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The Tigers needed another outfielder. The Red Sox needed starting pitching, and needed to trade an outfielder or three. The fit seems reasonable, and so now it appears that Detroit and Boston have exchanged Yoenis Cespedes for Rick Porcello, with the Tigers getting two additional players as well. And to add to the intrigue, the Tigers are reportedly simultaneously shipping several prospects to Cincinnati in exchange for a starting pitcher. While we don’t know all the names involved, it seems like the final details might be something like this.

The Red Sox get Rick Porcello
The Tigers get Yoenis Cespdes and maybe Mike Leake or Mat Latos
The Reds get prospects.

The facts, as we kind of know them now.

Porcello turns 26 in a few weeks and is headed into his final year before he becomes a free agent; he’s projected to earn $12 million in his final trip through arbitration. He’s developed nicely into roughly a +3 WAR starter by avoiding walks and getting groundballs, while also flashing some strikeout ability in 2013, but that didn’t carry over to last year. He’s a durable and effective innings eater, with perhaps a little bit of upside remaining beyond that.

Cespedes is 29 and is also going to be a free agent at years end, though unlike Porcello, the Tigers won’t be able to make him a qualifying offer as part of the terms of his contract. Cespedes will earn $10.5 million in 2015, so he’s slightly cheaper than Porcello, but the difference is minimal. Like Porcello, he’s settled in as a +3 WAR player, and he projects to perform at about that level next year.

So, really, this is a swap of two similarly valuable pieces, both in their walk years, both making about the same money. The qualifying offer potential makes Porcello a little more valuable, which is why Boston is kicking in a pair of prospects, but we shouldn’t expect them to be deal changing talents. The Red Sox turn a +3 WAR player they didn’t need into one they do, while the Tigers found it easier to replace Porcello with whichever Reds starter they’re acquiring than find another outfielder besisdes Cespedes.

Obviously, the names in the Cincinnati trade could change things, but on first glance, this looks like a reasonable deal for everyone. The Tigers turn more future value into a short-term upgrade, the Red Sox realgin their roster towards more pitching, and the Reds perhaps admit that it’s time to rebuild.

After a couple of weeks of rumors, the Padres have reportedly come to terms with the Dodgers on a deal that will bring Matt Kemp to San Diego.

San Diego Union-Tribune reporting agreement on Kemp to #Padres – Kemp and Federowicz plus about $30M for Grandal, Wieland and third player.

— Ken Rosenthal (@Ken_Rosenthal) December 11, 2014

Matt Kemp is due $107 million over the next five years, so if the Dodgers are kicking in $30 million, the Padres are essentially picking up Kemp at 5/$77M. The crowd estimated that the Dodgers would have to pick up $47 million in order to move Kemp, so the Dodgers have not only saved more money than expected, but also acquired several pieces of real talent in return.

The quick facts, then I’ll get started on a longer post analyzing the deal.

Kemp is 30 years old, so the Padres are picking up his age-30 to age-34 seasons. He has a career 128 wRC+, but a strong performance last year pushed that mark to 140, the 15th best total in MLB last year. Unfortunately, he also plays defense, and not particularly well, as Mike Petriello covered earlier this week. Kemp’s value as a corner outfielder will depend on whether he can be at least reasonable with the glove; if he can, the offensive production makes him an above average player. If he’s as bad defensively as the metrics have suggested, then Kemp is essentially an average player overall.

For the right to pay an aging, average — or maybe a bit better than average — big leaguer $77 million over the next five years, the Padres gave up Yasmani Grandal, Joe Wieland, and a third player.

Grandal is 26 and a switch-hitting catcher with a career 119 wRC+ in 777 plate appearances, though he’s been closer to above average than excellent at the plate the last two years. He controls the strike zone and has decent power, so he’s managed to be an above average hitter the last two years even as he’s run fairly low BABIPs. The big jump in his strikeout rate last year is a bit of a concern, as his contact rate fell to 75%, but at a .175 ISO, the power was strong enough to offset the rise in strikeouts.

Grandal also rates exceptionally well by catcher framing metrics, so while he’s not very good at controlling the running game, he may be a better defensive catcher than his reputation. Grandal is under team control for four more years, and will be eligible for arbitration next winter.

Joe Wieland is an interesting arm who hasn’t been able to stay healthy. He had Tommy John surgery in 2012, and then had surgery for a stress reaction in his elbow after a setback in his rehab. He’s missed most of the last two years, during which he’s been accruing Major League service time while on the DL, so he’s now a Super-Two arbitration player and will be eligible for free agency in four years.

The third player is unknown, but should probably be assumed to be a lesser piece.

2015 Steamer Projections

Matt Kemp: 555 PA, 128 wRC+, +2.1 WAR
Yasmani Grandal: 393 PA, 111 wRC+, +1.5 WAR
Joe Wieland: ? IP, 3.96 ERA, 0.0 WAR

I’ll have a full write-up on this soon, but suffice it to say that I love this trade for the Dodgers and don’t really get it at all for the Padres. They get a big right-handed slugger, but I’m not sure they got any better, and they spent $75 million for the right to be differently bad.

The Dodgers have had one insanely busy day. They have a new middle infield, for one, but along the way to acquiring Howie Kendrick, the team shipped off Dan Haren, opening up a spot in their rotation. That spot was open for about five hours before Ken Rosenthal reported this.

Sources: #Dodgers close to four-year deal with free-agent RHP Brandon McCarthy.

— Ken Rosenthal (@Ken_Rosenthal) December 11, 2014

The deal will reportedly pay McCarthy $48 million over those four seasons, which gives him a slight premium over what Francisco Liriano got from the Pirates earlier this week. As a fellow talented-but-regularly-injured starter, Liriano and McCarthy seemed destined to sign similar-ish contracts — I guessed 3/$42M for McCarthy and 3/$39M for Liriano — and ended up fairly close in AAV, with McCarthy leveraging his strong finish to the year into a fourth year with the Dodgers.

Not surprisingly, the four teams rumored to have pursued McCarthy the hardest were the Red Sox, Yankees, Pirates, and Dodgers; all four organizations put significant value on statistical analysis, and the nerdy stats make him look far more attractive than his traditional numbers. Specifically, that glowing 2.87 xFIP that ranked 9th best in baseball last year. If you can get past ERA as an evaluator of pitching talent, McCarthy’s 2014 performance is extremely encouraging.

Especially because it’s supported by an increase in velocity. McCarthy’s average fastball jumped to 93 mph last year, far beyond anything he’d ever done before. The improvement in stuff helps explain the significant rise in strikeouts, and if McCarthy can continue to post a league average strikeout rate while never walking anyone and getting his fair share of groundballs, he’ll likely perform at a level well beyond his $12 million per year salary.

Health is going to be the primary factor in whether this contract works out for the Dodgers, though. McCarthy threw 200 innings last year, making 32 starts and avoiding the disabled list entirely, but he’d made only 40 starts in the two years prior, and his career high was 25. The Dodgers probably shouldn’t assume McCarthy will ever throw 200 innings in a season again, and they’ll have to assume that they’ll need a fill-in at some point if his shoulder acts up again.

So, the question is can McCarthy perform well enough when he is on the mound to justify the stretches of time when he is not, especially under a contract that covers his age-31 to age-34 seasons? Jeff Sullivan will have the full write up on that in a bit.

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.

The author — who’s already been alive for 35 years and will probably die pretty soon, relatively speaking — the author, despite his age, has never had occasion to describe one thing as the “jewel” of another thing. Like, even though I visited Croatia this past spring, for example, I was never once compelled to suggest that Diocletian’s Palace is the “jewel” of Split. And even though I live in New Hampshire, for other example, I’ve never felt so overcome by Winnipesaukee to pronounce it the “jewel” of that state’s Lakes Region.

Standing on what are probably the broad, masculine shoulders of Jared Cross and his Steamer projection system, however, it seems totally reasonable — so far as projected WAR for 2015 is concerned, at least — it seems reasonable to describe half-catcher, half-second-baseman Austin Barnes as the “jewel” of today’s Dodgers-Marlins trade.

Read the rest of this entry »

Well, this has been an interesting afternoon of Wade Miley rumors. First, the D’Backs were reportedly close to a deal with Boston, then Boston wasn’t involved at all, then it was the Marlins who were close to a deal, then no one was close, and now apparently the Red Sox have struck a deal to land Miley after all.

#RedSox have agreement in principle for #DBacks’ Miley, sources tell me and @jonmorosi. AZ will get Webster, De La Rosa and a minor leaguer.

— Ken Rosenthal (@Ken_Rosenthal) December 11, 2014

The quick facts, and then we’ll have a full post up when all the details are known.

Wade Miley is 28, under team control for three more seasons, and is projected to make $4.3 million in arbitration this winter. His ERA went the wrong way last season, but since you’re on FanGraphs, I’m going to assume you know not to evaulate a pitcher by single season ERA. In over 600 big league innings, he has an ERA-/FIP-/xFIP- line of 97/97/98, which is solidly above average for a starter. Especially a durable starter with no health issues.

Rubby de la Rosa is probably the main piece coming back to Arizona. He’ll be 26 in a few months and is under team control for four more seasons, and he’ll make the league minimum this year. His stuff is good, but he doesn’t miss as many bats as you’d expect for a guy with his velocity and the command isn’t great. He’s also a Tommy John recovery guy, and the combination of some medical red flags and bad command have some projecting him as a reliever.

Allen Webster (turns 26 in February) is a simliar good stuff/bad command guy who doesn’t get enough strikeouts to justify the walks. His velocity also tumbled last year, as his fastball fell from 94.0 in 2013 to 92.0 in 2014. He comes with two extra years of team control, but he also seems likely to end up as a reliever. Probably more so than de la Rosa, in fact.

The third prospect is unknown as of this moment.

2015 Steamer projections

Wade Miley: 192 IP, +2.3 WAR
Rubby de la Rosa: 189 IP, +1.4 WAR
Allen Webster: 182 IP, +0.6 WAR

The Red Sox trade 10 years of team control for three years, but get a much more reliable mid-rotation starter in exchange. And if de la Rosa and Webster end up as relievers, then the extra years won’t matter much at all. While I recognize that I probably like pitchers in the mold of Wade Miley more than most, my early take — without knowing who the third prospect is, which could change things — is that this is a pretty nifty upgrade for the Red Sox.

The Astros have made it clear that they intend to upgrade their bullpen this winter, chasing Andrew Miller and David Robertson with significant four year offers before watching both sign with other teams. So this morning, they turned to Plan C, reportedly signing Luke Gregerson to a three year, $18.5 million contract, according to Bob Nightengale.

The big question hanging over this move, and the pursuits of Miller and Robertson, is why the Astros are spending money to sign free agent relievers. Expensive bullpen arms have historically proven to provide the lowest return on investment in baseball, and the Astros are not in a position to sacrifice significant future value for a modest short-term boost. Why would a team that has been so set on building for the future suddenly shift gears and sign an aging reliever who probably won’t still be an effective arm by the time the Astros are ready to contend?

Well, I’m just speculating here, but perhaps the Astros signed Gregerson with the clear intention of trading him this summer for something that could be a part of their future. As we see every July, the markup on useful bullpen arms is ridiculously high in-season, and with so many teams currently in go-for-it mode, the Astros are positioned to be one of the few teams able to take advantage of what should be a very strong seller’s market.

When everyone is buying, being the only team with stuff to sell is a great position to be in, but first, you have to have things that the buyers want. As long as he continues to pitch relatively well, contending teams will want Gregerson in July, especially if the Astros agree to pick up a bit of his future salary. And in effect, the Astros could essentially be buying themselves a pretty decent prospect.

Let’s say they hold him until mid-July, so they’d have paid him $3 million of his $6 million 2015 salary, then agreed to pick up $5 million of the remaining $15 million he was still owed. An acquiring team would only have to absorb $10 million in salaries for 2.5 years of relief work, which would look like a bargain at a time when there are going to be few other options to upgrade in-season. And so, the Astros could likely extract a solid young player in return, essentially buying that prospect for $8 million in salary.

The Astros have money, so they can afford to gamble the $18.5 million in guaranteed money that Gregerson can still be effective for a few months. If it doesn’t work out, well, they’re out $6 million per year in a few years where they probably weren’t going to win anyway, and premium free agents aren’t taking their money until they get a little more respectable anyway. Yeah, Gregerson could suck, and then they’d have “wasted” that money, but it’s only wasted cash if you could have spent it on something better. If no one wants to sign with the Astros, and the alternative was to not spend it, then it’s not a waste even if he’s lousy and nukes his own trade value.

If he’s not lousy, and his trade value is buoyed by the Astros willingness to pay down part of this contract in July, then the Astros might have just found a way to make themselves an even more attractive seller in a market where there is going to be very little competition.

After a very long courtship, Jon Lester has decided to pitch for the Chicago Cubs.

Jon Lester, Cubs agree on six-year, $155M deal, sources tell Yahoo Sports. Red Sox are runners-up. Their final bid: six for $135M.

— Jeff Passan (@JeffPassan) December 10, 2014

Passan also adds that the Giants were willing to stretch to $168 million over seven years, so Lester took a slightly smaller total guarantee from Chicago. Lester immediately becomes the Cubs ace, and along with the addition of Miguel Montero earlier today, signals to the rest of the National League Central that the Cubs are moving up their window to win.

We’ll have a full-write up on this deal in a bit, but for now, let me encourage you to read the things that we’ve already published on Lester this week.

How Much to Believe in Jon Lester’s 2014, by Jeff Sullivan.
How Will Jon Lester Age?, by Tony Blengino.

Lester’s one of the best pitchers in the game, and he’s now getting paid like it. Whether the Cubs can improve the rest of their roster enough to make this deal pay off remains to be seen, but a team with a strong future suddenly has a much stronger present.

At the end of November, the author wrote a post concerning Atlanta’s acquisition of Corban Joseph entitled — for purposes simultaneously of information and also very mild amusement — entitled “Atlanta Signs Basically Tommy La Stella“. The main point of that brief dispatch: that Corban Joseph, a below-average defender with compelling and probably overlooked offensive skills, was a sensible and economical replacement for the recently traded La Stella.

What I didn’t know at the time — indeed, couldn’t have known — is that the Atlantans would less than two weeks later acquire a player arguably more similar to La Stella than even Joseph himself. Today, the Braves signed former Oakland infielder Alberto Callaspo to a one-year, $3 million deal.

Here are the Steamer projections for the triumvirate, prorated in each case to 550 plate appearances:

Callaspo is older than La Stella by some margin, but possesses similar defensive value, nearly identical plate-discipline projections, and also probably a power profile that more nearly resembles La Stella’s. Of some interest with regard to Callaspo is his batted-ball skill. Over that past three years, Callaspo has produced just a .259 BABIP — one of the lowest figures, that, among qualified batters during that same interval. The Atlanta front office probably has some feelings about how much that says about Callaspo’s hit tool. In any case, it would appear as though Callaspo is the favorite to start at second base for Atlanta presently.

In a winter of runaway inflation, the Pirates have reportedly re-signed Francisco Liriano to a deal that looks downright reasonable.

Liriano in agreement with #Pirates on three-year, $39M deal. Pending physical. First reported: @RobertMurrayMLB

— Ken Rosenthal (@Ken_Rosenthal) December 9, 2014

3/$39M is exactly the contract I guessed a month ago, and just $1 million more per year than our crowdsourcing project came up with. Given that almost every deal signed so far has added an extra year or several million onto the AAV, signing a player for the expected price looks like a relative bargain.

The issue with Liriano is always going to be health. Even the last two years — two of his best seasons — he’s only thrown 160 innings, and he’s only managed to throw 3,000+ pitches in a season once in his career. You don’t sign Francisco Liriano for durability or innings. You sign him because when he’s on the mound, he’s really quite good.

Over the last two seasons, his ERA-/FIP-/xFIP- line is 89/90/87, putting him well above the league average in all three marks. For comparison, other starters with an 87 xFIP- over the last two seasons: Johnny Cueto, Jeff Samardzija, Garrett Richards, Tyson Ross, and Hyun-Jin Ryu. Jordan Zimmermann is at 88. Cole Hamels is at 89. Jon Lester is at 90.

Now, Liriano has historicaly underperformed his peripherals, but his runner stranding problems haven’t followed him to Pittsburgh, and he’s pitched at essentially a +3 WAR level when he’s been on the mound with the Pirates. Even if you discount that performance for the lower total of innings pitched, Liriano looks like a +2 WAR pitcher for 2015, with some upside beyond that. In this market, $39 million for that kind of value looks like a pretty nice steal for the Pirates.

Of course, he could also break down at any point, and Pittsburgh could end up getting nothing out of their investment. Liriano offsets a lot of his value with about as low a floor as you can find. He’s super high risk/high reward, but for this price, this seems like the right kind of risk/reward balance for the Pirates.