Archive for Teams

The headline isn’t the way the Marlins would put it. It’s not the only way to interpret Wednesday’s trade — it’s just one way to do so. The Dodgers, who’ve been in the market for rotation help, convinced the Marlins to sell them Mat Latos. The price for Los Angeles: accepting, along with Latos, Michael Morse. To soften that blow, the Marlins have thrown in a competitive-balance draft pick, to be made after the end of the first round. Now, technically, the Dodgers are sending the Marlins three minor-league pitchers. So it’s not a pure sale, and we don’t know who those players are, so maybe a conclusion shouldn’t be jumped to, but this one feels pretty safe. Those pitchers are presumably the equivalent of nothing. They won’t be as valuable as the player that draft pick turns into. The Marlins sold an asset at the deadline, and they’re the ones effectively losing the best prospect.

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The market has moved forward as we approach the trading deadline, but its shape is still difficult to make out, especially in terms of hitters. We have seen the mega-deal, with franchise cornerstone Troy Tulowitzki moving from the Colorado Rockies to the Toronto Blue Jays. We have seen the rental, with Ben Zobrist helping the already strong Kansas City Royals. There appear to be solid outfielders remaining on the market, including Justin Upton, Yoenis Cespedes, and Gerardo Parra all available as rentals. Even so, it still looks to be a sellers’ market on the hitting side. The Cincinnati Reds and Colorado Rockies are in a decent position to move two hitters, neither of whom are rentals nor franchise cornerstones. Jay Bruce and Carlos Gonzalez are remarkably similar players and both could provide a jolt of offense for a team needing help this season and in the future.

Both Bruce and Gonzalez were called up to majors in 2008, and while Gonzalez has played some center field, both are good-hitting corner outfielders. Both are left-handed hitters with platoon splits that make them just good enough to hit everyday. Both have contracts lasting potentially through 2017, with Bruce carrying a reasonable $13 million team option in 2017 after a $12.5 million salary in 2016 and Gonzalez owed $37 million over the next two years. In addition to being cheaper, Bruce is also slightly younger, at 28, compared to the 29-year-old Gonzalez. In Gonzalez’s favor is slightly better production over the course of their respective careers. Their career lines are below.

Even factoring in Coors Field, Gonzalez has been the better hitter than Bruce, who plays in a decent hitters’ park himself. The pair have both been adequate on defense while losing some overall value due to the negative positional adjustment produced by a corner-outfield spot. Gonzalez has been the better runner, as well, but Bruce has closed the gap in overall value by staying healthy and recording nearly 1,000 more plate appearances than Gonzalez. They have accumulated their WAR in a very similar manner, though, both breaking out in 2010 and having very good years in 2013 before experiencing major struggles last season. Their cumulative WAR chart below is remarkable for the singular progression between the two players.

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If you look at the movement charts on Drew Hutchison’s slider, it seems obvious: the Blue Jays’ righty starter had more drop late last year, when he was going well. This year, the pitch is harder and firmer, and he’s not going well. So he’s missing that slider he had, right?

Well, maybe not. We had Craig Edwards point out that Hutch might actually need his best fastball to succeed. And then we have the pitcher himself telling us that no, he hasn’t done anything to change his slider. “Every time I throw my slider I try to get good depth on it,” he told me before a game with the Athletics this week.

But the pitcher said this just moments before he admitted to using the slider differently. Which might actually have something to do with his struggles this year. Funny how that works.

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The New York Mets have been one of the more active teams leading up to the trade deadline, trading for Juan Uribe, Kelly Johnson, and Tyler Clippard, but the Troy Tulowitzki–Jose Reyes/Jeff Hoffman trade between the Toronto Blue Jays and Colorado Rockies has raised questions about the moves New York hasn’t made. The Mets are in contention and are making moves in attempt to better their team. That’s true. But when a player (in Tulowitzki) after whom the Mets, or at least their fans, have been pining for is moved for a decent, but not colossal package, and the other big-name player in the trade (in Reyes) was once a fan favorite and requires only a two-year commitment after 2015 — and would immediately be one of the best position players on the Mets if added to the team — a question is asked.

The question: where were the Mets?

The snarky answer: counting their money.

The more technically accurate answer: paying down owners’ debts.

The Tulowitzki trade might not be the best example of lost opportunities for the Mets, as the Rockies were at least paying lip-service to Tulowitzki’s request not to be traded to New York. Unfortunately for Mets fans, however, their other transactions indicate that the snark-filled answer is not that far from the truth. In both Mets trades, the club negotiated for a portion of the remaining salaries to be paid by the Atlanta Braves and even the perpetually cash-strapped Oakland Athletics.

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Among the bright spots for the Nationals this year has been the emergence of Drew Storen. Already an effective reliever, Storen tweaked his breaking ball and became something of a strikeout machine. Instead of sitting down two of every 10 batters, Storen has bumped that up to three out of 10, succeeding as the closer for a first-place but somehow still disappointing team. As a reward for his step forward, the Nationals have demoted Storen out of the closer role, agreeing to pick up Jonathan Papelbon and everything that comes with him.

For a straight swap, this one’s a little complicated. The Nationals needed to convince Papelbon to come, and there was the matter of his $13-million vesting option. The option was almost sure to vest, but the Nationals opted to guarantee it for $11 million. That gives Papelbon some certainty, yet he’s also been given other certainty: the right to close, down the stretch. Technically, I suppose, the Nationals could go back on their word. And if Papelbon struggles, well, the Nationals would be stupid to leave him there. But this is without question the interesting thing. A team with a closer added a closer.

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Our depth charts haven’t updated to show the details of the trade just yet, and those feed the projections, which feed the playoff odds. And the Royals have the second-best playoff odds in baseball right now at 97.4%.

Soon they will update to reflect that the Royals just went and got the available bat that fits their team best in Ben Zobrist from the Athletics. The cost may end up being high — the Athletics confirmed in a press release that Sean Manea is headed to Oakland, making the Royals’ top prospect the fourth lefty pitcher the team has spent on this year’s chances — but the reward, and the fit, is obvious.

Second base was the Royals’ worst position, and Zobrist can play their second-worst position (Right Field) well, too. Between the two positions, the newcomer is projected to be worth nearly a win and a half for his team. Between Omar Infante and Alex Rios, our projections have them worth around a half-win to the Royals.

But the Royals get better than a win better once you look further into the team dynamics and postseason roster choices.

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There’s no such thing as ideal circumstances under which to trade Troy Tulowitzki. The best-case scenario is that Tulowitzki is both healthy and performing well, and then, you’re still a front office trading one of the most talented players in baseball. And in Colorado, of course, Tulowitzki has been more than just a good player, having been the beloved face of the franchise. Do something like this, and it’s going to hurt, regardless. But it’s been increasingly clear that a separation would be necessary. That both parties needed to move on. The Rockies just couldn’t get Tulowitzki to stay at peak level. So they did what they did, doing about the best they could do at the time, and with Carlos Gonzalez probably following Tulowitzki out the door, this is a watershed. No longer will the Rockies be caught trying to build future success around present-day veterans.

Tulowitzki was no stranger to trade rumors. There was thought he could go a year ago, but after lighting the league on fire, he got injured. The injury questions hung over him during the offseason, making it tricky to find a match, and now that he’s been mostly healthy in 2015, his performance has been uncharacteristically mortal. So the injury questions morphed into performance questions, and the Rockies had to accept that. Your opinion of the trade is dependent on your level of Tulowitzki optimism. Given what he’s capable of being, you could argue the Rockies sold low. Alternatively, you could consider it meaningful that the Rockies had trouble getting the 30-year-old Tulowitzki both healthy and great.

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While many of you were snuggled up in your beds last night, Alex Anthopoulos and his henchmen were hard at work acquiring Troy Tulowitzki from the Rockies. You can read Dave Cameron’s piping hot take on the trade here and Kiley McDaniel’s scouting-oriented contribution on the three pitching prospects going from Toronto to Colorado here. Below, I’ll be taking a data-driven look at those same three prospects, as follow: Miguel Castro, Jeff Hoffman, and Jesus Tinoco.

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Lead Prospect Analyst Kiley McDaniel is currently scouting the East Coast Pro prep showcase in Tampa, Florida. What follows is a collection of scouting reports written by McDaniel concerning the three players traded by Toronto to Colorado in exchange for Troy Tulowitzki — compiled and updated to account both for recent developments and/or likely role with the Rockies.

Jeff Hoffman, RHP, Colorado Rockies, FV: 55

In Hoffman’s offseason scouting report, I noted that he was in contention to go #1 overall until his elbow surgery just before the 2014 draft, in which he went ninth overall. He made his first pro appearance this year and started making buzz right away, showing big velocity in a late big-league spring-training appearance, then in extended spring training and in his regular season debut at High-A Dunedin (he was just promoted to Double-A in the last few days). In the video, the first game shown is when I saw Hoffman about a month ago and the second game is when our own Chris King saw his first start for Dunedin about a month before that.

I like to keep all the clips we have of a player in the official video on the FanGraphs YouTube page (now over 1 million views and 1,000 videos in less than a year) for reasons just like this, so we can see the changes over time. Notice from the third game in the video (the summer before he was drafted, in the Cape Cod League) how aggressive Hoffman’s delivery is (and the knockout curve at 3:00) and note that much of that is still there in the second game, his pro debut in Dunedin. Now look at the first game, the most recent one, and notice how much more upright, stiff and generally tall-and-fall his delivery is, rather than attacking the plate.

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Here is the story of the 2015 Toronto Blue Jays, presented in two easy graphs.

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