Trade Review: Montezuma's and Billy Chapel

Billy Chapel receives:
SP Aaron Harang LAD
SP Kyle Drabek TOR

Montezuma’s Revenge receives:
3B Aramis Ramirez MIL

I don’t really like doing reviews of my own trades, namely because its impossible to be objective. Obviously, in the immediate aftermath of a trade, I always think I win. Otherwise I would do the trade. If anyone care to take over reviews when I’m involved in a trade, just let me know. It’d be much appreciated. Without further ado…

Troy and I had been going back and forth for a week or so on a much larger deal, but ultimately settled on a swap of the more minor elements.  n the wake of the Beckett trade, Troy was in need of some pitching help and received it in the trade with Drabek and Harang, each of whom has had better seasons thus far than Ramirez.  Drabek has been particularly impressive; even though he’s got a 1.43 WHIP, that 3.27 ERA is very good and he’s tallied five QS and had really only one bad game (5 IP, 5 ER @ LAA). And he’s been going against some of the best offenses and producing well – BOS, TEX, NYY, TAM, BAL (twice). While sabermetrics will tell you some regression is coming, he’s got the pedigree to be an excellent addition. Meanwhile, Harang has been quite valuable as well with a 3.83 ERA and 1.30 WHIP to go along with 5 QS. He too has been good throughout, minus one real stinker at COL and has very good K potential (struck out 13 Padres in 6 IP Apr 13th). Harang had a good year last year (3.64/1.37) in a big park and is pitching in another big park in the same division this year, so no reason why that success can’t continue.

Aramis, meanwhile, has started slow with a 25/3/22/2/.294 line, but he’s a notoriously slow starter, so he could easily turn it around and prove to be very valuable UTIL option for my team (or a fill in at 3B in case Lawrie decides to peg another ump with his helmet). ARam was a key addition to my team last year and contributed 22 HR and 67 RBI in 325 ABs on my way to regular season championship last year after Casten gave up on him (Boesch, JJohnson, BMcCarthy for Aram, Masterson, Oswalt, and AHill). Hopefully he will provide some of the power my team is currently lacking. It does create a couple holes in the rotation though and it’s unclear who might fill that void and whether they can provide the returns Drabek and Harang had so far.