I'm just going to hope the Red Sox at least tried.

The deal remains contingent on the Jays' ability to sign Dickey to an extension within a 72-hour negotiating window which expires Tuesday at 2pm et.

There has yet to be confirmation on the players involved besides Dickey, but according to Joel Sherman of the New York Post, the deal between the two clubs could see seven players switch teams, with Dickey, catcher Josh Thole and a prospect heading to Toronto for catching prospect Travis d'Arnaud, pitching prospect Noah Syndergaard, recently acquired catcher John Buck and another prospect.

Mixed emotions

I'm just going to hope the Red Sox at least tried.

LOL.

Literally the first post. Amazing.

The reported cost in talent for the Jays, d'Arnaud + Syndergaard, is roughly equivalent to Bogaerts + Barnes. (I would prefer the Sox prospects, but I don't think it's a categorically different package.) I would not have wanted the Sox to do that. If earlier reports are correct, the Jays are giving up a lot.

Well, the window is now for the Jays. Plus if this deal goes through it's because they're getting a #1 starter for under market value, as I would suggest that no matter what Dickey will be underpaid relative to his value since he's a knuckleballer.

Oh, I'm not really criticizing the Jays. I respect what they're doing. The most important wins in baseball are wins 87-92 or so, and the Jays are right at that point where every added win has a ton of value.

I do wonder if it might have been possible to get Dickey without shipping Syndergaard too, but the overall plan the Jays have executed is a good one, and this should be a lot of fun for their fans.

I keep thinking Anthopoulos & Alderson could have great fun trolling the press: "Ha, ha! No, it Mejia & Harvey for Rasmus!" "No, it's Dickey & Duda for Lind & Romero!" "No, get this, it's a three-way with Vernon Wells going to New York!"
Heh.

Re Thole: How do you come in second in passed balls, and throw out a lower pct than league average...and still get a 1.1 dWAR? Plainly I don't understand how it works.

the Jays are right at that point where every added win has a ton of value

Indeed, it looks like they are waking from their long slumber. The rise of the Rays didn't seem to spur them on, but the Baltimore F. Orioles charging into the playoffs this year means they're out of excuses. Go out and get some players and win something, already :)

How do you come in second in passed balls, and throw out a lower pct than league average...and still get a 1.1 dWAR?

A big chunk of that is positional adjustment - just credit for playing C. dWAR is structured so that you can compare players between positions based on relative difficulty of the position.

The reported cost in talent for the Jays, d'Arnaud + Syndergaard, is roughly equivalent to Bogaerts + Barnes. (I would prefer the Sox prospects, but I don't think it's a categorically different package.)

Who would be an analogous Red Sox package in the Marlins deal? [Hechavarria,Alvarez,Nicolino,Marisnick] <-> [Iglesias,Doubront,Webster,Bradley] ? I'm trying to figure out what it would have looked like for the Sox to have done both deals instead.

Do the Jays make their move this year if the Yankees didn't lay down and die in the playoffs, AND the 2nd wild card wasn't introduced?

With Boston imploding, Baltimore looking like a fluke (if they see it from that point of view) and the Yankees crumbling fast (ARod/CC surgeries), maybe AA said "Well, it's now or never!" and convinced those holding the purse strings that it was time.

If this batch of wheeling and dealing doesn't work out for the Jays (and they don't make the playoffs in 2013/14), then I don't think the Jays fans (like myself) can really be that upset.

Indeed, it looks like they are waking from their long slumber. The rise of the Rays didn't seem to spur them on, but the Baltimore F. Orioles charging into the playoffs this year means they're out of excuses. Go out and get some players and win something, already :)

After playing a wait and see game coming into '12 with Alvarez, Hutchison, McGowan, Cecil and Drabek and all of those players either blowing their elbows out, continuing to be broken down, or not improving much at all, the rotation had two holes in it with no one to fill them in the Org except J.A. Happ. Moves had to be made. Coinciding with Encarnacion's breakout, Anthopoulos has said, he does not want to waste the prime of Bautista and Encarnacion's peak.

Here's what I don't get. Why didn't the Mets just sign Dickey to whatever extension they could agree to, and then trade him?

Here's what I don't get. Why didn't the Mets just sign Dickey to whatever extension they could agree to, and then trade him?

I assume that Dickey was only offering the Mets a below market $26M/2 year deal if it included strict no trade provisions.

72 hours? This is taking forever.

So the Jays trading d'Arnaud and Syndegaard for Dickey is smart while the Royals trading Myers for Shields and Davis is not smart mainly because the Jays are otherwise better than the Royals? Or is it because Shields isn't as good as Dickey? Or is it because Myers is better than d'Arnaud and Syndegaard?

yes.

It makes sense to trade prospects for a front-line starter if it gets you from 86 wins into the playoff zone. It doesn't make much sense if it takes you from 75 wins to 80 (or whatever.)

Myers might not be better than d'Arnaud and Syndergaard, but Myers and Odoeizzi are

So the Jays trading d'Arnaud and Syndegaard for Dickey is smart while the Royals trading Myers for Shields and Davis is not smart mainly because the Jays are otherwise better than the Royals? Or is it because Shields isn't as good as Dickey? Or is it because Myers is better than d'Arnaud and Syndegaard?

Yeah, as Shock is saying. The Jays are actually situated in their division to win it, unlike the Royals. Dave Cameron did a tidy Fangraphs article on this this morning, actually.

the Jays trading d'Arnaud and Syndegaard for Dickey is smart while the Royals trading Myers [and Odorizzi] for Shields and Davis is not smart mainly because

... Thole/Arencibia are better than Francoeur

Shields is nowhere near as good as Dickey. Myers for Dickey would have made more sense. Plus if Dickey gives the Jays the same offer as he gave the Mets, the Jays will get 3 years of Dickey at the same AAV as the Royals are getting two years of Shields. I'll let the prospect mavens weigh in on the packages. On the surface looks like the Royals package was a bit bigger mainly because Syndergaard is so far away from the majors (19 year old coming out of A ball) compared to Odorizzi but then he probably has the higher ceiling (it was a pretty dominant 100 innings). Also Myers is a couple of years younger than d'Arnaud.

But I'm not sure either trade is all that good. Compared to other "ace" trades, looks like the Jays are giving up more than most. The Jays got one of the better looking packages when they traded Halladay 3 years ago. Two of those guys bombed out (Drabek could still pay off) and now d'Arnaud is shipped out in an "ace" trade. Other than saving money, they might as well have held onto Halladay. :-) Mainly it comes down to Syndergaard I guess ... and I don't have a lot of faith in 19-year-old pitching prospects.

But the big winner in all of this is JP Arencibia -- d'Arnaud and Buck gone in one trade.

Re Thole: How do you come in second in passed balls, and throw out a lower pct than league average...and still get a 1.1 dWAR? Plainly I don't understand how it works.

Silly boy. dWAR doesn't tell you anything about how good of a C he is, it tells you he would be as good a CF as Colby Rasmus.

dWAR is just Rfield + Rpos (converted to wins). Comparing players at the same position, you can use Rfield or dWAR, dWAR having the advantage of a little extra playing time adjustment plus handling the case where one of the players spent some time elsewhere (e.g. Posey). Comparing players across positions is the main purpose of dWAR.

Rfield -- compared to average at your position
dWAR -- compared to mythical average defender

Now, how Thole finished with positive Rfield is a question I can't answer.

I hate losing such a profoundly entertaining player, but I can't complain about the package the Mets got.

... Thole/Arencibia are better than Francoeur

Agreed. By not playing Myers in RF, the Royals are almost certainly worse off at that position in '13. IIRC, the Jays was not even planning to have D'Arnaud on the big-league roster in April.

Nice to see the Mets actually bite the bullet and do what they are supposed to do for once, rather than stringing things out as long and as painfully as possible, and in the end being left only with a missed opportunity (see Reyes, Jose).

This trade is necessary, but it really sucks, too. As stated by others above, D'Arnaud and Syndergaard is a really good haul.

Two of those guys bombed out (Drabek could still pay off) and now d'Arnaud is shipped out in an "ace" trade. Other than saving money, they might as well have held onto Halladay.

Anthopoulos later traded Brett Wallace for Anthony Gose, whom he wanted in the Halladay deal, but the Phillies wouldn't trade him at that point. So, actually only Drabek has "bombed out" at this point from the Jays end of the Halladay haul. Who knows, maybe he someday provides some value to TOR. He's definitely not counted on for anything anymore, at least by myself.

Yeah, as Shock is saying. The Jays are actually situated in their division to win it, unlike the Royals. Dave Cameron did a tidy Fangraphs article on this this morning, actually.

Thanks for the Fangraphs article tip. It was interesting. The counter-argument might be that with the 2nd WC, the Royals might actually have a better shot than the Jays, because they get to play the Indians and Twins and a White Sox team that may be worse than 2012, while none of the AL East teams is really terrible, and the Yankees and Rays are better than any AL Central team except the Tigers. If the Royals are an 85 win team playing a schedule of a 95 win team, a 75 win team and 2 65 win teams, that might lead to a better record than a 90 win team playing 2 other 90 win teams and 2 75 win teams. Or it might not, I don't really know. Those estimates of how good the other teams are might be wrong of course.

So the Jays trading d'Arnaud and Syndegaard for Dickey is smart while the Royals trading Myers for Shields and Davis is not smart mainly because the Jays are otherwise better than the Royals? Or is it because Shields isn't as good as Dickey? Or is it because Myers is better than d'Arnaud and Syndegaard?

Yea, the prospects the Jays gave up are worse, Dickey is both better and costs less than Shields, and the Jays are closer to contention. It's only a superficially similar deal.

I assume that Dickey was only offering the Mets a below market $26M/2 year deal if it included strict no trade provisions.

As revolting as all of this is, I'll be interested to see what Dickey and the Jays agree to, now that the hometown discount is not in play.

What if Dickey hems and haws but never signs an extension with any team the Mets want to trade him to? Does he stay put, or can the Mets still get D'Arnaud? Is Snydergaard the value of the extension to the Jays?

I hate losing such a profoundly entertaining player, but I can't complain about the package the Mets got.

I'm going to grumble about Buck, who the Mets could DFA for all I care, but yeah, if you're going to trade your ace, get high ceiling guys; now's not the time to reload on middle relievers.

The counter-argument might be that with the 2nd WC, the Royals might actually have a better shot than the Jays, because they get to play the Indians and Twins and a White Sox team that may be worse than 2012, while none of the AL East teams is really terrible, and the Yankees and Rays are better than any AL Central team except the Tigers.

It seems highly likely the WC will come out the West (more than likely) or East though.

The Royals have to finish first, no AL Central team is finishing 4th or better in a group of Texas, Anaheim, Oakland, NYY, Toronto, Tampa Bay and Baltimore to get a wildcard birth.

Yea, the prospects the Jays gave up are worse, Dickey is both better and costs less than Shields, and the Jays are closer to contention. It's only a superficially similar deal.

If the Royals were foolish to trade for a pitcher they will control for only two years, how would it be better to get a pitcher they would control for only one year?

By negotiating a window to sign an extension, as TOR did.

The other thing about the KC trade is that if your goal is to compete in 2012, it was the worst possible way to "improve" the team.

A much better solution would have been to

Start Myers ahead of Francoer.

Add JakeO to your rotation (as good if not likely better than Davis )

Spend the $14M a year Shields/Davis would have cost on another starter, either Sanchez (making up for low first 2 years with a backloaded deal, say $85M/(oops) 5 years) or more likely Jackson.

Even if its Jackson, Myers makes up for the difference with Shields and you get to keep the other two lottery prospects in the minors (or trade them for other needs), and have 5 years of cheap control over Myers and Odruzzi.

Similar win expectancy in 2012 with much higher win expectancy in 2013+..

These two trades certainly make the Jays better, but 20 wins better? I wouldn't crown them just yet.

To me it makes all the sense in the world for the Mets to trade Dickey now - while his value is at an all-time high and his age will never be lower -- and also with his acquiring team getting him and the right to negotiate with him for a song ($5 mil owed).

Anthopoulos later traded Brett Wallace for Anthony Gose, whom he wanted in the Halladay deal, but the Phillies wouldn't trade him at that point.

After trading Taylor, who he got in the Halladay trade, for Wallace and getting in on essentially a 3-way with Houston and Philly involving Oswalt. Too removed to be part of the Halladay trade.

If the Royals were foolish to trade for a pitcher they will control for only two years, how would it be better to get a pitcher they would control for only one year?

Obviously Toronto is only giving up this much if they get RA on a $30M-$35M/3 year deal.

But even if Dickey refused to sign an extension, Toronto wouldn't be getting him on a 1 year deal. Dickey is actually available on a $19M/2 year deal, because Toronto will almost certainly make him a qualifying offer, which will probably cost $14M next year. If Dickey declines, they'll get a draft pick probably worth as much or more as Dickey's excess value on a qualifying offer. And there is also value in the optionality of it, not being forced to make the offer if Dickey collapses/gets hurt.

To me it makes all the sense in the world for the Mets to trade Dickey now - while his value is at an all-time high and his age will never be lower -- and also with his acquiring team getting him and the right to negotiate with him for a song ($5 mil owed).

It's exactly te right move for the Mets because they are broke.

If they had the budget of days past, they snap accept Dickey's offer and actively add help in FA market and taking on other teams payroll (Reyes might have been back in town).

So yea, the Dickey trade is perfectly fine, the manner in which they did it is sadly not..

To me it makes all the sense in the world for the Mets to trade Dickey now - while his value is at an all-time high and his age will never be lower -- and also with his acquiring team getting him and the right to negotiate with him for a song ($5 mil owed).

It's exactly te right move for the Mets because they are broke.

If they had the budget of days past, they snap accept Dickey's offer and actively add help in FA market and taking on other teams payroll (Reyes might have been back in town).
Even if the Mets were not broke and just moderately cash-strapped, Sandy is sober enough to realize* that the Mets have little chance of competing before 2015.

* Jeff's mileage may vary.

I wonder if the owners thought that the extra wild card would be a financial bonanza - for the players.

When will we get the first Toronto article lambasting RA Dickey for shameless self-promotion and effective brand management? If hockey stays in lockout mode, the Sun sportswriters will have too much time on their hands.

These two trades certainly make the Jays better, but 20 wins better? I wouldn't crown them just yet

Absolutely. Still have to play the games. Remember though, TOR had a ton of injuries last year, lost Bautista for over two months, Morrow for three, etc etc. They were at the top of man games lost to injury in '12. The WAR tally of players shipped to the Marlins compared to their counterparts coming in was about 8 WAR. Cabrera is almost a 4 WAR improvement over Gose/Snider/Thames. Dickey is about 5.5 WAR guy replacing guys like Villanueva who are around 1 WAR. So, it should be a considerably better team W-L wise.

I'm going to grumble about Buck, who the Mets could DFA for all I care

He's just a placeholder until d'Arnaud is ready, he didn't really cost anything (other than money).

I may take back what I said about this being a higher price than most "ace" trades. I've got to bring money into that and most aces, when traded, are already making something close to $20 M. The trading team is usually getting players and at least one year of salary relief. Here the Mets are really getting no salary relief so it makes sense they'd get better value in talent. Similarly from Toronto's angle given they're likely to get Dickey at a lower AAV than Sanchez, they're in line to get very good value out of Dickey and should be willing to give up more.

Back to Royals-Jays ... while I prefer this trade I will say I'm also not sure the Jays playoff chances are that much better than the Royals. The Shields trade is not the only move the Royals have made this offseason, also picking up Santana and resigning Guthrie and those moves cost them nothing but money. Moore was having a pretty good offseason prior to the Shields trade (which could of course still work out). The entire Royals rotation last year gave them 1 WAR. They've retained the most valuable guy (Guthrie 1.7 WAR) and added 3 guys who who could give them another 5-7 WAR and (since nobody seems gone) actually have a good amount of SP depth. Hosmer was a disappointment and could certainly add 3-4 WAR (he was -.7 last year). They'll hopefully have a healthy Perez. 72 wins, 74 pythag wins last year but they look like at least a 500 team right now and you might squint to get them to 85. And that's a weak division although, yes, it will take some luck to top Detroit.

Whereas I see a bit of a bloodbath of mediocrity in the AL East. I think they're all decent teams (even the Red Sox) and I don't think any of them are dominant. Even if the Jays are pretty good, I can easily see them being the Rays. And the Jays last year won only 73 with 74 pythag. Another 60 games from Bautista would help and Reyes and Buehrle and now Dickey add a lot. Josh Johnson has always been fragile -- if he and/or Romero are healthy and effective, they should be very good. Anyway, even if Reyes, Dickey, Buehrle, Johnson and Melky add 15 wins, that still gets you only to 88.

The Jays do look like the better team and even if they don't project much better, the rotation of Dickey, Buehrle, Johnson and Romero has massive upside. But they're in a division with a bunch of other teams projected to 80+ wins and, as I understand it, they have to play the games!

Early guesstimate says I think the Jays could finish anywhere from 1st to 4th in the ALE and they'll probably need to be top 2 to make the playoffs. The Royals could finish anywhere from 1st to 3rd and they'll probably need to finish first to make the playoffs. Given it's just a 1-game WC playoff, I'm not sure the Jays are in that much better a spot. The odds of the Royals winning the ALC have to be pretty close to the odds of the Jays winning the ALE.

The Mets are obviously punting 2013 so the goal is to get some major league caliber players in the outfield for 2014. The rotation looks about set for 2014 as does the infield. The outfield and bullpen continue to be complete messes.

Two questions: When can the Mets seriously be considered a team that can make the playoffs? And how low is the payroll going to get in 2014? There's a chance that the Mets will be at less than half where they were in 2009 when they were at about 150 million. It's pretty amazing.

Cabrera is almost a 4 WAR improvement over Gose/Snider/Thames.

Why does anybody think this can be counted on. At that price it's certainly worth a gamble (he's being paid only for about 1.5 WAR) but Melky stunk until 2011, "magically" transforms himself, tests positive. Even if "natural" Melky is as good as "magical" Melky, I would view him as hard to predict.

I think the Jays could finish anywhere from 1st to 4th in the ALE

I wouldn't be at all surprised to see the Jays finish 5th.

I wouldn't pencil Melky in for 5 WAR either, but he last stunk in 2010, not 2011. He put up 4 WAR in KC in 2011.

No one yet, has written his improvements the last two years were solely to do with PED's except maybe you. He had a 2.6 WAR once upon a time fwiw. Only one way to find out. Lotta upside with the roster, and lotsa risk too. Have gotta play the games to find out.

Cabrera is almost a 4 WAR improvement over Gose/Snider/Thames.


I was very confused when I saw this. Couldn't fathom what Cabrera was a 5+ WAR player. I was pretty sure Toronto didn't get Miguel w/o me noticing it, and I was really shocked they were moving him to the OF.

Do the Mets have any outfielders in their system that could be ready to help in 2014?

@48 I assume that was snidely put, perhaps not, but each WAR provided by the three last year is not pretty, and Rajai Davis who got 487 AB's because of the injures also provided nothing:

Davis .5
Gose .4
Snider .2
Thames -.8

If Dickey declines, they'll get a draft pick probably worth as much or more as Dickey's excess value on a qualifying offer.

Sandwich pick? I think it's been estimated to be worth 3m, though the number of the pick matters.

It's exactly te right move for the Mets because they are broke.

I'd argue the opposite, that since being broke is relative, and they can in fact afford Dickey, that It's better if they extended Dickey.

I think Dickey is going to be a decent starter, which the Mets desperately need, through 2015. I don't think D'Arnaud is going to provide more value through 2015 than Dickey. That leaves the value D'Arnaud might bring the Mets from 2016 through 2018, probably the last year they'll control him, the difference in their salaries (favors D'Arnaud), and the difference in their contributions (probably favors Dickey, from 2013 through 2015) and the value Snydergaard might bring, from something like 2017-2022.

Since I think it's likely the Mets are going to be owned by the Wilpons in perpetuity, and I don't see their finances improving during this decade, they aren't going to be able to put a championship team on the field.

To believe this is a good, meaningful deal, you have to think the Wilpons are going to boost payroll substantially during the time D'Arnaud might be good and the Mets might be in contention, and after Dickey would have left or become of little value. Snydergaard is too far away to be a meaningful piece of the calculation.

Even if the Mets were not broke and just moderately cash-strapped, Sandy is sober enough to realize* that the Mets have little chance of competing before 2015.

This is part of my point--D'Arnaud's value to the Mets is only meaningful in terms of getting to the postseason insofar as it exceeds Dickey's.

Btw, do you think there is enough in the minors for the Mets to be legit competitors in 2015 on this year's $94m payroll?

Two questions: When can the Mets seriously be considered a team that can make the playoffs? And how low is the payroll going to get in 2014? There's a chance that the Mets will be at less than half where they were in 2009 when they were at about 150 million. It's pretty amazing.

This is why, while the deal looks fine in the abstract, I don't like it. The Mets don't have nearly the talent in the system (and are entirely out of trade chips) to contend on a $95m payroll. The Wilpons' debt is huge, omnipresent. They will always funnel cash away from the team in order to deal with debt. I don't see them contending during the time they control D'Arnaud, therefore I'd rather watch Dickey pitch every five days for the next three years.

In fact, the Mets are probably more like to contend for the postseason through 2015 if they keep Dickey. Dickey's upside is more Cy Young seasons. That's huge, if you need just about every player to perform optimally in order to sniff 87 wins. The other case is D'Arnaud plus $31m less 2m or so over three seasons. I don't see that being more likely to get the Mets to the postseason, though someone could argue that D'Arnaud is good enough to come out of the gate with a bunch of 4 win seasons, and the Mets could get lucky with that 31m and find players that chip in, say, another 4 wins for 9.67m per season.

The Mets are obviously punting 2013 so the goal is to get some major league caliber players in the outfield for 2014.

Another of my points. They don't have anyone in the system, they have nothing to trade for solid ML talent, and they won't have the money for it. That goal is unattainable.

I'd project Cabrera around 2-3 WAR with no PED adjustment. That's an improvement, but "almost 4 WAR" is really pushing it.

If nothing else, Alex Anthopoulos has rapidly become one of the most fascinating GMs in all of baseball. Note that I didn't say "best," because based on the actual on-field results...well, yeah. But when I think of the biggest, most breathtaking player transactions over the past few years, it's remarkable how many of them Anthopoulos has been involved in: shedding Alex Rios' awful contract on waivers, the ridiculous Vernon Wells-for-Mike Napoli trade (which, to be fair, AA undid to a certain extent by immediately shipping Napoli off for Frank Francisco), the Miami Marlins firesale, and now this.

Do the Mets have any outfielders in their system that could be ready to help in 2014?

Den Dekker maybe, but he's not really better than Niuwenhuis and Baxter.

A big chunk of that is positional adjustment - just credit for playing C. dWAR is structured so that you can compare players between positions based on relative difficulty of the position.

This can't be right. Posey had 2 passed balls to Thole's 18 and threw out 30% of basestealers compared to 23% for Thole. Posey also had more innings at Catcher.

Posey had 0.5 dWAR to Thole's 1.1 dWAR.

I am somewhat skeptical of Thole's dWAR as a result.

@51: but maybe not.

Trading Dickey does make it more likely the Mets get to the postseason in 2013, 2014, for 2015, even though it makes them more likely to win 71 instead of 75 games.

While it's on the order of boosting your chances from 0.5% to 1%, D'Arnaud plus $29m over three years can, in the best case scenario, bring in more wins than Dickey repeating his Cy Young season.

Dickey's upside is probably 5 WAR each of the next three years.
I don't have D'Arnaud's MLE's handy, but if he stays healthy and hits at his best, he might be a 4-5 win guy (without getting into absurdities). D'A strikes me as the kind of guy with enough polish to come out of the gate fast as a rookie.

If Alderson is smart and lucky with the 10m per season he'd have to spend (and assuming he even has it to spend), that being the difference between D'Arnaud's and Dickey's salaries, it's not outrageous to think he might grab 3 to 4 wins with that cash.

So, best case in both directions, trading Dickey gets the Mets their only chance at turning his talent and salaries into significantly more than 5 wins, where 8 wins is probably the sane, upper bound.

THEN, you have to imagine that those 8 wins versus the best case 5 wins Dickey might bring, get the Mets from 84 to 87 wins and thereby into the postseason.

@53--yeah, the Napoli deal was baffling, but AA does mostly great stuff. I'd love to have him leading the Mets.

But when I think of the biggest, most breathtaking player transactions over the past few years, it's remarkable how many of them Anthopoulos has been involved in: shedding Alex Rios' awful contract on waivers, the ridiculous Vernon Wells-for-Mike Napoli trade (which, to be fair, AA undid to a certain extent by immediately shipping Napoli off for Frank Francisco), the Miami Marlins firesale, and now this.

Very quick note, the Rios contract was still with JP in charge. As you guys were.

A big chunk of that is positional adjustment - just credit for playing C. dWAR is structured so that you can compare players between positions based on relative difficulty of the position.

This can't be right. Posey had 2 passed balls to Thole's 18 and threw out 30% of basestealers compared to 23% for Thole. Posey also had more innings at Catcher.

How is it not right? You can of course disagree with the defensive ratings of the catchers (Thole +4, Posey +0), but the dWAR ratings for both of them combine positional adjustment and defense relative to position. Posey and Thole both get a +5 positional adjustment that accounts for a big chunk of their dWAR (Posey played more games at C, but he also played 30 games at 1B while Thole caught exclusively).

If you look at the advanced fielding stats breakdown at B-Ref, you can see that Thole's good rating comes from fielding bunts (+2) and game calling (+4). His catching numbers rate him -2, so you get a combined +4 defensive rating.

re: 58:

Oh, I see. That is a somewhat crazy bad system then. I now know to give dWAR for catchers very little credence.

yeah, the Napoli deal was baffling

The Napoli deal was obvious. Napoli wasn't about to be a free agent and Francisco was. Anthopolous wanted a free agent to get more picks in the draft. And that's exactly how it worked out. Smart move that means Toronto has Smoral in the minors instead of the 0 that Texas will get for Napoli.

Sandwich pick? I think it's been estimated to be worth 3m, though the number of the pick matters.

If its that low I'm way off on the value but Toronto still gets a bit more than Dickey for 1 year/$5M if they don't extend him.

Smart move that means Toronto has Smoral in the minors instead of the 0 that Texas will get for Napoli.

Not offering Napoli a qualifying offer appears to have been a mistake, though, as his market settled well above 1/13.

Is 60 a joke?

The Napoli deal was obvious. Napoli wasn't about to be a free agent and Francisco was. Anthopolous wanted a free agent to get more picks in the draft. And that's exactly how it worked out. Smart move that means Toronto has Smoral in the minors instead of the 0 that Texas will get for Napoli.

Napoli also gave the Rangers 7.6 fWAR over the past two seasons. That has to be worth at least as much as Smoral.

The rise of the Rays didn't seem to spur them on, but the Baltimore F. Orioles charging into the playoffs this year means they're out of excuses. Go out and get some players and win something, already :)

Amen to that, and it looks like they've actually figured that out,

So the Jays trading d'Arnaud and Syndegaard for Dickey is smart while the Royals trading Myers for Shields and Davis is not smart mainly because the Jays are otherwise better than the Royals? Or is it because Shields isn't as good as Dickey? Or is it because Myers is better than d'Arnaud and Syndegaard?

You need to read Nate Silver's chapter "Is Alex Rodriguez Overpaid?" in BP's book BASEBALL BETWEEN THE NUMBERS, in which he explains how players of different win values will have very different monetary values to different teams and why.

What is the deal with the JP Ricciadi account, anyway? It isn't actually JP Ricciardi, is it?

I remember when the great Larry Bowa got canned, along with his Bushmills, because having even an obvious parody account in the name of a baseball figure wasn't acceptable.

Third order wins.

Tampa Bay 97.4 - 64.6
New York Yankees 96.7 - 65.3
Texas Rangers 95.1 - 66.9
Los Angeles Angels 92.7 - 69.3
Detroit Tigers 88.9 - 73.1
Oakland Athletics 88.8 - 73.2
Chicago White Sox 84.8 - 77.2
Baltimore Orioles 80.4 - 81.6
Seattle Mariners 77.6 - 84.4
Boston Red Sox 76.5 - 85.5
Toronto Blue Jays 71.5 - 90.5

The only teams ahead of Toronto to improve substantially this offseason is Detroit, which as 2013 Central Champ doesn't matter.

The Yankees are definitely worse, Tampa is likely worse, the Angels rotation is a mess, one Sox is a mess, the other ancient, the Orioles and As were over-achievers. If Toronto doesn't go for it this season after the raping of Miami, when?

Anything can happen in baseball, but they should easily be co-favorites in the east with Tampa. It should go something like

Tampa
Toronto
NYY
Boston
Baltimore

Toronto should have little trouble finishing 2nd among, Oakland, Anaheim and the former NYY for a WC spot.

Pelfrey gets $4 M from the Twins. So that's Dickey replacement option off the table.

The Jay rotation looks fantastic right now. If Romero remembers at all how to pitch, they're going to be really good. Catcher will be a hole for them-- a Thole/Arencibia tandem is kind of interesting, only because their complete opposites as hitters, but there's a big difference between "interesting" and "good"...

Napoli also gave the Rangers 7.6 fWAR over the past two seasons. That has to be worth at least as much as Smoral.

Yup. The quick Napoli flip for Franscico was infuriating at the time, even with understanding the thinking behind it. But, after the GM magically rids the team of Vernon Wells and his remaining $86M I found it hard to complain too loud. And they have had great results with letting guys walk for the picks. The best ones off the top of my head were Burnett who brought back Marisnick and Syndergaard. And Scuturo who begat Sanchez and Nicolino. Three of those guys all used in the big trades this off-season.

Pelfrey gets $4 M from the Twins. So that's Dickey replacement option off the table.

I'd rather see you pitch than Pelfrey.

Why no team ZIPS projections this offseason? That was one of my favorite parts of this site.

Weird how the names of the 2 non-elite minor leaguers haven't leaked.

Oh, I see. That is a somewhat crazy bad system then. I now know to give dWAR for catchers very little credence.

Based on what do you call it "crazy bad"?

I wouldn't be at all surprised to see the Jays finish 5th.

What's your definition of "surprised"? :-) I realized the way I phrased my comment seemed to imply there's one team in the ALE I think is crappy (i.e. certain to finish 5th) but I don't. So of course it's possible for the Jays to finish 5th. But if they're currently the #2 team (sounds right to me), maybe #1 depending on Yankee playing time, projected to something like 87-88 wins then, yeah, it's pretty unlikely they'll be 5th.

Even if you had a division where the odds of winning for each team were identical, you'd still only be talking a 20% chance of finishing last. Since I think the Jays are better than the Os and Red Sox and maybe the Rays ... and I'm uncertain how the Yanks are going to work out with their injuries ... their chances of finishing last are under 20%. I don't know how far under but would a team with a 10-15% chance of finishing last actually doing so count as a "surprise"?

Meanwhile in the ALC, I assume the Twins and Indians are gonna suck.

No one yet, has written his improvements the last two years were solely to do with PED's except maybe you.

How could anybody possibly write such a thing?

It's rather beside the point. It is a fair bet that a clean Melky can't be better than Melky using PEDs so "stable" would seem to be the upside here. And it's rather beside the point because it would be pretty silly to project the following player due to extreme variance:

2007-10, 2100+ PA, -45 Rbat
2011-12, 1200+ PA, +54 Rbat

2007-10: 286 BABIP
2011: 332
2012: 379

Like I said, perfectly good contract -- 2/$16, break-even point around 3 WAR over 2 seasons and age 21-22 Melky gets you above that. But expecting him to give you 4 WAR? I don't see it. And it's pretty clear that few if any in MLB saw it either or somebody would have stepped up with better than 2/$16, baggage or no. On the other hand, 2/$16 is pretty good evidence folks expect him to be at least average and not purely a PEDs mirage.

Based on what do you call it "crazy bad"?

Someone who had 18 passed balls and 57 stolen bases at a below average CS rate only allegedly cost his team 1 run over the course of a season.

Why no team ZIPS projections this offseason? That was one of my favorite parts of this site.

Dan's no longer officially affiliated with BBTF (he still posts). ZiPS projections will be appearing elsewhere (I forget where) ... and I assume will be linked here.

Sad.

Someone who had 18 passed balls and a below average CS rate only allegedly cost his team 1 run over the course of a season.

And your counter-evidence is ...

And your evidence of his bunt fielding ability?

And your evidence of his game-calling?

WAR turning up a result you disagree with is not evidence of a fundamental flaw in WAR.

I wonder how many of those "passed balls" came catching Dickey? The answer to that appears to be 13 of the 18 but I may have missed some. Or it could be over-counting if some of those came after Dickey left the game. Other than when he was hurt in May, Thole caught almost all of Dickey's starts but Nickeas managed to squeeze in 6 PB with Dickey anyway. At least 10 of his 16 in 2011 were in Dickey starts (and you can add another 5-6 in the Paulino/Nickeas starts).

It wouldn't surprise me if the main reason Thole is in this trade is to be Dickey's personal C.

I don't know what's expected but doing a quick squizz, Thole seems a bit above-average in WP/inning caught although that could be the pitchers.

Someone who had 18 passed balls and 57 stolen bases at a below average CS rate only allegedly cost his team 1 run over the course of a season.

I could be way off, but my WAG would be that the average catcher is involved in more baserunner advances and fewer baserunner kills than you might think.

I wonder how many of those "passed balls" came catching Dickey? The answer to that appears to be 13 of the 18 but I may have missed some. Or it could be over-counting if some of those came after Dickey left the game. Other than when he was hurt in May, Thole caught almost all of Dickey's starts but Nickeas managed to squeeze in 6 PB with Dickey anyway. At least 10 of his 16 in 2011 were in Dickey starts (and you can add another 5-6 in the Paulino/Nickeas starts).

Definitive evidence that Walt is, in fact, HAL 9000 with instant access to every fact ever recorded.

That's fine Walt. Anthopoulos likes to strike early with moves, so maybe Cabrera doesn't get more than his two year deal if he waited until the market for OF's set up, or maybe he would have. He posted 8.8 WAR over the last two seasons, and they got basically 0 WAR from LF in '12 so I said around 4 WAR. The 2 recent obvious things about Cabrera success prior to the PED busting had been his BABIP being sky high in '11-'12 compared to career norms and he stopped coming into the seasons a fatass. So who knows? did he start applying himself, is it 2 years of luck, was it coming into his age 27 season meme, or was it the drugs? I was doing a generalized quick add of '12 roster, combined with the incoming one, I could have phrased it different to allow for the caveats.

And your counter-evidence is ...

And your evidence of his bunt fielding ability?

And your evidence of his game-calling?

To be clear, WAR says that a catcher with 18 passed balls and 57 SB at a below average rate is 1 run below average *just on baserunning.* He's above average on other things. So bunt fielding, etc, those things don't matter.

So again, WAR says that a guy hanging out near the league leaders in PB and with a pretty raggedy arm is just one run below average. That is not very credible to me.

Maybe he's getting some sort of knuckleballer credit.

RLYW's CAIRO projections has the AL East standings pre-Dickey trade looking like:

TM        W     Div     WC1   WC2   PS%
Blue Jays 86.5  25.3%   9.0%  8.7%  42.9%
Yankees   86.4  25.0%   8.7%  9.2%  42.9%
Rays      86.0  24.6%   8.7%  8.8%  42.1%
Red Sox   82.6  17.9%   6.9%  8.4%  33.2%
Orioles   74.1   7.3%   3.7%  4.8%  15.8%

Looks like the Blue Jays are doubling-down on the right hand.

Maybe he's getting some sort of knuckleballer credit.

He shouldn't be. R.A. Dickey has a pretty normal WP rate.

Napoli also gave the Rangers 7.6 fWAR over the past two seasons. That has to be worth at least as much as Smoral.

Really? What would 7.6WAR do for Toronto in 2011/2012?

Not offering Napoli a qualifying offer appears to have been a mistake, though, as his market settled well above 1/13.

He got 13 a year with no compensation attached. it's a mistake to assume that he would have got that, or even tested the market, if a first round pick was attached to his signing.

tshipman - you really think all those passed balls are just Thole's fault? Come on. The reason Dickey is good is that he throws a violently unpredictable pitch that stays within the strike zone.

He shouldn't be. R.A. Dickey has a pretty normal WP rate.

Are you really trying to argue that knuckleball catchers aren't going to allow more PB than catchers who don't have to catch the knuckleball?

Dickey was fourth in the AL in WP in 2008 (in only 112 innings). He was eighth in the NL in 2010 and ninth in 2011. He threw only four last year, but it's not like the knuckler was dancing any less.

The fact that thirteen of Thole's eighteen PB and six of Mike Nickeas' eight came when catching Dickey is decent evidence that Dickey/the knuckleball had more to do with those PB totals than either man's catching ability.

tshipman - you really think all those passed balls are just Thole's fault? Come on. The reason Dickey is good is that he throws a violently unpredictable pitch that stays within the strike zone.

Even if we were to take Thole's non-Dickey PB rate and expand that to 1000 innings, he'd still have a relatively high number of PB's: 10.

In addition, pitchers with high number of WPs typically have a high number of PB's.

When he only caught Dickey for 133 innings in 2011, Thole still led the league in PB's.

He's not a good defensive catcher.

Isn't that rather damning of the PB as a statistic? Isnt' the whole point of the PB stat that it's supposed to be the catcher's fault? Why don't we just dump it and go with WP for all uncaught pitches.

Why don't we just dump it and go with WP for all uncaught pitches.
Some people combine them, yes. I think trying to differentiate between the two is valuable, but some kind of weighted average of the two is the way to go. (IMO)

He'd still be the best backup catcher the Jays have had since Zaun and Bengie Molina were splitting the job.

Isn't that rather damning of the PB as a statistic? Isnt' the whole point of the PB stat that it's supposed to be the catcher's fault? Why don't we just dump it and go with WP for all uncaught pitches.

Informally, pitches in the dirt or above the catchers head are WP's. Other pitches are PB's.

Some people combine them, yes. I think trying to differentiate between the two is valuable, but some kind of weighted average of the two is the way to go. (IMO)

Helpfully, Thole is bad at both.

Even if we were to take Thole's non-Dickey PB rate and expand that to 1000 innings, he'd still have a relatively high number of PB's: 10.

One PB per 100 innings is high?

Not trying to say that Thole's a great defender - just that he certainly does deserve credit for catching Dickey.

A passed ball every 11 games isn't particularly good either. Remember, that's not wild pitches.

One PB per 100 innings is high?

Yes. It would have led the AL, for example.

Not trying to say that Thole's a great defender - just that he certainly does deserve credit for catching Dickey.

I mean, maybe he does, although I would expect Dickey to show up with more than 4 WP's if he's all that tough to catch. But in either case, unless he's getting a large and unwarranted knuckleballer adjustment or something, it's borderline ridiculous for someone with 18 PB's in fewer than 800 innings to be stated to only cost his team one run on the basepaths.

A passed ball every 11 games isn't particularly good either. Remember, that's not wild pitches.

I have never thought about it, and honestly didn't think one passed ball every 11 games seemed that bad. I'm probably wrong.

The run value of a PB (or WP) should be about .3. The run value of a CS vs. successful SB is about .9 I believe.

Thole's non-Dickey extra PBs may have cost 1 run; the 3 extra steals he allowed vs. average might have cost 3 runs. Even if he is below-average on these, it's not a big deal.

Seriously, the running game just generally doesn't matter. There were 74 attempts in 798 innings with Dickey behind the plate.

Thole appears to be average or better on WP. In 2012, he caught 56% of Met innings (and more of Dickey's) while allowing only 45% of their WPs. In 2011 he caught 55% of Met innings (and most of Dickey's) while allowing 52% of their WPs.

Note I don't have a clue how WAR handles PB and WP. I seriously doubt it adjusts for Dickey's PBs but I wouldn't be surprised if it pretty much ignores the difference between WP and PB and judges Cs on the combination of the two. (Many PBs come on pitches where the C was crossed up anyway, not necessarily the C's fault.) I have no idea how it apportions blame/credit for PB/WP/SB between P and C. I can't find league PB numbers but the WP rate is about 1 per 28 innings. Eyeballing a lot of other Cs (Molina, Ruiz, McCann, Ellis, Montero) suggests that something like 1 PB per 160 to 180 innings is pretty standard. Using those rates, in his roughly 800 innings in 2012, Thole should have allowed 29 WPs and say 5 PB ... instead he was 18 and 18. Now the Mets only had a WP once every 35 innings or so which would reduce his expected WP to 23. Oddly enough, Dickey had a WP only about one per 60 innings perhaps meaning his "WP" are getting coded PBs. (His WP rates in the past were always high.)

Wait, found it. NL 2012 average PB rate was 1 per 117 innings so Dickey's expected PB goes up to about 7. So, the following options:

29 expected WP + 7 expected PB = 36 = 18 WP + 18 PB
23 expected WP + 7 expected PB = 30 < 36 ... approximately 2 runs
29 expected WP + 7 expected PB = 36 > 18 WP + 6 expected non-Dickey PB ... also 30>24 ... 2 to 4 runs in Thole's favor

Like I said, I doubt WAR is doing the last one but I wouldn't be surprised if it's doing one of the first two (or somewhere in between). Anyway, I don't see how to get this plus his throwing to add up to more than 5 runs in the negative which would still be brought back to average by his bunt and game-calling runs.

And for what it's worth, the Mets led the league in PB (thanks to Dickey games) but had the 4th fewest WP. The Giants were tied for the fewest PB (5) but were 6th in WP. Combining the two, the Mets had 72 to the Giants 59. That difference is Dickey.

Ahh, crap, I've written too much to go back now. I suppose the run value of WP/PB must be a bit higher than .3 -- I was thinking of just one runner advancing but obviously some come with 2 or 3 runners on base. Call it .5 and recalculate on your own.

Definitive evidence that Walt is, in fact, HAL 9000 with instant access to every fact ever recorded

That f'ing fact took me a good 10 + minutes tolling through box scores via Dickey's game log. I really should learn retrosheet.