Revisiting the Kevin Stocker/Bobby Abreu Trade
by R.J. Anderson on Jul 13, 2009 3:35 PM EDT
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It's the all-star break, we have until Friday to cover any loose analytical ties, but for a moment let's step back to 1997 and talk about potentially the worst trade in franchise history.
What we knew then...
Bobby Abreu, we barely knew you.
After taking the young corner outfielder with the sixth pick in the expansion draft, Chuck LaMar and the Devil Rays have traded him to the Phillies for shortstop Kevin Stocker. Reportedly a strong defender, Stocker has hit .247/.326/.337 over the last three years, and turns 28 before the start of next season. Stocker's offense is really, really poor. He walks, strikes out a bit more than you would expect, doesn't hit for power, and doesn't really hit for average despite decent BABIP. In other words, he's awful.
American League average last season was .271/.340/.428, it's hard to see Stocker coming anywhere near that.
Meanwhile, Bobby Abreu turns 24 before the season starts, and in ~230 plate appearances in the majors has hit .248/.325/.362. Sure, he plays a less demanding position, but he's younger and in 1,300 plate appearances at Triple-A hit .288/.382/.468, mostly as a 21 and 22-year old. He's a corner outfielder with no chance of playing center and yet he still has more upside than Stocker ever has.
Abreu has shown more willingness to take a walk than Stocker ever has. The power in his bat is evident and scouting reports peg him as having a strong arm in right. Is he better than Mike Kelly right now? Maybe. Kelly had a good season last year (.293/.338/.543) in 150 plate appearances; of course in his previous 300 his line was .213/.285/.373. 28 in June, Kelly seems like a player living off his draft status and his middle name (Raymond).
The player the D-Rays sent to Cincy for Kelly has been named, and it's Dmitri Young. Another young outfielder,
Young has 410 plate appearances in the majors and has hit .257/.337/.354. Young also has an OPS over .900 in the International League, so we'll see, but this seems like trading potential for mediocrity.
Most expansion teams don't compete in year one, to think the Devil Rays will be any different is star-wishing. Later in the draft the D-Rays took Aaron Ledesma. I'm not sure how well his leather plays at short, and his bat isn't great either, but look at his last three seasons in Triple-A:
1995 - .299/.335/.368
1996 - .305/.360/.391
1997 - .325/.388/.439
Nothing moon-shattering, still though, he turns 27 next June and is he really that much worse than Kevin Stocker? Even if Ledesma is an absolute butcher and Stocker is Ozzie Smith, I'm not sure the difference on this particular teams warrants yielding a young, potentially good, corner outfielder for a below average shortstop.
Neither of these trades looks all too appealing, but we'll see.
What we know now...
Chuck LaMar's right to make personnel decisions should've been stripped immediately. Trading young hitters with solid track records for old hitters with no history of being effective based on position doesn't seem like a good idea. This is well before we had readily available defensive metrics, so even if the Rays scouts thought Stocker was a really good defender, he would have to make up a ton of ground to be equal to Abreu. He never did.
You have to appreciate that LaMar may have understood that shortstops are more valuable than right fielders and that defense matters. Unfortunately he ignored total value. Trades for Stocker and Kelly were motivated by a "win-now" philosophy. Why? Beats me, I guess "be better than the Cleveland Spiders" isn't a lofty goal, but trying to compete in the American League East in your first try is an insurmountable battle.
When it comes to these trades, LaMar had the vision of a bat in an echo chamber.
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AH, the good ole days
thanks for the reminder of where we came from. Nice to see some progression, even if it came under differetn management.
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I might do a post on this one too.
So…stupid.
by R.J. Anderson on Jul 13, 2009 3:58 PM EDT up reply actions
Seems like we're forgetting a trade here
It’s the all-star break, we have until Friday to cover any loose analytical ties, but for a moment let’s step back to 1998 and talk about potentially the worst trade in franchise history.
Methinks there may have been a trade this offseason that enters into the discussion?
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by Top Gun Numba 1 on Jul 13, 2009 4:01 PM EDT reply actions
Well if we're revisiting the worst trades in francise history, lets be complete
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by Top Gun Numba 1 on Jul 13, 2009 4:03 PM EDT up reply actions
"What we knew then"
Makes it a pretty good trade.
by R.J. Anderson on Jul 13, 2009 4:03 PM EDT up reply actions
The Abreu/Stocker deal has 10+ years to draw on.
Jackson/Joyce has 1/2 of a year.
Sign lady must die.
by EminenceFront on Jul 13, 2009 4:04 PM EDT up reply actions
I think he means Hammel.
Joyce is a good player.
by R.J. Anderson on Jul 13, 2009 4:05 PM EDT up reply actions
Both were awful
The rotation is in shambles and yet the two pitchers we rid ourselves of have been putting up Cy Young calibre numbers
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by Top Gun Numba 1 on Jul 13, 2009 4:05 PM EDT up reply actions
The Abreu/Stocker deal has 10+ years to draw on.
Hammel/Rodriguez has 1/2 of a year
Sign lady must die.
by EminenceFront on Jul 13, 2009 4:06 PM EDT up reply actions
Why do we have to wait 10 years to determine the trades were terrible?
It’s not like we needed that long for Abreu/Stocker
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by Top Gun Numba 1 on Jul 13, 2009 4:07 PM EDT up reply actions
We needed more than 1/2 a season.
Sign lady must die.
by EminenceFront on Jul 13, 2009 4:07 PM EDT up reply actions
I don't think so.
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by Top Gun Numba 1 on Jul 13, 2009 4:08 PM EDT up reply actions
Hammel's had a great year for Colorado
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by Top Gun Numba 1 on Jul 13, 2009 4:08 PM EDT up reply actions
Away from Coors Jason Hammel is 4-2 with a 1.97 era.
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by Top Gun Numba 1 on Jul 13, 2009 4:13 PM EDT up reply actions
I'm with you
just didn’t know if you were joking or not.
I wanted to keep the Hammel Camel over another reliever. Most likely Joe Nelson. Just thought that he is much more valuable
Kap-rilla???
Agreed
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by Top Gun Numba 1 on Jul 13, 2009 4:19 PM EDT up reply actions
It would've been over Cormier. Not Nelson.
And nobody wanted that.
by R.J. Anderson on Jul 13, 2009 4:21 PM EDT up reply actions
Hammel and Cormier would make a great 1 2 punch in long relief, meaning we'd never need Nelson
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by Top Gun Numba 1 on Jul 13, 2009 4:22 PM EDT up reply actions
He makes too much money.
Sign lady must die.
by EminenceFront on Jul 13, 2009 4:24 PM EDT up reply actions
Who takes too much money, what?
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by Top Gun Numba 1 on Jul 13, 2009 4:25 PM EDT up reply actions
We pay Nelson too much to cut him for an unproven Hammel.
Sign lady must die.
by EminenceFront on Jul 13, 2009 4:26 PM EDT up reply actions
Nelson proved that he could be an above average major league reliever
if it was in a small sample size. Look, I liked Hammel, but saying Hammel is great without giving Aneury Rodriguez any time to make a case and by analyzing 1/2 a season to this point as opposed to a career of mediocrity is naive
We could have traded him for a prospect
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by Top Gun Numba 1 on Jul 13, 2009 4:26 PM EDT up reply actions
I would imagine that we would eat his salary anyways.
Sign lady must die.
by EminenceFront on Jul 13, 2009 4:28 PM EDT up reply actions
Not if we found the right deal
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by Top Gun Numba 1 on Jul 13, 2009 4:29 PM EDT up reply actions
Who would want an older reliever with his full salary for high-upside prospects?
This isn’t MLB2k9. You can’t pick your trades like that.
Sign lady must die.
by EminenceFront on Jul 13, 2009 4:32 PM EDT up reply actions
We'd have to balance out the trade with one of the Gabes, but isn't that the reason we dealt for Joyce?
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by Top Gun Numba 1 on Jul 13, 2009 4:33 PM EDT up reply actions
Who would want a Gabe and Nelson?
Nobody. That would be a terrible trade.
Sign lady must die.
by EminenceFront on Jul 13, 2009 4:38 PM EDT up reply actions
Kapler has shown ability to hit lefty pitching
Gross is good defensively.
Package Joyce for all I care, maybe he can finally contribute something
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by Top Gun Numba 1 on Jul 13, 2009 4:39 PM EDT up reply actions
This is not a reasoned argument.
Sign lady must die.
by EminenceFront on Jul 13, 2009 4:50 PM EDT up reply actions
How so? Hammel has shown more value than any of those players
There are plenty of dumb GMs out there that Friedman can hornswaggle
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by Top Gun Numba 1 on Jul 13, 2009 4:50 PM EDT up reply actions
None would take Nelson, Kapler, and Joyce for "prospects"
That’s just silly.
If you assume Friedman can hornswaggle them, why don’t you understand his logic in the hammel trade?
Sign lady must die.
by EminenceFront on Jul 13, 2009 4:53 PM EDT up reply actions
Just because he can doesn't mean he does
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by Top Gun Numba 1 on Jul 13, 2009 4:54 PM EDT up reply actions
Hammel has shown more value than Gross? when? in this 1/2 season where Gross has been getting inconsistent playing time?
for a time he wasnt even playing against righties while Hammel has a good 90 IP under his belt (or about 45% of a season’s worth), Gross has gotten 190 PA (or about 30% of a season’s worth). Sure, Gross may not be able to hit lefties, but play him every day and you still get a 2.5 win player (if not better). Sorry If I’m not sold on Hammel being able to do that.
Weren’t you the one citing Hammel’s ERA, Wins, and Losses? They aren’t even any good in his case, so what are you basing this argument off of (obviously the 3.75 FIP, but just thought I’d throw that out there).
It didn't have to be
no reason you can’t keep 2 guys who can throw multiple innings plus Hammel could spot start in a pinch
Kap-rilla???
Well in hindsight it doesn't have to be.
Then, it did have to be.
This really isn’t hard to grasp.
by R.J. Anderson on Jul 13, 2009 4:24 PM EDT up reply actions
And long relievers are usually the worst pitchers on the team.
by R.J. Anderson on Jul 13, 2009 4:25 PM EDT up reply actions
Not in this case. Howell started in the pen as a long reliever, did he not?
YOUR BOYFRIEND????
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by Top Gun Numba 1 on Jul 13, 2009 4:25 PM EDT up reply actions
You mad because YOUR BOYFRIEND was terrible yesterday
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by Top Gun Numba 1 on Jul 13, 2009 4:27 PM EDT up reply actions
JP Howell has like 30 dicks, he doesn't care
Brad Ziegler had a scoreless inning streak. Brad Ziegler had not met BJ Upton.
So he's a character from one of the cartoons you watch?
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by Top Gun Numba 1 on Jul 13, 2009 4:28 PM EDT up reply actions 1 recs
He was also hurt before he came here.
When he was healthy, despite being rushed, he was pretty freaking fantastic.
Tools Whore
And by "pinch" you could mean Kazmir imploding, Sonny being horrible or Price not being MLB ready
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by Top Gun Numba 1 on Jul 13, 2009 4:25 PM EDT up reply actions
You know, we've never been to the playoffs with Jackson or Hammel on the playoff roster.
History is against Detroit and Colorado.
by R.J. Anderson on Jul 13, 2009 4:09 PM EDT up reply actions
you have got to be kidding
1/2 a season worth of data to go on for that trade right now. Bobby Abreu was really really good (better than Edwin Jackson no doubt) and no matter how you spin it Sonny is/was better than Kevin Stoker by a mile. Also, I think context played just a bit of a role in trading Edwin and it made much more sense than trading Abreu (again, in context). I’m sorry, but not even close
Ooh! Make it sooner!
I loves me some Carlos Bombs… Car-Bombs? Car-blos?
Gross for an everyday position! (no offense, Kapler)
JalaPENA poppers?
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by Top Gun Numba 1 on Jul 13, 2009 4:14 PM EDT up reply actions
HomeLOS problem?
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by Top Gun Numba 1 on Jul 13, 2009 4:15 PM EDT up reply actions
CARLOSito's way HOME TO RUN THERE HOME RUN
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by Top Gun Numba 1 on Jul 13, 2009 4:15 PM EDT up reply actions
DINGERS! SOCK SOME DINGERS!
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by Top Gun Numba 1 on Jul 13, 2009 4:16 PM EDT up reply actions
C-Pain: In luv wit a tripper
Brad Ziegler had a scoreless inning streak. Brad Ziegler had not met BJ Upton.
Thank God we made those trades
for a couple more wins back then we could easily not have the players/ownership we have now
Kap-rilla???
Split G GS PA AB R H 2B 3B HR RBI SB CS BB SO BA OBP SLG OPS TB GDP HBP SH SF IBB ROE BAbip tOPS+ sOPS+
Abreu: 1st Half 80 76 317 268 34 83 22 3 6 37 11 6 45 71 .310 .408 .481 .889 129 5 0 3 1 6 2 .401 96 136
Stocker: 1st Half 75 75 273 241 28 53 7 3 6 20 2 3 17 62 .220 .288 .349 .637 84 6 7 6 2 1 1 .269 114 69
Sign lady must die.
Fuck IE8.
Grr. It just shit that out for some reason.
Sign lady must die.
by EminenceFront on Jul 13, 2009 4:21 PM EDT up reply actions
That's not IE8, this site just gobbles up crazy whitespace in posts like a diabetic kid on a sugar rush.
I can't wait until we trade him for a reliever.
Holy crap, in only half the year you can tell it was a bad trade
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by Top Gun Numba 1 on Jul 13, 2009 4:21 PM EDT up reply actions
I never said it wasn't a bad trade.
I just don’t think you can judge trades in one season. Was this one bad from the start, yes. But will it be with Jackson, I don’t believe so. Besides, pitchers are so much more unpredictable than hitters. Jackson could melt down next year so easy.
Sign lady must die.
by EminenceFront on Jul 13, 2009 4:24 PM EDT up reply actions
Jackson is only getting better. This year will probably just be his first in CY contention
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by Top Gun Numba 1 on Jul 13, 2009 4:26 PM EDT up reply actions
Plus, Joyce hasn't even shown the ability to stick at a big league level yet
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by Top Gun Numba 1 on Jul 13, 2009 4:29 PM EDT up reply actions
I just hope he is a significant improvement over Gross
All signs point that he should be, but you never know.
Kap-rilla???
Did you not get the memo that Gabe Gross is good?
what is the fascination with calling him average on this site? He has a career 18.5 UZR/150 in right field and an average bat (and its about 10 runs above average against righties). I’m failing to see the averageness.
Labotomies are illegal… shame that memo went unnoticed as well
Gross is an average player
When he plays he is above average, but since he cannot play vs lefties that makes him around average. He is horrible vs lefties. When judging the overall skills of a player you have to look at their overall skills. You can’t pick and choose. Gross is a platoon player, and in that context he is a great fit. But this is like saying Ben Francisco is better than Babe Ruth if he only faced Andy Sonnanstine.
the point was that he is 18 runs above average if he plays every day defensively, and even if he plays against every single lefty and every single righty I dont see evidence that says his wOBA would be below .330
and I consider a player with a .345+ wOBA and approximatley 12 runs defensively over a full season in a platoon where he faces only righties better than average (even if he doesn’t get all the playing time benefits).
Regardless, playing against both righties and lefties his wOBA would be in the low .330s (dead average) and his defense would be nearly 2 wins above (I think at least 1 win above is fair to say after the positional disadvantage is thrown in). So if he is average with the bat, 1 win above when defense and position are considered, and has playing time benefits, that makes him above average…
I fail to remember where I mention Gabe Gross' skill level in my post
and hopefully we didn’t trade Edwin Jackson for the hope that Matt Joyce turns out to be as good as Gabe Gross. My point was that Gabe Gross is a solid platoon player and that if Matt Joyce doesn’t exceed that then what exactly where we trading for
Kap-rilla???
I'm sure they hope Joyce is better than Gross
But it’s five years of Joyce vs. three years of Jackson. That’s without including the Sonnanstine and Niemann part of the deal. There just was a whole lot more to the deal then comparing Jackson vs. Joyce.
That said, you can’t compare Jackson vs. Joyce after one year. The reason Joyce is in AAA isn’t because he can’t stick, it makes more sense in the long run for him to eat time in AAA vs. burn service time in the bigs when he probably wouldn’t outproduce Gross/Kapler by a large enough margin.
I'm just wondering when he will be able to outproduce our RF platoon by a significant enough margin
to justify trading an above average pitcher for him.
Kap-rilla???
Edwin wasn't above average at the time...
And the platoon can’t last forever. Again, considering the other factors surrounding the trade it wasn’t that terrible. I wouldn’t make the same trade today, but it still isn’t that awful. I don’t think the Rays expected to benefit from the trade this year anyhow.
I think the main point is that our talent evaluators and/or coaches screwed up with Ejax and Hammel
I’m sure Friedman got the most that he could. However, it isn’t just some major coincidence that those players somehow got significantly better in a year. There was no doubt a breakdown within our organization.
The jumps those players made were not random. Our org failed to see it. I didn’t expect them to know Ejax would become a Cy Young contender in 2009, but christ they should have seen something.
If our coaching, scouting, FO, etc did a better job then perhaps we could have gotten a better return for those players.
What do you think Ejax and Hammel are worth now?
The last line is a great point
I know one of the major questions asked about trading Ejax in the offseason was: Are we selling at the high point? Many on this board said yes some said No. Obviously we didn’t sell at the high point.
And if you don’t think Edwin would have succeeded here as he is in Detroit. I think you really need to take a look at our coaches *Cough(Hickey)
Kap-rilla???
To be frank, I went back through the thread about the trade and saw only two people who actually expressed disagreement on the trade.
One guy doesn’t post here anymore, the other is raysfaninminnesota. There were a good handful of people who have more or less said that they don’t like the trade anymore. Anybody who is saying that they never liked the trade and doesn’t meet those conditions either didn’t say anything here when it happened, or is a damn liar.
I can't wait until we trade him for a reliever.
How can you expect a member of the public to be able to forecast something that the FO was unable to?
The organization failed somewhere. If a member of the public is able to see that and then forecast how a player would perform without that failure then that poster needs to be hired by a MLB team.
I think this is where the disconnect is. I think everyone is okay with the trade if Edwin and Hammel pitch like they did in 2008. The thing is they are pitching substantially better than they did in 2008. It has cost us tons of value.
So Why? What changed? Why and how did the Rays miss it?
Those are questions that need to be answered. I know many here don’t like to talk about it, but I can virtually guarantee the FO is going through it. It is a mistake that they cannot afford to make again.
I'm not expecting people to forecast whether a trade is good or not.
I expect people to be honest. I expect someone who said last year "this is a good trade’ who is now saying ‘this trade is stupid’ to at some point in the middle have said ’I’ve changed my mind; I missed something, this isn’t a good trade.’ You did that, a lot of people have as well.
I can't wait until we trade him for a reliever.
There were many threads that touched on that topic before and after the actual trade
Brickhaus kind of sums exactly how I feel about this deal now except he knew it the day of the trade
Other than the age
It’s not like Gross is 35 or something though. Unless Joyce has some unforeseen improvement, we’re going to have two different corner outfielders who:
- Are left-handed
- Play good but not great defense
- Have low batting averages
- Take a fair number of walks
- Have averagish speed
- Have good power for a centerfielder but mediocre power for a corner outfielder
- Can’t hit lefty pitching
I still don’t see the real upgrade to next year’s team, other than saving about a half million because we can just nontender Gross. And it’s a massive waste of roster space to have two of this kind of player on the same roster if they don’t.
Kap-rilla???
This leads to my biggest Monday Morning GMing opinion
We should have gotten Jason Bay. That would have allowed us to keep Edwin. Then just imagine how good our offense and pitching staff would be. Plug Brignac is far more expendable with Bartlett emerging. Who knows what would have happened in the playoffs last year too. That trade is certainly a big ‘what if’ moment in Rays history.
We did try to get Bay though
there was some funny business that happened in the final moments. I still think we got cheated
Kap-rilla???
I know
I think based on what we know now that we would have thrown in another piece.
you never know what would have happened though
The Red Sox could have still had Manny and maybe the Rays never make it to the series at all. Too many hypotheticals to go down that road.
Kap-rilla???
Considering we made it the World Series, I'm not really upset about it.
It was a crap shoot, and we caught the bad breaks – bad weather, and the Jaime Moyer strike zone.
Right now we'd probably have to offer Jennings + Brignac to get Ejax back
I wouldn’t be shocked to see him win the Cy Young. In fact he may be the favorite if I had to handicap the race. Halladay will be traded, most likely to the NL. Beckett and King Felix will put up awesome numbers. However Edwin leading the Tigers to the ALC crown may put him over the top.
(I wouldn’t make that trade, but rather am saying that is what his value is on the market now. A Cy Young contending young pitcher throwing gas is pretty tough to come by)
He isn't this good
My work on eK and eBB shows him outperforming what he should be doing. He isn’t a Cy Young caliber pitcher year in and year out. This year will probably be his career year. However I’d be shocked to see him go to “terrible”. I’d say over the next 5 years he will be slightly below Shields level, and above Garzas.
Even if he's at Garza level for the next 3-4 years, I don't begrudge the trade.
Was it a bad trade? Yes, but the FO really doesn’t deserve to much criticism for it. He’d basically been Daniel Cabrera over the last few years. Sometimes these guys click, sometimes they don’t – might as well get some value for them if you can replace them.
The big problem is Kazmir’s implosion. If he’d been pitching up to his capabilities, the Edwin conversation would be more,“Well, man, it’d be great if he was a fifth starter, but whatever!” instead of,“Oh my god, we’ve made a horrible mistake!”
Well it all comes down to why Edwin and to a lesser extend Hammel suddenly got so much better. They need to find out where the organization failed so they won’t make the same mistake again.
And Edwin would be the 2nd best pitcher on our staff
Until Price got it going and then he’d be third. I’d be shocked if Garza or Kazmir are better over the next 5 years.
Of course whatever held Edwin back may be holding Garza back.
Holding back might be a bit strong.
Edwin was a 4.8 FIP + guy with us.
Garza’s been a 4.1 FIP +. Yeah, they’re both in the 4 range, but Garza’s performance has been much closer to good than Edwin’s had been.
*had been*
Right now I doubt any team would take trade Edwin for Garza straight up ignoring any contract situation.
Edwin is simply a better pitcher right now.
Perhaps Garza makes a similar jump and becomes a elite pitcher. Who knows.
It all comes back to why Edwin suddenly got so much better.
No Grienke?
He has to be the favorite. He started the year with a ton of press, is leading the league in ERA, has 10 wins already (three over Edwin), and is top-5 in Ks.
Jackson’s up there, but I’d bet on Grienke or Felix at this point.
He was actually my pre-season Cy Young pick
However he has been trending down, and his K’s are way up and his BBs are way down given what their expected rates should be. He is going to fall back a fair amount.
Are u working on something with these #s?
I’m at least curious how the Rays stack up vs xK and xBB
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Yeah; I've been busy the past couple days though
I think I’m on a pretty good path. Although I’m not sure if I’m going to post status updates here. I think I may see what more mathematically inclined folks think of it and to make sure everything holds. Then I may send it over to a more sabemetrically focused site rather than a team blog.
For sure
I’ll definitely post my findings on how it relates to the Rays. I’ll just leave the heavy duty math stuff to the people that are more interested in that stuff.
Is this the one where you asked for community help?
might be a good idea to throw some cred to those who helped out. Maybe I’m thinking of a different piece.
Make sure you post it here too, I’d say most of the guys here (newbs like me included) are interested in the math of it all. Just because I don’t post on it doesn’t mean i’m not interested
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I was disappointed not to get your take on the Catchers post I did yesterday
I know there are sample size issues, but do you see that as strong enough to indicate a trend with the scale in question or just a SSS mirage?
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I found that post extremely interesting
Thanks for putting the time in to research it. I don’t think some of the authors get enough credit for the work and research they put in to this site. So thanks to you and all the other posters
Kap-rilla???
I actually haven't had time to really look at it
I was busy at work moreso than usual and I haven’t had much free time. I’ll look at it tonight.
I'm saying his numbers won't be the best in the league
They’ll be extremely good, but not where they are now. Factor in he won’t be getting the wins on the Royals and I doubt he will win the Cy Young. Jackson won’t even finish with better underlying stats, but he will have far more wins on a division winning team.
Remember I’m talking about winning the Cy Young; not who the better pitcher is.
Yeah
I’m not saying Edwin is the best pitcher in the AL. And I’m definitely not saying he can duplicate this year over year. However I do think he has a very strong case for AL Cy Young this year. I wouldn’t be shocked at all. Of course as we all know best pitcher doesn’t equal Cy Young quite a bit of the time.
Actually what I've seen so far has been pretty interesting...
Basically what I’ve gotten so far is pretty intuitive. What was interesting was that balls were taken out of the equation. I’m sure it is partially because the cumulative of the other variables is essentially all “strikes” so balls are indirectly related. Either way I’m trying to think of a way to factor in something like first pitch strikes; although I’m afraid it may cause that overlap issue again.
Besides being able to finetune FIP I’d like to be able to get to the point where I can say “Pitcher X should throw more changeups because it will cause changes in X,Y,Z which would result in an increase of X amount of strikeouts”
I was furious about the Stocker trade at the time
and agree it was a warning bell for Rays fans.
But the trade that convinced me that administration was clueless was the McGriff trade. Despite his age, Fred remained a productive player and was off to another good start. The Cubs were desperate for left handed power. LaMar was already known to be a very difficult trading partner, demanding far more than players were worth, and usually hanging onto them far too long rather than getting some value back.
But this time he gave McGriff away for a terrible pitcher and terrible infielder, neither of whom had ever shown any skills to suggest they would be useful major leaguers. It was squandering your most valuable resource.
It was possible to argue a case for the Abreu deal (not really, but with a lot of straining you could make it sound rational) or the Young for Kelly deal. But the McGriff deal was without a shred of sense.
Oh, and can we please get past the Jackson/Joyce deal.
It is more than irritating now; it is plain stupid to keep rehashing it.
As of this minute, it has turned out badly for the Rays. Jackson has been more valuable to the Tigers than Joyce has been to the Rays. We don’t know that he would have had equivalent success here, but he might have of course. Nonetheless, at the time it was made, it made perfect sense for all the reasons mentioned over and over again. And for the future we remain uncertain. But to continue to harp on it smacks of a nasty disposition to stick out one’s tongue and bleat “yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah yeah”. We aren’t all 12 year olds.
The motto of this website is "progressive statistical analysis and reasoned argument."
This is a reasoned argument. People debate the true author of Shakespeare’s plays ad nauseum. People debate the intent of scripture all the time.
Debate is, of itself, a sport. Ejax / Joyce is simply another avenue for those debates.
And it’s physically impossible to bleat with your tongue out.
Type Strong
Let's work together to combat Terminal Rocco Disease.
by Top Gun Numba 1 on Jul 13, 2009 4:35 PM EDT up reply actions
It's obviously Marlowe
Type Strong
Let's work together to combat Terminal Rocco Disease.
by Top Gun Numba 1 on Jul 13, 2009 4:51 PM EDT up reply actions
heh?
Type Strong
Let's work together to combat Terminal Rocco Disease.
by Top Gun Numba 1 on Jul 13, 2009 10:52 PM EDT up reply actions
We've debated the Jackson/Joyce trade with the same frequency as a Shakespere play.
Frankly, I’ll be rolling in my grave if 100 years from now they’re still talking about this trade. Edwin Jackson is not Babe Ruth. Never will be either. Can we please just let this thing rest, at least for a little while?
I can't wait until we trade him for a reliever.
Just realize it's a joke and smile. That's what everyone else does.
I can't wait until we trade him for a reliever.
Malarkey.
It is not reasoned argument. It is purely an effort to repeat “I told you so” as loudly and obnoxiously as possible. And since there is nothing to the “I told you so” it is doubly irritating, like the kid in the back seat who knows his humming irritates his younger brother so he keeps doing it.
Please don't use that language
Type Strong
Let's work together to combat Terminal Rocco Disease.
by Top Gun Numba 1 on Jul 13, 2009 10:53 PM EDT up reply actions
Poor RJ, posts a fun thread on Stocker/Abreu and it quickly turns
to Jackson/Joyce, and I had nothing to do with it
There is a God
I hate how this gets turned on the Rays...
And the Josh Hamilton deal also gets turned against the Rays. It can’t go both ways. Either blame the Astros for Abreu and the Rays for Hamilton or blame the Cubs for Hamilton and Rays for Abreu.
Was the Abreu deal not just a draft and trade? Would the Rays have drafted him if not for the Phillies interest?
Yes, it was a pre-arranged deal.
Apparently the Rays wanted what they saw as an established player with a great glove — thus Kevin Stocker. I guess they saw him as Jason Bartlett, if Bartlett were signed to a 3-year, $7.5mil contract (what’s that in today’s money?). I have no idea if Stocker’s defense was actually good enough to justify the move.
As for blame, teams could only protect 15 players in the expansion draft and the Astros had prospects such as Freddy Garcia, Carlos Guillen and BA top-20 prospect Richard Hidalgo (oops) in addition to a playoff caliber roster (Kile, Hampton, Killer B’s, Billy Wagner, etc). I don’t know if their thought process was all that unreasonable; just as leaving a seemingly broken down struggling prospect available for Rule 5 where, if selected, he would have to remain on the major league roster doesn’t seem unreasonable.
Pointless supposed factoid: according to Gammons, both the Rays and D-Backs passed over unprotected Jason Varitek and Paul LoDuca in the 1997 expansion draft
Here is something interesting
Here is an evaluation of the Rays’ expansion draft in 1997, from BP’s Christina Kahrl: Link Here
Kahrl already notices a lot of tendencies we will see in the future: favoring familiar players, established players, players who will supposedly draw local interest and overvaluing easily obtained talent. Kahrl also questions the strength of Stocker’s glove, which was his only possible positive. If his glove wasn’t good, there was no reason to ever take him and then give him a guaranteed three-year contract. Oh well.
That was a good read...
Seemed like a lot of things worked out exactly as she said they would.
Interesting to see the ties with the Marlins and Braves. Of course the Saunders situation could not have been predicted, but he I remember Suppan being the heavy favorite for #1.
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