Seems like a lot for the Yanks to give up for a one-to-one swap, although Effross has been legitimately very good this year.

Still, not at all unlikely that Wesneski is the more valuable player for the remainder of this season, if the Cubs call him up.

better than usual setup man departs, better than usual prospect arrives.

interesting.

Effross should help if he can be as effective as he was as a Cub. Zack Britton is getting close to facing live batters, and might also strengthen the bullpen in time for the playoffs.

I think the Yankees' analysis is: regardless of whether Wesneski is valuable to a second tier franchise (like the Cubs) operating at lower payroll/expectations, for the Yankees he'll never be more than a 5th starter and his stuff doesn't translate well to the bullpen, so it makes sense to turn him into an asset that would be valuable on a good Yankees team.

Put differently, in a year where Wesneski would be an important part of the team, the Yankees would be rebuilding.

Seems like a lot for the Yanks to give up for a one-to-one swap, although Effross has been legitimately very good this year.

Maybe. Effross has 5 years of control left. He could turn into a pumpkin tomorrow, Wesneski might end up with a career ERA over 5 in 92 innings. MLB.com has slotted Wesneski in at #8 on the Cubs list (really #7 given Davis's injury).

But it's certainly an unusual trade -- teams like the Cubs aren't usually flipping guys with 5 years of control left; teams like the Yanks are usually acquiring proven veteran relievers. Would anybody have batted an eye if it had been Wesneski for David Robertson? This is (likely) a better trade for the Yanks than that one would have been. (I'm not sure anybody but us nerds are batting our eyes at this one.)

I like the deal on many levels, but the main one is the wear and tear on the Yankees' bullpen that's been caused by their increasingly unreliable starting pitching. Their yearlong rotation of Cole, Montgomery, Taillon, Cortes and Severino have posted sub-50 Game Scores in 11 of their last 25 starts, which is a huge dropoff from prior to that. And Severino's replacement (Germán) has put up a 28 and a 51 since Severino went on the IL. So AFAIC the more bullpen arms, the better, because without a deep and completely reliable bullpen these starters aren't going to take the Yankees very far in October.

The whole "years of control" thing has really gotten fetishistic when we're applying it to someone like Effross. He's a 28yo rookie short reliever who won't even ever get a real shot at closing, since his stuff is not typical closer stuff - there's almost certainly no big payday coming his way in free agency all those years from now, and he can keep pitching like he's been pitching and even the potential arb awards won't be huge. Whether he has 2 months or 2 years or 5 years before free agency is of only the most marginal concern in any reasonable practical sense.

And besides, Wesneski has zero service time, so he's got all his years of control left too. Granted, he's not an established MLBer like Effross ... but then again, even Effross only has a grand total of 58 IP in the majors to his name.

Yankees have now reportedly acquired Frankie Montas & Lou Trivino from the A’s. No word yet on what they gave up.

Everything you said about Effross is true of Wesneski as well. Wesneski will probably never be as useful as Effross has already been. I'll grant years of control aren't that big of a deal for a guy like Effross but they're still an advantage -- you have him, he's not going anywhere unless you want him to go somewhere and, in this case, he's essentially free for the next two years. And if Effross's performance is at all indicative of his future, then guys like that will cost you $6-10 M on the FA market so the low-cost options is hardly ignorable. The Yanks have spent over $40 M on their pen this year, most of it wasted. I have little doubt that Effross's service time and cheapness were a key selling point for the Yanks.

And of course Wesneski has all his service time -- not only is that not news it's the whole reason that the trade is unusual. You don't see many trades anymore where both guys have lots of control left. It's a good old-fashioned challenge trade, albeit a low-level one.

Details on the Frankie Montas trade:

The Yankees are acquiring Frankie Montas and Lou Trivino from the Athletics, per Jack Curry of YES Network. In exchange, the Athletics will receive pitchers JP Sears, Ken Waldichuk and Luis Medina, as well as second baseman Cooper Bowman, also from Curry.

That’s quite a bit to give up, and probably leaves the Yankees without enough bits & pieces for a Soto trade. With all the movement today, it’s beginning to look like lots of teams are no longer in the Soto hunt.

Let's see: Sears looks useful
Waldichuck is older than I'd like, but he's been good.
Medina looks like he doesn't know where his fastball is going
Bowman is speedy but probably organizational filler

Eh, they got some prospects. Given that Bean is involved, I'm worried, but they'll probably get some major league years out of these guys. Given what the Reds got for Castillo, I'd have expected to see Volpe headlining this one.

That’s quite a bit to give up, and probably leaves the Yankees without enough bits & pieces for a Soto trade.

Yankees were never going to get Soto. No team is going to pay Cole, Stanton, Judge, AND Soto.

Waldichuk is a very good prospect, but not without risk - his AA/AAA BB rates are right on the edge of where they become a problem for a starter making the transition to MLB, especially without overwhelming stuff. I like him a lot but he's not a sure thing.

Sears is a valuable MLB reliever right now.

Everything you said about Effross is true of Wesneski as well.

??? What's one thing that I said about Effross that is also true of Wesneski? He's not 28, he's not a short reliever, he doesn't have soft-tossing stuff. If Wesneski is successful in the majors, he'll become expensive fast (being a starter), and will command a big contract when he reaches free agency if it comes to that. The two situations aren't the same at all.

Wesneski will probably never be as useful as Effross has already been.

I don't think that's true. As good as Effross has been, he's put up a grand total of 0.6 bWAR over two partial seasons for the Cubs, which seems like a low bar for a starter who's already had AAA success to clear. Obviously there's no guarantees and there's a lot of room for Wesneski to fail - but the word "probably" there seems like an overbid.

Or maybe not an overbid so much as just overrating Effross, which is ultimately what I think the Yankees are doing here. This is a trade straight out of the pre-Moneyball 1980s - contending team sees a bright shiny bauble and trades some relatively promising minor leaguer to get him, because, hey, who cares about minor leaguers? 20 years ago, we all knew these kinds of trades were dumb. Hell, one of them got Ed Lynch fired.

But Effross just ain't done much yet - this is, after all, a guy who didn't even break into AAA until last year when he was 27. And it's no cinch he would have done it in the lost 2020 season either, given how wretchedly awful he was in 2019 in AA. And yeah, yeah ... I know he changed his delivery, but none of us would have been surprised if he'd stayed with the Cubs and flamed out by the end of the year as the league adjusted to him. He's been great, but he has virtually no track record, either.

....his stuff is not typical closer stuff

how does that work exactly? The rules of baseball don't change in the ninth inn.

MLB.com has slotted Wesneski in at #8 on the Cubs list (really #7 given Davis's injury).

That's an oversell of the impact of Davis's injury, IMO. It sounded bad at first, but now they're saying he's expected to play again this year. FWIW, KLaw just put out his top 60 prospects and while Davis fell a little (from 27-38, IIRC), he's still on there. I think you'd have to really think Davis isn't gonna play again soon to move him out of the top 3 of Cubs prospects (which MLB.com still has him at #1; a number of other places have already moved PCA ahead of him).

Or maybe not an overbid so much as just overrating Effross, which is ultimately what I think the Yankees are doing here. This is a trade straight out of the pre-Moneyball 1980s - contending team sees a bright shiny bauble and trades some relatively promising minor leaguer to get him, because, hey, who cares about minor leaguers? 20 years ago, we all knew these kinds of trades were dumb. Hell, one of them got Ed Lynch fired.

Yes the Yankees have a history of operating this way - its a shame they continue to make foolish mistakes. Maybe one day they can get decent management and become consistent winners.

??? What's one thing that I said about Effross that is also true of Wesneski?

Everything in the following except his age. The whole "years of control" thing has really gotten fetishistic when we're applying it to someone like Effross. He's a 28yo rookie short reliever who won't even ever get a real shot at closing, since his stuff is not typical closer stuff - there's almost certainly no big payday coming his way in free agency all those years from now, and he can keep pitching like he's been pitching and even the potential arb awards won't be huge. Whether he has 2 months or 2 years or 5 years before free agency is of only the most marginal concern in any reasonable practical sense.

Wesneski's most likely outcome is to toss a few innings in a bullpen sometime on the AAAA shuttle. He's a starter for now -- much like half the relievers in MLB. Even if he comes up as a starter, his most likely outcome is to stink. All of this assuming he doesn't get hurt along the way. As such his "years of control" don't matter, he'll likely be a short reliever in short order, there's almost certainly no big payday coming his way. But sure, if he turns into Marcus Stroman then he'll make real money.

One of the frustrating things about prospect lists. MLB's writeup on Wesneski sounds great -- low 90s sinker, high 90s 4-seam, improving deceptive slider that generates swings and misses, pounds the strike zone. But they put him #8 in a Cubs system that has 4 in the top 100 (mostly lower down) so he's probably around the lower end of the top 200. Whoop de doo.

Perhaps time for a reminder.

Of the players who debuted in 2012, 36 of them have reached the 8 WAR mark. Most of that value would have been during their control period, roughly speaking producing 2-3 years at an average level and a bit here and there in their other seasons. By the time we get to #60 we're at 5 WAR. So on average a team will debut 2 guys a year who hit the 5 WAR mark. Those aren't necessarily (maybe not even usually) their top 2 prospects when the year started because those top prospects will often still be just 19-20. But they're probably in the top 10; probably only a small percentage of them were ever not in their team's top 15-20.

There doesn't seem to be anything particularly unusual about 2012. In 2007, 32 players made it to 8+ WAR and #60 was just under 3; in 2002 it was 34 at 8+ but #60 was just 2.2 WAR. To the extent that has gotten "better" over time, it may just be a function of the greater reliance on younger players (WAR has to go somewhere) although that is counter-acted by fewer innings for starters and fewer qualified batter seasons.

So 5 WAR would be a good outcome for Wesneski; 8 WAR would be excellent. Both of those numbers will probably top Effross's career WAR. I'm happy to be wrong but I'm pretty confident Wesneski's most likely outcome is less than Effross's career WAR -- therefore his years of control don't matter, his future earnings will be trivial. As we all know, you gather guys like Kilian, Wicks, Wesneski, Franklin, Steele, etc. not so much because you think each of them is gonna produce but to give yourself more tickets in the raffle.

Also a repeat of something I pointed out the other day ... even Luis Castillo's first 2 arb years cost just $11.5 M and that's a guy who hasn't missed a start with a 125 ERA+; Cole's first 2 arb years were $10.5. Matthew Boyd would be a very good outcome for Wesniski and he's at about $15 for all three years with a non-tender last year. Dylan Bundy would be a good outcome and his control years totalled $18 M (I think on a buyout). Jakob Junis would be a good outcome but he got hurt at the wrong time so he's made just $3.5 M in his first 2 arb years. Obviously we could go on like this for a long time -- even if Wesneski has a good maybe even excellent outcome, we're not talking about a lot of money. (Granted, Effross is a long way from making even that kind of money.)

Look, I have zero problem with this trade. The Cubs traded a guy with a bit of ML success that could go pop tommorrow (with an optimistic upside of Steve Cishek) for a guy with no ML experience but is 4 years younger and has a reasonable chance of out-producing the other guy going forward and presumably has a higher upside. Most likely this is a trade nobody will have any reason to remember 5 years from now ... but sure, if it is remembered, it will most likely be for "can you believe the Cubs got Wesneski for some reliever I've never heard of? that's why you never trade SPs for RPs..."

I enjoyed that analysis, Walt. A simple question that hopefully is easy to answer:

out of a teams top 10 prospects, how many do we expect to make the majors? same for top 20. thanks

I would imagine if you can control for what is known already about Effross that it would paint a rosier picture for him

60 above average innings tend to beget more above average innings

For the Cubs an even-up trade makes sense if it pushes the value a season later.

For the Cubs an even-up trade makes sense if it pushes the value a season later.

Yes, and also if it increases volatility. Right now the Cubs would rather have a guy with a 30% chance of a 10 WAR career, than a guy with a 100% chance of a 3 WAR career.