St. Louis Deals Rasmus for Pitching
If there was ever a precursor to a trade, this was it, via Matthew Leach and Austin Laymance:
Speaking to KSDK TV-5 in St. Louis, La Russa was largely complimentary of Rasmus until the end of the interview. He spoke of Rasmus’ bright future and said that the club is not shopping Rasmus.
At the end, however, La Russa was asked whether Rasmus is listening and responded tartly.
“Well, he’s listening to somebody,” the manager said.
Asked whether Rasmus is listening to the Cardinals’ coaches, he was more direct.
“No, he doesn’t listen to the Cardinal coaches much now, and that’s why he gets in these funks, in my opinion,” La Russa said. “If he would just stay with [basically] what they teach, he would have … but I actually feel concern for him, because he hears it from so many places, he’s got to be confused.”
Approximately 12 hours after that piece hit MLB.com, the Cardinals sent Colby Rasmus packing to Toronto along with relievers Brian Tallet and Trever Miller and minor league stalwart P.J. Walters for a package centered around Edwin Jackson. The Blue Jays also sent relievers Octavio Dotel and Marc Rzepczynski and center fielder Corey Patterson to St. Louis to complete the deal.
Only a year ago, Colby Rasmus was one of MLB’s hottest young talents, playing what appeared to be a quality center field, hitting for power, and showing solid on-base skills. Through the first 100 games and change in 2011, it’s not so obvious that Rasmus is the super-stud we thought merely a year ago. Rasmus’s batting line is still well above average, with a 111 wRC+, but the .354 BABIP that drove his tremendous 2010 (.276/.361/.498, 129 wRC+) has returned to earth. Still, a good defensive center fielder producing 10% more offense than the league average is an extremely valuable commodity.
However, since Rasmus posted a +10 UZR in his first MLB season, things haven’t looked so rosy by the defensive metrics. UZR has Rasmus as a -16 center fielder since the beginning of the 2010 season. DRS is not so convinced, rating him as exactly average. Of course, defensive metrics are hardly the end-all be-all of defensive analysis, but at the least, questions have been raised and debate is warranted.
Even with his relatively poor play at the plate and in the field, Rasmus is still on pace for about 2.2 WAR over 600 plate appearances, with a ton of upside and at a relatively low cost. The Cardinals are certainly giving up a major asset in the future, but with the team holding a mere half-game lead in the NL Central division in Albert Pujols’s final year before free agency, the Cardinals are likely considering the short term a higher priority than the long term. Rasmus is a good player, to be sure, but in the short term, his loss doesn’t necessarily hurt the Cardinals, even before we consider the attitude problems and issues with his father that drove this trade.
The Cardinals will replace Rasmus with Jon Jay for the most part, with Skip Schumaker possibly seeing some time back in his old home of center field as well. The trade might be as much an endorsement of Jay as much as a renouncement of Rasmus for St. Louis; in Jay’s 612 MLB plate appearances, the 26-year-old has accumulated 3.3 WAR behind a .305/.361/.430 line and roughly average outfield defense split between the corners and center field. There are questions with Jay — Will his .352 BABIP hold up? Will his glove play in center field? — but the drop-off between him and Rasmus, at least based on Rasmus’s 2011 performance, shouldn’t be too noticeable.
The addition of Edwin Jackson — a free agent at the end of the season — is a definite improvement over Kyle McClellan in the starting rotation. Jackson’s current ERA of 3.92 is well above his FIP of 3.21, suggesting a possible improvement coming, but at the same time, the 27-year-old’s walk rate and home run rate are well below his career marks in a sample of 121.2 innings. Dave Duncan is famed for his work with starting pitchers, and I doubt anybody would be too surprised if he worked some magic with Jackson. And even if Jackson regresses to his ZiPS projection (4.32 ERA, 4.07 FIP) is still superior to what the Cardinals can expect out of McClellan down the stretch. McClellan doesn’t miss bats and not even Duncan’s magic has managed to keep the ball in the park; his 4.59 FIP is barely better than replacement level.
The additions of Rzepczynski and Dotel should bolster the Cardinals bullpen a bit, and dumping Tallet and Miller (combined -0.8 WAR) shouldn’t hurt. Judging by Tony La Russa’s typical bullpen usage, it wouldn’t be surprising to see Rzepcynski utilized as a LOOGY, and Dotel adds another fireballer behind Jason Motte and Fernando Salas. Dotel’s career appears to be living off high strikeout totals opposed to production, though — an ERA of 3.68 is hardly impressive out of a reliever these days, and his FIPs have been above 4.00 for the last two seasons. Rzepczynski could be an interesting long term asset if the Cardinals attempt to turn him into a starter, but his results as a reliever (2.97 ERA, 3.34 FIP) or as a starter in Toronto (4.95 ERA, 4.47 FIP) don’t suggest he’d improve much as a starter with the Cardinals. He is only 25 though, and with work the Cardinals could find an asset in Rzepcynski.
All-in-all, as long as Tony La Russa doesn’t start doling out starts in center field to Corey Patterson (and really, who knows with that), the Cardinals shouldn’t be any worse off for 2011 with this trade, and if Edwin Jackson’s results start to line up with his peripherals from this season, they could improve. Long-term, with Jackson departing after the season and Colby Rasmus under team control for the next three years, the Cardinals appear to take a hit, but by design. As the aforementioned story presented, the Cardinals and Colby Rasmus just didn’t seem to be able to reconcile their differences — with both parties likely at fault — and at some point, GM John Mozeliak had to cut his losses. The Cardinals managed to do so without weakening themselves noticeably in the short run, and with the lack of leverage given Rasmus’s situation, that’s probably as well as the Cardinals could do.
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AL East fleeces everyone, again.
Why didn’t the Cards have leverage in the Rasmus situation? They had him under contract for three more years.
LaRussa’s too arrogant to keep his mouth shut, so everyone knew they wanted Rasmus gone.
Ding ding ding.
TLR.
The Cards allowed this issue to spin out of control. It doesn’t make sense to me that you’d bench Rasmus periodically in preparation to dealing him away. I think John saw things deteriorating, and forced a move. LaRussa made it more complicated than what should have been. The Cardinals completely exposed their hand.
and how does that matter when he has serious value to every other team? They can still hold a bidding war and could have gotten way more value.
Well, Ryan, because of the way he was projected.
In a trade, you want to put out the best word you can for your guy, to maximize his value. So, when his manager is calling him arrogant and thick-headed when he’s supposed to talk nicely, teams think that’s putting it nicely, and that he might be an even bigger problem than what that makes him out to be.
You don’t pay for a guy underproducing when you know the current team suffers if he stays.
Does Jackson even pitch in the post-season if they make it?
Depends on how well he does the next two months, but besides Garcia and Carpenter, Jackson is as good as, if not better than, any of the other starters the Cards have.
Definitely. Who else would? Westbrook? Lohse? McClellan? Without Wainwright the Cardinals’ rotation isn’t nearly as fearsome. At least Jackson is a solid #3.
I was thinking Lohse.
Shelby Miller
What could go wrong?!?!
(oh…right…the gas)
Sorry, outside of St. Louis, no one really thinks of Lohse as all that great.
I posted something similar elsewhere, but …
2010 WAR
—————
Carpenter: 3.7
Garcia: 3.2
Jackson: 3.8
2011 WAR
—————-
Carpenter: 2.8
Garcia: 3.1
Jackson: 3.0
Full seasons for all 3 pitchers.
Either WAR is misleading or inaccurate, or Jackson has to be a “bad” pitcher, just because.
CC11, shockingly we agree. EJax has made large steps each of the past few seasons and may be the best pitcher on the Cardinals roster.
*start
Given how much LaRussa hates Rasmus, how come he didn’t get dropped off the trade value list a la Escobar?
I don’t remember Edwin Jackson making the top 50…
You’re obviously a pissy Jays fan by posting this, but it’s actually a valid point. I’m no Cardinals fan, and I don’t follow non-Tigers really closely, but I knew Rasmus was not liked in St. Louis. Seems similar enough to me to wonder why it didn’t affect his trade value.
Man, Edwin Jackson gets moved around a TON. Why is that?
Because he’s in between being a terrible or great pitcher, has potential, a managable contract, and can go on hot streaks where he can be dominant for a stretch.
I looked up his game logs, and for 2011 he has not put together more than back-to-back consecutive quality starts, nor had more than 2 non-QS in a row.
Most of his non-QS were of the 4 ER variety.
While he’s not Mark Buehrle consistent (15 consecutive QS), Jackson is “normal consistent”. Seriously look at various pitchers game logs and note the [1] percent of QS, and [2] strings of QS and non-QS.
Awful deal for my Cards. I’d rather have that Jeff Niemann deal, since he’s at least under contract.
I would have liked Niemann as well but they don’t say all the players that would have been involved. I doubt Rasmus by himself would not have gotten Niemann, Howell and a prospect. I’m guessing the Rays wanted someone else significant.
I nominate this for the “Heist of the Year” award
Vernon Wells.. I speak thy name…
The Jays got Napoli and Rivera for Wells.
Is that more value than they gave up for Rasmus?
Those two, and what amounts to a bazillion bucks in payroll flexibility. You decide.
This was a horrendous deal for the Jays. All they are getting is a mediocre outfielder with severe attitude problems. Wouldn’t be surprised if they tried to add Upton to go with Rasmus and Esscobar to make like a bermuda triangle of attitude and arrogance issues.
Then sign Barry Bonds, Roger Clemens, Ty Cobb, Alejandro “Butch” Heddo, Dave “Tiger” Williams and Stephon Marbury.
Tony? Bobby? Is that you?
Escobar has no issues any more. Just talent and chemistry with Bautista.
How many 24 year olds can play center field like Rasmus? How many of them have his contract?
Smiles don’t hit. You can change an attitude, but you can’t teach talent. Ted Williams, Rogers Hornsby and Ty Cobb were three of the most miserable sonsabitches ever to play the game, but that didn’t stop them from producing.
Wash out your damn mouth about Ted Williams. Everyone knows all his insecurity and anger was focused on the media and the rare bum in the crowd. He loved kids, was kind to rookies, and was often described as a warm and handsome guy.
Ty Cobb, meanwhile, was a ass
Easily the most descriptive thing written about a guy on wikipedia:
“Cobb once slapped a black elevator operator for being uppity.’ When a black night watchman intervened, Cobb pulled out a knife and stabbed him.
– Ty Cobb’s wikipedia page.
It wasn’t the smiles that hit attitude. It’s the “I don’t have to listen to anyone” attitude. If he was hitting .310, I wouldn’t say shit. But when you’re hitting 230, maybe you should stop listening to your Dad who played all the way up to single A ball with a 244 average. Maybe that hitting coach with 586 career homers might know something.
I don’t know if I’d expect that much improvement from Jackson due to Duncan — if Don Cooper wasn’t getting it out of him I don’t know if Duncan will.
I was thinking the same. People will continue to love Jackson’s arm but if he can’t learn how to pitch under these two guys a lot of teams might think twice before paying whatever king’s ransom Boras is going to try to make him out to be worth.
Yeah, Jackson is just streaky. That’s it. When eh’s on, he shows all of the skills that pitching coaches teach. When he’s off, he has nothing.
Not sure how much improvement people really need to expect from Jackson.
WAR and IP
————–
2009: 3.5 (214)
2010: 3.8 (209)
2011: 3.0 (121)
Most of those innings were in the AL, which features stronger lineups.
Jackson’s WAR matches Carpenter’s from 2010, and his WAR this year is right there with Carpenter and Garcia.
Edwin Jackson is a pretty good pitcher.
Jackson (3.0) replaces McClellan (0.2), who replaces a negative WAR reliever. If Jay continues his performance in the OF, this will be a significant increase in overall WAR for StL in a season race where 1-2 wins probably determines the division.
I don;t think StL “lost” this trade, even though it looks decent for the other teams involved. I’m also wondering Jackson will have a “Jeff Weaver” run, where he pitches well for the remainder and in the playoffs, and parlays it into an overpay contract in the offseason.
Getting Corey Patterson in the deal makes it worse for the Cardinals.
They gave back Brian Tallet, though.
I stared at this article for quite some time, wondering how the hell Edwin Jackson went from Chicago to Toronto.
One of these days I expect to see Edwin Jackson involved in an elaborate multi-team deal that ends with him back on the same team he started the day with.
http://espn.go.com/chicago/mlb/story/_/id/6808198/chicago-white-sox-trade-edwin-jackson-mark-teahen-toronto-blue-jays
Wondering if the Giants could have gotten Rasumus for Jonathan Sanchez. Pretty similar (albeit LHP) to Jackson w/ an entire extra yr of control.
I guess it’s because they see more help coming from Beltran for 2011. Looks like the Giants are going to nail that deal down shortly…
Nice trade for Toronto. 3rd place feel thy breath for years!
if MLB adds another Wild Card Toronto could technically get into the playoffs as a 3rd place team in the AL east
even third place would be tough!
one thing is for sure: AA holds the title of “best GM to never finish better than second to last in his own division.” book it.
Toronto didn’t just get Edwin Jackson from the White Sox for free. They gave up a pretty good SP prospect in Zach Stewart. This should at least be mentioned when analyzing this deal.
From Keith Law:
Stewart is a classic sinker-slider starter with great movement on a low-90s sinker that will touch the mid-90s; his control took a step forward this year but he wasn’t getting as many ground balls, which is more a question of his pitching plan than a lack of life on the fastball. His slider is his best offspeed pitch, tight at 83-87 with good tilt, and he commands the pitch well, throwing it to both sides of the plate. He’s got a solid, average-or-better changeup and showed no platoon split this year. With a show-me curveball and good control, he should be given every opportunity to start for Chicago, and I like pitching coach Don Cooper’s chances to turn Stewart into at least a mid-rotation starter if not more.
Honestly I think people are too quick to call this a huge win for the Jays. Bad deal for the Cards, sure, but the White Sox got some real value out of a guy who was just going to walk at season’s end anyway.
Stewart, Frasor, Dotel and Marc R. all had serious value. Obviously Colby does as well but the Jays gave up a lot for him. Plus they’ll be sending along 3 more players. Probably still a win for the Jays, but hardly the fleecing the internet has made it out to be.
Stewart took a huge step back this year actually. and he’s a ground ball pitcher who has issues leaving the ball up at times, very inconsistant. Zep has control issues, Dotel is a ROOGY. Frasor was going to be a free agent.
I understand that none of these guys are perfect, but tons of teams are looking for relievers right now. Dotel and especially Frasor would have been very easy to flip for prospects (Frasor could have probably brought somebody pretty good). Stewart was a top 50 prospect coming into the year and, while he’s backpedaled, still has definite value. Marc R. is a good young pitcher under team control through 2016 which is obviously very valuable.
I’m not saying it was a bad trade for the Jays, I’m just surprised people have been so quick to shower praise on AA. It’s easy to imagine a scenario two years from now where this would be viewed as a serious overpay (if Stewart or any of the 3 PTBNL pan out, Rasmus fails to improve, Marc R. turns into a quality starter for STL etc.). When you give up 8 players for 1 (and lets be honest, the other 3 guys the Blue Jays got are completely worthless, or, in Teahen’s case, less than worthless) there’s always the risk it blows up in your face.
Stewart wasn’t a top 50 prospect by anybodys list.
Those guys did not have “serious value.” K-rod got the Mets what in exchange? And renting Dotel for a couple months could have brought the jays back……? AA can replace the relievers he traded very easily and cheaply, but he cant get a guy like Rasmus.
Keith Law is probably the worst talent evaluator tool you can find out there. His slider isn’t tight at all, its long and loopy
I’m sure Keith’s slider IS long and loopy, but that doesn’t make him a bad scout.
Saw Stewart’s starts for Toronto this year… his fastball was touching 90-91…
I have a learning disorder.
There’s no guarantee that Duncan will help Jackson. I’d be pretty doubtful of that. Cooper has as good of a record getting the most out of pitchers, and Jackson didn’t noticeably improve in Chicago. There’s a reason the guy’s on like his 20th team before he’s 30.
I don;t understand this and similar sentiments about Jackson?
From 2009-2011, he’s had 3.5+ WAR per season (on pace for more than that in 2011).
He’s a good pitcher that’s not an ace, so he’s always valuable for a team that needs pitching help, but not a guy that you’ll give a mega contract for.
Teams trade him because he has some value, and gets some value in return.
He’s not on a bunch of teams because he’s trash.
If we, as a sabermetric community, are going to highly value and promote WAR, we need to be consistent in how we use it. In terms of WAR from 2009-2011, Edwin Jackson is 19th for starting pitchers. That’s pretty good.
Since 2009, Cliff Lee has been traded 3 times, and signed as a free agent once. Edwin jackson has been traded 3 times, and will probably sign with another team as a free agent. Before that Lee played for 2 teams, Jackson played for 3. Point being, teams can, and do, trade good players … and trade them often.
I think most of us get that getting traded a bunch isn’t a knock on the guy. It’s just pretty funny and people are making jokes.
It just bothers me that E-Jax has provided at least 6.8 WAR in value for 13.35M. At ~$2M/WAR, he’s a very good value … yet he’s often cast as some sort of average or below pitcher, that nobody wants. He’s been traded for essentially Colby Rasmus and Austin Jackson, who have only matched Jackson’s WAR in abnormally high BABIP seasons.
As I said before, either WAR isn’t as accurate or important as we generally say, or we like to pick and choose how we use WAR based on preconceived notions or preferences. I disagree with either scenario.
I just don;t understand why FG views Jackson so much lower than his WAR would dictate.
Just to speculate, I would say people are more down on Edwin Jackson than his WAR would indicate because he’s a very streaky guy. He’ll rattle off a few starts where he looks like an ace, and then completely blow up for a start or two and look like garbage. Even understanding that every pitcher has good days and bad days, this guy seems to take it to extremes. Maybe the average team or the average fan would prefer a guy who gives more of a consistent effort every time out and keeps his team consistently in games. Instead, Jackson’s the guy who will pitch you a CG SO one start and then the next start give up 6 ER by the second inning.
“He’ll rattle off a few starts where he looks like an ace, and then completely blow up for a start or two and look like garbage.”
Are there any pitchers that dont? The Red Sox just dropped 6 on Felix Hernandez. Cliff Lee gave up 7 to Toronto last week.
@RC Minor nitpick–Toronto dropped six earned on him a month ago–4 of which came in the 8th. That was after a month of 0 ER and three years of sustained excellence. Anyway, my point is that, you’re not wrong about aces getting lit up, but there are better comps (Ubaldo, for instance) for what you’re trying to say.
I admit that preconceived notions about EJax misinform my opinion of him. He seems to be victimized by his own very goodness but not greatness. I wonder if you polled FG readership before this trade and asked them to guess what his accumulated WAR from the beginning of 2009 was, what the results would be. I know I would have guessed 5.5-6 WAR.
Same here, and I’ve in general been a Jackson supporter. He’s pretty good and very durable.
But, the other day my dad called and asked me what I thought about the potential trade, and was asking about Jackson. I said “remember Jason marquis?”. That comparison is nowhere near Edwin Jackson (I was thinking purely of IP numbers), and I completely over-valued marquis (I thought he would have been 1.5-2 WAR/Ssn).
Jackson over the past 2 years has been as valuable as Garcia and Carpenter (and at a much lower cost than CC29). It kills me that neither article mentioned this, especially since we treat WAR as THE stat. Neither article failed to mention Rasmus’ 4 WAR , inflated BABIP fueled, 2010 season.
This site gets a hard on for Carl Pavano, while Edwin jackson has been better over the last 3 years.
I’m not sure I like this trade for Toronto at all. At the end of the day (thanks Jack Z), they’re giving up 8 pieces to get Rasmus + some Cardinal garbage and taking on a rather worthless utility guy and the rest of his contract. That’s an awful lot to be giving up to get one guy.
I think the real crux of this deal hinges on what those 3 PTBNL are. Not saying it will happen, but if one of those PTBNL ends up being someone interesting like Brett Lawrie, the deal just looks like crap for the Jays.
If Lawrie was on the list, then he wouldn’t be a PTBNL, they’d just take him now. Because who else could be on the list that they’d have to consider taking instead of Lawrie?
There is a list of prospects the Cards can choose from. They can pick them at any time they want, or choose the cash.
The fact that they aren’t jumping at any of them already suggests that they’re probably not prospects of any note.
Or they are all 2010 draft picks who signed late (improbable). Aaron Sanchez, for example. I think that might change up the calculus quite a bit. More likely it’s a couple guys who are came over from the DSL and they haven’t had much of a look at them yet, and some short college reliever they’ll turn into a starter when he comes off the DL.
hahahahaahaaha. yeah, lawrie is one of those 3, right! if it’s either those 3 or cash, it’s doubtful any of them are that interesting.
I don’t think this trade is as lopsided in the Jays favor as many would think. Although, this totally hinges up on the performance of Edwin Jackson for the rest of the season, which is a huge gamble imo. It’s also a gamble for the Jays to trade away that much for basically one guy that is also unpredictable.
some little quibbles with the article: Salas is by no means a fireballer; Boggs is though. Salas is more of a finesse pitcher. Skip Schumaker playing center field would be as bad (or worse) than Corey Patterson playing center
Agreed that it’s not a huge win for Toronto, and I’m not sure why it’s so bad for St. Louis. I know the internets hate to admit this, but if Carpenter and/or Albert walk and they re-sign Jackson, they do so without giving up a draft pick (MLBTR says he’s a type B, but I’m wondering how he barely makes the compensation cutoff at B while Ervin Santana is an A). If that’s part of the Cards’ rationale, it’s sound. But then even if he is only a B, if he walks they get a pick. Along with a B for Dotel.
The big wild card in all this is Rzepczynski. He’s very good in the pen and they are certainly short on impact lefties there. He’ll stay in that role this season, but I’d be shocked if he’s not turned back into a starter next year. He’s Duncan’s wet dream, sinkerballing lefty with wipeout slider and low mileage arm.
Lastly, I know this is not a popular opinion in electronland, but do people really think that if he’s not listening to coaches, he’s listening to teammates? Or getting along well with teammates? Given the makeup of the team, where the other players certainly seem to respect and listen to coaches, it surprises me that nobody sees this as a problem. He’s not a rookie anymore. I wish like hell the Royals would have done this with Billy Butler when he was still within shouting distance of Yuniesky Betancourt’s home run total.
“MLBTR says he’s a type B, but I’m wondering how he barely makes the compensation cutoff at B”
The first half of last year when he was bad with the D’Backs probably goes a long way towards explaining it.
LOOGYs are so hard to find. *rolls eyes* Dotel is garbage. He did great for the Dodgers down the stretch last year, right? This is the worst trade in the last 30 years.
The wild card in all this is Rasmus, period. If he ever reaches his potential, this trade is going to look bad for St. Louis and good for Toronto. If he doesn’t do any better than this year, it will look prescient for St. Louis and naive for Toronto. Either outcome is possible, as is anything in between. There’s just no way to know. At the moment he is damaged goods, with reason to believe, but not to be certain, that he’ll recover from the damage. If that doesn’t qualify him as a wild card, I don’t know what does.
The Cardinals fan-blogs are absolutely rabid about this. Most are calling for Mozeliak’s head on a platter, the platter composed of TLR’s testicles pounded flat and dipped in molten bronze while still attached to his body. I submit that this is an overreaction. We just don’t _know_ what Raz is going to turn into, let alone what he’d have done had he stayed in St. Louis, within easy reach of his papa.
Don’t worry fellas, it’s not Lawrie.
Don’t be surprised if it’s Tallet or Miller, boy, wouldn’t that be a real doozy??
this only even qualifies as a “win-now” move if lance berkman stays healthy. since berkman is out for an MRI for uncertain rotator cuff issues. that could mean he needs a few days of rest, or it could mean he next plays in 2012.
if the club goes from a holliday-rasmus-berkman outfield to a holliday-jay-berkman outfield, sure, no huge downgrade this year. but jay and allen craig (who is still working HIS way back from injury) got plenty of PAs early in the year as a result of various injuries in the outfield.
jackson will be a substantial improvement on kyle mcclellan, but if the cardinals start giving starts to replacement value subs in the outfield because of injuries to berkman, craig, and/or holliday (who’s had a few tweaks), the “win-now” advantage afforded by the trade could become vanishingly small.
and there’s really no argument that the trade doesn’t make the team worse in 2012 and beyond.
how did the sox not end up with rasmus out of all of this? GM fail
Because they’re still trying to win this year and thus couldn’t gut their bullpen like Toronto did?
if they were so intent on winning this year they would have just kept jackon. this deal makes them worse this year.
They shed Teahan’s contract, which was what KW said they were going to do, shed money.
Which is the one reason why there is no way in hell this counts as a win for A.A. Mark Teahen may be more overpaid than both Barry Zito and Vernon Wells. Just a terrible, unrosterable player.
but chicago’s offense is still poor, and colby would’ve given them a cheap upgrade over pierre. I’d rather have a cheap starter (and potential star) at a premium position than tehan’s salary plus ian stewart and change.
or zach stewart
in short, colby seemed to represent both a short- and long-term improvement, at a low cost. just surprised kw passed on the chance. the money problems must be pretty bad.
“They shed Teahan’s contract, which was what KW said they were going to do, shed money.”
Teahen is set to make $7M over the next year and a half. The White Sox are a $140M payroll team.
Giving up ANY talent to get rid of 4M payroll is silly.
Buy low on Yunel
Trade Shawn Marcum for Brett Lawrie
Trade the un-tradeable Vernon Wells contract
Re-sign Joey Bats at a bargain
Re-sign Yunel at a Bargain
Trade Zach Stewart and spare parts for Colby Rasmus
Not to shabby Alex…
You also forgot passing the Rios contract to the White Sox
that was actually JP.
Also JP who signed Rios and Wells to long-term deals in the first place.
JP was smart enough to put Rios on waivers, but Kenny Williams is the one who took the contract. JP wasn’t like, “Here, I’ll trade you this guy on waivers!”, but he probably did do a little dance and open a bottle of wine when Kenny Williams took the bait.
I would take as many guys as Rasmus as I could – meaning promising, cheap, young players, who’ve hit a bump in the road and have so-called “attitude problems”.
I have very, very low regard for LaRussa ever since it’s been admitted that he covered up McGuire and Canseco’s steroid abuse. I mean this guy is no Boy Scout.
But in the last few seasons the Jays have gotten some quality talent that other teams were willing to give up on for all the wrong reasons: i.e. Rasmus and Brandon Morrow.
I’d be surprised if there’s a manager in baseball who doesn’t have a player who he knows is on something that is banned. Right now.
I don’t like LaRussa either, but that reason is ridiculous.
Amazing how Joe Torre has escaped the same criticism TLR has received after considering the parade of failed tests and Mitchel Report names than all played under Torre.
Rasmus was only a .277/.366/.485 guy in well over 400 Minor League games – and got worse and worse as he moved up the “A’s”.
Jay was .301/.367/ .432 in the minors and got better throughout the minors.
Jay’s Minor League rtz was higher too in fewer games.
Now these aren’t huge sample sizes, but based on his minors and majors career, I have seen nothing to think Rasmus is going to be a great player or even much better than Jay.
For this season, the Cards starting staff improves since Jackson is better than McClellen. The pen improves by Kyle Mac going to the pen and changing out Miller and Walters with Marc R. and Dotel. Not a huge drop from Rasmus to Jay. This move helps the Cards this year.
Going forward, it is only a bad deal, if Rasmus is significantly better than his ho-hum major AND minor league stats suggest. I know people reference his 4.4 WAR last season, but that looks like an outlier…not the other way around.
“Rasmus … got worse and worse as he moved up the “A’s”.”
Actually, his wOBA fluctuated: .407, .354, .414, .335 in A, A+, AA, AAA
“Jay … got better throughout the minors.”
Actually, his wOBA fluctuated: .405, .329, .329/.372, ..328/.407 in A, A+, AA, AAA
“Jay’s Minor League rtz was higher too in fewer games.”
Not sure what a ‘rtz’ is, but MiLB games: Jay 409, Raysmus 417 so that’s a wash… regardless of what the point was.
And everything Rasmus did was done when he was nearly two years younger than Jay was while at the same level. Their careers may go in a gazillion different ways, but I’ll take the younger guy with the better ISO & BB% over the guy with the .351 career BABIP.
I get it… at this moment in time, while the Cards are chasing the playoffs, it appears that Jay is contributing more. However, I don’t see him as much long term.
“but I’ll take the younger guy with the better ISO & BB% over the guy with the .351 career BABIP.”
Its funny you say that, as a good chunk of Rasmus’s perceived value is on the back of his .354 BABIP last year.
Rasmus’s career BABIP is .306 and he’s got a career .337 wOBA and he hasn’t completed his age 24 season yet. Disappointing compared to the expectations placed on him, but I’d still take him over Jay.
I think most of Rasmus’s perceived value comes from him being a first round draft pick with good minor league numbers and league average hitting as a young guy at an up the middle position. Does he live up to his potential in the end? Who knows.
The trends are up and down even with the fluctuations, especially when you consider their MLB numbers. “RTZ” is a reisezed total zone.
And RC got it right when he mentioned Rasmus’ fluky BABIP last year. Outsied of that fluky BABIP outlier, he has never, ever been that great of a hitter…even in the minors.
I think the Blue Jays should target all guys with the name Jay. Jon Jay, Jay Buhner, Jay Bell. Tony Reagins, make it happen. Trade for Angel Hernandez!
Your final analysis is absurd. Rasmus is not Soriano, making a net even trade short term and big negative long-term is not the best they could have done. Rasmus had serious value and the Cards sold low, it’s a loss all around. I’m sure they could have gotten a pen arm or two for way less.
I agree they could have gotten more. But given his ho-hum Minors and Majors numbers, I fail to see why everyone is so confident he will be such a stud.
So I will agree that the deal was not ideal…but not because of the loss of Rasmus. But because there are so many people with Rasmus-love, that they could have gotten more.
Edwin Jackson is streaky? The guy has put up, maybe, two bad starts since May 1. I’ll take streaky, if that’s streaky. Jackson’s a solid #2 behind Carpenter. He’s also boosted his fastball velocity almost two MPH over the last few months. He’s locked in right now.
I like this string of deals for Chicago and Toronto. Chicago unloaded a useless player and a guy they didn’t plan on keeping and got a real upside prospect pitcher.
The Jays unloaded a project they didn’t want for a slightly more refined project they do want. In order to compete w/ Boston and New York, these are the kind of home run deals they need to be doing. If Rasmus flops in Toronto, the team is in relatively the same spot, plus or minus a few wins. If he succeeds, their chances of having a 2008-Rays style breakthrough goes way up.
St. Louis, well, Jackson is good and all, but this team is worse in 2012 (I can’t imagine how trading away future success will convince Albert Pujols to stay). If this was a Terry Francona, Manny Acta, or some other calmer manager saying things about Rasmus, I might buy it, but everyone I know (including Cards fans) just think LaRussa had a vendetta against the kid. The Cardinals definitely had to sell for $0.90 on the dollar.
Or $0.25
Yayyyy we got rid of Teehans!!! This is clearly the most important part of the deal.
@Joe R try $.50 on the dollar…and that’s being generous
Something that I’m surprised nobody’s mentioned is that we have a pitcher leaving a hitter’s park in the AL East for a pitcher’s park in the NL – and a batter going the opposite direction. That alone can make either/both of them perform better by itself.