Gunnar v. Adley v. MLB - Top 20 Trade Value

[bpilktree67]

58 minutes ago, Aristotelian said:

11-20 are McLanahan, Murphy, Riley, Robert, Harris, Webb, Alcantara, Perez, Ramirez, Bichette.

That would leave Yordan, Murphy, Strider, Wander, Acuna, Julio, Carroll, Tatis, Adley, and Gunnar for 1-10. I think you nailed it although I can't imagine Tatis that high with his contract. 

You have Murphy on their twice.   

[Aristotelian]

6 minutes ago, Hallas said:

No Elly?

 

I'm guessing Gunnar at like 7-10 and Adley around 2-4.  I'd be shocked if anyone other than Acuna is #1.   You have murphy in your top-10 but he went 12.  Unless there's another murphy.

Oops, yeah, Elly instead of Murphy in the top 10. 

[Alasdaire]

23 hours ago, Just Regular said:

Those 20 I pulled from a couple commenters, but Sean Murphy felt kind of flimsy.     Felix Bautista couldn't rank this high, could he?

He won't be ranked like that because he's a reliever, but it's an interesting thought.

We think about Gunnar/Adley/Jackson as untouchable, but isn't Felix in practice? There are plenty of guys who have higher WARs than him, but would you give away Felix for any of them?

Losing him this year would imperil the majority of high-leverage games, so even if you were to get back a guy on this trade value list in exchange for him, you're basically throwing away this season. And then there's absolutely no guarantee you would be able to find someone like him at any point in the foreseeable future.

He's under team control for awhile, and he might only just be entering his prime. A wonderful asset to have.

[Hallas]

4 minutes ago, Alasdaire said:

He won't be ranked like that because he's a reliever, but it's an interesting thought.

We think about Gunnar/Adley/Jackson as untouchable, but isn't Felix in practice? There are plenty of guys who have higher WARs than him, but would you give away Felix for any of them?

Losing him this year would imperil the majority of high-leverage games, so even if you were to get back a guy on this trade value list in exchange for him, you're basically throwing away this season. And then there's absolutely no guarantee you would be able to find someone like him at any point in the foreseeable future.

He's under team control for awhile, and he might only just be entering his prime. A wonderful asset to have.

The obvious rebuttal to this one is that if you offered Adley for Corbin Carroll, they might respond to you.  If you offered Bautista for Corbin Carroll, it's a question of whether the D-Backs can stop laughing for long enough to actually ignore you.

[Alasdaire]

Just now, Hallas said:

The obvious rebuttal to this one is that if you offered Adley for Corbin Carroll, they might respond to you.  If you offered Bautista for Corbin Carroll, it's a question of whether the D-Backs can stop laughing for long enough to actually ignore you.

Totally fair, if you're playing the "who says no" game, the Diamondbacks can't get the word out of their mouth fast enough. But if Arizona offered us Carroll for Felix, do we say yes?

Seems like a case where a stat like WAR doesn't tell the whole story. What does Carroll's extra .009 WAR per game difference vis-a-vis Felix's do to help the team this year compared to Felix's very real responsibility of coming in dozens of times to finish games with no suitable replacement if he were gone?

If you were to trade him for anyone other than perhaps Shohei, you would either need to concede your chance of contending this year or else make a second trade for another elite reliever to replace Felix.

[Frobby]

12 minutes ago, Alasdaire said:

Totally fair, if you're playing the "who says no" game, the Diamondbacks can't get the word out of their mouth fast enough. But if Arizona offered us Carroll for Felix, do we say yes?

Seems like a case where a stat like WAR doesn't tell the whole story. What does Carroll's extra .009 WAR per game difference vis-a-vis Felix's do to help the team this year compared to Felix's very real responsibility of coming in dozens of times to finish games with no suitable replacement if he were gone?

If you were to trade him for anyone other than perhaps Shohei, you would either need to concede your chance of contending this year or else make a second trade for another elite reliever to replace Felix.

This isn’t even a close call.  Put Carroll in our lineup and we’d have bigger leads when the closer comes in, and more leads in games generally.  Felix is doing a great job but most games are won or lost before the 9th inning.

[ArtVanDelay]

7 hours ago, bpilktree67 said:

You have Murphy on their twice.   

The second Murphy was this guy:

https://www.baseball-reference.com/players/m/murph01.shtml

[Alasdaire]

  

Just now, Frobby said:

This isn’t even a close call.  Put Carroll in our lineup and we’d have bigger leads when the closer comes in, and more leads in games generally.  Felix is doing a great job but most games are won or lost before the 9th inning.

Imagine we're entering a seven-game series against the Braves in the WS. Are you going to be happy that you're entering that series with Corbin Carroll + one of Danny Coulombe/Yennier Cano as closer instead of having gone in with one of Cowser/Santander/Hays/Hicks + Felix Bautista as closer?

Just an idle thought experiment. Felix does feel a bit different than a lot of pop-up closers who put things together for a short stint after failing as a starter or take the league by storm with smoke and mirrors before being figured out. His stuff is undeniable and we get to keep him for awhile.

[e16bball]

7 hours ago, Aristotelian said:

Oops, yeah, Elly instead of Murphy in the top 10. 

Murphy is in there. Clemens tipped that one earlier when he was discussing Francisco Alvarez — said Will Smith, Adley, and Murphy are the only catchers higher on the list.

It has to be Tatis that isn’t on the list. Which feels a little petty, given J-Rod is in the top 10. The Tatis contract is a lot bigger, true, but he’s also a better player (at present, at the very least). He’s nowhere in the top 50 or honorable mention?

[Alasdaire]

5 minutes ago, e16bball said:

It has to be Tatis that isn’t on the list. Which feels a little petty, given J-Rod is in the top 10. The Tatis contract is a lot bigger, true, but he’s also a better player (at present, at the very least). He’s nowhere in the top 50 or honorable mention?

I suppose it's somewhat plausible that some teams wouldn't be willing to touch Tatis given his volatility/character questions.

He's obviously very talented, but perhaps not good enough to give up what would be the best prospects for most systems and take on that contract to worry that the guy is going to have another blowup.

[Hallas]

4 minutes ago, Alasdaire said:

I suppose it's somewhat plausible that some teams wouldn't be willing to touch Tatis given his volatility/character questions.

He's obviously very talented, but perhaps not good enough to give up what would be the best prospects for most systems and take on that contract to worry that the guy is going to have another blowup.

I also wonder if part of it is because Tatis the corner outfielder isn't quite as valuable as Tatis the shortstop.

[Frobby]

11 minutes ago, e16bball said:

Murphy is in there. Clemens tipped that one earlier when he was discussing Francisco Alvarez — said Will Smith, Adley, and Murphy are the only catchers higher on the list.

It has to be Tatis that isn’t on the list. Which feels a little petty, given J-Rod is in the top 10. The Tatis contract is a lot bigger, true, but he’s also a better player (at present, at the very least). He’s nowhere in the top 50 or honorable mention?

Size of contract weighs heavily in determining hypothetical trade value.  Also, Rodriguez is 3 years younger.  Tatis has $325 mm coming at ages 25-35 and it’s all guaranteed.  The Rodriguez deal is way more flexible.

[e16bball]

55 minutes ago, Frobby said:

Size of contract weighs heavily in determining hypothetical trade value.  Also, Rodriguez is 3 years younger.  Tatis has $325 mm coming at ages 25-35 and it’s all guaranteed.  The Rodriguez deal is way more flexible.

It’s not really a question of saying Tatis should be ahead of J-Rod, though. There’s no doubt Rodriguez has the preferable contract, and he almost certainly should be ahead of Tatis on that basis.

But putting Rodriguez in the top 10 (and presumably Acuna at #1, though we won’t know that until tomorrow) confirms that the author recognizes the value of elite young talent under contract for a very long time, presumably cost-controlled and likely below market price. That same description fits Tatis. 

He’s 24, and he’s basically top 20 in WAR since the day he debuted (21 in fWAR, 20 in bWAR), despite playing about 75 less games than any other player in the top 25. From the age of 20-24, he’s averaged about 8 WAR per 162 games. Which is wild. And it’s not like the contract is crazy — including this year, it’s 12/324M, which comes out to $27M a year. As we know, that’s paying him for about 3.5 WAR/season. There’s surplus value in that contract, and potentially a ton of surplus value, especially given that he’s been one of the more marketable players in the game to date.

We’re talking about a list that has guys like Ke’Bryan Hayes, Lars Nootbaar, and even (though I love him) Cedric Mullins on it. And Fernando Tatis Jr. doesn’t even merit an honorable mention? That’s not really being reasonable.

 

[Frobby]

15 minutes ago, e16bball said:

It’s not really a question of saying Tatis should be ahead of J-Rod, though. There’s no doubt Rodriguez has the preferable contract, and he almost certainly should be ahead of Tatis on that basis.

But putting Rodriguez in the top 10 (and presumably Acuna at #1, though we won’t know that until tomorrow) confirms that the author recognizes the value of elite young talent under contract for a very long time, presumably cost-controlled and likely below market price. That same description fits Tatis. 

He’s 24, and he’s basically top 20 in WAR since the day he debuted (21 in fWAR, 20 in bWAR), despite playing about 75 less games than any other player in the top 25. From the age of 20-24, he’s averaged about 8 WAR per 162 games. Which is wild. And it’s not like the contract is crazy — including this year, it’s 12/324M, which comes out to $27M a year. As we know, that’s paying him for about 3.5 WAR/season. There’s surplus value in that contract, and potentially a ton of surplus value, especially given that he’s been one of the more marketable players in the game to date.

We’re talking about a list that has guys like Ke’Bryan Hayes, Lars Nootbaar, and even (though I love him) Cedric Mullins on it. And Fernando Tatis Jr. doesn’t even merit an honorable mention? That’s not really being reasonable.

 

Yeah, I wasn’t really commenting on whether Tatis belongs in the top 50, just on why Rodriguez probably outranks him on this list though Tatis may be the better player.  I’m sure Clemens will get some questions about the omission of Tatis.   

[Sports Guy]

Elite talent is so important.

Gunnar took that game over in some ways last night. Bautista shut them down for 2 innings, including the fake baseball in extra innings.

Elite talent is what wins you titles. It’s so great that this team finally has elite guys and more are on the way.