Fangraphs: The Price of Relief

[weams]

http://www.fangraphs.com/blogs/the-cubs-chapman-and-the-new-price-for-an-elite-reliever/

This is one of those rare times when you can rightfully declare a winner or loser on the day of the trade, if inclined.

Aroldis Chapman's been accused of choking a woman, for which he was suspended 30 games. I've since heard folks refer to him as a monster. You?d be hard-pressed to argue with that description. We enjoy sports because they provide us an enjoyable diversion from the terrors of the world and the tedium of daily life. It becomes harder to glean pleasure from the diversion when the diversion and the terrors begin to intertwine. The Chicago Cubs had a young man in their organization who, as far as we can tell, is an upstanding citizen with a bright future ahead of him, personally and professionally. They seem, in this case, to prefer the troubled man with the dark history. You could say the Cubs already lost this trade.