How that translates into trading your #2 starter to your division rival is beyond me. Earlier in the week, the New York Post had speculated that Millwood might be an attractive option for the Yanks, and a good trade fit given the Braves' gaping first-base hole, which could have been ably filled by Nick Johnson. Obviously that didn't come to pass; the Yanks may still have their doubts about trading Johnson, but this clearly would have been a more valuable deal than the king's ransom Montreal is asking for Bartolo Colon or Javier Vasquez.
As for Atlanta, they've now turned over 3/5 of their rotation this offseason. But have they improved? Here's a look at the Braves' front four in 2002; the last two columns are their 2002 and 2003 salaries (including rather steep arbitration projections for Maddux and Milwood):
The Braves as a whole had a very efficient defense; their .730 Defensive Efficiency Rating was the second-best in the NL, 18 points above the league average. This means that they allowed a meager .270 average on balls in play, which kept their 2002 ERAs down. But note that these pitchers didn't have especially good strikeout rates or control; they don't project especially well using Defense-Independent ERA (dERA). And these four pitchers look to cost about 50% more than they did last season.
Here's the retooled foursome, with free-agent addition Paul Byrd and trade acquisitions Mike Hampton and Russ Ortiz:
If the first foursome didn't project well, this one looks even worse. Hampton was a walking disaster area in Colorado, and God only knows whether he can get sorted out again. Byrd is a gopher-prone, low-strikeout pitcher who did surprisingly well in Kansas City, but he's never put two good seasons together back-to-back. Ortiz walks too damn many guys, doesn't strikeout enough, and furthermore, has his stats camouflaged by the best pitcher's park in the game; his ERA at Pac Bell over the past three seasons is 3.32, while on the road it's 4.48. Yargh.
This new, less-fearsome foursome will cost about the same as last season's foursome did, depending upon how Maddux does in arbitration. A lot of that is due to the smoke-and-mirrors of the Hampton deal, which has the Florida Marlins picking up most of Mikey Moustache's salary for the next three seasons. Byrd's contract is backloaded, with a $7 million player option for '04. Ortiz has a $5.7 million team option for '04. His current salary also includes a bonus incentive based on innings pitched which kicks in at 195; he's averaged 209 over the past four seasons, so he may cost a bit more than indicated here.
Over on Braves Journal, readers are calling for Schuerholz's head. But my longtime reader Trevise suggests in a comment to my previous post that this rotation remake has more to do with the corporate mentality behind the Braves than it does with Schuerholz:
This is also why I say that "No Corporate Ownership" is one of the few things that MLB should follow the NFL's lead on. Sure, Schuerholtz has made his share of mistakes but he doesn't make an egregious trade such as this then go to a press conference and make the statements he did, if he wasn't forced into it by someone in a "non-baseball" position.
While it's obvious that non-baseball factors were involved in this decision, that doesn't mean we should let Schuerholz off the hook for the baseball decisions which painted him into this corner. Not signing Glavine was a smart move given his asking price and his projections, and taking a flier on Hampton at that price wasn't the worst idea ever. But going out and picking up a couple of underwhelming mid-rotation guys who don't project particularly well and who cost a significant chunk of change BEFORE getting caught with his pants down on the Maddux decision, and THEN being forced into the Millwood one doesn't speak well for Schuerholz. He could have passed on Byrd and Ortiz until he knew what Maddux was doing, and figured that the loss of Glavine's salary was Millwood's gain. That would have left him with Maddux, Millwood, Hampton, and Moss as his front four, at around $30 million. A bit more expensive than the Braves were willing to go, but not so much that they couldn't make up the difference in other areas. This team, after all, paid $3 million to Vinny Castilla to put up a robust .616 OPS (exactly the same as Rey Ordoñez), and they're on the hook for $4.5 mil to him for 2003. John Schuerholz can whine all he wants about how baseball's economics stink, but irresponsibility like that buys no sympathy here.
Braves fans better hope Leo Mazzone can work a few more miracles along the lines of John Burkett and Chris Hammond, or there's going to be a new sheriff in town in the NL East.
Though it's tantalizing to envision Vlad the Impaler wearing pinstripes and patrolling rightfield in the House That Ruth Built, the Yanks' interest in this dubious sell-off gravitates around the two starting pitchers, Colón and Vazquez. Initally, their focus had been primarily in the former, a beefy 29-year old righthander whose merits I discussed a couple of weeks ago. But the latter has been drawing some favorable attention too. Vazquez is 26, in better shape, and -- a key for the Yanks -- less expensive than Colón. While the former will make $8.25 million and then become a free agent, the latter will get a raise from his $4.725 million salary via arbitration.
Here's a quick comparison of the two Expo starters in 2002:
W L IP ERA K/9 WHIP K/W HR/9 BABIP dERA
Colon 20 8 233.1 2.93 5.75 1.24 2.13 0.77 .274 3.92
Vazquez 10 13 230.2 3.90 6.98 1.27 3.65 1.09 .302 3.78
Superficially, Colón looks like the better pitcher, with that nice round 20-win season and an ERA a run lower. But as I pointed out before, the rotund one's strikeout rate fell off the table in 2002 (down 2.4 per 9 from his previous season average), and he was fairly lucky on balls in play as well. Vazquez , though he's more prone to the gopher ball, has a markedly higher strikeout rate, and much better control. Much of the difference in their ERAs comes on balls in play; the Expos defense helped Colón (.281 for the Canadian bacon slice of his season) much more than Vazquez at .302. The difference comes out in the wash of their Defense Independent ERAs, with Vazquez holding a slight edge.
Minaya knows he's got hot commodities on his hands, so he's been working to drive the price on them even higher; reports are that he's playing the Yanks' interest against that of the Red Sox. The asking price for Colón is now absurdly high for the Yanks: Nick Johnson, Juan Rivera, Orlando Hernandez AND the money to cover El Duque's salary next season (perhaps $5 million). The toll from the Sox is third baseman Shea Hillenbrand and lefty Casey Fossum for Colon and third baseman Fernando Tatis, a poison pill with his $6.25 million salary, reduced productivity, and reportedly poor attitude.
Even if the Yanks were to give in to the Expos demands, El Duque's salary would still count against Brian Cashman's payroll. Effectively, they'd be paying perhaps $13 million for Colon's spot in the rotation, hardly a bargain, and they'd be giving up two of their least expensive and most promising young hitters. If they can get Vazquez at a cheaper price, the deal might be worth pursuing; otherwise, this is too rich for the Yankees' blood.
• • • • •
The most interesting deal which went down in Nashville was a four-way trade in which Baseball Primer posterboy (or was it Baseball Prospectus centerfold?) Erubiel Durazo was finally sprung from the shackles of his oppressors in the Arizona desert. Statheads have taken "Free Erubiel Durazo!" as their rallying cry ever since the Mexico native posted a .403 average at Double-A El Paso and .407 at Triple-A Tucson in 1999, his first year in the D-backs chain. Durazo has posted a career .918 OPS over the past four seasons. But, owing to injuries and the density of Bob Brenly's skull, he'd managed only 900 plate appearances over that span. Eager to see the lefty slugger flourish in a more favorable environment, the geeks have pined for the day when a sabermetrically-inclined GM could rescue him before he passed his prime.
With this weekend's trade, the 28-year old will finally get his shot, and in the friendliest home for his type: Billy Beane's Oakland A's. Beane admitted that acquiring Durazo had become something of a quest: "This has been a three-year odyssey for me. This is probably the most aggressively I've ever pursued a player. I think I might have come pretty close to breaking the tampering rules on this one." Elsewhere, he even referred to Durazo as his Holy Grail, apparently with apologies to Monty Python.
The knocks against Durazo are his injuries (about which Beane even rationalized, "If he didn't spend that time on the DL, we probably never would have gotten him because he would have hit 45 home runs."), his defense (including an alleged refusal to play rightfield during last year's playoffs), and his trouble with lefties (career .577 OPS in about 150 PA). But the A's will gladly find a spot for him, making him their full-time DH and only occasional first baseman, and probably find him a platoon partner as well. But here's his career line against righties, about a season's worth of PAs: .293 AVG, 42 HR, 133 RBI, .403 OBP/.563 SLG/.966 OPS. Yeah, I could find a spot in my lineup for that guy, too.
