenty of time to sort this out before next spring. Maybe they’ll just shut Victorino down for the year and tell him to get healthy for next year, then shop him, Craig, or Cespedes to a team looking for a right-handed bat this winter. Or maybe they’ll trade Betts to a team that would rather use him as a second baseman. Or maybe Craig will continue to look completely broken even in Fenway, and he’ll just take Mike Carp‘s role as reserve 1B/DH.
The Red Sox are in asset collection mode. Joe Kelly is a pretty nifty asset to collect, and Allen Craig is a lottery ticket who might be good, might be terrible, or might not last very long in Boston. There’s no way of knowing what the 2015 Red Sox are going to look like, but they’re doing a nice job of giving themselves options. Their current pieces don’t all fit together, but they’ve got another eight months to figure out who should stay and who should go.
The idea of a league minimum John Lackey would have been nice too, but if you believe that Lackey wasn’t going to play along, this is a much cleaner way to have a cheap starting pitcher and some upside beyond. And if part of the pitch to Jon Lester is that the team is going to get back on the winning track next year, trading for guys he’s heard of probably doesn’t hurt either.
This one isn’t quite as straight forward as the Lester-for-Cespedes deal, since that was a rental for not-a-rental, while the Red Sox could have held onto Lackey for 2015 due to the clause in his contract that gave the Red Sox a league minimum option on his deal due to his 2011 Tommy John surgery. However, there was legitimate concern that Lackey wouldn’t actually pitch for the league minimum next year, and given that he’ll be 36 in a few months, he had some leverage in the form of retirement. If Lackey really didn’t want to take the mound for the same salary as some guy from Triple-A, he could have walked away, leaving the Red Sox to either give him a raise/extension or to get nothing for the option.
That makes Lackey a very difficult asset to value, because we really don’t know what he’s going to cost for the next few years. The most reasonable outcome seems like some kind of short-term extension at below market rates that doesn’t offend him, so maybe something like 2/$20M keeps him on the field. But this is all speculative; we don’t actually have any idea what the Cardinals are going to pay Lackey next year. I’d bet it won’t be $500,000, though.
By moving Lackey now, the Red Sox dump that uncertainty, and get a starting pitcher in return who doesn’t have a say in how much he makes next year. 2015 will be Kelly’s final pre-arbitration year, and so he’ll make whatever the Red Sox decide he’s going to make, which will likely be something in the $500,000 range. In exchange for a guy who might pitch at the league minimum, the Red Sox got a guy who definitely will, and then they’ll control for three years beyond that.
Of course, Kelly isn’t as good as John Lackey, so this is a downgrade in talent, and the cost savings of dumping whatever Lackey might have demanded will now have to be reallocated to Allen Craig, who also is coming to Boston in this trade. So your opinion of this deal might very well hinge on what you think of Craig’s ability to bounce back and become something close to the player he was the last three years.
For two and a half years, Craig was one of the best hitters in baseball; this year, he’s been one of the worst. His power has disappeared, as he’s stopped pulling the ball with authority, which has sunk both his ISO and his BABIP. As an aggressive hitter who doesn’t walk much, he absolutely has to hit for power to be useful, and the 2014 version of Craig has been pretty terrible.
Theoretically, Fenway Park should be the perfect place for Craig to get his career back on track. A line drive right-handed pull guy who can bounce balls off the Green Monster? This is a recipe that has worked wonders before. But Craig hasn’t been a line drive pull guy this year, and if he keeps hitting the ball to right center, the park isn’t going to do him any favors. If the Red Sox think his issues are fixable, and he can get back to being the Allen Craig of prior years, then this is a pretty big win for Boston.
But it’s certainly a gamble, and one that is going to require some trade-offs for the Red Sox to explore. After all, Craig should probably be a first baseman or a designated hitter, but Boston already has Mike Napoli and David Ortiz. The team has had success putting limited range guys in left field before — hello, Manny — but they play on the road too, and Craig’s defensive issues and offensive question marks likely make him a downgrade from any of Cespedes, Jackie Bradley Jr, or a healthy Shane Victorino. It’s not even clear that Craig-as-an-LF is dramatically better than Daniel Nava, and he’s probably worse than Mookie Betts next year.
In some ways, Craig is a great fit for Boston. In other ways, he doesn’t fit at all, but the Sox have plenty of time to sort this out before next spring. Maybe they’ll just shut Victorino down for the year and tell him to get healthy for next year, then shop him, Craig, or Cespedes to a team looking for a right-handed bat this winter. Or maybe they’ll trade Betts to a team that would rather use him as a second baseman. Or maybe Craig will continue to look completely broken even in Fenway, and he’ll just take Mike Carp‘s role as reserve 1B/DH.
The Red Sox are in asset collection mode. Joe Kelly is a pretty nifty asset to collect, and Allen Craig is a lottery ticket who might be good, might be terrible, or might not last very long in Boston. There’s no way of knowing what the 2015 Red Sox are going to look like, but they’re doing a nice job of giving themselves options. Their current pieces don’t all fit together, but they’ve got another eight months to figure out who should stay and who should go.
The idea of a league minimum John Lackey would have been nice too, but if you believe that Lackey wasn’t going to play along, this is a much cleaner way to have a cheap starting pitcher and some upside beyond. And if part of the pitch to Jon Lester is that the team is going to get back on the winning track next year, trading for guys he’s heard of probably doesn’t hurt either.
The Dark Side Of Booming Local TV Deals.
Bud Selig has been giddy watching baseball teams attract bigger and bigger local television deals. More local TV revenue to a team means more money for the league to spread via revenue sharing and greater competitive balance. And Bug Selig sure loves competitive balance. On a recent visit to PNC Park, Major League Baseball’s commissioner told Pittsburgh Pirates broadcasters that he got “goosebumps” watching the Reds and Pirates square off in last year’s postseason.
But big local TV contracts aren’t all Skittles and puppies. Certainly not for fans who are forced to pay higher and higher cable and satellite TV bills to watch their home team. Nor for cable and satellite TV customers who don’t care about baseball but have to pay the higher prices as part of their bundled programming.
It turns out that big local TV contracts aren’t always good news for teams either. That has turned Selig’s mood quite sour.
When a regional sports network agrees to pay millions of dollars to an MLB team, that RSN has two principal ways to recoup that investment: (1) sell ads during the game broadcasts; (2) charge a carriage fee to the cable and satellite operators in the region who want to carry the RSN. But what happens when the cable and satellite companies balk at the carriage fees?
The San Diego Padres were the first to find out the answer to that question. When FoxSports San Diego launched before the 2012 season, the RSN was available in only 40% of the San Diego TV market because DISH, AT&T U-verse and Time Warner Cable hadn’t agreed the carriage fee FS San Diego sought to charge. DISH and AT&T came on board before the 2013 season, but TWC held out until this year.
The FS San Diego situation was irksome, but mostly to the Padres and their fans. It didn’t garner much attention from Selig or national baseball writers (although we covered the issue extensively) and it didn’t take long to resolve.
That hasn’t been the case in Houston. Comcast SportsNet Houston launched in October 2012 and, since then, has been seen only by Comcast cable customers. The new RSN – a joint venture among the Houston Astros, Houston Rockets and Comcast Sports Group — couldn’t come to agreement on carriage fees with any other cable or satellite company in the region. With the RSN bleeding cash, Comcast forced the venture into bankruptcy court last September, where the parties have been fighting ever since. Astros owner Jim Crane also sued Comcast and former team owner Drayton McLane for fraud in the sale of the team. That did not make Bud Selig happy at all.
The bankruptcy process has dragged on, as they often do. The Astros and Rockets have worked feverishly to find a new broadcast partner to buy out Comcast’s interest, and there was news yesterday that such a deal could be close. When and if a deal gets done, though, the Astros will have played at least two seasons with little in the way of TV revenue and without anyone watching their games on TV. Sure, the Astros haven’t had much of a product worth watching the last few years, but their ratings are clearly a reflection of how few Houstonians have access to the games.
That brings us to the Los Angeles Dodgers. As I explained before the season started:
SportsNet LA launched in February with around-the-clock Dodgers programming, but only customers with TWC or Bright House can view the network in their homes.Every other cable and satellite operator in the Los Angeles market has balked at the network’s carriage fee demand. And TWC hardly counts as an arms-length agreement, as it is the Dodgers’ broadcast partner in SportsNet LA. Indeed, TWC will essentially pay itself the carriage fee for SportsNet LA, and then pay the Dodgers their monthly rights fee as part of the 25-year, $8.3 billion megadeal.
No deal’s been reached. A vast majority of Dodgers fans in LA missed Josh Beckett’s no-hitter, Clayton Kershaw’s no-hitter and every Yasiel Puig bat flip — unless they watched with a friend or at a bar with TWC. Even Vin Scully is without Dodgers’ broadcasts when he’s at home during the team’s long road trips.
Now members of Congress and the Federal Communications Commission have stepped in and urged the parties to reach a deal as quickly as possible. A local congressman suggested TWC and DirecTV agree to binding arbitration on the outstanding issues: the carriage fee; length of contract; and whether SportsNetLA would be bundled to every customer, or offered a la carte. TWC is prepared to take the dispute to arbitration and Bud Selig recently chimed in with his support for that plan.
MLB statement regarding the Los Angeles Dodgers: pic.twitter.com/UlPxpEPZDT
— MLB Public Relations (@MLB_PR) July 29, 2014
DirecTV hasn’t budged and sports media experts don’t expect that it will. Which means the team in the second-largest TV market in the country, with the largest player payroll in the league, won’t be seen by its local fans as it battles for the National League West title. Bud Selig isn’t happy.
When it comes to Selig, though, these carriage fee disputes pale in comparison to fight between the Washington Nationals and the Baltimore Orioles over the money flowing into the Mid-Atlantic Sports Network. I explained the origins of the dispute in a November 2012 post:
[MASN] was created as part of the deal that moved the Expos from Montreal to Washington, D.C. to become the Nationals. Orioles owner Peter Angelos opposed the move as an encroachment on the Orioles’ exclusive broadcast and commercial region. [This is different from the dispute between the Giants and the A's over the territorial rights to San Jose and Santa Clara County.] As part of the negotiated settlement between MLB (which then owned the Expos) and Angelos, MASN was created with the Orioles to own 90 percent and the Nationals to own ten percent. The deal also called for the Nationals to be paid $20 million/year in broadcast rights, although that figure would increase by $1 million every season. In 2011, MASN reportedly paid the Nationals $29 million in broadcast fees and $7 million for its now 13 percent share of the network.
The MASN agreement also includes a re-set provision by which the Nationals can re-negotiate the broadcast fee structure every five years. Early in 2012, the Nationals proposed that MASN pay between $100 million and $120 million per year in broadcast fees. The Orioles countered at $34 million per year. The two sides have been in protracted negotiations ever since. Commissioner Selig asked representatives from the Pirates, Rays, and Mets to mediate the dispute. A resolution was expected over the summer but never materialized and the parties reportedly remain far apart.
No resolution came and parties remained far apart, through 2013 and the first half of 2014.
On Wednesday, The Hollywood Reporter published detailed of a secret arbitration overseen by the representatives of the Pirates, Rays and Mets which ruled in favor of the Nationals at the end of June. That sent the Orioles to court in New York in an effort to undo the arbitration. The Nationals countered with their own suit to confirm the decision. Both cases were filed under seal.
Selig was furious.
According to The Hollywood Reporter, Selig sent a letter to the Nationals and the Orioles that included this passage:
“Both the Orioles and the Nationals have at various times made threats to institute litigation in connection with this dispute, despite my office’s extended, good-faith efforts to have this matter resolved by agreement. On a personal note, I owned a Club for decades and I can honestly say that under no circumstances would I have threatened, let alone commenced, litigation against Baseball. Please be advised that nothing in the Agreement authorizes the parties to file any lawsuit. … I want there to be no doubt that, if any party initiates any lawsuit, or fails to act in strict compliance with the procedures set forth in the Agreement concerning the [Revenue Sharing Definitions Committee of Major League Baseball]‘s decision, I will not hesitate to impose the strongest sanctions available to me under the Major League Constitution.”
No matter. Attorneys for the two teams and MASN have continued to launch attacks and counter-attacks. The Orioles think the MLB-sponsored panel was predisposed to rule for the Nationals because the league stands to gain financially the more the Nationals receive as a rights fee. For their part, the Nationals have threatened to terminate MASN’s license to broadcast their games if the panel’s ruling isn’t confirmed.
The MASN mess may shed some light on Selig’s unwillingness to make a final decision on the Oakland Athletics’ proposal to move to San Jose. He may fear that any resolution of the territory dispute between the A’s and the San Francisco Giants that involves the A’s compensating the Giants could lead to in-fighting for years down the road.
All these TV deal disputes bring to mind the adage “Be careful what you wish for.”
But big local TV contracts aren’t all Skittles and puppies. Certainly not for fans who are forced to pay higher and higher cable and satellite TV bills to watch their home team. Nor for cable and satellite TV customers who don’t care about baseball but have to pay the higher prices as part of their bundled programming.
It turns out that big local TV contracts aren’t always good news for teams either. That has turned Selig’s mood quite sour.
When a regional sports network agrees to pay millions of dollars to an MLB team, that RSN has two principal ways to recoup that investment: (1) sell ads during the game broadcasts; (2) charge a carriage fee to the cable and satellite operators in the region who want to carry the RSN. But what happens when the cable and satellite companies balk at the carriage fees?
The San Diego Padres were the first to find out the answer to that question. When FoxSports San Diego launched before the 2012 season, the RSN was available in only 40% of the San Diego TV market because DISH, AT&T U-verse and Time Warner Cable hadn’t agreed the carriage fee FS San Diego sought to charge. DISH and AT&T came on board before the 2013 season, but TWC held out until this year.
The FS San Diego situation was irksome, but mostly to the Padres and their fans. It didn’t garner much attention from Selig or national baseball writers (although we covered the issue extensively) and it didn’t take long to resolve.
That hasn’t been the case in Houston. Comcast SportsNet Houston launched in October 2012 and, since then, has been seen only by Comcast cable customers. The new RSN – a joint venture among the Houston Astros, Houston Rockets and Comcast Sports Group — couldn’t come to agreement on carriage fees with any other cable or satellite company in the region. With the RSN bleeding cash, Comcast forced the venture into bankruptcy court last September, where the parties have been fighting ever since. Astros owner Jim Crane also sued Comcast and former team owner Drayton McLane for fraud in the sale of the team. That did not make Bud Selig happy at all.
The bankruptcy process has dragged on, as they often do. The Astros and Rockets have worked feverishly to find a new broadcast partner to buy out Comcast’s interest, and there was news yesterday that such a deal could be close. When and if a deal gets done, though, the Astros will have played at least two seasons with little in the way of TV revenue and without anyone watching their games on TV. Sure, the Astros haven’t had much of a product worth watching the last few years, but their ratings are clearly a reflection of how few Houstonians have access to the games.
That brings us to the Los Angeles Dodgers. As I explained before the season started:
SportsNet LA launched in February with around-the-clock Dodgers programming, but only customers with TWC or Bright House can view the network in their homes.Every other cable and satellite operator in the Los Angeles market has balked at the network’s carriage fee demand. And TWC hardly counts as an arms-length agreement, as it is the Dodgers’ broadcast partner in SportsNet LA. Indeed, TWC will essentially pay itself the carriage fee for SportsNet LA, and then pay the Dodgers their monthly rights fee as part of the 25-year, $8.3 billion megadeal.
No deal’s been reached. A vast majority of Dodgers fans in LA missed Josh Beckett’s no-hitter, Clayton Kershaw’s no-hitter and every Yasiel Puig bat flip — unless they watched with a friend or at a bar with TWC. Even Vin Scully is without Dodgers’ broadcasts when he’s at home during the team’s long road trips.
Now members of Congress and the Federal Communications Commission have stepped in and urged the parties to reach a deal as quickly as possible. A local congressman suggested TWC and DirecTV agree to binding arbitration on the outstanding issues: the carriage fee; length of contract; and whether SportsNetLA would be bundled to every customer, or offered a la carte. TWC is prepared to take the dispute to arbitration and Bud Selig recently chimed in with his support for that plan.
MLB statement regarding the Los Angeles Dodgers: pic.twitter.com/UlPxpEPZDT
— MLB Public Relations (@MLB_PR) July 29, 2014
DirecTV hasn’t budged and sports media experts don’t expect that it will. Which means the team in the second-largest TV market in the country, with the largest player payroll in the league, won’t be seen by its local fans as it battles for the National League West title. Bud Selig isn’t happy.
When it comes to Selig, though, these carriage fee disputes pale in comparison to fight between the Washington Nationals and the Baltimore Orioles over the money flowing into the Mid-Atlantic Sports Network. I explained the origins of the dispute in a November 2012 post:
[MASN] was created as part of the deal that moved the Expos from Montreal to Washington, D.C. to become the Nationals. Orioles owner Peter Angelos opposed the move as an encroachment on the Orioles’ exclusive broadcast and commercial region. [This is different from the dispute between the Giants and the A's over the territorial rights to San Jose and Santa Clara County.] As part of the negotiated settlement between MLB (which then owned the Expos) and Angelos, MASN was created with the Orioles to own 90 percent and the Nationals to own ten percent. The deal also called for the Nationals to be paid $20 million/year in broadcast rights, although that figure would increase by $1 million every season. In 2011, MASN reportedly paid the Nationals $29 million in broadcast fees and $7 million for its now 13 percent share of the network.
The MASN agreement also includes a re-set provision by which the Nationals can re-negotiate the broadcast fee structure every five years. Early in 2012, the Nationals proposed that MASN pay between $100 million and $120 million per year in broadcast fees. The Orioles countered at $34 million per year. The two sides have been in protracted negotiations ever since. Commissioner Selig asked representatives from the Pirates, Rays, and Mets to mediate the dispute. A resolution was expected over the summer but never materialized and the parties reportedly remain far apart.
No resolution came and parties remained far apart, through 2013 and the first half of 2014.
On Wednesday, The Hollywood Reporter published detailed of a secret arbitration overseen by the representatives of the Pirates, Rays and Mets which ruled in favor of the Nationals at the end of June. That sent the Orioles to court in New York in an effort to undo the arbitration. The Nationals countered with their own suit to confirm the decision. Both cases were filed under seal.
Selig was furious.
According to The Hollywood Reporter, Selig sent a letter to the Nationals and the Orioles that included this passage:
“Both the Orioles and the Nationals have at various times made threats to institute litigation in connection with this dispute, despite my office’s extended, good-faith efforts to have this matter resolved by agreement. On a personal note, I owned a Club for decades and I can honestly say that under no circumstances would I have threatened, let alone commenced, litigation against Baseball. Please be advised that nothing in the Agreement authorizes the parties to file any lawsuit. … I want there to be no doubt that, if any party initiates any lawsuit, or fails to act in strict compliance with the procedures set forth in the Agreement concerning the [Revenue Sharing Definitions Committee of Major League Baseball]‘s decision, I will not hesitate to impose the strongest sanctions available to me under the Major League Constitution.”
No matter. Attorneys for the two teams and MASN have continued to launch attacks and counter-attacks. The Orioles think the MLB-sponsored panel was predisposed to rule for the Nationals because the league stands to gain financially the more the Nationals receive as a rights fee. For their part, the Nationals have threatened to terminate MASN’s license to broadcast their games if the panel’s ruling isn’t confirmed.
The MASN mess may shed some light on Selig’s unwillingness to make a final decision on the Oakland Athletics’ proposal to move to San Jose. He may fear that any resolution of the territory dispute between the A’s and the San Francisco Giants that involves the A’s compensating the Giants could lead to in-fighting for years down the road.
All these TV deal disputes bring to mind the adage “Be careful what you wish for.”
Yankees Gain Flexibility in Landing Prado, Drew.
For much of today, it seemed like the Red Sox were going to be the only active American League East team, but then the Orioles and Yankees got in on the act (you can read all of our trade deadline analysis here). For the Yankees part, they acquired Stephen Drew and Martin Prado. Both could be important to the team, but Prado’s acquisition may affect the 2015 Yankees as well, which makes it a little more interesting.
Of course, the most interesting part of this deal is which Martin Prado are the Yankees getting? There’s a big difference between the .345 wOBA version of Prado and the current .305 wOBA incarnation. Either way, they are unlikely to miss prospect Peter O’Brien, who despite hitting some impressive home runs, was unlikely to find much time behind the plate for the Yankees — if he can even remain behind the plate. O’Brien has played some first base and right field this year, and it’s unclear exactly where he will fit with the Dbacks, if and when he reaches the majors.
Getting back to Prado, both ZiPS and Steamer think that he’ll do better, and it’s possible that Prado’s performance was dragged down by the sinkhole that has been the Diamondbacks’ season. Assuming just for a moment that the change of scenery reinvigorates Prado, he should be able to help in a number of ways. For starters, he is going to right field, which will mercifully push Ichiro Suzuki and his sub-replacement-ness back to the bench. But Prado is probably going to play all over. He’s going to help out in left field on occasion, and at third base as well. Maybe even a little at first base.
The key question, however, is how much time he sees at second base. Carlos Beltran may be ready to resume some work in right field soon, and when he is, there will be an opportunity created to move Derek Jeter to designated hitter — Beltran in right, Prado at second, Drew at short, and the Captain at DH. At this stage, Jeter is never going to play another defensive position, but he has started at DH four times this year, and adding Prado and Drew will give them the flexibility to rest Jeter’s legs more frequently down the stretch without sacrificing offense the way they would have been by starting Brendan Ryan at short.
Finally, there is the consideration beyond this year. When the team traded for Chase Headley, general manager Brian Cashman hedged on whether or not he would be in their 2015 plans, but between Prado being under contract and Alex Rodriguez returning, it would seem that the Yankees now have little to no motivation to retain Headley.
Neither Prado nor Drew is going to make the Yankees a title contender, but they are better than the players they replaced, they help push Ichiro to the bench, and might be able to buy Jeter some easier nights. That’s not a bad bit of work considering all they sacrificed was one fringe prospect, and it should keep the Yankees viable in the AL East for the rest of the way.
Of course, the most interesting part of this deal is which Martin Prado are the Yankees getting? There’s a big difference between the .345 wOBA version of Prado and the current .305 wOBA incarnation. Either way, they are unlikely to miss prospect Peter O’Brien, who despite hitting some impressive home runs, was unlikely to find much time behind the plate for the Yankees — if he can even remain behind the plate. O’Brien has played some first base and right field this year, and it’s unclear exactly where he will fit with the Dbacks, if and when he reaches the majors.
Getting back to Prado, both ZiPS and Steamer think that he’ll do better, and it’s possible that Prado’s performance was dragged down by the sinkhole that has been the Diamondbacks’ season. Assuming just for a moment that the change of scenery reinvigorates Prado, he should be able to help in a number of ways. For starters, he is going to right field, which will mercifully push Ichiro Suzuki and his sub-replacement-ness back to the bench. But Prado is probably going to play all over. He’s going to help out in left field on occasion, and at third base as well. Maybe even a little at first base.
The key question, however, is how much time he sees at second base. Carlos Beltran may be ready to resume some work in right field soon, and when he is, there will be an opportunity created to move Derek Jeter to designated hitter — Beltran in right, Prado at second, Drew at short, and the Captain at DH. At this stage, Jeter is never going to play another defensive position, but he has started at DH four times this year, and adding Prado and Drew will give them the flexibility to rest Jeter’s legs more frequently down the stretch without sacrificing offense the way they would have been by starting Brendan Ryan at short.
Finally, there is the consideration beyond this year. When the team traded for Chase Headley, general manager Brian Cashman hedged on whether or not he would be in their 2015 plans, but between Prado being under contract and Alex Rodriguez returning, it would seem that the Yankees now have little to no motivation to retain Headley.
Neither Prado nor Drew is going to make the Yankees a title contender, but they are better than the players they replaced, they help push Ichiro to the bench, and might be able to buy Jeter some easier nights. That’s not a bad bit of work considering all they sacrificed was one fringe prospect, and it should keep the Yankees viable in the AL East for the rest of the way.
Five Versions of Cleveland’s New Prospect, Zach Walters.
Earlier today, the Cleveland Americans received infield prospect Zach Walters from the Washington Nationals in exchange for Asdrubal Cabrera. Less early today, my amusingly coiffed colleague Eno Sarris considered Walters’ possible future as a major-leaguer.
In Sarris’s piece, he cites work by Chris St. John which suggests that players who’ve recorded similar walk and strikeout rates as Walters at Triple-A — that those players have failed to make any sort of positive impact at the major-league level about 88% of the time. That’s a reasonable framework by which to evaluate Walters, and a not particularly optimistic conclusion. As Sarris concedes, however, St. John’s work is position agnostic. Moreover, one notes that it ignores the possible influence of power numbers. Indeed, it appears to be the case that Walters’ positional value and his home-run rate are likely to be his primary sources of value.
With a view towards attempting to better understand how Walters might perform at the major-league level, I’ve produced five different lines below, each of which represents a different version of Zach Walters prorated over a full season’s worth of plate appearances.
# PA BB% K% HR BABIP BsR wRC+ Off Def WAR
1 550 7.9% 19.8% 13 .301 0.0 100 0 0 2.0
2 550 4.7% 25.3% 20 .294 0.0 93 -4 -4 1.1
3 550 9.6% 38.0% 28 .286 -3.1 110 6 7 3.5
4 550 7.7% 23.8% 32 .348 -1.0 156 35 4 5.8
5 550 6.0% 30.0% 21 .300 0.0 94 -3 3 1.9
Line (1) is an average non-pitching major-league batter in the year 2014. This is what a Marcel-type projection system might produce for Walters. Line (2) is Walters’ current Steamer projection just prorated to 550 plate appearances. Steamer doesn’t care for Walters’ defense. Consider: for a shortstop to produce an overall defensive mark of -4 runs, he’d need to record a single-season UZR of something like -11 or -12 runs. Line (3) is Walters’ current major-league line — through just 52 plate appearances — prorated to a full season. Walters has managed to hit three home runs on the 31 occasions he hasn’t either walked or struck out — about three times the normal major-league rate. Line (4) is a verbatim rendering of Walters’ Triple-A line this year — with baserunning estimated from speed score and defense based entirely on positional adjustment. Line (5) is the least important of all the above insofar as it represents a sort of “scouting” projection by the author. Walters will strike out at a rate greater than average, is the suggestion, and will walk at a rate below average. But both his power and defensive skills are considerable enough in concert — is my own half-educated opinion — so as to produce an average major-leaguer.
In Sarris’s piece, he cites work by Chris St. John which suggests that players who’ve recorded similar walk and strikeout rates as Walters at Triple-A — that those players have failed to make any sort of positive impact at the major-league level about 88% of the time. That’s a reasonable framework by which to evaluate Walters, and a not particularly optimistic conclusion. As Sarris concedes, however, St. John’s work is position agnostic. Moreover, one notes that it ignores the possible influence of power numbers. Indeed, it appears to be the case that Walters’ positional value and his home-run rate are likely to be his primary sources of value.
With a view towards attempting to better understand how Walters might perform at the major-league level, I’ve produced five different lines below, each of which represents a different version of Zach Walters prorated over a full season’s worth of plate appearances.
# PA BB% K% HR BABIP BsR wRC+ Off Def WAR
1 550 7.9% 19.8% 13 .301 0.0 100 0 0 2.0
2 550 4.7% 25.3% 20 .294 0.0 93 -4 -4 1.1
3 550 9.6% 38.0% 28 .286 -3.1 110 6 7 3.5
4 550 7.7% 23.8% 32 .348 -1.0 156 35 4 5.8
5 550 6.0% 30.0% 21 .300 0.0 94 -3 3 1.9
Line (1) is an average non-pitching major-league batter in the year 2014. This is what a Marcel-type projection system might produce for Walters. Line (2) is Walters’ current Steamer projection just prorated to 550 plate appearances. Steamer doesn’t care for Walters’ defense. Consider: for a shortstop to produce an overall defensive mark of -4 runs, he’d need to record a single-season UZR of something like -11 or -12 runs. Line (3) is Walters’ current major-league line — through just 52 plate appearances — prorated to a full season. Walters has managed to hit three home runs on the 31 occasions he hasn’t either walked or struck out — about three times the normal major-league rate. Line (4) is a verbatim rendering of Walters’ Triple-A line this year — with baserunning estimated from speed score and defense based entirely on positional adjustment. Line (5) is the least important of all the above insofar as it represents a sort of “scouting” projection by the author. Walters will strike out at a rate greater than average, is the suggestion, and will walk at a rate below average. But both his power and defensive skills are considerable enough in concert — is my own half-educated opinion — so as to produce an average major-leaguer.
Orioles Land Andrew Miller from busy Red Sox.
Andrew Miller has been phenomenal for Boston this season. He has struck out over 40 percent of the batters he has faced, and has been death against both lefties (0.65 FIP, .194 wOBA allowed) and righties (2.41 FIP, .243 wOBA allowed). He has been one of the best relievers in baseball this year — his WAR is 11th-highest among qualified relievers, and his 43 FIP- is fifth-best — and he will surely help the Orioles bullpen down the stretch. But he is also a free agent at the end of the season, which could make the price paid for him — reportedly pitching prospect Eduardo Rodriguez — steep.
Let’s start with Baltimore. As a unit, their bullpen FIP- is 16th-best in baseball as we sit here right now. Over the past 30 days though, it has been considerably better — their 64 FIP- in this most recent period ranks second-best in baseball. Between Zach Britton, Brian Matusz, Tommy Hunter and Darren O’Day, the team has four relievers that they can trust in high-leverage situations. And Ryan Webb and Brad Brach have flashed potential at times as well, though neither gets the strikeouts requisite for being elite in a bullpen role.
In adding Miller to this group, but not adding a starting pitcher, it seems as though the Orioles didn’t like the options available to them in the starting pitching market, or the prices needed to acquire one of the options that they did desire. It would seem that their strategy then is to pray their starting pitching — which by FIP- has been the worst in the majors this season — can keep them in the game through five or six innings, and then turn the ball over to their bullpen. It’s not the prettiest of strategies, but it’s one that helped them get to the brink of the American League Championship Series in 2012.
This time though, they may have dealt away a bit more of their future than they would have preferred. Just last December, the Orioles were saying that they’d have to be blown away to deal Rodriguez, as the Venezuelan native reached Double-A last season at age 20. In 59.2 innings there, he struck out 23.4% of the batters he faced, and caught the attention of the prospect world. Baseball America, Baseball Prospectus and MLB.com all ranked him in the 60s in their top 100 prospect lists this year. At ESPN, Keith Law ranked him 43rd, and FanGraphs’ Marc Hulet ranked him 36th. Law had ranked him 100th the year before as well, so this didn’t just come out of nowhere.
Rodriguez missed some time this year thanks to a knee injury, and he has been inconsistent since returning, but the potential was there not even six months ago, and likely hasn’t vanished.
The Sox turning one-third of a season from a relief pitcher who wasn’t going to help much on a last place team into a top-60 prospect is a pretty nice return, but Miller has been mighty impressive this season, and if the Orioles do reach the postseason, he will be an important weapon for them in October.
Let’s start with Baltimore. As a unit, their bullpen FIP- is 16th-best in baseball as we sit here right now. Over the past 30 days though, it has been considerably better — their 64 FIP- in this most recent period ranks second-best in baseball. Between Zach Britton, Brian Matusz, Tommy Hunter and Darren O’Day, the team has four relievers that they can trust in high-leverage situations. And Ryan Webb and Brad Brach have flashed potential at times as well, though neither gets the strikeouts requisite for being elite in a bullpen role.
In adding Miller to this group, but not adding a starting pitcher, it seems as though the Orioles didn’t like the options available to them in the starting pitching market, or the prices needed to acquire one of the options that they did desire. It would seem that their strategy then is to pray their starting pitching — which by FIP- has been the worst in the majors this season — can keep them in the game through five or six innings, and then turn the ball over to their bullpen. It’s not the prettiest of strategies, but it’s one that helped them get to the brink of the American League Championship Series in 2012.
This time though, they may have dealt away a bit more of their future than they would have preferred. Just last December, the Orioles were saying that they’d have to be blown away to deal Rodriguez, as the Venezuelan native reached Double-A last season at age 20. In 59.2 innings there, he struck out 23.4% of the batters he faced, and caught the attention of the prospect world. Baseball America, Baseball Prospectus and MLB.com all ranked him in the 60s in their top 100 prospect lists this year. At ESPN, Keith Law ranked him 43rd, and FanGraphs’ Marc Hulet ranked him 36th. Law had ranked him 100th the year before as well, so this didn’t just come out of nowhere.
Rodriguez missed some time this year thanks to a knee injury, and he has been inconsistent since returning, but the potential was there not even six months ago, and likely hasn’t vanished.
The Sox turning one-third of a season from a relief pitcher who wasn’t going to help much on a last place team into a top-60 prospect is a pretty nice return, but Miller has been mighty impressive this season, and if the Orioles do reach the postseason, he will be an important weapon for them in October.
Nationals Take a Small Risk in Dealing Risky Prospect.
At the beginning of the year, the Nationals’ infield might have seemed a strength. Ryan Zimmerman, Ian Desmond, Anthony Rendon and Adam LaRoche, with Danny Espinosa in reserve? Especially if you told then’s version of yourself that LaRoche would resurge and Rendon would surge, you’d be happy with what you had.
Even with the injury to Zimmerman, you could argue that that a team with a 93% chance of making the playoffs might be fine with their current infield. Sure, Espinosa is hovering too close to replacement level for comfort, but they could win enough games with him in there to make the postseason, and Zimmerman might be healthy by then.
Then again, winning the division and making the postseason are two different things. This team needs to keep pace with the Braves. And so they traded Zach Walters for Asdrubal Cabrera.
And the upgrade over Danny Espinosa is undebatable. Though Espinosa has recovered some of his value from his nadir, and is showing some power and speed, there are two facets of his game that have not recovered. His league-average or better walk rate has not returned (5.6% BB%), and his glove is not rated well this year (-1.1 UZR). Cabrera should be able to match that defense with the shift from short, and his offense is just about league average these days.
They’re trading a potential shortstop for a couple months of a second baseman. You can’t debate that. Even as he’s moved on to other positions, Zach Walters played twice as many games at short than any other.
But even while you acknowledge the risk, you can point to the risk inherent in Walters. Not only as a prospect, but as a prospect with a low walk rate and a high strikeout rate. Prospects with that sort of a profile at 24 years old in Triple-A had an 88% bust rate according to Chris St. John’s work.
So, yeah, they took a chance. A chance that has about 12% likelihood of burning them.
Even with the injury to Zimmerman, you could argue that that a team with a 93% chance of making the playoffs might be fine with their current infield. Sure, Espinosa is hovering too close to replacement level for comfort, but they could win enough games with him in there to make the postseason, and Zimmerman might be healthy by then.
Then again, winning the division and making the postseason are two different things. This team needs to keep pace with the Braves. And so they traded Zach Walters for Asdrubal Cabrera.
And the upgrade over Danny Espinosa is undebatable. Though Espinosa has recovered some of his value from his nadir, and is showing some power and speed, there are two facets of his game that have not recovered. His league-average or better walk rate has not returned (5.6% BB%), and his glove is not rated well this year (-1.1 UZR). Cabrera should be able to match that defense with the shift from short, and his offense is just about league average these days.
They’re trading a potential shortstop for a couple months of a second baseman. You can’t debate that. Even as he’s moved on to other positions, Zach Walters played twice as many games at short than any other.
But even while you acknowledge the risk, you can point to the risk inherent in Walters. Not only as a prospect, but as a prospect with a low walk rate and a high strikeout rate. Prospects with that sort of a profile at 24 years old in Triple-A had an 88% bust rate according to Chris St. John’s work.
So, yeah, they took a chance. A chance that has about 12% likelihood of burning them.
Brewers Bet on a Different Sort of Regression.
Though it wasn’t very flashy, the Brewers quietly made a deadline trade with the Diamondbacks, dealing a couple minor leaguers for a guy with a negative WAR. Going to Arizona: Mitchell Haniger and Anthony Banda. Haniger is the better prospect of the two, although he’s got a low ceiling and an unspectacular 2014 campaign under his belt. Going to Milwaukee: Gerardo Parra, who joins an outfield that already includes Carlos Gomez, Ryan Braun, and Khris Davis. Parra’s WAR stands at -0.3.
But, a year ago, it was 4.6, tied for 26th in all of baseball. With that kind of massive decline, you assume an offensive dropoff, and, sure enough, Parra’s wRC+ has dipped. But his modest skills are intact, and the biggest reason for the statistical dip is on the defensive side. The numbers think that, this year, Parra’s been a roughly average defensive outfielder. Last year he was fourth in baseball in overall Defense rating, right by the spectacular Gomez. Beyond that, Parra’s played all over, and here are his league rankings between 2009 – 2013 (1000-inning minimum):
Left field: 8th out of 60 in UZR/150
Center field: 20th out of 64
Right field: 1st out of 47
There’s a good bit of evidence that Parra is one of baseball’s better and more rangey outfielders. He hasn’t been hurt in 2014, and his own manager thinks he’s been fine. The Brewers are assuming that Parra is better than his 2014 statistics, and you can’t really blame them:
Assuming Parra’s still a good defensive outfielder, then he has value, and he improves a Brewers team that’s still fighting for its life. At the plate, he’s weakest against lefties, but as it works out, Parra’s left-handed and Davis is right-handed so we could have the makings here of something of a platoon. At least, Parra’s a fourth outfielder and defensive replacement, and few teams have a guy with such a great standout skill available on the bench. It’s a somewhat low-impact move for the Brewers, but Parra’s better than Logan Schafer, and this raises the team’s floor. Plus, if they’re extra daring, they can control Parra for 2015 as well. So far the Cardinals have made the NL Central splashes, but the Brewers paid relatively little for a guy who, several months ago, would’ve cost an upper-level prospect. It was a good time to strike.
But, a year ago, it was 4.6, tied for 26th in all of baseball. With that kind of massive decline, you assume an offensive dropoff, and, sure enough, Parra’s wRC+ has dipped. But his modest skills are intact, and the biggest reason for the statistical dip is on the defensive side. The numbers think that, this year, Parra’s been a roughly average defensive outfielder. Last year he was fourth in baseball in overall Defense rating, right by the spectacular Gomez. Beyond that, Parra’s played all over, and here are his league rankings between 2009 – 2013 (1000-inning minimum):
Left field: 8th out of 60 in UZR/150
Center field: 20th out of 64
Right field: 1st out of 47
There’s a good bit of evidence that Parra is one of baseball’s better and more rangey outfielders. He hasn’t been hurt in 2014, and his own manager thinks he’s been fine. The Brewers are assuming that Parra is better than his 2014 statistics, and you can’t really blame them:
Assuming Parra’s still a good defensive outfielder, then he has value, and he improves a Brewers team that’s still fighting for its life. At the plate, he’s weakest against lefties, but as it works out, Parra’s left-handed and Davis is right-handed so we could have the makings here of something of a platoon. At least, Parra’s a fourth outfielder and defensive replacement, and few teams have a guy with such a great standout skill available on the bench. It’s a somewhat low-impact move for the Brewers, but Parra’s better than Logan Schafer, and this raises the team’s floor. Plus, if they’re extra daring, they can control Parra for 2015 as well. So far the Cardinals have made the NL Central splashes, but the Brewers paid relatively little for a guy who, several months ago, would’ve cost an upper-level prospect. It was a good time to strike.
Chris Denorfia: Improvement By Not Being Endy Chavez.
The Mariners are one of the pseudo-contenders who are are hanging around the second wild card chase, leaving them in the somewhat awkward position of wanting to upgrade but not being in a position where a significant move makes good sense. We currently estimate their playoff odds at 18%, about the same as the Indians, and that’s entirely tied to making the Wild Card game, so their chances of reaching the division series are a little less than half of that. But, at 55-52, they weren’t going to entirely stand still, so the task for the day was to find a player who could make them better without costing them something that they’ll miss in the future.
Enter Chris Denorfia. He just turned 34 a few weeks ago, will be a free agent at year’s end, and is hitting .242/.293/.319 for the Padres. That’s the kind of trifecta that will basically guarantee a low acquisition cost, and sure enough, the Mariners gave up little to get him, sending Abraham Almonte and Stephen Kohlscheen, who you have never heard of and probably will never hear of again.
In Denorfia, the Mariners get a guy who has a history of hitting left-handed pitching well and playing solid defense, though the hitting part hasn’t really happened this year. Still, a longer view of his talent level suggests he should be something like an average hitter, or maybe a tick below. Toss in the defense and some baserunning value, and Denorfia is a nifty little part-time outfielder. Not a guy you want in the line-up everyday, but a useful role player.
For the Mariners, though, that’s a massive improvement, considering that they have been using Endy Chavez as their starting right fielder. Since the start of the 2012 season, covering his last 617 plate appearances Chavez has been worth -2.3 WAR. If ever there was addition by subtraction, it is in replacing Chavez with an actual Major League player.
This move probably won’t help the Mariners enough to make a difference down the stretch, but it makes them better, and it makes them better at basically no cost. This is exactly the kind of move a team with a one-in-five chance of winning the second Wild Card should be making.
Enter Chris Denorfia. He just turned 34 a few weeks ago, will be a free agent at year’s end, and is hitting .242/.293/.319 for the Padres. That’s the kind of trifecta that will basically guarantee a low acquisition cost, and sure enough, the Mariners gave up little to get him, sending Abraham Almonte and Stephen Kohlscheen, who you have never heard of and probably will never hear of again.
In Denorfia, the Mariners get a guy who has a history of hitting left-handed pitching well and playing solid defense, though the hitting part hasn’t really happened this year. Still, a longer view of his talent level suggests he should be something like an average hitter, or maybe a tick below. Toss in the defense and some baserunning value, and Denorfia is a nifty little part-time outfielder. Not a guy you want in the line-up everyday, but a useful role player.
For the Mariners, though, that’s a massive improvement, considering that they have been using Endy Chavez as their starting right fielder. Since the start of the 2012 season, covering his last 617 plate appearances Chavez has been worth -2.3 WAR. If ever there was addition by subtraction, it is in replacing Chavez with an actual Major League player.
This move probably won’t help the Mariners enough to make a difference down the stretch, but it makes them better, and it makes them better at basically no cost. This is exactly the kind of move a team with a one-in-five chance of winning the second Wild Card should be making.
- 31,851
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- Aug 2, 2006
we have a really easy schedule the rest of the way.
plus 9 against the o's i think which by that time well have Edwin/Lind/Lawrie back.
should prob be worried.
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- Jul 18, 2012
This Buster Posey rule is ******* up the game. Marlins/Reds game last night 
*edit*
thought this was cool:
*edit*
thought this was cool:
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- Apr 8, 2010
This
And it seems like Valencia and Reimold are good pick ups. The rest of the team seems to be stepping up too, I like our chances.
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- Jan 7, 2004
This Buster Posey rule is ******* up the game. Marlins/Reds game last night
*edit*
thought this was cool:
You think Manny will have a better career than Donaldson?
jumpmanfromdabay
Banned
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- Jan 25, 2008
Manny is only 22
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And Donaldson is 28. Manny's glove work is nice. Can he ever hit close to Josh is what I'm asking J's.
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- May 10, 2006
doubleJ's was comparing Machado to Trout before the injury. Im sure he think's he'll be better than Josh 
These last two Bal/LAA seriee have been really fun to watch. Hope we meet in the postseason.
These last two Bal/LAA seriee have been really fun to watch. Hope we meet in the postseason.
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- Jan 3, 2011
Go make a pick. Your time technically expired, apparently.
fullcourtpress
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- Jul 24, 2014
Trout and Machado are comparable in terms of impact on the game, just different position and style of play. I see Baltimore making post season but doubt Angels will.doubleJ's was comparing Machado to Trout before the injury. Im sure he think's he'll be better than Josh
These last two Bal/LAA seriee have been really fun to watch. Hope we meet in the postseason.
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- Sep 4, 2006
Red Sox / Yankees
gonna have a hamburger, coca-cola & some apple pie while i watch
gonna have a hamburger, coca-cola & some apple pie while i watch
fullcourtpress
Banned
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- Jul 24, 2014
Chris Davis is such a liability in da lineup
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The pace of this Mets/Giants game is exactly what baseball needs. I enjoy watching Niese pitch against the Giants.
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That Mookie Betts catch was unreal.
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The Jays and Orioles are quietly on a tear. It's not looking good for the Evil Empire.
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