Garza from the Rays Trade Revisited

[apete6]

Obviously, the story won't be complete for another several years when Lee & Archer finish their careers, but let's discuss this as Garza is about to get moved.

 

Garza has produced 7.0 WAR in his 3 seasons with the Cubs (4.9 of which came in 2010).

Zach Rosscup has not yet made the major leagues, but has looked good in the minors so far.

Fernando Perez never made MLB with the Cubs.

 

Sam Fuld has produced 1.9 WAR in his 3 seasons as a Ray (1.7 of which came in 2010 due to some insane fielding #s)

Chris Archer has produced 0.9 WAR in portions of 2 seasons as a Ray

Brandon Guyer produced 0.4 WAR in his time with the Rays

Robinson Chirinos produced -0.1 WAR in his time with the Rays

Hak Ju Lee has not yet arrived in the majors and recently suffered a serious injury

 

If you add the 3 years of Garza to the future WAR of the guys we get from Texas, it is possible that this trade ends up being a good one for the Cubs over the long term strictly looking at WAR and would have been even better if not for some unexpected injuries that Garza suffered. Obviously WAR/$ will almost certainly go the way of the Rays if Archer and/or Lee can provide any decent value over the next several years, but that is the type of risk that big market teams make sometimes.

 

Overall, not a terrible trade and unless Hak Ju Lee ends up being the next Derek Jeter, it likely won't make any of the "worst trades of all time" lists. Hell, who knows, one of the guys the Cubs gets for Garza could swing the trade the other way. Would I have preferred to not have made the trade? Yes, but it doesn't appear to be as terrible as everyone predicted at the time it happened.

Edited July 19, 2013 by apete6

[Guest]

Excuse me sir, but you've completely omitted the linchpin to that trade. One Robinson Chirinos, ready made MLB catcher at your service.

[jersey cubs fan]

huh, I don't remember everybody thinking it was terrible.

[Little Slide Rooter]

Don't forget we also got Rosscup, who's been very good since coming over.

[apete6]

Excuse me sir, but you've completely omitted the linchpin to that trade. One Robinson Chirinos, ready made MLB catcher at your service.

 

Edited to include Chirinos & Rosscup as well as Fernando Perez.

 

I thought the overwhelming reaction on this board was HOW CAN WE TRADE LEE AND ARCHER!!!?

[Andy]

huh, I don't remember everybody thinking it was terrible.

I sure didn't.

[mookie]

Hendry rocked the [expletive] out of that trade.

[KingCubsFan]

Most of the outrage was over the fact that Matt Garza was equivalent to Randy Wells, and we were giving up good assets to get him.

[mookie]

hahahahahahaha

 

I loved all of that nonsense. RAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAANDY!!

[Hairyducked Idiot]

huh, I don't remember everybody thinking it was terrible.

 

IIRC (and that's always questionable), it was much more popular (rightly so) on NSBB than elsewhere.

[Exile on Waveland]

Randy Wells, lol.

 

I thought this board mainly disliked the trade.

[Tyrant]

My recollection was a pretty overwhelming dislike of the deal. Partly for who was given up though mostly because people thought Garza wasn't very good.

[scarey]

I admit to be a critic of the trade. I was not thrilled with the 2010 production from Matt Garza. Also, I thought Hak Ju Lee was going to be producing the way Arismendy Alcantara has been producing since that trade. Finally, I thought we'd be seeing a couple "down" years in Wrigley and felt investing in this type of starting pitching at this ime wouldn't pay off for when the Cubs were competitive again.

 

I'm happy to have been two-thirds wrong.

[jersey cubs fan]

My recollection was a pretty overwhelming dislike of the deal. Partly for who was given up though mostly because people thought Garza wasn't very good.

 

I thought I was overly critical of it but plenty of others liked it, but I have no idea now.

[Guest]

i thought we all liked it, but the organization was in complete disarray at the time so nobody really cared enough to get excited

[imb]

i thought we all liked it, but the organization was in complete disarray at the time so nobody really cared enough to get excited

 

Yeah my recollection is that the board mostly thought it was a good trade, but we all figured we were trading minor leaguers for a guy we would trade for more minor leaguers later.

[toonsterwu]

I think my opinion was that the value made sense, but I was wary of Garza. He took a big, big step up after coming over.

 

That said, I was never really against the value. I was never as big on Lee as others. I liked Archer a lot more than most (I remember some discussions here about Archer vs. McNutt and I felt like I was in the minority then arguing for Archer ahead of McNutt), but you gotta give up something to get a cost-controlled young arm. I liked Chirinos and Guyer, but they didn't matter in the grand scheme of things.

[Tyrant]

I think my opinion was that the value made sense, but I was wary of Garza. He took a big, big step up after coming over.

 

That said, I was never really against the value. I was never as big on Lee as others. I liked Archer a lot more than most (I remember some discussions here about Archer vs. McNutt and I felt like I was in the minority then arguing for Archer ahead of McNutt), but you gotta give up something to get a cost-controlled young arm. I liked Chirinos and Guyer, but they didn't matter in the grand scheme of things.

 

I forgot all about Trey McNutt. Looked him up and this is his 4th year in a row at Tennessee. No signs of going anywhere else either.

[dew1679666265]

Most of the outrage was over the fact that Matt Garza was equivalent to Randy Wells, and we were giving up good assets to get him.

 

It wasn't that Garza was equivalent to Wells necessarily, it was that Garza hadn't been better than Wells yet to that point and that was disturbing given his much better stuff and how much value we were giving.

 

I didn't like it at all at the time, primarily because I was very high on Archer and skeptical of Garza. I'm glad to be wrong. I also remember the reaction on here being pretty mixed at the extremes - most people either loved it (based on Garza's stuff and upside) or hated it (too much question in Garza's actual performance to give up all that talent).

[Rob]

I remember being very against any deal that included Wells. At the time, they were coming off similarly valued seasons, IIRC. Garza still had a ceiling above that, of course, but it didn't make much sense to give up Wells+ at the time.

 

I was still pissed about the deal when it went down (even sans Wells), but I hate almost every deal at first. I came around on it when I started to see Garza throwing a lot more breaking pitches and getting some strikeouts.

[Layoutman]

Hendry rocked the [expletive] out of that trade.

 

 

I think there was more fallout from trading DeRosa than there ever was regarding the Garza deal. Think Archer and Stevens were the centerpieces of that deal.

[XZero771679666304]

I remember being very against any deal that included Wells. At the time, they were coming off similarly valued seasons, IIRC. Garza still had a ceiling above that, of course, but it didn't make much sense to give up Wells+ at the time.

 

I was still pissed about the deal when it went down (even sans Wells), but I hate almost every deal at first. I came around on it when I started to see Garza throwing a lot more breaking pitches and getting some strikeouts.

 

I never bought in on Randy Wells, I always felt like he was Cinderella at 11:59.

 

I wasn't pissed about the trade, but I was not thrilled with giving up Hak Ju Lee. I felt Archer was a bit of a wild card due to his control issues.

[Illini Iceman]

I am starting to think giving up Archer was a big mistake.

[Little Slide Rooter]

I am starting to think giving up Archer was a big mistake.

 

It's not exactly considered giving up when you use him as one of the center pieces for a front end pitcher.

 

Now if anyone lost in this deal, it was the Cardinals who traded Chris Perez for a few unseless months of DeRosa not too long after.

[Tracer Bullet]

I am starting to think giving up Archer was a big mistake.

 

It's not exactly considered giving up when you use him as one of the center pieces for a front end pitcher.

 

Now if anyone lost in this deal, it was the Cardinals who traded Chris Perez for a few unseless months of DeRosa not too long after.

 

As he used it, "giving up" pretty clearly means "trading away."