Twins - Acquired Castillo
Minnesota Twins - Acquired 2B Luis Castillo from the Florida Marlins for P Scott Tyler and P Travis Bowyer.
For a nice change of pace, Terry Ryan didn’t sit on his hands watching everybody make moves. This is an excellent trade for the Twins as they fill one of the biggest holes on the team without giving up anyone they value all that highly. Tyler’s not the level of prospect that Scott Baker or Francisco Liriano are and the Twins have a bunch of other decent mid-level arms with upside. Castillo will be quite popular in the Twin Cities after 2006, barring injury. He’s nowhere near as good as Carew was with the Twins, but after some of the middle infielders the Twins have trotted out, it’ll seem like he is.
This was more of a pure dump for the Marlins than the last trades. For Delgado and Beckett, the Marlins got prime prospects. Castillo’s a very good player as well, but they didn’t get nearly as much for him. I have no idea what the Marlins are going to do now at 2nd. They could rush Andino to the majors like Hanley and put the former at 2nd. Or they could play Josh Wilson, who won’t be good. Or stick Amezaga there or something.
2006 ZiPS Projection - Luis Castillo
————————————————————————————-
AB R H 2B 3B HR RBI BB SO SB BA OBP SLG
————————————————————————————-
532 94 171 15 5 4 58 73 57 15 .321 .401 .391
2006 ZiPS Projection - Travis Bowyer
———————————————————————-
W L G GS IP H ER HR BB SO ERA
———————————————————————-
4 4 56 0 79 63 34 8 43 96 3.87
Dan Szymborski
Posted: December 02, 2005 at 08:32 PM |
56 comment(s)
Login to Bookmark
Related News:
Reader Comments and Retorts
Go to end of page
Statements posted here are those of our readers and do not represent the BaseballThinkFactory. Names are provided by the poster and are not verified. We ask that posters follow our submission policy. Please report any inappropriate comments.
1. stealfirstbase Posted: December 02, 2005 at 08:58 PM (#1757113)There's no reason to dump such a reasonable salaried player this far out before spring training starts. If this was the best deal on the table, then Florida should have waited a few months to see if an injury to another team's expected 2B created a more competitive market.
Castillo fell off big-time after the All-Star break last year (.335 OBP, .684 OPS) and the Marlins were not happy with his attitude, from what I understand. At 30, and perhaps losing a step or three, he's no longer the value he once was. This seems to be a reasonable return to me.
So, does this mean Nick Punto or some other sad sack is going to take the starting SS job away from Bartlett?
What has Bartlett done to deserve having the SS job handed to him? Outside of a week-long hot streak at the end of August, he's struggled to hit major league pitching, and he had plenty of opportunities to do so after his recall from AAA, playing virtually every day thereafter. Bartlett has to earn the job, at this point.
-- MWE
1920's recent enough for you? can babe ruth play SS?
If he comes even close to that .401 OBP projection, then the Twins are getting a legitimate (OBP, not just fast) leadoff hitter and plugging two holes - the one at second and the non-Mauer OBP black hole that is the Twins lineup. For this, they give up a couple unproven arms that aren't even their best prospects.
This is a great deal. Even if Castillo only has one year left on his contract (right?), then they likely can get Type A compensation if he signs elsewhere.
The Marlins have reportedly traded Luis Castillo to the Twins for pitchers Travis Bowyer and Scott Tyler.
The Twins will pick up the $5 million owed to him in 2006 and either $5.75 million in 2007 or a $500,000 buyout. If the Marlins really had four teams interested, it's disappointing they couldn't do better than this. Bowyer is quite a relief prospect, but he's still a relief prospect. Tyler wasn't one of the Twins' top young arms. Dec. 2 - 1:41 pm et
Source: ESPN.com
Bartlett very well may be as bad as those players, but he's earned the right to get more than 224 at-bats to prove he isn't.
Signed through '06 with a team option for '07.
I forgot to mention that Castillo also had injury problems last year - knee and hamstrings.
One other quick thing - I took a look at his bb-ref comps, and they include guys like Dave Cash, Willie Randolph, Steve Sax, and Delino Deshields. Randolph is probably the closest match to the "type" of player that Castillo is (although Cash is a better comp statistically, according to bb-ref) and he did manage to keep it going after age 30, but most of the others fell off a cliff shortly after turning 30.
-- MWE
Joe Dillon and Hanley Ramirez will probably be the front-runners for 2B and SS, respectively, with Josh Wilson as the stopgap in case one of them isn't ready. Dillon may be 30 next year, but damn if those aren't some nice numbers in AAA, even adjusting for his age and the PCL's reputation as a hitter's paradise.
Yeah, but it's not considered his best spot (third is).
Looks like the second coming of Greg Brock.
not only that, they will succeed in trading pierre and loduca.
It may be Miami, but the sky's going to be a hazy shade of winter . . . all summer long. They will be by far the worst team in the NL in 2006, and may just challenge the 2004 Diamondbacks for worst NL team of the decade.
Maybe by 2008 they'll have the glimmerings of a rebound. By which time they'll be all set to lose Willis as a FA, and just a year from losing Cabrera.
And once they dump those two and then Villone, they are poised to enter 2006 with a payroll in the neighborhood of $15M. Yes, that FIFTEEN million. With the impending departures of Pierre, Lo Duca, and Villone, there will (momentarily) not be anyone on the roster even into their arb years except for Dontrelle.
Does anyone here think that the Marlins have a shot at more than about 70 wins or so?
No. I think any result that doesn't have them losing 100 games would be an accomplishment, although Dontrelle and Cabrera are two players of the caliber that don't usually populate awful clubs.
Using post-ASB stats as the sole means of projecting the following year's performance? Been reading a little too much John Benson circa 1991, huh?
And it should be noted that the only FA that they're seriously targetting is Jeff Conine, to whom they recently offered $1M for one year (he made $3M in 2005). Assuming the trio you mentioned gets traded, it's quite possible that he'll be the highest paid player on the team! That's just plain sad.
Thanks to b-r's transaction pages, I'm surprised to learn that the dismantling of the 97 Marlins didn't bring in nearly the talent that I thought (or that talent didn't pay off). The only two important players they got were Derrek Lee (Kevin Brown trade) and AJ Burnett (Leiter trade). Meanwhile, none of the players they got for Moises Alou, Robb Nen, Jeff Conine, and Devon White ever paid off. Out of all of Bobby Bo, Gary Sheffield, Charles Johnson and Jim Eisenreich, they ended up with Preston Wilson and a little Todd Zeile (with Piazza bouncing from LA to the Mets). Zeile was traded later that season for more players who never paid off. After the 98 season, they traded Renteria and the best player they got out of that was Braden Looper (although at least all 3 made the majors).
In 99 they started getting it right, sending some prospects to the Yanks (yes, in those long-ago days, the Yanks sometimes traded for prospects) to get Mike Lowell (then still a prospect).
Lee and Burnett are nothing to sneeze at, but they gave up an awful lot of talent. And contrary to the storyline, the 1997 fire sale did not bring in much of the talent on the 2003 team.
The Marlins also had a great transaction that offseason. On March 21, they received Eric Owens from the Reds for a PTBNL. On March 26, they sent the Reds Jesus Martinez, the only player they had received in the Devon White trade in November. On March 25, before completing the deal, they sold Eric Owens to the Brewers. They traded Devon White for whatever cash they got from the Brewers for Eric Owens (for the Brewers sake, I hope it wasn't much).
And before you make some Devon White crack -- count the rings baby! After counting the rings, feel free to make your crack.
Still, Castillo only needs to hold it together for 1-2 seasons (ages 30-31). That's not risking a whole lot. (I thought I read elsewhere on Primer that Castillo's option vested based on PAs or something).
Castillo fell off big-time after the All-Star break last year (.335 OBP, .684 OPS)
He also hit .331/.427/.406 in the first half. He's too young to have dropped off a cliff. He's still a good player.
The Mets could have given the Marlins more than that for him.
Why? Is he going to drop off a cliff the following season?
jeff kent didn't drop off after age 30
- and i bet this team costs less than the devil rays and the attendence is less than the 04 expos
and loria is gonna try to get the city of miami/state of florida to finance THAT?????
or maybe they just gonna contract
the players union guys better get ready to fight cuz i have this feeling that bud smells blood in the water
Park-adjusted Marcel projections.
Apparently, the Marlins agreed not to offer him arbitration at the end of the contract, so forget that.
(I thought I read elsewhere on Primer that Castillo's option vested based on PAs or something).
There's multiple PA combos over the three years of the deal that trigger the vesting option. 501 PA's in '06 would reach the first one (1150 in 2004 (649) and 2006) and vest the option at 5.75M in '07.
Never diss Devo. He was the greatest pure flychaser I ever saw. When he was with Toronto, if he couldn't get to a flyball...nobody could.
Yeah, he struck out too much and had a noodle of an arm but damn....
Thank you Devo....we couldn't have done it without you.
Best Regards
John
Unfortunately i don't really think they do. I really wish they did, hes a helluva story and it seems like he could be a good utility guy/PH if given the chance. He was felled by back problems, was out of the game for a few years, was a volunteer asst. coach at his alma mater (Texas Tech) and then decided to give it one last shot and managed to nab the starting job at 3b in 04 for the Marlins AA team, the carolina mudcats, bttchslapped the Southern League and then kept hitting in AAA. And then did the same this year. Hes been played at 3b,2b,lf,rf and 1b and supposedly isn't as bad an athlete as youd expect a 30 yo 3b w back problems to be. Maybe he's just another dime-a-dozen decent player who knows how to use the Albequere park (Lord knows there've been many-remeber PHIL HIATT hitting like 50 HRs there?) but unlike a lot of those guys he has some defensive versalitliy. Deserves a shot, i'll be rooting for him
This is before the silly-ball era remember.
Plus that "D" in CF.
It explains why I have such fond memories of the man.
Best Regards
John
And let's make clear that I'm not claiming they all fall off a cliff either. Morgan aged fantastically and was a very valuable player throughout his career, just substantially less valuable than he had been. Biggio has aged well and remains a good player (and yeah, I was ready to stick a fork in him after 2002).
I don't mean this as a shocking statement of course. Most players who make it that far experience a noticeable decline in their early 30s. But it does seem fewer 2B than you would expect manage to make it through that age.
Now here's a shocking statement: Luis Castillo is gonna go all Bert Campaneris on the AL this year! Balls are gonna be bouncing off the baggie at an alarming rate. :-)
Best Regards
John
I believe it was Mike E. who briefly mentioned second baseman who experienced an offensive downturn soon after passing their 30th birthday. And more specifically, second baseman similar to Luis Castillo. (Get on base speedy singles hitters)
Jeff Kent and Luis Castillo play the same position on the baseball field. Other than that they couldn't be more different.
Returning to Mike's comment a good many "slap hitters" seem to drive off the career cliff in their early 30's. One would think that somebody who is just swiping at the ball could retain that skill later than the average. But merely by observation that does not appear to be the case. Something to ponder.
I wonder if Luis will suffer any "culture shock"? Minnesota is pleasant enough, but it ain't Miami.
Castillo does seem to struggle with the hard stuff while batting lefty. Maybe a move to the AL with unfamiliar pitchers will work to his advantage.
Indeed. I can confirm that Kent is officially in fact a little more country, while Castillo is a little more rock-n-roll.
Okay, but I also imagine that most slap hitters are heavily reliant on their speed and, by extension, their ability to beat out groundballs.
It's called "regression to the mean."
Love ZIPS generally, but what's with the K-rate projections for pitching prospects? This is the third trade we have seen this winter where you have projected a prospect to have a K/9 of 9 or higher. Are you sure your MLEs are working as well as they could?
Yes. Part of what you're seeing is that the Marlins have acquired guys who strike out a lot of batters and part of it is park - Pro Player is a tremendous strikeout park. Whereas most teams have parks with 3-year K rates between 95 and 105, the Marlins' 3-year weighted factor (I use 2,3,5 instead of 1,2,3) is 118.
Also, a K an inning is far less unusual than it used to be, especially for relievers (I only have 10 pitchers with more than 75 IP in the minors last year with a K/9 MLE of 9 or better).
Just to illustrate, look at 2004. Of pitchers that debuted that year, there were 42 that have pitched 50 innings in the majors now. 4 of them had K rates above 9. When you take into account the park factors, you end up with 9 of 42. Generally an unimpressive list, too - Frank Francisco, Mike Wuertz, Scott Dohman, Akinori Otsuka, Heath Bell, Scott Kazmir, Matt Thornton, Robert Novoa, and Greg Aquino.
Taking out the Japanese guys, those 40 pitchers have a K rate of 6.49. Their last MLEs of 50 innings or more gave them a K rate of 6.68.
Castillo has a couple of advantages which suggest (to me at least) that he has a better chance of remaining reasonably productive over the next couple years than your average slap hitter. First, he walks a good bit so even if his average drops to 270, he'll probably still reach base at a 340-350 pace. Without the walks, there'd be a real danger he'd turn into Womack. And he's a 2B, one of the weaker hitting positions on the field, so even 350/330 isn't so bad as long as it's accompanied by good defense and baserunning.
Are the park factors for strikeouts published anywhere (if so, where) or do you calculate them yourself? If you had a link, that would be great. If not, which are the other standout parks (presumably Coors on the low side but any surprises).
Unfortunately, I was with him on post 45.
A park factor thread wouldn't be a bad idea.
And how severe are or were Castillo's leg problems?
You must be Registered and Logged In to post comments.
<< Back to main