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Monday, August 04, 2008

Statistically Speaking: World Famous StatSpeak Roundtable: August 4

With special guest, J.C. Bradbury.

Question #3: Have the Boston Red Sox lost their minds?

Pizza Cutter: There are varying degrees of losing one’s mind, and thankfully because of my “real job” in psychology, I’m the one who gets to decide who’s sane and who’s not. (Someone out there just re-read my answer to question #1 and shook his head at that thought.) To look at the Manny trade as a pure value trade, it’s actually not all that bad. The Red Sox got back Jason Bay who is almost as good as Manny Ramirez and the guys they sent to Pittsburgh were unimportant. Bay is signed to a relatively cheap contract through next year, while Manny had a $20 million option. The Red Sox can at least make a sensible argument that they might very well break even and/or net out more value per dollar with Bay over Ramirez in the next year and a half. Maybe the thought process was “We still have a good chance to win in ‘08 and Bay improves our chances of winning in ‘09 and in total, the probabilities are actually greater that win something.” That’s at least rational.

With that said, let’s examine the premise of “We need to trade away one of the best hitters in baseball in the middle of a pennant race in which we are fighting for our lives… because he’s annoying.” I appreciate that Manny can be a pain (I grew up with the Indians in the 90s), but the reality is that the Red Sox made themselves (slightly) worse for this year by trading Ramirez. Even if Manny is lazy, he’s a lazy man who hits the ball better than a lot of guys in the league, and in the days leading up to the deadline, the Red Sox made it clear that they really just wanted Manny out. Given those parameters, they made a decent deal, but this was a trade that didn’t need to be made. One of the things that I do in my “real job” is to help people cope when things aren’t ideal or even comfortable. Everyone has to go through those times, and the trick is not to do something self-destructive to compensate. The Red Sox should pay a visit to my office.

Repoz Posted: August 04, 2008 at 03:41 PM | 12 comment(s)
Related News: General, Sabermetrics, Boston

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1. The Joe Mauer Power Hour (kj) Posted: August 04, 2008 at 04:15 PM (#2889653)

The Red Sox can at least make a sensible argument that they might very well break even and/or net out more value per dollar with Bay over Ramirez in the next year and a half.

I don't think there's a "might" about it. Bay's value per dollar should blow Manny's out of the water.

With that said, let’s examine the premise of “We need to trade away one of the best hitters in baseball in the middle of a pennant race in which we are fighting for our lives… because he’s annoying.”

But the trade makes sense from a baseball perspective, as you already detailed. Boston doesn't make this deal in the middle of a pennant race if it's only addition by subtraction.

2. Robert Machemer Posted: August 04, 2008 at 04:29 PM (#2889675)

With that said, let’s examine the premise of “We need to trade away one of the best hitters in baseball in the middle of a pennant race in which we are fighting for our lives… because he’s annoying.”

But if Bay is roughly as good as Ramirez, then what's it matter if you're trading away one of the best hitters in baseball, given that what you're getting is also one of the best hitters in baseball (and allegedly not as annoying)? The Red Sox traded Ramirez for a player who is probably about as good a player AND not as (allegedly) annoying -- where's the insanity in that?

3. Robert Machemer Posted: August 04, 2008 at 05:09 PM (#2889733)

I mean, if the Yankees traded away Alex Rodriguez for Albert Pujols, would anyone ask if they're crazy? The reason why people are bothered by the trade is because they don't really believe Bay is as good as Ramirez, but that speaks more to them and/or his toiling in "anonymity" than it does to Bay or Ramirez, at least at this point in their careers.

4. Pizza Cutter Posted: August 04, 2008 at 08:16 PM (#2889960)

The trick is that Bay is almost as good as Manny. So, the Red Sox handicapped themselves in the short term, which doesn't make sense for a deadline deal.

5. Vaux, A.B.D. Posted: August 04, 2008 at 08:34 PM (#2889995)

The problem isn't just Bay's relative anonymity, it's that Bay isn't as good as Manny was, merely as good as Manny is. The media and most fans always perceive a star player as being the best player he ever was, even when he's in decline.

6. Srul Itza Posted: August 04, 2008 at 10:15 PM (#2890211)

In figuring out the dollar value, don't forget that Boston is paying all of Manny's salary for the rest of the year (around $9 mill, maybe?).

IF you assume that they had not intention of picking up Manny's option for next year, then the bang for the buck argument becomes more problematic.

Then again, IF you assume that they had not intention of picking up Manny's option for next year, getting Jason Bay for next year at his current salary is also a very good fill in.

7. Walt Davis Posted: August 04, 2008 at 10:18 PM (#2890221)

Another thing being (mostly) overlooked here is that Bay makes the 2009 Red Sox much better. Manny's option would have cost much more, any FA corner LF would have either cost much more or not been as good as Bay. So even if they did take a short-term hit on the Manny-Bay difference (see below), they came out way ahead for next year. At worst it's high-risk (miss the playoffs this year)-high reward (significantly better chance of making them next year).

As to the short-term hit -- my concern is only two-fold. First is our standard concern about the accuracy of defensive run valuation (with the added Green Monster effect -- and Bay in LF may be a good way to get a handle on that). Second is Bay's 2007 which still scares me. I know, he's hitting like the Bay of old -- almost exactly his 2006 numbers. But if he's a substantial risk to turn back into Bay 2007, that's not good.

8. Russ Posted: August 04, 2008 at 10:31 PM (#2890256)

But if he's a substantial risk to turn back into Bay 2007, that's not good.

Bay was hurt pretty much all of last year, played through a lot of pain, he's better now. There are many bigger risks in baseball than Jason Bay.

9. greenback345397SM6 Posted: August 04, 2008 at 10:36 PM (#2890264)

Bradbury's comment about the Brewers dealing CC Sabathia is nuts.

10. Srul Itza Posted: August 04, 2008 at 10:47 PM (#2890295)

the Red Sox made it clear that they really just wanted Manny out. Given those parameters, they made a decent deal

Given that they were apparently desperate to dispose of Manny, getting Jason Bay in return is a great deal, depending on how you value those prospects they parted with.

11. KJOK Posted: August 04, 2008 at 11:52 PM (#2890418)

Bradbury's comment about the Brewers dealing CC Sabathia is nuts.

Yes, that seemed much more intereting than the Manny comments.

While I agree with him that the Brewers really aren't that good, neither are the Cardinals, or Marlins, or Mets, and it isn't likely any of those teams are going to leave the Brewers behind far enough soon enough that they'd consider waiving Sabathia.

12. Mattbert Posted: August 05, 2008 at 05:27 AM (#2890539)

Given that they were apparently desperate to dispose of Manny, getting Jason Bay in return is a great deal, depending on how you value those prospects they parted with.

Assigning a value to those prospects is tricky as well, since both Moss and Hansen will be valued differently by the Pirates than they were by the Red Sox. For example, I think Moss will turn out to be a pretty decent hitter--let's say 105-115 OPS+ by the WAGNER projection--and his defense is good enough to play either corner OF spot. However, with the resources the Red Sox have, it's unlikely they would have "settled" for that, and so Moss's ceiling in Boston was probably 4th OFer with occasional spells at 1B. On the other hand, Moss's ceiling in Pittsburgh is everyday, above-average corner OFer, simply by virtue of a different opportunity. He could certainly develop into a fine player, but he wasn't going to get that chance in Boston.

I'm less sanguine on Hansen, mostly because I think his mechanics are ruinous. He's got potentially dominant stuff, but I don't think he'll ever be able to command it throwing the way he does. And if he tinkers with his mechanics to better harness his stuff, there's a strong possibility he loses some of that stuff. There's some evidence that this is exactly what happened during his time in the Red Sox minor league system: he made some changes, lost effectiveness, and then went back to his original mechanics. I wish him the best because his slider is an absolute thunderbolt when it's on, every bit as wicked as vintage K-Rod.

Overall, I think all three parties involved in the Manny-Bay deal did reasonably well for themselves. The Dodgers probably weren't under the same pressure to do something as the Red Sox and Pirates were, but it was a bold stroke for them and the early returns have been quite favorable. I don't see any clear winners or losers coming out of this trade; if anything, I'd be tempted to say everybody won.

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Monday, August 04, 2008

Statistically Speaking: World Famous StatSpeak Roundtable: August 4

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