The Inevitable Becomes Reality
Dave · January 27, 2008 at 5:07 pm · Filed Under Mariners
According to Geoff Baker, Adam Jones is on his way to Baltimore for a physical. The deal is done – it’s going to be some kind of Jones/Sherrill/prospects (probably Tillman and someone) deal for Bedard.
If you’ve read the blog for more than a day or two, you know we’re not fans of this deal because we believe that the team will regret giving up Adam Jones. That said, Erik Bedard is awesome, and we welcome him to Seattle.
But this still sucks.
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I’m generally ok with it, depending on who else we give up. Two years from now, this could either be a very horrible deal, or a very good one.
At least it’ll make the upcoming season a little more interesting for the casual fan…
I just logged on and had a queazy feeling something like this was going down! Dammit!
I agree with your sentiment … “Welcome to Seattle Erik” however I still can’t believe Adam Jones is out.
I checked here a few minutes ago. Nothing new. Then checked Rotoworld and checked back here. Then to the toilet to throw up.
Really wish i could be happy, but my gut says other. Just hope not too much more talent is going East.
Perhaps Bedard will be open to extension which will take some of the sting away.
Good luck Mr Jones.
Actually, I can believe it…in Bavasi’s World, AJ was NEVER gonna get any kind of chance!
As Fee Waybill of the Tubes once said, “another example of the Completion Backwards Principle”.
>:(
Welcome to Seattle, Eric.
It is killing me waiting to know who else is in this deal. :/
2007:
1.Felix
2.WASH
3.Batista
4.HoRam
5.Weaver
2008:
1.Bedard
1.Felix
3.Silva
4.Batista
5.Washburn
I hope Bedard has a long and prosperous run in Seattle (fingers and toes crossed).
I also hope AJ has an illustrious career outside the AL West. I have a feeling watching him through the years is going to bring on a lot of “I remember when we had him in Seattle…”
Dave,
Don’t take this the wrong way, but it sucks hearing from you for the first time in a while.
Welcome to Seattle, Eric.
Erik, actually.
It’ll be the new Pineiro. Piniella.
I’ve read the arguments here and I respect Dave and the many other knowledgable people on this site, but I’m going to weigh in to counter Dave’s comment that “this sucks.”
Dave’s primary argument as I read it is a strong one–that smart teams such as the A’s do not trade players who stay under a team’s control. I won’t argue against the logic, but the mitigating factors that outweigh it (although I would say just barely–I’m about 52% in favor of this trade).
Who the other names are in the deal may sway my percentage, but from what I know now, the other themes that have been the undercurrents all of over this site bear slightly more weight:
1. Bedard is proven at the major league level, Jones is not. To put a 14 million tag on Jones in ’09 and call it conservative is, in my opinion, a stretch
2. The replacement value…that’s been beaten to death so I won’t go into rehashing detail
3. Domino effect on the staff. We’ve heard all the back and forth this week about taxing the bullpen…the truth is, whether Hargrove did or did not leave hook quickly to save his job is less important than the brutal fact of what his starting pitching was giving him
I would be more in favor if it weren’t for the poor player development, which after all is what allows the A’s to trade their studs for future studs–the fact that they developed the current studs to begin with.
Time will tell. For baseball junkies, the best part is that pitchers and catchers reporting is only 3 weeks away.
I just died a little inside.
Can’t say how bad it is till its known who else is going. But its still bad.
Those arguments have been refuted in some detail in previous posts. Re-asserting them doesn’t infuse them with value they didn’t have before. The deal sucks.
I saw the story about Jones heading to Baltimore for a physical noted over at Sons of Sam Horn and wanted to see what you guys were saying. I’ve been following the rumors over here.
I don’t know what to say. The result of every deal is uncertain. I know that Bedard seemed like just about the toughest pitcher the Red Sox faced last year. I really don’t know much about Jones. I went and looked at his stats and was impressed. It might be better if he walked a bit more but the guy rang up an OPS of something like .970 at age 21 in AAA in what I think is one of the more reasonable PCL parks.
I kind of liked the picture of Bedard that emerged from some articles that I found. Absolutely no bs talk with the press. I wonder if the extremely PR conscious mariners organization will deal with that very well.
Good luck guys.
DMZ,
<>
I respect the fact that you, Dave, and many others here back up your assertions with data–that’s why this is a great blog. But just because the arguments have been refuted by you and some other posters on this board does not mean they are without value.
This is wrong…
Who else is involved? I stop watching the M’s if Triunfel is ALSO in this deal…can you say fleeced?
If I didn’t have homework to do, I’d drink myself to sleep tonight.
#15 – I agree! If Triunfel is in this deal, it may go down as the worst trade in baseball history. Bavasi seems to be doing his best Woody Woodward impersonation. We’ll take Varitek OR Lowe … OK, have em both!
If I argue that the sun rises in the north every day, and someone disproves that, repeating the argument doesn’t give it value.
Minor league stats are predictive. There’s no value in being a proven major leaguer. There’s no “relief” effect of having other pitchers in the rotation. You’re wrong. You’re making bad conclusions from bad assumptions. There’s no couching this any other way.
Actually, I can believe it…in Bavasi’s World, AJ was NEVER gonna get any kind of chance!
This is simply not true. Bavasi was very high on Adam Jones, but he values Erik Bedard and the “ace” quality pitching role more. Baltimore was probably never going to trade Bedard for any deal not including Adam, and so Bavasi made his choice.
If you really want to bitch about who wouldn’t have given AJ a chance, go back and scream at Hargrove and McLaren.
Everything that a GM does is about putting a dollar figure on everything. The GM is a businessman before he’s fan. An owner can be a fan, but not a GM. Just like you and your job and your mortgage. It’s all business, quantifying into dollars everything you do, implicity or explicitly.
When arguing the merits of the trade, from the GMs standpoint, you have to figure out what Bedart Properties is worth to the Orioles, to you, and to another team out there. And the same with Adam Jones Properties.
Even “proven MLB player” is all about giving a dollar value to that. So, if you want to analyze the deal, use whatever parameters you feel is relevant. But, put a price tag on it. That’s what a GM does.
If you don’t want to do that, then obviously the Ms win this deal. But, that’s not how to value the deal.
Please. This is not Varitek/Lowe for Slocomb or Soriano for HoRam. Like the trade or not, and we’re still not even sure what it is, it has two sides.
There were people who thought Soriano for HoRam was a good deal. Varitek & Lowe for Slocumb had fans at the time – two unproven prospects for a veteran, proven reliever.
tangotiger:
You also have to factor in a team’s budget. If this is the A’s, this is a terrible deal (and the opposite of any deal Beane would even entertain). With the budget the Bavasi has to work with, operating like the A’s GM would be foolish.
The notion that winning teams do not make deals like this seems to be the corallary to this argument, and is, of course, false. Sorry I’m not drinking the USSM Kool Aid.
With the budget the Bavasi has to work with, operating like the A’s GM would be foolish.
Yeah. Over the last, say, five years, he’d have won more games. That’s crazy.
19: Actually, I was kind of inferring that Hargrove and McLaren were part of “Bavasi’s World” by extension — and yeah, you’re right, those two are also to blame for the raw deal which Adam wound up getting here.
As for Bedard…while I have no problem with upgrading the starting rotation or with Bedard’s talent in general, I do have some reservations re his general lack of durability — and in no event do I think we should trade all of our best propects for two years (or less) of one player.
Sorry to seem like a “downer” on this, but it’s just very frustrating as a fan to know that BB seems to have some stupid “January/February Surprise” up his sleeve every year to deflate fan interest before ST even begins.
Who’s the M’s Lefty 8th inning set-up man with Sherrill most likely out as well? Rhodes? HoRam? O’Flaherty? And it seemed Affeldt would be a likely replacement but he’s off the market too.
So now the M’s have weakened the strength of their team for a 2nd year in a row and also have a gaping hole in RF. Please don’t say Luis Gonzalez or Shawn Green will be the Bavasi’s answer. Is there any chance another trade could be in the works to fill AJ’s spot?
I guess we can still hold our breath that Peter Angelos will wake up tomorrow and change his mind. It’s happened before …
LOOGYs are easily replaced. Rowland-Smith or O’Flaherty alone could do the job easily enough. Not that they should be limited to those roles, but that’s how our roster is constructed so…
What the hell is this deal for!?!!?!?!?!?!
To get swept in the first round of the playoffs!?!??!?!?!?!?!
This is the most god-awful trade I’ve ever seen!!!!!!! This franchise will never, ever learn what the hell it takes to win. These are just a bunch of mindless, corprate losers who don’t know a lick about anything!
Yep, pretty much ranks right up there with Varitek AND Lowe for Slocumb…or the Tigers back in 2000 trading about half their roster to Texas for about 100 games worth of Juan Gonzalez’ whining…or other such infinitely horrid moves.
[namecalling]
30: So, by that rationale, how will having a sucky defensive right-fielder actually HELP the M’s in ’08?
Bedard and Hernandez could potentially be an unbeatable 1-2 combination in the playoffs. Jones and Hernandez? Not so much.
DMZ,
You missed my point, which means I wrote my point poorly. The day they brought Bavasi back last year was one of my darkest, and he can’t even be mentioned in the same breath with a wizard like Beane…and the reason Bavasi was backed into this corner is mostly his own doing. But to constantly do what tangotiger was implying, to always consider every trade on ONLY on a dollar value basis and not a basis of need when you have a budget like the Mariners would not be wise. Sometimes you have to overpay to fill a hole, regardless of whether or not you were the one that created the hole in the first place.
And anyone who thought Soriano for HoRam was a good trade at the time doesn’t understand baseball. I guess that includes Bavasi.
That’s not true at all. We’ve discussed the knapsack problem here before, and why in some circumstances it makes sense to fill that a position with as much contribution as you can get, even if that’s the worst dollar/contribution value.
That’s not what Tango’s talking about.
I’m excited to see Bedard pitch in a Mariners uni.
That said, I’m terrified of who the Mariners are going to end up running out in right field this season. I’m also having awful visions of Bedard being one out away from a no hitter, only to see a bloop fly to left field thud to the ground where a gimpy Raul Ibanez couldn’t quite make it in time.
This is a bad trade because it raises more issues than it fixes.
Re: # 27 – LOOGYS are easily replaced.
Geotge Sherrill easily replaced? He’s a first-rate loogy, not just any old loogy.
Among other things, he struck out more than three times as many batters as he walked.
In case you’ve never seen his stats: http://tinyurl.com/ysx3b8
BTW, I’ll bet that Lou Gorman is having the best sleep he’s had in some time.
DMZ,
Fair enough. Thanks for all your contributions here. We’ll have to hope for the best on this one.
Mister
How depressing. Bavasi’s clearly feeling the heat and knows his job is on the line. He’s willing to mortgage the future for the present, because he won’t be around for the future. This does suck. Royally.
I didn’t say “George Sherrill” is easily replaced. I said “LOOGYs” are easily replaced. Remember, this team is stuck and fixated on it’s “role players” mentality of roster construction. Sherrill is a top notch bullpen arm against all comers, but he was relegated to the role of “lefty guy”. Replacing what he did against lefties shouldn’t be hard at all.
O’Flaherty vs LH – .193 / .271 / .228 / .495 OPS
Rowland-Smith vs LH – .275 / .322 / .412 / .734 OPS
Boom. Done.
[spelling]
Pretty silly question. Do YOU really think Dave is saying Torii Hunter is better than Erik Bedard? Or are you just framing an absurb question that you already know the answer to in a puzzling effort to undermine the prevailing opinion on this trade?
Apologies to the spelling gods. “absurd”
So what do YOU think Jones will be? I already told you what i think and what the professionals think. And by the way, just because the majority of people that post on this blog say they don’t like the trade, doesn’t mean that everyone else doesn’t like the trade. To that end, it seem pretty split down the middle.
I hear bees.
If Adam Jones turned out to be a career Torii Hunter that came up through our farm system, a Torii Hunter that we didn’t have to trade any talent for, then trading a lifetime Mariner Torii Hunter for two years of Erik Bedard is a PREPOSTEROUS trade.