Riggleman takes over another moribund last place team
We mentioned this repeatedly last year, but we here at USSM have an immense amount of respect for the job Jim Riggleman did trying to keep the M’s together and playing in a lost season. Well, he gets to try again, as Manny Acta’s been fired in Washington-the-non-state.
Good luck, sir.
Bedard currently middle of the Type Bs
Wanted to touch on this since it affects trade value: there are ~10 guys ahead of him in the Bs right now, according to Eddie Bajek in Detroit Tiger Thoughts latest calculations. You want page 7. So the value for hanging onto him is not so great.
Fun fact: Washburn, according to this, is not so far off the B ratings himself.
Dave adds: However, offering Washburn arbitration, a necessary step in order to get compensation for a departing free agent, would be crazy. He’d clean the Mariners clocks in arbitration, thanks to his rosy ERA this year. So, he’s a non-compensation player, for all intents and purposes.
The JJ Hardy Plan
With all the talk of whether the M’s should be buyers or sellers, I’ve advocated for the last few months that the M’s should be both.
This team is not good enough to justify hanging onto Erik Bedard and Jarrod Washburn only to watch them leave via free agency at years end, when the trade market is craving veteran starting pitching. If this team had a 40% chance or better at making the playoffs, then you could look at maximizing the talent on the 2009 squad at the expense of future teams in order to take a chance at winning in October. But, realistically, their playoff odds are more like 15%, so five out of six times, that push for the playoffs comes up short and the team gets neither October baseball or future value in exchange for keeping Bedard and Washburn.
On the other hand, a 15% chance of making the playoffs is too high to abandon as a lost cause. The potential reward for that one-in-six chance coming up in your favor is extremely high, and should keep the team away from a blow-up-the-roster-and-play-the-kids strategy. St. Louis won a World Series in 2006 while going 83-79 in the regular season and outscoring their opponents by a whopping 19 runs. You don’t have to be the ’27 Yankees to get hot in October, and the M’s have enough talent to make a crazy playoff run possible. You can’t pretend that the potential for that kind of outcome, even if it is unlikely, has no value.
So the team is faced with a scenario where it should trade Bedard and Washburn for players that will be around past this season, but also should be looking to keep the 2009 team competitive. The solution? J.J. Hardy.
The Brewers shortstop was drafted by Zduriencik when he was the scouting director for Milwaukee. Since arriving in the majors in 2005, Hardy has compiled a career .264/.324/.435 mark that is about as close to league average as you can possibly get. Over 2,168 plate appearances in the big leagues, Hardy’s Weighted Runs Above Average is -0.5. Half of a run below average as a hitter over his 4+ year career. When someone says he’s a league average hitter, they aren’t kidding.
A league average hitter might not be that exciting, but it isn’t very easy to find league average hitters who play quality defense at premium positions. As Mariner fans have seen over the past few years, the average offense + terrific defense combination is quite valuable. And Hardy is a really good defender – his career UZR is +39 in 4,411 innings, which works out to about +12 runs per 150 games. That makes him one of the best defensive shortstops in the game.
This is, essentially, the Adrian Beltre/Mike Cameron/Franklin Gutierrez skillset. Hardy is that kind of player. Over his big league career, he’s been worth +13.4 wins in those 2,168 PA, or about +3.7 wins per season. He turns 27 in August, so he’s not living off of career year performances that he can’t be expected to repeat, either. Going forward, Hardy should be projected as a +4 win player over a full season.
Why on earth would the Brewers want to trade a 26-year-old +4 win shortstop while they are in the middle of a pennant race? Because they have this kid named Alcides Escobar hanging out in Triple-A, waiting for the call to Milwaukee. Escobar is a 22-year-old that the Milwaukee front office is absolutely in love with, to the point that when declaring him off limits in trade discussions, Doug Melvin said “You can go years without having a shortstop prospect like him. They don’t come around that often.”
Escobar is a premium defender with an improving bat, currently hitting .296/.348/.417 in Triple-A, including a .310/.412/.517 mark in July. He’s capable of holding his own in the big leagues right now, and he’d be one of the rangiest players in the league from the moment he got to the big leagues. Quite simply, Escobar is the Brewers shortstop of the future, and they’re going to have to move Hardy out of his way at some point soon.
They could move him to third base, except he has no interest in playing anywhere besides shortstop and their other “untouchable” prospect, Mat Gamel, is getting time there right now. They could move him to second base, but Casey McGehee is posting a .396 wOBA while filling in for the injured Rickie Weeks, who will be back next season. In reality, they just don’t have a spot for Hardy going forward. His future is somewhere besides Milwaukee.
So, if Melvin is looking at an inevitable trade of Hardy, dealing him now to acquire some badly needed pitching help makes more sense than waiting to deal him this winter. Melvin has been blunt about his ability to acquire pitching in this market, stating that the teams that are willing to move veteran starting pitchers are looking for young pitchers back in return, and he doesn’t have any to trade. He’s a man trying to buy in a land where his currency isn’t any good.
The M’s, however, should have little to no interest in getting a young pitcher back from the Brewers. The Mariners need a shortstop, and the Brewers have two. The Brewers need starting pitchers, and the Mariners have seven. This would be a perfect match even if Zduriencik and Melvin hadn’t spent years working together. Their history should make a deal between those two significantly easier to hash out.
What kind of deal would work for both sides? No need to make this complicated. The M’s ship both of their free-agent-to-be starters to Milwaukee, along with enough cash to fit their salaries into Milwaukee’s budget, in exchange for Hardy. Both teams trade from depth to fill holes.
For the Mariners, the move would essentially break down like this.
Hardy replaces Cedeno at SS
Hardy (projected .338 wOBA going forward) would be a big offensive upgrade from Cedeno (projected .284 wOBA going forward), and probably a minor upgrade from Cedeno defensively. Over two and a half months, the offensive difference would be worth about 11 runs.
Morrow replaces Bedard at SP
One talented but enigmatic pitcher replaces another. Morrow’s not nearly as good as Bedard, but as we saw in Boston, he has his moments. His projected FIP of 4.37 over 69 innings over the rest of the year is a dropoff from Bedard’s 3.19 FIP over 62 innings, but only about an eight run difference.
Rowland-Smith replaces Washburn at SP
This is where it gets a little dicey. Washburn’s projected for a 4.22 FIP over 77 innings for the rest of the season, but ZIPS doesn’t know that Ryan Rowland-Smith has been converted to the rotation, got placed on the disabled list for a few months, and then had some issues with decreased velocity in Triple-A. However, RRS has pitched well in the majors in previous years and his last three starts for Tacoma have been very good, so there are reasons to believe that he could join the rotation and pitch well. If you think he’s going to be something like a Jason Vargas and post a ~5.00 FIP over the rest of the season, you’d be looking at a six run dropoff. If you think he’d be really bad, we could give him a 5.50 FIP and the gap would go up to ten runs.
Add it all up for the M’s, and the net difference of adding Hardy while subtracting Bedard and Washburn would be something like -5 runs over the rest of the year. That’s half a win that they lose, while also getting to retain Hardy’s services for 2010 (after which point, this deal would be an easy net positive for the Mariners).
If I do the same thing for the Brewers, just without the wordiness, we get a -5 for the dropoff from Hardy to Escobar, a +9 from Suppan to Bedard, and a +4 from Burns to Washburn. That makes them almost a win better this year by making this deal. They also offset the loss of Hardy’s future value by getting the draft pick back from letting Bedard leave via free agency, and potentially getting Washburn to sign a home town discount deal to stay in Wisconsin beyond this season.
The M’s get a shortstop for the present and future. They make the 2009 roster only marginally worse while drastically improving the 2010 roster and providing a long term solution to the shortstop problem. The Brewers get much needed pitching help, while clearing the way for their shortstop of the future, and they do so without having to expand their budget or trade away any pieces from their farm system.
This is the quintessential win-win trade. The M’s allow themselves to stay in contention for the rest of 2009 (and if you’re that concerned with the rotation after the deal, just go trade for Ian Snell, who Pittsburgh is trying to give away) and acquire a foundation-caliber player who will stick around for 2010 and potentially beyond.
The M’s have surplus pitching. The Brewers have a surplus at shortstop. The Mariners need a shortstop, and the Brewers need pitching. Let’s just make everyone happy and pull the trigger on this, okay?
Minor League Wrap (7/6-12/09)
Yesterday, people were complaining about a lack of baseball over the all-star break (what, 162 regular season games not enough for you? I get to deal with 700-800 in the minors alone). There won’t be much, if any minor league action on the big day, but today you can check out the Southern League All-Star Game and on Wednesday, the PCL plays the International League in the Triple-A All-Star Game. Just saying.
To the jump!
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Road Trip Of Doom Recap
The M’s just completed the hardest stretch of their season schedule. Before they took off for LA, we noted that anything over .500 would be a pretty big accomplishment. They went 9-7.
Now, here’s the amazing part. How well would you have thought the offense was going to do if Russell Branyan was going to hit .200/.315/.467 during the last 16 games? Seriously, we’d have been expecting a long series of shutouts. Instead, Franklin Gutierrez and Rob Johnson (four extra base hits and three walks in his last seven games… amazing) picked up the slack, and the offense was respectable enough, especially considering the competition.
And, when the offense is respectable, this team wins games, because the run prevention is among the best in the league. Even with some bullpen problems, the defense and the rotation carried the day, and the M’s were able to keep enough runs off the board to be in most every game. With the subtraction of Betancourt and the additions of Langerhans and Hannahan, the M’s probably have the best defense in baseball, and this is what you can do when nearly everyone on the field is turning balls in play into outs. Over the last two weeks, the M’s opponents have posted a .234 batting average on balls in play. .234! Yea, a decent chunk of that is good luck, but these guys can really play defense, and they’ve got some quality arms in the rotation to boot.
16 games against quality opponents, with Beltre missing the last 13 of them, and the team went 9-7. Be impressed. The M’s just played a bunch of games against playoff quality teams and held their own. There are still some pretty obvious weaknesses on this roster, and the Angels catching fire means that we’re still 4 games out of first place in the AL West, but if this roster was going to roll over and die, this was when they were going to do it. Instead, they went toe to toe with the best in the league and won.
What a great way to finish the most encouraging first half of baseball we’ve seen since 2001. Over the next three weeks, we’ll find out just what Jack and his crew can do to make the team better. If Beltre can come back, and the team adds a shortstop and shores up the bullpen… watch out. This could be a fun, fun ride.
Actual email
We get a ton of email here at USSM. A lot of spam*, pointers to stories, requests for tickets, whatever. But I thought I’d share this one, which arrived with no subject.
from what i see you have already sold out to the man. the only good thing the mariners have done was to get rid of yuni. the rest of the moves have been really stupid
They’re serious. Somewhere out there is a Mariner fan who thinks, among other things, that Branyan sucks, the Putz trade was bad, and on and on and on. Our work will never be done.
Also, if we sold out to the man, could someone tell me where the check went?
Random other stuff:
– I did a footer fix based on a reader suggestion (remember, patches are welcome here at USSM)
– the AdSense block that made us like $1 was wayyyy too spammy with the Evony ads and all so I nuked it.
– As long as I’m selling out to the man, I have another story in the August Asimov’s, as long as I’m at it. Check it out.
– I was 6m off from doing the STP in under 11 hours this year.
* particularly link exchange requests, paid link offers, and so on
Game 88, Rangers at Mariners
The lineups are the same as they were last night, but Baker also informs us that Chad Cordero is close to getting into a game and Jeff Zimmerman (surprise) has arm soreness. I’m sure one of you was wondering.
I’d suggest checking out the Futures Game too, where RF Tyson Gillies and 3B Alex Liddi are batting two and three for the World Team, but they’re in the midst of a rain delay. Gillies grounded out in his first at-bat, but Liddi drew a walk and the World Team has scored two runs off of former Mariners prospect RHP Chris Tillman.
Alternatively, there is a Jerry Brewer article on pitching coach Rick Adair that could help pass those long forty minutes until the game starts.
Game 87, Rangers at Mariners
Special Safeco Tenth Anniversary Edition:
As if we haven’t had enough to talk about, there’s another game today. How much the team has changed these past few weeks. How much the franchise has changed in the past ten years.
RF Ichiro!
1B Russell Branyan
2B Jose Lopez
DH Ken Griffey Jr.
CF Franklin Gutierrez
LF Ryan Langerhans
C Rob Johnson
3B Jack Hannahan
SS Ronny Cedeno
Have at you, in a civil and thoughtful manner, of course.
Morrow to Tacoma, For Real
You should really read the whole thing, but to summarize, Morrow wasn’t throwing his curve last night, Kenji doesn’t consider it to be much more than an “out pitch” at this moment, and he’ll need the better secondary offerings to keep starting. The Mariners don’t need a fifth starter until the 25th of July. The Rainiers won’t get a day off following their all-star break until August 13th. In the meantime, we have Garrett Olson.
Jack Hannahan, New M’s Third Baseman
Do you remember a front office that would take months to make obvious personnel moves? Because I’m quickly forgetting that. Zduriencik has apparently tired of the defensive antics over at the hot corner and has made a trade with the Athletics for 3B Jack Hannahan. RHP Justin Souza is sent to play for what I think would be his hometown team, unless he was a Giants fan.
You may remember Hannahan as the starting third baseman for the Athletics all of last season, after Eric Chavez’ back exploded for the nth time. He didn’t hit much, posting a .218/.305/.342 line and somehow managed to be even worse this year. The A’s tired of his not-hitting and so he’s been in triple-A for the past ten games, putting up a .333/~.411/.533 line in that limited span. There’s not much to indicate at the age of 29 that he’ll ever be major threat at the plate, as he’s only ever topped ten home runs in a season once. Handedness aside, his only real strong suit is that he can work counts, and saw 4.1 pitches per plate appearance this season, so even though he’s often an out, he’s at least a pesky one.
On the field, it’s a different story. Hannahan ranked between Ryan Zimmerman and Pedro Feliz in UZR this season, and last year it was Mike Lowell and Chone Figgins. That isn’t on the Beltre level of defense, not that many are, but after you get out of that elite tier that seems to hover around the double digits, he’s among the best mortals to play the position.
Souza, a 9th round pick by the Mariners in a really productive ’06 draft, was one of our better arms in the high minors. He’s an undersized right-hander who could light up the gun now and then. His main asset has been his command, as he only had eighteen walks to sixty-two strikeouts in 78.0 innings this year. He’s someone that we may have ended up talking more about later, but his loss is not a big one. Cortes fits into that West Tenn rotation spot rather nicely.
So there Mariners got better defense, more left-handed, and more patient in exchange for something they might not have used in the first place. As temporary fixes go, and that’s exactly what Hannahan is, we can and have in the past done a lot worse. Now, on to solving the real need at shortstop…