The New Market Inefficiency?

[SouthSideRyan]

 

you also have to disqualify guys who have proven they don't have the requisite tools to succeed: like the DeWitt example, where we had known he couldn't defend at 2B or hit for any power to play 3B, or Clement, where he lost all value being moved off C

 

Or Jeff Francouer when he showed he had no ability to tell a ball from a strike as he put up hilariously bad numbers in the major leagues for 3 seasons.

 

Or Brandon Wood who hasn't hit outside the PCL in 6 years.

 

Or Casey Kotchman who had 0.7 total WAR over the past 3 years. (With that 0.7 coming from 1B defense?)

[sneakypower]

 

you also have to disqualify guys who have proven they don't have the requisite tools to succeed: like the DeWitt example, where we had known he couldn't defend at 2B or hit for any power to play 3B, or Clement, where he lost all value being moved off C

 

Or Jeff Francouer when he showed he had no ability to tell a ball from a strike as he put up hilariously bad numbers in the major leagues for 3 seasons. Or Brandon Wood who hasn't hit outside the PCL in 6 years.

Francoeur's plate discipline alone doesn't preclude him from being a successful player (look at Kemp, Soriano, Crawford, CarGo, Hart, Pence, ...) and Wood's defense at 3B has been good enough he could still hit his AAA MLE of .293 obp/.416 slg and be an above-average player

 

Or Casey Kotchman who had 0.7 total WAR over the past 3 years. (With that 0.7 coming from 1B defense?)

where are you going with this? my central premise was that these guys were underperforming their potential. Alex Gordon had 0.1 WAR the last two seasons, getting oft-demoted and i was (outwardly) hoping like hell we would heavily pursue him

[KingCubsFan]

Not sure why the focus is on a guy with 55 at bats who lived in a trash can last year and Melky Cabrera. There's obviously some risk (and luck) involved, but smart teams who identify the right type of player have been able to get a ton of value out of this practice. Even the Cubs have had success, but they don't do it enough. Through the years, there's been some really good players who failed in their first organization and revived their careers (some of these guys had more success than others in their first organization):

Carlos Pena

Paul Konerko

Kelley Johnson

Carlos Quentin

Bobby Jenks

Matt Thornton

Travis Hafner

Adrian Gonzalez

David Ortiz

Jon Rauch

Joe Nathan

Ryan Ludwick

Jayson Werth

 

Sure, the Cubs have a lot of money, but they're not the Yankees. They need to plug holes with cheap production, and this is one of the best ways to do it, particularly when your minor league system isn't producing impact offensive talent.

 

there are a few names that have no business being on this list. konerko was traded twice - at age 21 and age 22 - once for the old "proven closer" (jeff shaw) and then the next time for mike cameron. the two years he was traded he was OPS'ing over 1.000 in AAA, so he certainly didn't flop for one organization before turning good for another org. hafner was inexplicably traded for einar diaz; at the time of the trade hafner was one of the better 1b prospects in baseball.

 

i would argue against gonzalez being on this list because he was still young when florida traded him for something of value (ugie urbina) and then by the time he was dealt to san diego for another player of value (chris young), he was raking in AAA and was blocked by teixeira.

 

david ortiz was still a solid hitter for minnesota, then his power/steroids blossomed with the red sox. but he wasn't a bust by any means.

 

and joe nathan was one of the better setup men in baseball the year before the giants traded him to the twins (and what a bad trade that was)

There's obviously going to be variations in how much value is given up, but most of these guys (I forgot Nathan was healthy for a year before the Twins traded for him) were either blocked or had disappointed in their organization (or organizations). Yes, Konerko was traded for Mike Cameron, the same Mike Cameron who had just hit .210 with a .621 OPS for the White Sox. It's not as if the guy's value was at an all time high. And Konerko, despite destroying AAA, had just finished a season where he OPS'd .608 in the majors. This trade was basically one disappointing player for another, and the White Sox got more value out of Konerko than the Reds ever got out of Cameron. I'm not sure how Gonzalez being blocked by Teixera refutes my point. He was a former top prospect who was somewhat disappointing (the Rangers valued guys like Hank Blalock over him) and could be easily acquired because he was blocked by a superior player. This would be similar to the Cubs going out and getting Yonder Alonso right now (which I think they should try). Same thing with Hafner. He was traded for crap, meaning his organization didn't value him enough. And Ortiz was non-tendered by the Twins.

 

These are obviously some of the best cases, but I think the Cubs should try and hit similar homeruns. I would never advocate giving a lot of playing time to guys like Francouer or Melky Cabrera, because they had never really had sustained success in the minors. The first player I would target would be Matt LaPorta. With Sizemore out, start with Byrd and see if you can pry him away. Someone above mentioned Clement, but his recent BB/K ratio decline worries me. I doubt the Blue Jays have given up on Travis Snider yet, but he'd be another one. I mentioned Alonso above. Chris Nelson will never play SS for the Rockies, let's see if we can get him. I'd rather have him play 2B for the rest of the year over guys like Barney and Dewitt (although not LaMahieu). Matt Gamel is another one. See if we can get them for relatively cheap, and see how they perform for us for the rest of the year. If we don't get Fielder or Pujols, I'd rather roll the dice with someone like LaPorta rather than bringing back Pena for another 10-12 million.

[SouthSideRyan]

 

you also have to disqualify guys who have proven they don't have the requisite tools to succeed: like the DeWitt example, where we had known he couldn't defend at 2B or hit for any power to play 3B, or Clement, where he lost all value being moved off C

 

Or Jeff Francouer when he showed he had no ability to tell a ball from a strike as he put up hilariously bad numbers in the major leagues for 3 seasons. Or Brandon Wood who hasn't hit outside the PCL in 6 years.

Francoeur's plate discipline alone doesn't preclude him from being a successful player (look at Kemp, Soriano, Crawford, CarGo, Hart, Pence, ...) and Wood's defense at 3B has been good enough he could still hit his AAA MLE of .293 obp/.416 slg and be an above-average player

 

Or Casey Kotchman who had 0.7 total WAR over the past 3 years. (With that 0.7 coming from 1B defense?)

where are you going with this? my central premise was that these guys were underperforming their potential. Alex Gordon had 0.1 WAR the last two seasons, getting oft-demoted and i was (outwardly) hoping like hell we would heavily pursue him

 

That it's a lot easier to see these as guys to pursue in hindsight. Kotchman and Francouer haven't been prospects in a long time. How many major league ABs before a guy is no longer considered a former prospect, and instead is a mediocre major leaguer? (Or worse in Francouer's case.)

 

You've got 2300 major league PAs of 720 OPS from Kotchman and you want to pick him up because BA rated him highly 6 years ago.

 

You've got 3400 major leauge PAs of 730 OPS from Francouer, and you want to pick him because he had a good 250 ABs 7 years ago.

[NonProfitCow]

Cards just picked up Patterson so lets just put this to the test.

[KingKongvs.Godzilla]

 

you also have to disqualify guys who have proven they don't have the requisite tools to succeed: like the DeWitt example, where we had known he couldn't defend at 2B or hit for any power to play 3B, or Clement, where he lost all value being moved off C

 

Or Jeff Francouer when he showed he had no ability to tell a ball from a strike as he put up hilariously bad numbers in the major leagues for 3 seasons. Or Brandon Wood who hasn't hit outside the PCL in 6 years.

Francoeur's plate discipline alone doesn't preclude him from being a successful player (look at Kemp, Soriano, Crawford, CarGo, Hart, Pence, ...) and Wood's defense at 3B has been good enough he could still hit his AAA MLE of .293 obp/.416 slg and be an above-average player

 

Or Casey Kotchman who had 0.7 total WAR over the past 3 years. (With that 0.7 coming from 1B defense?)

where are you going with this? my central premise was that these guys were underperforming their potential. Alex Gordon had 0.1 WAR the last two seasons, getting oft-demoted and i was (outwardly) hoping like hell we would heavily pursue him

 

That it's a lot easier to see these as guys to pursue in hindsight. Kotchman and Francouer haven't been prospects in a long time. How many major league ABs before a guy is no longer considered a former prospect, and instead is a mediocre major leaguer? (Or worse in Francouer's case.)

 

You've got 2300 major league PAs of 720 OPS from Kotchman and you want to pick him up because BA rated him highly 6 years ago.

 

You've got 3400 major leauge PAs of 730 OPS from Francouer, and you want to pick him because he had a good 250 ABs 7 years ago.

 

Pedigree.

 

The fact that at one point people really thought they'd be high end baseball players no doubt helped them stick around.

[imb]

let's add jesus guzman to this list now

[TruffleShuffle]

davearm2, if i ever find out who you are in real life i'm going to run you over with my car.

[Formerly Snayke]

davearm2, if i ever find out who you are in real life i'm going to run you over with my car.

 

Davearm, I think he's being literal.

[TruffleShuffle]

and posting in the wrong thread :x

[Bull]

Pagan