Open Trading Reviews - Part 4

S. Napalm receives:

OF Junior Lake CHC

13^th rounder

15^th rounder

Overrated receives:

SP Brandon Beachy ATL

RP Jonathan Papelbon PHI

18^th rounder

18^th rounder

Pretty good haul for Russ, but you have to wonder if this could end up ultimately hurting him. Pap has been awful and Beachy, while the name is bright and shiny, is coming off TJS and has been just OK, picking up 4-6 ks per inning and getting shelled his first time out. Perhaps he’ll get hot again and prove to be a valuable addition as he was last year, but it’s a tough call. Rarely do guys regain their form immediately after returning. This is why I stopped drafting guys returning from TJS midseason. They typically take up a valuable roster spot for a long time, don’t return on schedule, don’t have their old form, and generally aren’t viewed as keepers. But they do eventually recover fully and Beachy looks like he’ll be no different, perhaps recovering immediately. The last three outings have been good, albeit against PHI twice and MIA. He’s only let up four walks, so that’s promising. For Mike, eight rounds is a decent haul, especially since I’m sure people weren’t knocking down the door for Paps. As of Sunday morning, he will be done drafting in the 18^th, but that’s likely to change before the 2014 draft. A shame he didn’t go for it because his team was good enough, but he should be firing on all cylinders next season.

Ring receives:

OF Hunter Pence SF

SP Alex Wood ATL

19^th rounder

20^th rounder

S. Napalm receives:

SP Jason Vargas LAA

SP Edwin Jackson CHC

13^th rounder

18^th rounder

This one stung a bit since I had been working on a deal for Pence for a couple days and thought we had settled on three rounds. Looks like Dagan beat me to the punch with a much bigger offer, so I can’t blame Mike for taking it. I wasn’t going to give up that much, mainly because the dropoff from Pence to Aoki wasn’t tremendous. But the trade makes sense for Dagan as he’s kept his draft board largely intact (missing 10, 13, 15s) and got back some nice value. Pence gives Dagan a legitimate base stealer, whch is odd to say, but the results are there (he’s only been caught once). The problem is he hasn’t hit a homer in a month. Last year he fell off badly toward the end, so there’s a risk in that being repeated. Wood has been quite impressive since coming up with 57/2.61/1.03/4 in 51 ip, but he’s a risk as well since he is a rookie with a deceptive delivery. Overall, Dagan’s staff has a lot of nice numbers for the year, but some of the names make me wonder if they can keep this up. Colon was dreadful the last couple times out and is now on the DL, meanwhile Latos is the only real K artist here. Still, there’s plenty of talent on this squad for Dagan to make another run at it. Meanwhile, Mike obviously got more than he would’ve gotten if I accepted the deal he sent earlier that morning, so good for him. Perhaps bad for me. We shall see.

Moose receives:

SP Julio Teheran ATL

SS Elvis Andrus TEX

14^th rounder

15^th rounder

Cowhide receives:

3B David Freese STL

RP LaTroy Hawkins NYM

9^th rounder

11^th rounder

I’m surprised Dave was willing to deal these two, but I think it’s a good move. Teheran is a great young pitcher obviously, but you generally want pitcher keepers to be surefire studs not guys with one good year under their belt. And it has been good, just not surefire keeper good. Next year, he could reach a new stratosphere given his ample pedigree or he could struggle. It’s not a bad idea to cash in now. Meanwhile, I’ve long said Andrus isn’t much of a keeper. He hurts three categories and is good (not great) in two. Just a big name. He’s still young, but the power will never be there. That said, it’s a great piece to add to Moose’s offense as he previously only have Altuve as a legit stealer. He’s got a pretty great offense with the resurgent Soriano, while Teheran adds talent to what seemed like a lot of lucky guys in the rotation. Good use of the two high picks, as he only had to give up a total of nine rounds – a far cry from the 18 rounds I gave up for Liriano/Kimbrel, which looks like a drastic overpayment at this point. Anyhow, I like the move for Dave. He’s got a great draft board (11 picks in the first five rounds) and a firm base of keepers in Posey, Hosmer, Jennings, and Price. Moving on from Andrus and closers elevates this group already. Also, the advent of the bevy of offseason trades will make it really easy for him to find two guys to join them, likely better keepers that cost less than he received in the trade.