Brandon Morrow, in his last outing, got the ends of his fingers slightly more on top of the baseball at release, per Adair's gospel. He threw, IIRC, a 1-hit shutout with 10k's (or something very similar).
That outing is entirely reproducible. Just a quick visual to twist the knife a bit. ;- )
If he is indeed moving out for Brandon League and a prospect, we can see three completely different scenarios in which this helps the Mariners win their next pennant:
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=== Prospect ===
Scenario 1 would be ... the "prospect" is Travis Snyder or somebody like him. Snyder and Wallace aren't "prospects," of course, but we're chatting about the verbiage in a Twitter, right?
Here is the Hardball Times on the Jays' Top 10 actual prospects. Commentary encouraged and solicited. G, this means you ;- )
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=== Closer ===
Scenario 2 would be ... Jack Zduriencik expects Brandon League to become the American League's next great short reliever.
League isn't a big name becasue (a) injured in 2007, (b) recovering in 2008, and (c) unjustly accused of wildness.
.............
League has two (2) legit wipeout pitches:
94-97 fastball that induces not only >9k per game, but also one of the most extreme groundball rates in the majors. This puts League in a very rare category with Kevin Brown, Felix Hernandez, Erik Bedard, and only a couple of others.
Hitters miss FB's underneath the ball. It's unpossible to throw a FB that gets both topped, and undercut. Except for a few guys like Brandon League.
...
87 splitfinger / change that had run values of 5.92 and 2.65 (!!) the last two years. By comparison, Bedard's curve sits around 2 runs above average per 100 pitches. Felix has three pitches around 0.5, and his change is 2.0 to 2.5.
So you're talking about a man with a Kevin Brown two-seamer and a Kazuhiro Sasaki splitfinger. (The photos show League holding circle changes, but whatever.)
At this link, click the second Yanks vid and you'll see a pitch that looks a LOT like Daimajin's "thang," which is the more amusing since it's thrown sidearm. (The sidearm delivery might explain why a circle change would dive like a Peregrine falcon. Sasaki's change had a unique mechanic to it, also, and never was solved by AL hitters.)
Click the first vid on that site and you'll see a tasty 98 fastball that rips the catcher's glove off. At the knees, inside black.
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=== Starter ===
League started 40-50 games in the minors.
This article gives a good feel for the potential League has to regain strength. If Zduriencik tells us that the Mariners believe that Brandon League can start, I'm going to start weeping.
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=== New Broom Sweeps Clean ===
If it really is just Morrow for League and a decent prospect, that goes into the "Closer" basket above.
It's the most heavy-boldface indication yet that Zduriencik wants to win with his own young players. And it's one more reinforcement of the idea that Zduriencik loves Special Talent (Milton Bradley, Cliff Lee, Aardsma and Lowe take over the bullpen, Sweeney & Griffey, etc etc). SSI, of course, dearly approves of this bias.
...........
If the trade is Morrow-for-League, the M's are making a statement that they think League will be a great reliever.
If it's Morrow-for-League-and-prospect/pillar, that's another conversation.
BABVA,
Dr D
THat's scenario 4, Doc.
Aardsma is now a big name closer and if the Mariners had a deal in the works that sent Aardsma to a team in depserate need for a closer, they go get Brandon League and a prospect and flip Aardsma for another bat and some more prospects.
to the "flip" than David Aardsma.
I don' wanna be anywhere near Ground Zero when the land mine goes off... question is, what you can get for a shibboleth-ic "closer" like Aardsma.
Maybe Franklin Gutierrez and Mike Carp, I guess.
League was the #1 reliever on my list of relievers I'd like to trade for (I'm kind of suprised to see actually go out and get him). I like the idea of acquiring him in a vaccuum, but for Brandon Morrow it doesn't make sense. I'm going to wait to see who that prospect is.
You get undervalued commodities that turn into all-stars. :D
If he could flip Aardsma to a team in need of a closer for a couple of nice hitting prospects...I would celebrate.
But first thing's first...who's the prospect...if it's Arencibio...then the first deal is really quite poor.
Interesting. You haven't been too high on Morrow in the past Taro, and even you think this could be a bit dissapointing.
I will be sad if Morrow is shipped off just to clean house of Bavasi picks. Hopefully we're getting a little more in return than it looks as of now.
Interesting!
What was the appeal that had him number one? The factors listed above, or?
The change/split. The addition of that pitch (on top of the overwhelming velocity, high GB%, and solid command) turned League into one of the top relievers in the game in '09, and yet not a lot of people have caught onto it yet. :-)
His ERA was incredibly misleading in 2009. An ERA of 4.58 and an xFIP of 3.16, but League is great bet to even top that xFIP mark in '10. A 14.3 SwS% , 71% contact rate against and O-Swing% of 32.9 put him in elite company. When you combine that with a high GB% and above-average command you have one of the top RPs in the league.
If hes healthy, League is going to be one heck of a late inning arm.
I suggested him as a mid-year target last year along with guys like Smith and also sugested him as my #1 RP target this offseason. Of course I also expected to be able to steal him away from the Jays.. Morrow is a very steep price, which means that prospect is likely going to be a significant one.
I'm not high on Morrow.. I think hes got something like a 90% chance of being a total bust, but I am pretty high on his trade value. :-)
I love me some high K/BB, high GB/FB power arms. As you know.
I just think you have to do better than a really good reliever for Morrow...he was our best trade chip left.
If you get League and Wallace or (dare I dream) Snyder...then it's a different ballgame.
League IS one of those guys where, the fans are just behind the curve. Even and especially the 'analyst' fans.
Seriously, after watching some vid, you could make a career off either one of League's pitches. He's Sasaki plus 5 mph, or Armando Benitez plus a Bryan Harvey fork.
The only thing that isn't there is the rep. Yet.
...but we need to trade Aardsma. Because Aardsma is not going to be cool with stepping aside for League, and leveraging league as your primary set-up man might tick off Mark Lowe. That pen is a tight knit group y'know.