Deals on wheels

[JohnU]

Taking a general look at the Reds and the trades they have made over the last year.
And other deals.

Trading Simon for Suarez is, for the moment, probably a good trade.
Trading Latos for DeSclafani and Wallach will probably be a good trade.
Trading for Byrd was probably a short-term mistake, impeding the progress of a younger Winker.

Moving ahead, it's clear the Reds will lose Cueto and probably Leake. They will get a comp pick.

Pena will probably go FA. Barnhart will be the No. 1 catcher, which is probably a good deal.

The middle infield for the 2016 season is unstable. The outfield will still blow. Infield corners are stable.

Rotation next year: DeSclafani, Lorenzen, Iglesias, Moscot, Bailey eventually, and I'd guess ... somebody else. Howard, Travieso, Stephenson ....

Reds have a lot of good young arms.

Do they trade for somebody?

Do they trade Bruce? Frazier? Chapman?

The bullpen is not a consideration so far for next year.

 

[Redsfan1507]

IMO, everything baseball begins and ends with pitching. If the Reds are deep in young talented arms, everything else is easier. You never have enough pitching, because if you do, someone wants to trade for it.

I remember recent talk about having a roation logjam, and all the sudden we have a shortage..
.
What the Reds are really in short supply of, is young talented arms that can throw 200 innings a year, and not wind up on Kremcheck's patient list.

The bullpen, other than a closer and maybe a setup man, is a little like the position bench- high turnover rate is common, because the players in that role are skill limited by definition. Usually, if the middle bullpen is the only problem on a team, it isn't really a problem.

The OF, is a problem. I don't think Hamilton needs to be Rickey Henderson to help the Reds- Vince Coleman is enough, as long as he's the worst hitting OF the Reds have...currently as bad as Hamilton is hitting, that isn't the case...both Byrd and Bruce are worse, don't catch as many outs, and make 16 -20 times more money. Byrd's injury will allow the Reds to pass on next years contract, because he won't have the AB to meet the auto-renewal clause. There's an opportunity to watch how the Reds react to. Bruce is a problem- he was supposed to be someone to build around- he's locked up for a few years, at a salary that would be attractive to keep, or as a trade piece, if he hits 250/30. If he hits .216/16, the Reds are getting hosed if they keep him, and possibly worse if they trade him for what that miserable stat line is worth.

Must be harder than I think to find a farmhand that can at least pretend to be a LF that can hit at least .275 with 15 HR or so. How long has it been since they had one of those ?

BP is fine, but he's 32. Injuries and slumps will become more frequent if the fate of post PED middle infielders takes the path of the century of pre-PED middle infielders. All that means is someone 2-3 years from now is going to be needed to replace his bat- it may take 50 years to replace his glove with at least his bat.

IMO, Cozart or Suarez can probably be an acceptable SS, if they aren't required to be a bat higher than 8th in the lineup. If Barnhart instead of Mesoraco is the everyday catcher, that probably won't be the case. You don't score many runs with 3-4 players in every lineup that should be hitting 8th.

Votto and Bailey are signed forever. All we can do is hope they play a lot of full seasons and don't fall off the talent cliff until a buyout doesn't require selling the team.

Frazier, Mesoraco and Chapman aren't. If they play to normal expectations, they may all be out of reach financially in the next few years. Cueto and Leake will be in 4 months...this would all be easier if the Reds got near term value by trading unaffordable players, instead of waiting on compensation ( FA )draft picks to mature.

 

[chico ruiz]

the simon trade raised some red flags with me immediately. i'm not sure how that can be deemed a good trade (before, now, or after) using any evaluation of perceived future, or real, talent. dombrowski took that deal and ran. my guess is, he feels very good about it. suarez is filling in for cozart out of necessity. had zack stayed healthy, we may have seen suarez in september. crawford is a great big huge question mark. it's way too early to judge the second latos trade. i hope it works out for the reds.

stephenson's last handful of starts have been so good it prompted pat kelly to say," if you can throw three pitches like that over the plate you can pitch anywhere." garret pitched another good game in his last start in daytona. travieso is progressing. nick howard is the only recent high draft pick pitcher that is disappointing to this point. it's difficult to access, and i don't attach a lot of significance to the numbers down there, but he's walking a ton of hitters. 5 starts and 9 relief appearances. seems unusual for a college draft pick. stephens, romano, and strahan are wait & sees. can any pitcher at louisville be considered a prospect? the reds already brought up moscot and lorenzen. holmberg is only 23, but he seems to be regressing. if there was any year when he'd get a call-up you would think it is 2015.

1507 says, 'everything baseball begins and ends with pitching.' it sure does, especially in august and september. that and defense usually decides who goes to the post-season. kansas city, pittsburgh, and san francisco made that abundantly clear again last year. however, pitching includes the middle bullpen (see success of above mentioned teams). many baseball people in recent years have bemoaned the use of the closer arguing that in many cases they were needed more in the 5th, 6th, or 7th inning when the game was actually on the line. with starter's pitch and inning counts so closely monitored their roles have become increasingly more prominent and important. in fact, i've read several articles lately about a innovative approach to pitching coming out of colorado. they're experimenting with the idea of having starters go significantly fewer innings and then going to the bullpen. 3 or 4 predetermined pitchers will throw on a assigned day. so, their not really relieving at all. the rockies have done their homework and realize they're getting beat in the middle innings more often than not. they seem to be finding that the traditional way of approaching pitching isn't working for them. it's an interesting idea that underscores my point: if you have a middle bullpen problem, it really is a problem. even if it's a team's only ostensible weakness, it's still a big problem. that may not have been the case in 1965, but it is in 2015. food for thought.

 

[JohnU]

Bad bullpens are a problem but building one through trades and the FA market is a misuse of time and resources. You invite 50 guys to camp and let 6 of them get the job.

I have always wondered if a team could use 4 or 5 guys to pitch 2 innings ... I don't think pitchers prepare like that, though. Colorado could experiment all week and still have to play in Denver.

Guys get better pitching in the majors after they get their lunch a few dozen times.

I don't agree or disagree on the Simon trade. He was either burned out or hitting his career stride. Suarez was supposed to shove Cozart. Maybe he did that.

 

[Redsfan1507]

I tend to look at trades of players originally gotten on the cheap differently. What did we pay for Simon ? Not much- I can't remember, if you cant either - you get my original point.

• Latos on the other hand, cost 3 current MLB starting resources. A catcher with more than s dozen HR already this year, a 1b hitting well over .300, and a closer with 15 saves. No knock on Desclafani, I think he's got substantial upside, but the Reds gave up too much in the original trade. Latos value was intended to be used deeper and more often into post season than actually happened. IMO, the Reds got the better deal with Miami dumping the soon to be FA, but can't get back what's already gone for him. Just gotta turn the page.

• Lame duck FA's that can only be short term rentals get only token trade value in return. In many cases, a team losing a rare talent like Cueto so late in the year as not to get one of a franchises top prospects, might actually get better long term value by not trading him, making him turn down a contract, and taking the compensation draft pick when he signs elsewhere, instead of getting a 35th round pick minor league player and a washed up MLB bit player, to be DFA in a year. Package Chapman, who still had another year of contract, and the Reds would get a real player or three, but alone, at the trade deadline, Cueto goes for Cracker Jacks, IMO.

 

[JohnU]

I think with the Latos deal with SD, a lot of folks were thinking Alonso was wasted roster space. In truth, he kind of ... was. If we still had Grandal, we'd be trading Barnhart or Grandal, still waiting for Mesoraco to decide if he wants to actually PLAY baseball for his $30M contract or get a surgery that will keep his bat on the field in the off-chance he wants to bash 159 home runs in the Friendly GABPs of Confine Field.

Boxberger might just be having a generally good time. and it is hard to see how he would have fit. Compared to Gregg or Jimbo, Herm Wehmeier would be a good fit.

That's all post-game analysis of the trade. Latos in the last 12 months, has performed admirably ... not ... and left Cincy with a bad attitude. I suspect the Reds announcers will bring that up again when Miami visits, as if the fans even give a fuck.

Either way, the family tree on trades is always amusing if not fascinating. Hell, even the Frank Robinson trade left a hole in the Reds outfield that was eventually filled by George Foster or Ken Griffey.

I suppose my observation is that I don't see the Reds either backing up the truck or renting a U-Haul. They can't unload the entire roster just because this is a weenie season. Sometimes, you have some weenie seasons. I do think it's important to replace Price, but that's not because it will matter. it will just give the illusion that the front office isn't happy.

But the team is playing close to expectations now and the recent injuries will shine a sympathy light on the dugout staff. I mean, after all...how can you win with your players all hurt? Same way you can't win when they were all on the field, I reckon.

 

[chico ruiz]

let me preface this post with this: i'm not nit-picking. you guys are both correct from two different perspectives. however, the original latos trade was not a good one. btw, it cost 4 current mlb starting resources. four. it's not really about how well those 4 players are doing, although that fact does sting a little. it's about what their individual perceived value was to the other 28 gm's around the league at the time of the trade. what if they had been split up in multiple trades? 3 first round picks were gone in a instant. three. three highly sought after prospects were bundled in one trade. name me one other trade in recent mlb history where a gm was so reckless with his resources. you're right john; a lot of folks were thinking alonso was a wasted roster space. but, that doesn't mean you just give him away. again, his perceived upside and value to the other 28 gm's. the reds received one player back for alonso, grandal, boxberger, and volquez. one. just because there was a mvp already at first base it doesn't make it alright to let alonso go for virtually nothing in return. sure, it's post-game analysis of the trade, and i don't want to start a "wally bad" thread. but, that trade was bad when you look at what the reds could have received for those players. also, i have no problem seeing where and how boxberger would fit on this current reds staff. no problem at all.

when i read michael lewis's book in 2003 (i liked 'the big short' better, but that's another story) i realized it was less about obp and more about the mlbpa. the most important lessons that the moneyball mindset has spread around baseball has little to do with statistics, but simply with the basic rules of how mlb finances are structured. namely, that prospects are incredibly valuable. while this was always known, modern ('modern' being the key word here) franchises place even more value on prospects, with blockbuster-type trades, such as baltimore's pickup of adam jones, chris tillman, george sherrill, kam mickolio and tony butler for a single season of erik bedard, becoming harder to pull off. you see the consequences of this in the increased tendency of top players to be traded more than a year before free agency, like jeff samardzija to oakland and zack greinke to milwaukee, in order to grab bigger packages.


i'll leave the comparing and contrasting to you guys. personally, i don't think it's 'sleepy' gm-ing. i think it's more akin to criminal.

 

[JohnU]

I suppose the discussion could center around what the Reds thought they needed at the time and where they could best obtain that value. I was never a fan of the Latos-Volquez et al deal but tempered it a little in the early stages of Latos's time in Cincy. When Mesoraco emerged, the Grandal component seemed to be tolerable.

I might have been among the many who defended Alonso's bat and despised his inability to find a place for himself to play.

But the conversation -- yes, easily -- evolve into ... could the Reds have gotten Latos quality in exchange for 1 player? Arguably, Volquez already WAS that good ... just didn't seem to fit in.

The Grandal part of it is the most muddled, given his history with PEDs. Boxberger is a relief pitcher. I don't evaluate them unless they are awful.

Back to Alonso. In some circles, it could be argued that he was a bad draft pick in the first place, since the Reds had clearly undervalued Votto in their quest for the best left-hand hitting first baseman in all the land, unless you count Juanderful Juan Francisco.

I do think we measure trades on what we get, not what we think we ought to get. History is full of those deals.

Where the Reds need to go now ... they need to take a serious look at what they have, why it isn't working and what to do about it. That's a complex matter and the GMs who can pull that off are rare. They are also not making a big deal of it.

What's monkeyed up the trade routes in recent years is the preposterous 2nd wild card.

 

[chico ruiz]

the history of trades before the owners were found guilty of collusion, and the subsequent player strike in 94, are irrelevant to this discussion. as well, trades made during the reserve clause years have no bearing at all on this subject. the game and it's economic model have changed completely. in fact, i would venture to say that ballpark attendance will become less and less important in the evolving money making scheme we call baseball.


i'm not really interested in parsing elements of the latos trade. i'm interested in how much the game changed (and is changing) from the late 90's forward. i admire the gm's that understood these changes / trends and were / are innovative enough to field consistently competitive teams. i do not admire the gm's who thought they could do it the same way with solid evidence to the contrary right in front of their faces. that inability to learn, change, and adapt is unforgivable because it can take a lot of people / organizations down with it.

i read a recent t.rosecrans article. he was patting himself on the back for advocating trading cueto a year ago so as to get more back for him. trent's published hubris is only partially correct. it should have happened 2 or 3 years ago. not necessarily cueto, but one or two of the starters, at their peak values, should have been dealt.


what really 'monkeyed up' the trade routes in recent years was ownership collusion. after that salaries began to escalate, and the emerging disparity between the ability of large and smaller market teams to compete financially for top free agent talent led to a stratification in the league. it still exists today, but the smart gm's found a way to push the pendulum back the other way by hedging their bets with the accumulation & superior development of prospects, research & analysis, and getting back to fielding a team of 25 players that fit precisely what their game plan is for winning. team speed, defense, pitching, and bust your hump on every play. game by game, play by play, relentless execution of those 4 basic tenets is what baseball really is. right?

 

[JohnU]

Analysis of ownership collusion is somewhat outside my grasp of global sports economics. The intent of my original post was aimed at how the Reds intend to move forward in terms of personnel. Without much debate, the Reds front office and dugout management have spent more than 24 months pretending to have a clue. How this fits into their future would depend largely on whether they accept that as reality or continue to execute a strategy that boggles even the mind of The Village Idiot.

We've beaten some of these horses to death, namely how the Reds have used their personnel and the talent they've made available. In about 6 out of 10 tries, it has flopped.

The latest absurdity has come with how the front office has pursued the Mesoraco injury. Without scaling that fish, it just shows a man in a dark room with blinders on.

I also know that the difference between the post-season and fourth place is a six-game swing from year to year. I also know that only two or three teams in the NL are consistently in the post-season and until that changes, I will not give GMs more credit than they truly deserve.

 

[JohnU]

It's hard to imagine, but the Reds have found even MORE ways to cough up a divisional race. It's more than just losing games, it's about keeping a competitive balance in your own division. Losing 3 out of 4 games will happen, but this is going to be a fairly consistent event.
This team has become an insult.

 

[chico ruiz]

agreed john. what do the reds do moving forward? that is the better question to ask. i also understand your reticence on the subject of gm's. what i'm constantly surprised by is how little the typical reds fan knows about the rest of major league baseball. i'm not referring to you. in a lot of ways they reflect the entire organization. i don't know how a business, of any kind, can exist and thrive in a bubble. if you want to know what i mean by that, i'll be happy to extrapolate. extrapolate |ikˈstrapəˌlāt| - extend the application of (a method or conclusion, esp. one based on statistics) to an unknown situation by assuming that existing trends will continue or similar methods will be applicable. however, as you can see by the definition of the word, it would require taking a hard look at the last 8 years of executive management.

i think it's worth looking at, with a discerning eye, how gm's operating on smaller budgets than the reds, are able to achieve and maintain success. there is no carbon copy, and mistakes are made. they were / are / and going forward mostly successful at obtaining good value through trades in return for players who were / are going to become too expensive or don't fit organizationally. 6 out of ten is better than 4 out of ten. that is the difference in the six game swing you mentioned.

here's a mystery gm talking about the advent of the extra wild card, and the effect on the trade market you mentioned, among other things:
"I wish these markets existed when we were on the other side of it, when we were sellers. This is absolutely a sellers market, at this point in time. Now, there may be a dozen teams that go on hot and cold runs and it clarifies some pictures, but there are a lot of teams that are within striking distance. ... I think it's awfully tough to get those teams to take away from their major league team."

echoing a philosophy that we've heard the last few years, the gm said the organization's approach is to cautiously walk the line between upgrading this year's team, while preserving the resources necessary to remain competitive in the future:
"A couple years ago there was an argument that we had two legitimate holes that we had to fill and we didn't at the trade deadline. We heard it a lot. We wanted to see how it would progress and where it would go from there. We were able to add player 1 and player 2. We gave up a lot to get player 1 in hindsight. We knew it the day we did it. Those are the types of trades that unravel an organization if you do too many of them. They unravel a smaller, mid-market team very quickly. It will be interesting to see where the trade market plays out. We always walk that balance between now and the future. We want to do everything we can to put this club in a position to make the playoffs this year, win a World Series this year. At the same time, we want to be able to be in that position as many years in the future as we can."

i can't remember the current reds gm ever saying anything remotely similar to this.

as far as last nights game; it is frustrating, but mostly disappointing. you can't point at one thing specifically, but maddon teams win those type games more often than not. there's the obvious emphasis on good defense, but there are intangibles with him. for instance, rather than discipline a guy like castro, he embraces his personality peculiarities and somehow incorporates them into the team without infecting it. i know it sounds weird psychology and mystical-like, but i've watched him coax good performances for 9 -most of them successful- years. when the cubs get a couple more top shelf pitchers, look the fuck out. cardinals? enough said. pirates? they have 3 young center-fielders roaming around in their outfield and a bunch of pitching on the way. what were you saying about keeping a competitive balance in your own division? it pains me to write this, but moving forward, for the reds, it doesn't look good.

but, they should keep jocketty…….

 

[JohnU]

I can't predict where the Reds franchise should be in another year or five, or a decade. I'd be happy to be there to witness whatever it is ... having learned that peace in my time means not being upset about baseball.
But what HAS happened is that, under Price's reign, the Reds have become a team that has decided that EVERY GAME is a must-win game ... and that they aren't capable of pulling that off.
By, it's clear the team has realized that the must-win games can't be won and that there is little to do but let the boat drift downstream until it hopefully snags a log in a slough.
If that's what they've decided, then they can do that without me.
If they trade Cueto for Dee Fondy, hey ... let's cut payroll.

Losing the game Sunday night was an insult to the fans. Yeah, there were 4 scrubs in there ... but goddamn it, get better damned players!

 

[JohnU]

Looks like Cingrani was offered a deal -- Triple-A or the disabled list.
I guess they don't burn an option this way.

 

[eburg5000]

That game Sunday night was embarrassing. They had chances to win it, but just couldn't come through with runners in scoring position. A problem that has been with this team for something like 5 years now...

 

[Redsfan1507]

Meanwhile, another injury- due to the lack of fundamentals...they teach 12 year old pitchers how to handle a pickle between bags-Moscot started correctly- running at the runner hung between 2b-3b. He made the runner commit back to the previous bag- and showed the ball- all correct, until he faked a throw-always a no-no and had to run the runner down himself-bad little league form, that resulted in a dislocated shoulder for the enthusiastic, but fundamentally ignorant Moscot. Remember PFP Mr. Moscot ? Obviously not.

Now we will get to see the fastball challenged lefty Holmberg, I suppose. The bad keeps playing, off key...

 

[Redsfan1507]

I'd like to applaud Chico's points about the "business of baseball". Moneyball is more about money than ball, for sure. In many ways, I think trying to skirt around that fact has left the Reds where they are currently. Moneyball, isnt really Jocketty's thing. IMO, he's a guy that still can be effective as a GM, in the right, short term circumstances-by adding a few pieces. Those type of Reds deals have expired, leaving the team in a mess.

Trades are impossible to judge usually, because of next generation trades of the principals. Usually, I think it's more about what the trade did for you...and maybe 3 post season cameos is all that the Latos/Marshall/Chapman deals accomplished...it's conjecture if the same could have been obtained without them or with different deals, but today, I'm disappointed in where the Reds are, today. It's not all about those deals, they are just pieces of a puzzle that at the end of the day, may have more pieces missing than when the jigsaw effort started.

They have a few upside young arms, but not enough veteran 200 IP capable pitchers to allow them to develop this year and possibly next, without either risking too many innings, or shutting them down without viable replacements for the better part of the ladt month of the season. An interesting problem one can't really blame injury (other than Bailey) for..it was bad planning with an entire starting rotation that all became free agents at the same time. It's a real problem I haven't a clue how to resolve, unless they can somehow shut down pitchers for a month to save them in mid season, in order to trade them out for shutdown pitchers at the end. Still gotta add up to 5 SP all year. There is an error in the current SP math.

A's, Rays, and a few other unashamed teams definately play the Moneyball game- turning over low dollar rosters with farmhands and under valued short term contract journeymen, regularly. A rental isn't out if the question if they're in the race, but they aren't likely to buy a long term guy. It's a way to be competitive on a budget- probably more competitive for return on investment than the likelihood of a championship, however. They do surprisingly well at playing .500 and staying on races though. It's tough on fans, from the perspective that falling in live with a favorite player doesn't usually forecast to long term team association, but it may beat having your fav players spending their prime losing, waiting for the rest of the team to produce.

It is worth noting the Pirates, Rays, Royals, Astros, spun off decades of terrible teams accumulating draft picks and "competitive balance" benefits, before recent strides in the standings. It's not like those guys got smart all the sudden.

The Phillies and Yankees are examples of what happens when teams sign a lot of long term contracts, to established players in their prime earning years, and those contracts outlive the players talent. It's hard to bring up the farm, when most spots are blocked by 8-9 figure contracts. At present, the Dodgers seem to be trying to do better with balancing big contracts with allowing some worthy youngsters to play- although it appears they ate a lot of contract dollars to make that work.

There are lots of spin offs from both extremes- the Redsox and Jays seem to be all in for accumulating offensive contracts but seem to forget the pitching.

The Reds just seem reluctant to pick a stance they can live with. Castellini has invested heavily for a small market, but there always seems to be an underlying lack of sound long term plan by the front office. By the time the Reds get one area improved, another is in need of upgrade.

I don't think it's coincidence, that when the Reds started improving in 2010 or so, it was due to the change in philosophy, prioritizing pitching and defense over power hitting in the bandbox GABP. I still believe that's the way to go, although you sure can't win if you don't score. Currently, the Reds don't do either (pitch or hit) that well.

They starve because of too many low contact, low OBP hitters, and they dont make up for it often with the longball. They don't have a LHSP to counter opposing LH hitters. They have lots of young arms that arent likely to consistently pitch deep in games or deep into the season, but have a bullpen that isn't up to that challenge. They dont have a set lineup without L/R split deficiencies, but don't have viable platoon partners and/or the will to implement them. They have some speed, but are reluctant to use methodology that accents that speed. They pay too much for players too often on the DL.

Are the Reds making a profit ? I believe so, but it begs the question of how long that is sustainable if the team continues to be this bad. I used to say "you can always lose cheaper", but with long term guaranteed contracts, that isn't always true now. In fact, that's part of the problem now- about 65% of the payroll budget is tied up in a handful of players, leaving 75-80% of the roster to split only 35% of the payroll. Unless those players are all highly talented at rookie minimums, you get lots of low dollar , low talent castoffs like Gregg, Marquis, Boesch, Schumaker, etc. to make ends meet...payroll and profit wise, falling way short of making a contending team in the standings. No doubt, Bill James or Billy Beane type metrics based methodology was NOT used in choosing the Reds discount vets...I think they used the "good old boy, ex-players I used to like" methodology, and it sucks.

 

[JohnU]

In effect, the money spent on the bench is a sunk cost ... you basically have that cost built into the program. The issue is who you get for that money and the proposal going forward seemed to be that Gregg, Badenhop and Marquis were going to make the pitching staff regardless of who excelled. That's more than just the GM making that decision.

Boesch and Schumaker are also sunk costs. It's a matter of what you want them to contribute. I think Skippy has been as advertised, since his shoulder is healed. Boesch should never have been signed but somebody needed to play that role. It's guesswork. Ain't no Jerry Lynch out there, now that we are with 30 teams.

In deference to the whole, what's beating the Reds is incidentally poor baseball, like DeJesus dropping a fly ball or Boesch getting burned ... or throwing to the wrong base ... or an occasional error, or wild pitch or failure to look a guy back at 2nd base. The old "give them four outs and you made their day" just plays out in real life over and over and over.

But the starting pitchers have been better than we had hoped given their lack of experience.

This team just stands too close to the damned snake and needs to stop complaining about snakebite.

Honestly, does it really help to get Marlon Byrd back -- and his 15 strikeouts a week? Well, DeJesus will strike out 15 times and he has trouble catching a fly ball.

Dunno ... what goes on in the board room may be intriguing, but what happens in the restroom is more important.

GMs can play the game on the conference table. That's not where the team plays it. Put this on Price, right or wrong.