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Q. Is Kendrys Morales one of the most average players in the major leagues?
A. He made Fangraphs' top five, and that seems to be the consensus. Here's an article on the subject. The obvious implication is that he's a mediocrity. For example, the article notes Paul Konerko's WAR at 2'ish and sighs, "it's too bad," since Konerko actually looks kinda good at the plate.
As our servant, the WAR statistic is useful. As our master, it is a deceitful, exploitative tyrant. As we observed in this article, real GM's consistently pay less for no-hit WAR heroes than fanboys expect, and real GM's consistently pay more for no-WAR hit heroes than fanboys expect.
Even if Kendrys Morales were a 2.0 WAR first baseman, that wouldn't prove, to the flexibly minded, that he was a mediocrity. Any more than Billy Butler's WAR is the way that GM's judge his value.
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Q. Is Morales in fact a 2.0 WAR first baseman?
A. He is not.
He has averaged 2.88 WAR per 162 games since 2009, when President Obama took office. Thanks for asking.
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Q. Is a 2.0 WAR first baseman hard to come by, or no?
A. We remind you of our NASA analogy. If there are exactly 20 astronauts in the world, and 30 spaceships needing guys to fly them, what then?
Maybe the 20 astronauts, and 10 plumbers, average an IQ of 140 among them. You're spaceship #25, frozen out of the astronaut pool. Does that mean the average 140-IQ pilot doesn't mean much to you?
As compared to Prince Fielder .. Kendrys Morales isn't a big deal. As compared to Justin Smoak, he kind of is. Jack Zduriencik just un-froze himself out of the 100-RBI market.
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Q. Why would the Angels give up such a player?
A. They didn't expect to get Hamilton; it was Morales, with one year left, or Trumbo or Bourjos, with four years left.
What do the Angels care if the Mariners wield this mighty weapon against them? The Angels know for a fact that Morales will be gone after one year, one and done, and do you think they sweat the 2013 Mariners?
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Q. Was Jason Vargas really the best they could do?
A. For one thing, some of the teams with 2.0-WAR starting pitchers ... DID have astronauts at first base already. :- )
For another thing, you remember Bill James' rule, that orgs want players who kicked their keisters? In Vargas' last 11 starts against LA, he's got 62 strikeouts against 14 walks, and a 2+ ERA. They're literally figuring that's 2 WAR per year right there - they won't be dropping two extra games to Jason Vargas. HEH!!
Dr. D? First thing he did, after the fences came in, was write a post about pinball scores at Safeco. ;- ) Second thing he did was start a petition to get Vargas' keister out of this city. Judging by Vargas' face on TV that night, he got at least one signature the same day.
Jason Vargas was a good soldier. But think it through and you'll see that this "addition by subtraction" was a giant leap towards the club they'll win their next pennant with.
"They won't be replacing Vargas with a 2 WAR pitcher in April, so the trade's a wash" ... take two Baseball America subscriptions and call me in the morning. Or take class on shaping bansai trees. One way or the other, you'll find yourself blowing the froth off a clue, mate.
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As a completely tangential issue: we remind that earlier this winter, Capt Jack gravely threatened to acquire a closer... the implications for one Seattle rotation were ominous....
Will that be one Chris Sale, or two for yer? Perhaps a Feliz and Ogando both, and field a ROTATION whose velocity exceeds Justin Verlander's? Fortune favors the bold, Cap'n ...
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Q. What does Morales do in Seattle, in an UP season?
A. Oh .... I'll take a wild guess, say he hits .306 with a .569 SLG, hits 34 homers, 108 RBI, finishes #5 in the MVP voting.
His 2009 scatterchart has about 6, 8 doubles right to the fence in left and center, balls that are out in Safeco in 2013. His bounceback in late 2012 as he got his legs and timing back, a 35-homer pace the last two months, was confidently predicted by a lot of Angels fans in March.
Morales could come in weighing 270, could come in limping on that ankle, and wash out. He could also give Zduriencik a Russ Branyan season from the word Go, and hit better than in 2009. In a contract season, Capt Jack's got to like his chances.
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Cheers,
Dr D