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Out of context, this is way too much in prospects to pay for James Shields. In context, it still doesn't make sense.
Agreed. The Rays just reload again. Very impressive to watch them work. Wish my team was as shrewd in it's decision making at this point in time.
If I squint I can see the Royals winning 85 games with a rotation of Shields, Guthrie, Santana, Davis and Chen, if Hosmer becomes good, and all their starting players play up to their talent. They do get to play the Indians and Twins a lot. The bullpen seems OK. They still gave up more than they got in my opinion, but if Moore was going to be fired after 2013 if they didn't win, they really didn't give him a better option than to trade the farm for guys who can pitch now.
If I'm the fans I blame Glass for playing it half-way -- not extending Moore now, nor firing him now.
EDIT: Coke to Ivan for the 85 wins.
-James Shields is under contract this year for $9M with a $12M option for 2014.
-James Shields is 31 years old.
-Since becoming a regular at age 25, Shields has averaged 220 IP with a 108 ERA+, good for about 2.5 WAR per season
-For reasons I'm not 100% clear on, fWAR likes Shields a lot more than bWAR, despite little overall discrepancy between his ERA and FIP. fWAR has Shields worth an average of just under 4 WAR per season since 2007.
I mostly agree with this. But perhaps the Royals see Hosmer and Moustakas taking major steps forward, Escobar and Butler improving a bit and Perez giving them what he did last year but for a full season. That's optimistic, but given the pedigrees of their players, I don't think it's crazily optimistic.
I mostly don't know what to make of this trade though. Shields is very good, but he's not great, and he's only signed for 2 more seasons. Myers is an excellent prospect, but the Ks scare me a bit, and I can't write off 2011 entirely, even knowing of the wrist injury. The other players in the deal look mostly like window dressing, though I suspect Odorizzi is the most valuable of the lot. Ultimately, I think the edge has to go to the good team trading from surplus over the bad team trading to fill a need and a desire for the GM to save his job.
Rany's take.
Alfonso Soriano is available.
But I guess he wanted an ace to save his job, and not value for his incredible valuable property.
They're not old and expensive enough on short term contracts for Moore to give up prospects for.
I'm thinking the exact same thing with regards to the Reds and Mat Latos. I like Latos, and he had a nice season last year. However, this is an outstanding package of players, and I would definitely consider trading Latos for them.
But Matt Garza is. We'd have thrown in SPJ or Feldman or Baker or Wood or $10 M.
Well, it's depressingly possible that "we" does not include Theo and Jed.
It'd at least be interesting if they were in on Josh Hamilton.
For the Rays. Davis would have been the Royals third or fourth best starter last year. (Not that it makes it a good deal.)
I agree. But the Royals starters though were so bad this year that he's actually an upgrade. Luke Hochevar gave them 32 starts of 5.73 ERA/71 ERA+ and -1.7 WAR. They had only 2 starters with more than 1 WAR, same number as 2011 (I'll say that 0.9 is close enough). Davis is a fungible player for sure (however on a non-fungible contract), in a vacuum isn't the worst move for the Royals, who apparently have a hard time developing and acquiring fourth starters. But of course this didn't happen in a vacuum.
Not that I'm defending this trade for the Royals. I can't believe that Friedman had the balls to turn down Shields for Myers and ask for more and actually hold the line until getting this haul though. Major props to him for that, because I think most GMs would've taken a far less favorable deal rather than risking Moore walking away over the additional guys.
How do the Rays reinvest the payroll they cleared here? Between Shields and Davis they've freed up about $12M from this year's payroll and ~$17M for 2014. Do they turn around and make an offer to Youkilis to fill their hole at 1B/DH? That's the real kicker - after winning this trade straight up on talent, the Rays are also going to use this newfound payroll flexibility to fill a hole or two on offense.
I don't know anything about the Royals prospects so I can't really pass judgment on the trade. But I don't think there's anything wrong with the 2013 Royals trying to add a good veteran starter - what are they supposed to wait for before they're allowed to do something like that? If the price was too high, that would be true regardless of what kind of shot the Royals have at the 2013 playoffs.
If I'm a Royals fan, tho', I'm not keen on the deal. . . .
bWAR adjusts for the quality of team defense, and presumably the very good defensive squads the Rays have had the last several seasons are causing a large adjustment on Shields's WAR numbers here.
I wouldn't count on it. They've got Santana, Guthrie, Shields, Davis and Chen under contract too. Also Mendoza (their best starter in 2012), Duffy, Mazarro, Paulino, Will Smith -- some of whom have been hurt I know but still depth. Tendering Hochevar was as stupid as it gets but I don't see them eating salary to keep him in the rotation over Chen (who gets $4.5). Assuming nobody wants Hochevar or Chen, it's surely past time to find out if Hochevar is one of those guys who will make a decent reliever.
This sure looks like an extremely dumb move. Time to eliminate the process!
Would you give up one of the top prospects in baseball for a good but not great 31 year old on a two year contract? Especially when you are not a contender? It's not like they got, say, Madison Bumgarner or Cliff Lee.
Heh, Shields' 5th best similarity score is... Ervin Santana.
But is it the age that matter in this question? I would be equally happy to trade for a good but not great 31 year old on a two year contract, a good but not great 25 year old on a two year contract, a good but not great 37 year old on a two year contract...
(for pitchers, anyway)
Coming off a non-fluke 72 win season and with no other major overhauls, you'd give up a top prospect for a 37 year old?
If you're going to trade your best prospect and a top five guy overall, might as well trade for the actual Cy Young winner and get him to sign an extension.
My point is merely that I think the emphasis on the Royals' record and on Shields' age is misplaced. There's nothing wrong with the Royals acquiring a veteran starter, and nothing wrong with them trading young talent to do so. Shields is not so old that you would worry about him falling apart any time soon (and he has shown no signs of doing so), and the Royals are very well placed to make big leaps in the near future. They can't wait until they win 85 games before they go into contender mode.
That doesn't mean I think it's a good trade - just that Shields' age or the Royals' success cycle stage wouldn't really enter into my judgment of it.
I would have been happier to see them traded to a team closer to contention though, I doubt the Royals are making the playoffs (and may well fail to have a winning record) so they aren't going into an ideal situation. At least it's a crap division with no dominant team.
Lee to the Phils with 1.5 years on his contract brought back crap
Greinke, one year removed from his awesomeness, 2 years on his contract brought back Escobar, Cain and Odorizzi
1 year of Halladay and $6 M brought back 3 pretty good prospects, one of whom might turn out OK :-)
2+ years of a fragile Peavy brought back Clayton Richard and not much more
3 years of Haren brought back a ton of guys of whom the A's traded away the best one :-)
4 cost-controlled years of Latos brought back Alonso (meh) and Grandal (he could be something pretty special)
Did I forget any "big" pitchers traded recently with 1+ years?
I can see an argument that Shields is close enough to Greinke and Latos (but 4 years!) to be equal but generally (given years, cost, quality) he'd be at the bottom of this heap but Myers & Odorizzi is probably second only to the Halladay return. Odorizzi was top 100 in both 2011 and 12 (BA) ... and with over 9 K/9 and good control I wonder if he's under-rated but I ain't no prospect hound.
Why? I know they signed Hunter which will hopefully fill one of their gaping holes. OK, the return of VMart and a full season of Infante (not great but an improvement) ... I guess I can see it if they're mostly healthy.
Generally teams don't like to do what the Royals just did with Myers given the current financially realities. Sure guys like Miguel Cabrera and Matt Kemp are big talents and bring huge value to their teams, but you have to pay for them accordingly. But with a Mike Trout you get three years of him at league min, and then a few more at a good discount. And maybe that waiting time is enough to get him to sign a favorable long term deal ala Longoria.
And so when teams have a prospect who seems pretty close to a sure thing to have some decent MLB value, teams lately have treated them as close to untouchable; IE they're pretty much the last guys on the roster where it would make any financial sense to move them.
3 years of Garza brought back Lee, Archer, Fuld, Chirinos, and Guyer.
I guess this is the difinitive answer to the question: "Do you keep a crummy GM who builds a good farm system?" Answer: No, because when he feels his job is in jeopardy, the farm system will be out the window.
I hate, hate, hate, hate, hate this trade.
But that's the thing - Shields and Davis both cost real money, and there was just an article written on how the Royals profess to be in the red if their payroll exceeds $70M. I know some people are calling BS on that claim, and are happy to see the team spend more money with the new national TV contracts about to kick in. But even if you set all of that aside, the fact remains that no projection system is going to forecast them for anything better than about 10% playoff odds this year, and in making this deal, the team has hurt its playoff chances three to six years from now, when they presumably would have been better positioned to attempt to contend. It really seems like a bad move.
One other thing I find interesting here is the language Moore used.
If you ask me, it doesn't sound like even Moore believes that this team is really good enough to contend for the playoffs this year!
I'd be pissed if I was a Royals fan too, but I don't see this as an obviously awful trade by any stretch.
http://www.minorleagueball.com/2012/12/9/3749448/royals-trade-farm-system-for-31-year-old-pitcher
So you trade him to someone who overvalues him. You don't trade him for 60% of James Shields.
*shrug*
There is the Marlins trade. Though I suppose there have to be Marlins fans in the future for it to live on in infamy among them.
Jay Bruce is an interesting comp for Myers - they are both high-K hitters who put up some slash lines in the high minors that would make any prospect-hound drool (Myers arguably flashed even more power than Bruce) - but you know what, Jay Bruce is pretty damn good. Since 2010: .262/.340/.493, 120 OPS+ and 30 HR a year on the nose. Maybe not an MVP, but that's a hitter that would look good in anyone's lineup. I'd put that guy behind Butler and Gordon and call it a win.
As Sickels mentioned, it's clear the Royals believe they are selling high on Myers. Wil Myer's minor league numbers certainly suggest that, although he could be a great player, he also might only be an OK player. They clearly believe his upside is Mike Marshall (the outfielder) and not Jeff Bagwell. :D
But maybe the best part is how this is the culmination of a disaster that unfolded before us in slow motion. The Royals have been telegraphing their intention to trade Myers for weeks and all anyone could do was sit back and say "No, they aren't serious, are they?" We will be talking about this trade for years, and I'm certain what we'll be saying is that the Royals foolishly decided to short-circuit a long rebuilding process that was finally beginning to bear fruit for miniscule short-term gains. Because these are the Royals, I still can't decide if this is farce or tragedy.
Just in case anyone else was thinking of looking it up, this is apparently true. He's called Luis Mendoza - I would not have guessed that I'd have never heard of anyone who was the best starter on an MLB team in 2012, but here we are.
A triple post, but this actually reminds me more of the Adam Jones and Chris Tillman for Erik Bedard trade than anything else, in that you have one team overpaying in prospects for an "ace" because they've wildly misjudged how competitive their team is likely to be - except this is maybe even more likely to backfire.
It's possible Myers flames out and this becomes Jeremy Giambi part 2, but there's no way James Shields puts the Royals over the top and into playoff contention.
2) I see the logic of this trade from the Royals POV, though I don't agree with it. They had a ton of young players in the lineup last year who were not great, but not complete wipeouts, either (OPS+ of between 80 and 98 for their four starters under the age of 25). Butler was excellent, and Gordon looked very good. They must believe the young hitters will improve this year, as a group. They believe Butler and Gordon will conitnue to hit well. Dyson and Frenchy don't get it done, but if they replaced them with a couple of gloves with league-average bats, you might have something. It was the starting pitching that was pretty dreadful, and Shields - and even Davis - are a pretty big upgrade over what they put out there most of last year. I dont think it is going to work, but I understand what they might be thinking...
I don't think thats why you are seeing the large discrepancy. I think it's simply all the UER Shields has given up, which gives him a highish RA9, which is what bWAR uses, not ERA. He has been well into double digits 3 of the last 4 years, allowing 12,11,5,& 14.
The year he allowed just 5 UER he had over 4 bWAR.
(There's also the fact that the Royals have spent over $30M on pitching this offseason while giving away their best 2013 RF. They couldn't have spent that money on pitchers while not giving away their best 2013 RF?)
And Rany, if you're reading this, now is the time. The Fire Dayton and Glass Must Go armies are assembled and are only waiting for a leader. It is your destiny.
So, if this kind of move makes Anibal Sanchez and/or Josh Hamilton interested in making KC their home for a few years, it will be a better move than it would seem in isolation.
That said, if that's what it must take for the transaction to make sense, it's a bad transaction.
We don't know if McCarthy would have signed the same contract with Kansas City that he did with Arizona, and he's not exactly dependable to go 180 innings or whatever Shields can do. We also don't know how much Jackson or Anibal Sanchez will cost, or whether they'd make the Royals pay more for them than a team they thought was a contender. If they had waited for Sanchez or Jackson they might have not gotten either for anything short of 6/$110M or something. If Jackson comes at a reasonable price the Royals can still sign him. It's even possible that signing him became easier now that Shields is on the team.
Clearly the Royals think so, but I don't. Myers could easily be as good as Shields right now.
Hamilton to the Royals would be astounding.
No... not really. There's no possible PTBNL that could make this anything but a maelstrom of catastrophic stupidity for the Royals. If I were a Royals fan yesterday I would be an ex-Royals fan today. Hell, I'm vicariously infuriated just because of my sympathy for Rany and other Royals fans I like and respect. But my sympathy for them ends here. If they choose to keep supporting a team that's determined to kick them in the balls and laugh, it's on them now.
Odorizzi has an excellent chance to contribute more to a MLB team than Davis does right now, and he is under control (as is Myers) for six years.
Getting Montgomery as a "what the hell, we may be able to fix him" is an added bonus.
I assume what is TBA going to Kansas City isn't significant, as it's either a player or cash.
I had always thought the OOTP AI trading algorithm was based off of Dayton Moore brain scans - but I just tried this deal as the Rays and the Royals (run as the AI) responded with a "That's not a fair deal, I guess we don't have anything to talk about".
Maybe I'm not patched up-to-date...
Sure, it's still a dumb trade. Just maybe slightly less dumb, depending on who the PTBNL is.
To be fair to Dayton - and I think he is a disaster as a GM - I can't really point to any disaster trades before this one. The Melky Cabrera trade blew up in his face, but I don't think even the internet stat nerds thought it was a bad trade at the time - Melky had one year left on his deal, seemed to be coming off a flukey season, and Sanchez had the ability to strike guys out.
He just sucks hard in roster construction, in understanding the market, in understanding replacement level talent, and in relying too heavily on "homegrown" players.
This. I'm just floored Odorizzi was included.
Right. Assuming Wil is even a 1 WAR player his rookie season, that's a 3 win improvement in RF alone. Take out Hochevar and replace him with say Joe Blanton who can be a 1.5 WAR pitcher, and that's a 3 WAR improvement for roughly the same salary.
People complain that David Glass doesn't spend money, but its pretty clear that Dayton will take whatever money he gets and fritter it away like a junkie handed a $100 bill.
Otherwise, you get crap trades like this.
The Royals are a better team right now, if they put Myers in RF, and sign Edwin Jackson or somebody similar with the Shield/Davis money.
I don't know, but Moore should find out. He'd be an upgrade in RF for KC.
The key to this trade might be Davis and Odorizzi. One of those guys could end up being pretty valuable and change the equation, esp. Odorizzi. This trade could look horrible in a couple years if he pans out.
As far as the success cycle thing goes, I think it's overstated. You just never know when a group of players might gel or another team in the division might fall apart, and a GM should generally try to put the best team on the field on the assumption that the playoffs are a possibility, especially when you have a young, talented team. Bad teams make sudden leaps forward all the time: Tigers in 2006, Rays in 2008, Reds in 2010, Orioles in 2012, etc. The point isn't that they won X games last year and the addition of players A and B might get them to Y wins, it's that adding a player like Shields will help a team capitalize on the opportunity if the younger players take a step forward. Of course, giving up Myers is a steep price to pay, but I can see where Moore is coming from.
I don't think a Myers for Shields trade is that bad, but I'd guess it would be the Rays throwing in a few prospects to even it up. Giving away two more pitchers is not winning the trade.
I think starting Myers in RF in 2013 would add more immediate value to KC than what Shields brings over the guy he's replacing. Especially if you spend the $10M Shields is making on a SP.
OK, shower needed.
I think the key to this deal is that pitchers like Anibal Sanchez or Edwin Jackson won't sign with the Royals. They can't buy #2 starters, so they have to pay for them in talent.
FWIW, there are rumors the Royals think there is a huge hole in his swing and he can't handle sliders. But as suggested earlier, that doesn't mean you just trade him to the first team that comes along. With how offense-starved Seattle was, you'd think they might overpay for Myers.
Overpay. Jackson always struggle to get a multi-year deal; he took 1/11 from WAS last year. Offer him 4/50.
The Pirates overpaid last year, and he turned them down (3/30 according to reports). Maybe he really wants to play for a contender. The Royals are not contenders.
But they should have at least tried. There were no reports the Royals were at all interested in EJax.
I mean heck, why not offer Dempster that third year he was looking for?
I won't defend the decision to play Francoeur, but I agree that there's a good chance that Myers won't help the team over the next couple years. He isn't Trout or Harper, and it's likely that it will take him 1000 PAs to adjust to ML pitching (and that's assuming he does eventually become a quality player).
Right, which is why I think Odorizzi is the wild card here. If he turns into an averagish SP in the next couple years this trade will be a disaster for the Royals.
LAA 95-67
DET 91-71
TEX 88-74
OAK 88-74
TBR 86-76
TOR 86-76
NYY 85-77
BOS 84-78
KCR 84-78
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