Seattle Sports Insider

A look back at the J.J. Putz trade

Posted by

SABR Matt

7/4/09

Let's rewind to late January when the Mariners made a big splash trade, the particulars of which look like this:

Mets Receive:

J.J. Putz (CL)
Sean Green (SR)
Jeremy Reed (OF)

Indians Receive:

Joe Smith (SR)
Luis Valbuena (2B)

Cubs Receive:

Aaron Heilman (SR)

Mariners Receive:

Franklin Gutierrez (CF)
Endy Chavez (OF)
Mike Carp (1B)
Ronny Cedeno (MIF)
Jason Vargas (SP)
Garrett Olson (SP)
Maikel Cleto (SP)
Zeke Carrera (OF)

We can argue about what Putz' market value was perceived as prior to this trade, but I don't think we have all of the information to know that for sure. We do know that we were offered a package including Larish and Joyce from the Tigers, but that's about the only other offer on the table that has come to light. I believe the safest assumption with regard to what we could expect to get from J.J. would be that few teams trusted him to stay healthy and return to dominant reliever status and that there were several other closers available at the time, further reducing his trade value, but that's just speculation on my part and not the main point of this article. Today, I want to focus on results.

The star player in the deal, Putz, is on the disabled list after being relatively ineffective in the Mets' bullpen and earning boos to the chorus of Thunderstruck by the end. All reports were that his velocity was way down, his command was hariy at best, and his secondary pitch, the nasty splitter, was bouncing too much so it was off the table in the minds of the hitters. Sean Green turned out to be at best a lateral move from Joe Smith:

A) 4.15 ERA, 18/11 K/BB in 17.1 IP, 1 HR

B) 5.00 ERA, 31/16 K/BB in 36 IP, 4 HR

I'll take pitcher A for upside and for current results over pitcher B...the Mets seem inept at scouting pitchers. Jeremy Reed is still Jeremy Reed (read: slap happy 4th outfielder with little utility even on a team desperate for outfielders with its' CF superstar on the DL and injuries and age plaguing the rest of its outfielders).

The Cubs' little bite out of this defacto 4-team deal, Aaron Heilman, has worked out acceptibly for them, but he's been incredibly wild and unreliable and is relegated to the 6th/7th innings. The Mariners' replacement, obtained for essentially no cost, has been an all-star caliber closer (I refer of course to Aardsma). Fun comparison:

Aardsma: 38.1 IP, 1.41 ERA, 48/22 K/BB, 1 HR

Heilman: 36.2 IP, 3.93 ERA, 33/23 K/BB, 3 HR

And in exchange for Heilman, the Mariners acquired Garrett Olson (who has held serve out of the 5th rotation spot, including two hugely important games on this 9-game road trip that the Mariners managed to win - I shutter to think where the Ms 5th rotation spot would be without Olson) and Ronny Cedeno (not much with the bat, but with YuBet injured, one wonders who the heck would be playing short for us right now...certainly not someone with his defensive ability).

The Indians got Luis Valbuena who had this line in Cleveland before getting demoted:

.196/.258/.362 (12/40 BB/K), -16.2 R/150 G (UZR) on defense

To be fair, he's hitting very well in AAA since his demotion and there is still significant upside as a good on-base threat and an average defender at second.

Meanwhile, the Mariners' return from the Indians has turned into a minor star in center field (Doc and I disagree on how to interpret Gutierrez' performance, obviously) and from the Mets, Seattle acquired a number of pieces that have been critical to keeping the team in contention despite not being evidently brilliant ballplayers.

Endy Chavez - Filled in admirably for Ichiro while hw was on the DL with his ulcer recovery and gave the Ms a decent on base threat, a brilliant bit of defense in left, and a solid back-up for Gutierrez in center when he needed time off. His injury might not have been a death blow to the team, but without the acquisition of Langerhans, I think the Mariners would be feeling the effects of losing a guy like Chavez by now.

Jason Vargas - He's no great shakes, but filling in for Carlos Silva will make anyone look like a diety...well anyone who deserves to be there at any rate. Without Vargas (and of course Olson) keeping the Mariner rotation atop the AL in ERA, I don't think we'd still be in contention. His line thus far: 58.2 IP, 4.14 ERA, 35/14 K/BB, 10 HR (this is his bugaboo)...he's a little like a left handed Cha Seung Baek. That's not a bad thing to have around pitching at Safeco field.

Mike Carp - In AAA, Carp is OPSing an easy .900 and he looked like a legitimately solid and disciplined hitter in his brief MLB call-up. Too early to tell whether this pays the big dividends that I envision, but it's hard to deny that Carp was deeply under the radar of most scouts, not noticed by Baseball America, and generally dismissed as an "interesting" but uninspiring centerpiece in the Putz deal and that his future looks considerably brighter now.

Maikel Cleto - a flame thrower who hadn't missed bats very well in his early minor league tours with the Mets, Cleto found his Ks in 2 starts at the Midwest League level, 10 of them in 7.2 IP. He's still horribly raw and wild, so there's a better chance he winds up being nothing than a useful major leaguer, but he's an interesting guy to keep an eye on.

Zeke Carrera - hitting .341 with an .892 OPS (heavily led by a 40/36 BB/K!) and is 17 for 23 stealing bases for AA West Tennessee this year. His batting eye is rapidly improving, making up for his total lack of power. Scouts are impressed with his outfield defense as well...he compares minimally to Jeremy Reed and could be significantly better down the road.

For a reliever no one, including the Mariners, could trust to stay healthy, a completely replaceable mushy middle reliever, a nearly-valueless 4th outfielder and a marginal middle infield prospect, the Mariners have gotten themselves quite the haul. I am writing this as a reminder...because at the time the deal was made, I was APPALLED and highly disappointed with the lack of big names coming the Mariners' way. I was completely wrong. SABR Matt bows at Zduriencik's feet and admires his scouting proficiency...mea culpa Captain Jack.

Comments

AWESOME

to see you posting front-page Matty. And there's no kind of post I like better than a well-thought-out correction of a previous position.
In principle, I also disliked the Superstar-for-Spaghetti structure of the trade (though it didn't sting much since closers are a half-myth anyway).
The funny thing is, time is making Capt Jack look better and better and better on this one. That is the thing that makes you suspect a pro knows more than you do: you disagree at first, and then you come to agree later.
Nice to have that going on in Seattle :- )

Faith...

I haven't had real faith in a Mariner trade, free agent acquisition or roster move since Gillick left. I've been hopeful...I've tried to see the possible positive outcome...I've been a fan...but I haven't really trusted anything Bavasi has done. I now have faith in Zduriencik. That doesn't mean he'll do everything right, and it doens't mean I won't still take a critical eye to each move, but I'm going to be much more inclined to trust his vision and his baseball sense in the future.

Landscaping

Great post, Matt.
As someone who was very much behind the trade(s) when they occured, (primarily based on my belief that Carp could be a long-term solid MLB player), I think it is important to understand the trade was valuable in large part based on the landscape for the Ms at the time.
The ugly truth is the Ms were dreadfully awful over a multitude of positions, and had a farm club with almost nothing in the nearly-ready state. ANY GM was in a position where they were going to need to shove bodies into half the starting lineup spots, rebuild a bullpen, resolve the miserable backend of the rotation - and address the reality that the farm system was a mess.
It's quicker to name the 'decent' starting spots for the Ms coming into 2009: RF, 2B, 3B, SP1-SP2, (most didn't include Wash as decent).
Putz for a boatload of AAAA talent was a major coup for Seattle, because Seattle didn't even have decent AAAA players to call on. The farm consisted of Clement and Wlad as "near ready", and RRS as another demi-prospect.
Necessity is a mother.
Seattle post-Bavasi wasn't far removed from Whoville, post-Grinch.
There was incredible room for improvement because the existing talent base was so dreadfully bad. Honestly, Z would probably be considered even more of a genius if not for the miserable performance of 2/3 of the returning 'decent' bats in April/May. One must remember that when you're attempting to replace production like: Sexson, Vidro, Weaver, HoRam, Feierabend - the bar was awfully low.
The thing that's really interesting is that once Beltre and Lopez began hitting, the team was producing at a .770 clip in team-offense.
Z did what was necessary. He did it well. But, Wak is the one that has managed to get the most out of the talent given. Obviously, he had more success initially with the new player rather than the old, (except for Ichiro). Then again, Beltre was playing hurt.
I think it's important to realize that when you've lost 101 games, it is EASY to make progress. Yes, the Ms have exceeded expectations this season - but it WILL get progressively harder to improve. The farm is still extremely weak. The club is still just beginning to repair the damage from a methodology for prospect development that consisted of handing any "athlete" a full-time gig, then kicking him to the curb the instant he failed.
The reality that the AAAA pitchers leapt over the existing Ms AAA players is evidence of how bad off the Ms farm happened to be. That, coupled with the reality that it was a near-30 indy league pitcher jumped past everyone, too, really points not only to how bad the Ms farm was, but also how bad it is viewed by Z. Five years. That is about how much time I would say it takes to turn around an entire farm system. Until you do, there's no choice but to try and steal near-ready talent from better farms.

Yep...agreed with all of that

...though I would say that Zduriencik is doing a phenominal job ripping the low-hanging fruit off of everyone else's farm clubs...the ineptly managed clubs in particular (Mets, Nats)...he's playing a weak hand, but he's playing it extremely well.

Z-man

MLB Executive of the Year, perhaps? I think it would be tough to find anyone that has had a bigger, better impact on a club than this guy has had on the M's.
Sad thing is, he probably has to keep pulling rabbits from his hat for a while yet. The M's are going to have holes to fill this off season and not a lot of $$ to do it.

The only thing that hurts me

The only thing that hurts me is that the remnants of our past dealings, pre-Z, are a burr under my saddle for the new ones.
For an entire season's worth of ABs Shin-Soo Choo is now posting a .300/.400/.520/.920 style line, and is under club control until he's about 30. We gave him away for nothing. I wouldn't have needed another OFer, I would have had Choo.

Asdrubal Cabrera is posting a .800 OPS as a 23 year old who's already serving his 3rd decent chunk of time in the majors. He only has doubles power, but a .300/.360/.420 line is something Lazy-Yuni can only dream of, and Cabrera is a decently thick guy with more power to go get. He's not Eckstein-sized. But even if he never does, a solid .780 OPS SS/2B for mimimum salary is better than what we've currently got.

Valbuena at 23 is outhitting Carp at 23 (terribly small sample size) - both at AAA, with Valbuena as a middle infielder. In the deal, at least we did get back a reasonable bat, but both are lefties. I wouldn't need to trade for a MIF in the next year or so, I would have a 23 year-old with the great batting eye who - again - could post a higher OBP than either of my current MIFs (which looks like MILFs, but I swear isn't) even if he doesn't hit for average his first full year.

I'm just tired of hanging on to the Yunis and the Reeds and trading the Cabreras and the Choos, I guess. So now Reed's gone, and we added back in a bat I like (Carp) when we traded a bat I had hopes for (Valbuena). And I've been on the Carp bandwagon since before he got here, actually (he was on my list of "1B other teams don't have room or time for" along with guys like Chris Carter, who is now with the Bo Sox).

When you look at the deal (starting CFer, starting closer, bunch of guys who could turn into minor pieces of our next contender and 1 or 2 who might be major pieces if everything breaks right) it's awfully hard to argue with it. I wouldn't try. Jack does seem to know what he's doing, and I'm really glad we can stop getting fleeced at the bazaar for what winds up being a sterile goat and some rotten fruit.

I look forward to the day that we can sign, draft and keep our own middle infielder, though. And have him actually be good. Too many years of Juicy Boone and A-Rod are skewing my perceptions of the positions, most likely. ;) But seriously, we're about to add 3B to our infield issues, and we haven't been able to get what we want out of 2nd or short since "the good old days."
At least with Jack seeming to have a good grasp on players, I can feel like the pieces we do have that might be up for trade this year could bring a decent return. Not having to wonder which other future stars we can give up this year would be a bonus.
~G

Nick Franklin

G_Money says: "I look forward to the day that we can sign, draft and keep our own middle infielder, though. And have him actually be good."
I myself am optimistic about Nick Franklin as a switch-hitter who can stick defensively at SS and has the potential for offensive upside. The pick was generally panned, however.
I'd be curious what G or anyone else thought.
BTW, in addition to the horrible trade of Cabrera and the inclusion of Valbuena in the JJP bonanza, Yung-Chi Chen was a 2B showing quite a bit of potential before injuries did him in.
Except for Triunfel, who's been set back quite a bit with the injury, there is literally nothing in the middle infield all the way down to Franklin, who is an unsigned high school draft pick. I expect that Z will act in the trade market to get some MIF soon.

Kyle Seager

I should also mention Kyle Seager, the 3rd round pick, who is the UNC guy who was runner-up to Dustin Ackley in every offensive category.
Seager is supposedly close to signing, and is expected to stick at 2B with a nice lefty bat, although not a lot of pop.
But even if you're high on Franklin and Seager, which I am, you have to expect some trades to add more depth.

Z doesn't rush spects

Which means Seager and Franklin are both at least 2 if not 3 years away from having any chance to make it to the big leagues. Which means we have to live with Lopez playing either 2nd or 3rd, and we have to acquire at least two middle infielders who are minimally useful in the next little bit.

Right, Matt

Franklin is a high school draftee and not an overpowering athlete, so he's got a long ways to go. Seager is a polished college player, but is still going to have a couple of years in the minors.
What do you think of the Yuni/Cedeno to 2B, Lopez to 3B, get a "SS version of Langerhans" approach (at least for the rest of this year)?
Also, how would you assess the likelihood that Beltre would re-sign (in terms of interest from either side) or accept arb?

Given his injury...

...it's hard to say what Beltre will do. The SMART play would be to tell Seattle he'll accept arbitration, because his injury-related offensive slump makes him subject to a lot of doubt and speculation on the free agent market and he's not going to get a very nice contract if he goes out in FA this year. If he thinks he can stay healthy all of 2010, he should accept arbitration.