GL, and the rest of the analysts in the Wilson thread, are nails as usual:
None of the teams that did deals with Z felt like they were being fleeced at the time - they were getting what they wanted out of the deal.
But you're right that a solid MLB ready shortstop will be more costly and harder to come by than an MLB ready outfielder. That's why Z did the Jack Wilson deal in the first place.
Guti, Aardsma, Branyan, they weren't really secrets. Nobody expected Aardsma to gel like he did. Most GM's knew that Guti was a defensive whiz trapped behind Sizemore, and based on his age you would expect his bat to improve a bit.
............
Right. As mentioned in our Wilson / Rizzuto post, not only weren't Gutierrez or Wilson secrets -- these guys are glam players to modern GM's. Wilson's salary, for example, was out of all proportion to the Pirates' payroll.
.............
Guti is another example. Just this last Sunday, Zduriencik told Mentik (sp?) that the problem with the Putz deal was that nobody wanted to give up Franklin Gutierrez. Note well.
The Indians had Grady Sizemore in CF, and I don't care how much you like Guti, he is not going to be the one to disappoint Grady's Ladies in Cleveland. Sizemore is in CF, end of story.
The Indians had Shin-Soo Choo in RF, and Choo is a "pure" RF with a 95-mph pitcher's arm who was coming off a 148 OPS+. Gutierrez was not going to beat out Choo for RF, and he shouldn't have.
In LF also, the Indians liked Francisco, and LF is the "Chance" Yahtzee slot, so Gutierrez wasn't even particularly leading in the 2009 race to start for the Indians -- and yet the Indians had Gutierrez as an untouchable.
..........
Fortunately Zduriencik (evidently) has a lot of street cred in MLB. The Nationals tried to pull this very same thing on Langerhans: "Hey, this guy's a player."
Z, by his own statement, replied "He's worth zero to you. But thanks anyway." The Nats later called back.
Z told the Indians, "He's not worth much to you, but let me know if we can make it work, because I want Gutierrez." This game of hardball took place not because Zduriencik grasps UZR and Mark Shapiro does not. It took place because Zduriencik had a hole in CF and Shapiro had Grady Sizemore in CF.
...........
Zduriencik told Mentik that the Indians called back and said, "Okay, if you can do *this,* we can get you our fourth outfielder."
Interesting thing would be to know what that thing was.
Since the Mariners only sent out Sean Green and Jeremy Reed, plus Luis Albuena, with Putz.
The Indians wound up getting the Mets to add Joe Smith, so either that piece was either Green/Reed to acquire Smith, or the Indians are high on Luis Valbuena (as they were on Asdrubal Cabrera). Seeing as how the Indians pushed Albuena up to the bigs this year, it's probably the latter.
Valbuena wound up starting at 2B for the Indians, who are jelling a Royals-Padres type vulture-circle over our minors :- )
And you might realize with a start that, with our drought on MI's, the Indians plucked a starting MI out of our system that, at the time, we all viewed as a throwin. If there was anybody in the Gutierrez trade who was in on a secret, it was apparently Shapiro in on the secret that Luis Valbuena was a starting ML infielder right now.
None of which is to deny Zduriencik massive credit for Franklin Gutierrez, of course. He gave up a big-name closer, Valbuena, and goodies, and he got back a Moneyball player who is going to be part of his next pennant. He definitely targeted the right ballplayer for his re-direction plan.
..............
But take encouragement. The next time a talking head tells us, "there's nobody in the Mariners' organization who can make this trade happen," remember James' statement that every MLB org has dozens of important prospects. Valbuena, in the Guti trade, was one of those guys.
Cheers,
Dr D
Valbuena definetly looks like an underrated prospect. I'd trade Lopez for him straight-up personally.
Even so, the Indians probably don't feel too hot about the way Gutz has developed since the trade. Hes been one of the top 4 outfielders in the league this year.
they probably are hoping that he turns out to be a 4th OF, yeah, as I erroneously feared that he might (30% chance of his not being a starter, pre-season, now 0%).
... when we speak of Gutierrez as having MVP-candidate level value, we're basing that on the idea that he saves +28.5 runs above what some other quality AL center fielder would, if playing in Safeco.
There's a feasible argument that this is the case, but as you know, I'm pretty skeptical of that. Curtis Granderson saved a full -28 runs fewer than Gutierrez per UZR, but me personally, I'll bet a whale of a lot that Granderson gets to more balls in Safeco than Guti does.
Granderson's batting runs were 6.0, compared to Guti's 6.3, and Granderson 'earned' $14M as opposed to $26M. Such is the volatility of value that is driven by UZR.
There's a reason Granderson has never measured up by UZR compared to other gold glove candidates. He's clompy. I've seen enough Tigers games to know that Granderson is very talented but not particularly smart out there and that his routes are not very good.
Maybe in view of his 23 triples in 2007, we could call a standup three-bagger into 3B "the clomp."
And the longer you persist in this fantasy that you can immediately tell who the good fielders are by how many triples and steals they have, the more annoyed I'm gonig to be about it. :)
...Comerica Park is one of the highest Triples Factor parks in baseball...Granderson isn't a legit 23-triple speed thread. He's got a slower time to first than Ichiro and twice as many steals per year...what does that tell you?
That Sammy Sosa mighta hit 60 homers three or four times, sure, but Wrigley's a homer-friendly park.
23 triples? Isn't that like 11.5 times as many as Franklin Gutierrez' career high? And about 20 more than the other Tigers get there?
Last five years, the other Tigers get 1, 2, maybe 4 triples. Carlos Guillen's had a couple years of 6-9.
Twenty-three blinkin' triples. Mr. Clompy, that's me :- )
...that a man with both speed and power is more primed to take advatnage of Comerica than any of the other Tigers...who generally have one or the other (Guillen isn't fast nor possessing of massive power...most of the Tigers aren't fast except possible Polanco and he's not possessing the gap power needed).
You're being very heavy-handed here...I do not understand why you persist in belaboring a point which has been countered on at least five unique levels by not just me, but a dozen other members here.
It is very possible to be fast on the bases without being fast in the outfield (to the ball). Until you can prove otherwise, it is POINTLESS for you to repeatedly utter "23 triples!" as though you've solved anything.
I can see Granderson's defense as being Clompy, just like I can see Carp's hitting style as Clunky :) Lets not poke too much fun at others um ... unique, description abilities, you know pot, kettle and all that :) :)
And yeah I second you Matt in the fact that speed does equal steals and triples, but it does not equal smooth, great defense. The reducio absurdum here is, if speed = good defense, why wouldn't Usain Bolt TODAY, RIGHT NOW, not be the greatest CF (defensively) of all time? I have no doubt the Usain would have a great home to 1st time, or that he could beat Ichiro from home to 3rd by several strides, but he of course would be a terrible defender, I bet he has never ran backwards in his life ;) Or had a wonky over sized leather glove on his off hand :) Bottom line, OF Defense is easily just as much about timing, positioning, good first step, quickness, routes, and vector calculus as it is about pure speed, sure speed doesn't hurt, but it certainly won't make you a good defender on its own. In fact I would say desire is even a bigger aspect than speed, one criticism of Granderson is that if he *thinks* he can't get to a ball, or if it will be a lot of work to get to a ball, or if he might have to hit a wall to get to a ball, he will just jog over and pick up the easy double for the hitter and toss it into the infield, where as Gutz will try for and catch a handful of balls that other CF's don't even think about going after, it looks like Gutz is offended when he sees a ball drop ANYWHERE in the outfield! I bet Manny could actually be a decent fielder if he just tried a little harder ;)
totally derailed this threads comments, back to the original point.
I completely agree with you Doc that the M's farm system has a plethora of interesting specs that gives JackyZ the ability to really do whatever he wants this off season, and I really don't think other GM's are cowering in fear of getting "fleeced" by Dr. Z, I mean GM's still trade with Beane and Epstein right? It would be silly for a GM to limit his pool of possible trade partners by several teams just because he was afraid of getting out witted by them, in fact if I were an owner and caught wind that my GM was afraid of doing buisness with a certain other GM or two I would fire him on the spot!
Now I am sure that there are GMs that make other GMs mad (not afraid, angry) for some reason of another, and therefore will have a harder time getting deals done, for example the Portland Trailblazers FO made a pretty bad marketing mistake last year when they threatened to sue any team that hired Darius Miles and play him 10 days just to screw with the Blazers insurance policy it had on Miles (which would no longer pay his salary if he played again, and thus the Blazers would have less salary cap room to play with in the off season, which all did happen). This threatening email was leaked to the press of course, along with quotes from several GMs swearing to never work with Kevin Pritchard again, because of how offended they were. Then of course the draft came around and all the high and might GM's that said they would never work with Kevin Prichard again saw that Paul Allens money and Pritchards talented players were still coveted and so of course Kevin Pritchard had his usual flurry of draft day action :)
I say all that to say, I wouldn't be worried that Jack Z will have trouble getting GMs to listen to any proposed deals :)
You get 30 GM's at the winter meetings, thirty high-powered execs, and I can assure you that not a single one of them is viewed as a buffoon by the other 29.
Neither do any of them feel like there's a guy in the room that is too smart for them.
Big time business execs aren't made of that kind of material. They read the fans saying, this or that GM is an idiot, and they're just going, well, that's the fans for you.
Nobody was lining up at the winter meetings to try to trade with Bill Bavasi. Neither are any of them afraid to fax offers on Felix to Jack Zduriencik. All 30 GM's at any given time, represent the bow of a high-powered ship, and you don't rise to a job like that if you're not confident.