Dodgers Flip Andrew Heaney for Howie Kendrick
Well, that didn’t take long. A few hours after the reports came out on the trade sending Dee Gordon to the Marlins for Andrew Heaney and stuff, Heaney was redirected to the Angels in exchange for Howie Kendrick. So, really, instead of trading a second baseman and a pitcher they didn’t want for a bundle of prospects, the Dodgers traded their second baseman for the Angels second baseman and a slightly smaller bundle of prospects.
So, with the smoke (maybe) settled, the two trades essentially turn out to be one three trade. In the end, if we’re at the end, it looks something like this.
Marlins trade Heaney, Enrique Gonzalez, Austin Barnes, and Chris Hatcher for Dee Gordon
Dodgers trade Gordon for Kendrick, Gonzalez, Barnes, and Hatcher
Angels trade Kendrick for Heaney
Jeff already covered the first half of the deal in some depth, so if you’re interested in Gordon or the prospects, read that. The new guy here is Kendrick, so this quick post will focus on him.
In exchange for the six years of Heaney they could have held on to, the Dodgers are getting just one year of Kendrick’s services, but Kendrick is legitimately one of the best second baseman in baseball. At +10 WAR over the last three years, Kendrick isn’t quite in the Cano/Pedroia/Zobrist class, but he’s right there with the next tier of guys, and at 31, shouldn’t be expected to decline from that level in 2015.
Steamer projects Kendrick as a +3.3 WAR player for 2015, and given that he’ll make just $9.5 million next year, he’s a significant bargain for the money. The Dodgers can either approach Kendrick about an extension now, or keep him for the final year of his contract and hit him with a qualifying offer next winter. Given the market value of a win this winter, one season of Kendrick plus the potential draft pick is probably worth something like $25 or $30 million. Don’t sleep on Kendrick’s value as a big time asset.
Whether that’s worth six years of Andrew Heaney depends on what you think of him as a prospect, essentially. If you still see him as a solid mid-rotation starter — and Steamer’s projecting him at +1.4 WAR per 200 innings in 2015, so even incremental improvement over the next few years would get him there — then this might be too steep a price to pay. The Dodgers are definitely better with Kendrick than with Heaney, but a cheap solid starting pitcher has significant value as well.
The Angels essentially took a page out of the A’s playbook with this one, getting worse in the short-term to pick up a potentially solid long-term role player. Kendrick won’t be easy to replace, though, and the Angels don’t have an obvious candidate ready to step in.
All told: the Dodgers got better and added some prospects. The Angels got worse, but also younger and added more team control. And the Marlins got a guy who is fast.
Dave is the Managing Editor of FanGraphs.
The Marlins — there’s a team after my own heart.
How long should we give it until Kendrick is flipped to the Jays or Nats?
McCarthy and Dodgers reportedly nearing a 4 yr contract.
Jeez.. Loads of moves by the Dodgers.
I did not see them trading with the Angels though!
Have you forgotten the blockbuster Drew Butera trade?
You mean Butera who came from the Twins?
So, time to move Uribe now, right? He’s the only starting position player left on the Dodgers who isn’t an All Star
going to be one hell of a good defensive infield though
None of A.J. Ellis, Austin Barnes, and Ryan Lavarnway are All-Stars.
The Marlins could’ve gotten Howie Kendrick straight up for Heaney. Instead, they traded him and four prospects for a markedly worse second basemen.
This is incredible.
If you think Gordon is his 2014 self, it’s understandable why you take him instead, given how much more control he has. I wouldn’t make sense for them to trade for 1 year of Kendrick anyway. (Then why did they give up Heaney in the first place? I don’t know.)
Agreed. I wonder if the deal was about saving money for the Marlins. Normally a team might get the benefit of the doubt, but I don’t think the Marlins’ history warrants that benefit.
They just gave a guy a 325 million dollar contract, so I don’t know if you can legitimately make that claim.
True, although the opt-out is pretty conspicuous. Stanton’s signing might actually be one of those few contracts that is financially valuable to ticket selling, etc. as it shows that the team is committed. The team already struggles as is, and letting Stanton go might have been a final straw. I wouldn’t be surprised at all to see Stanton traded in a couple of years to one of the big market teams if he performs at a 5+ WAR per year level again. The contract is back loaded enough (it only pays $30 million through the end of the 2017 season) that they could trade him away before he costs the team big.
This is the damning part of the trade…apparently the Marlins didn’t or couldn’t do the leg work to find out a better trade was out there.
Wrong. They also got 12.5 million dollars.
the 12.5m only matters if Haren is going to pitch for them
It is incredible. I don’t disagree. But they got Dee Gordon for multiple years and would have only gotten Kendrick for 1. I can see why having Kendrick for just 1 year wouldn’t be all that appealing for the Marlins.
Gordon is a lot cheaper than Kendrick. That has historically been very important to the Marlins
There was a report earlier that the Angels were interested in trading for Brock Holt from the Red Sox. Could Holt play 2B full time?
Angels just acquired Josh Rutledge from COL in exchange for AA reliever Jairo Diaz. Looks like a Grant Green/Rutledge battle for the starting 2B job in spring training.
The 12.5mil the Dodgers shipped out should also be factored in, no?
Sure it’s only money, but it eats into the surplus value the Dodgers are getting. One way to view it is they are effectively paying Kendrick 22mil (or if you prefer they bought the potential QO pick and the lesser prospects in the Gordon deal for 12.5mil)
No way did the Angels lose on this, it’s an outstanding outcome. They weren’t going to sign Kendrick. Isn’t the ‘move before you lose’ angle the one that gets most of the ayes?
More to the point, the Angles farm system doesn’t have a single pitching prospect remotely as good as Heaney, and they have him now for six years. The Angels starting rotation was much the weakest part of the team, and getting a prime prospect there for a guy they were going to lose anyway is an outstanding move. Sure, whoever replaces Howie won’t be as good, but the drop off needn’t be severe. Of the three parties to this triangle play, Angels, Dogners and Marlins, to me it’s the Angels who came out the best.
Very good trade for the Angels. But the Dodgers had a really good day.
why aren’t the A’s making these kinds of deals with their sell-high, buy-low candidates? i get that they are trying to focus on prospects as well as the “now” but these wheelings and dealings by the dodgers seems so much more satisfactory to what the A’s got for donaldson, moss, and samardzija, all of whom are better players than gordon or haren at relative steals. wouldnt something like donaldson for kendrick + heaney have been a possible return?
Um, because the A’s can’t just give the Marlins $10 million to take on Haren and take on all of Kendrick’s $9.5 million salary?
These articles are leaving that out. Doesn’t really change the calculus for the Dodgers much, but the A’s can’t just give away $20 million.
And no, Donaldson for Kendrick & Heaney makes no sense, because Kendrick and Heaney were never on the same team.
1 year of howie kendrick
2.4 WAR at 9 million
boo hoo
I’d rather have 5 years of Dee or 6 of Heaney over that any day.
The Dodgers also got the Padres to take Kemp and got Grandal + 2 pitchers for him. And they only had to kick in $30 M. That’s a huge win for the Dodgers.
I can’t recall any team having this good a day in the offseason, except maybe the day the Jays got the Angels to take Vernon Wells. I’d still put this day for the Dodgers above that one for the Jays.
You say “got the Padres to take” as if Kemp is Ryan Howard. He could be a legitimately good player, and the Padres are paying him, what, $15MM/year? I know nothing about the pitchers involved, but I don’t think Kemp is bad on that contract.