Cole Hamels Traded to Rangers

[davell]

If we just would have added Amaya, Hamels would be ours.

[Sammy Sofa]

Baez becoming Hamels is basically the sole reason Baez exists right now.

 

Though maybe he'll be saved if they actually raise the strikezone, so who knows.

[treebird]

If Baez hadn't gotten the callup last season and was still eligible, he'd still be a Top 10 prospect, in all of baseball, maybe Top 5.

 

this imaginary scenario doesn't make him a better prospect.

[Deeg]

Ignoring it doesn't make ignorant people knowledgeable.

[davell]

For the doom and gloom guys on Javy:What do you truly see him becoming?

[Guest]

For the doom and gloom guys on Javy:What do you truly see him becoming?

 

I'm not one of those but I think it's pretty clear they see him becoming Mike Olt, Brett Jaxon, etc.

[RammyFanny]

I'm looking back through Javy's B-Ref page and holy crap did I forget how much he massacred AA at only 20. I'm used to his usual .500 OPS for the first month dragging down his line.

 

.983 OPS with 20 hrs in only 54 games. That's 60 dongs per 162 as a 20 year old SS in a league extremely advanced for his age.

 

Signed,

 

Javy apologist.

[sneakypower]

For the doom and gloom guys on Javy:What do you truly see him becoming?

my belief for likelihood of Baez career outcomes:

Alfonso Soriano (5%)

Ian Desmond (10%)

Danny Espinosa (50%)

Brandon Wood (35%)

[Guest]

For the doom and gloom guys on Javy:What do you truly see him becoming?

 

I'm not one of those but I think it's pretty clear they see him becoming Mike Olt, Brett Jaxon, etc.

 

Player A- First major league season

153 PA, 46K, .141 AVG, .242 SLG, at age 21.

 

Player B- First major league season

229 PA, 95K, .169 AVG, .324 SLG, at age 21.

 

I'm just not ready to give up on Player B as quickly as so many others seem to be, mainly because of how well Player A turned out. Player B is Baez and Player A is Rizzo. The same can be said for Almora. He's been young for the average age at every stop in the minors, and giving up on him now is just too soon.

[Guest]

For the doom and gloom guys on Javy:What do you truly see him becoming?

 

I'm not one of those but I think it's pretty clear they see him becoming Mike Olt, Brett Jaxon, etc.

 

Player A- First major league season

153 PA, 46K, .141 AVG, .242 SLG, at age 21.

 

Player B- First major league season

229 PA, 95K, .169 AVG, .324 SLG, at age 21.

 

I'm just not ready to give up on Player B as quickly as so many others seem to be, mainly because of how well Player A turned out. Player B is Baez and Player A is Rizzo. The same can be said for Almora. He's been young for the average age at every stop in the minors, and giving up on him now is just too soon.

 

Rizzo didn't show the propensity for swinging and missing (and striking out) in the minors that Javy has.

 

Rizzo is also a massive anomaly in that he has managed to reduce his strikeout rate in MLB from what it was in the minors.

 

I'm not one of the super doom and gloom on Javy guys (I love him), but I really can't stand the "hey look how good this guy who also was really bad turned out" arguments.

 

Also, trading guys for good players is not "giving up" on them.

[Hairyducked Idiot]

For the doom and gloom guys on Javy:What do you truly see him becoming?

 

I'm not one of those but I think it's pretty clear they see him becoming Mike Olt, Brett Jaxon, etc.

 

Player A- First major league season

153 PA, 46K, .141 AVG, .242 SLG, at age 21.

 

Player B- First major league season

229 PA, 95K, .169 AVG, .324 SLG, at age 21.

 

I'm just not ready to give up on Player B as quickly as so many others seem to be, mainly because of how well Player A turned out. Player B is Baez and Player A is Rizzo. The same can be said for Almora. He's been young for the average age at every stop in the minors, and giving up on him now is just too soon.

 

Hey look it's a big list of stats that have little or nothing to do with why people are worried about Baez.

[Clem Fandango]

I'm not a doom and gloom kind of guy either as I'm still keeping the faith, but if he can get better than what he is now without reaching his beast mode peak, I can see Dan Uggla circa 2011 numbers with fewer walks, more K's, but with much better defense.

 

.233/.311/.453/.764 36 HR 82 RBI 62 BB 156 K

 

That was Uggla's 2011. Uggla was worth 1.8 rWAR and 2.2 fWAR that season with below average defense (-9.8 on FG and a -1.0 dWAR). Baez would likely be putting up positive defensive numbers (albeit not insane GG style numbers) so I imagine he'd probably be a 3 win player on average in that particular situation, IMO. It's a far cry from what he'd be capable of doing if he ever figures out how to be more selective and hit for more contact, but I don't think it's unrealistic to hover around numbers similar to that. Uggla was very much a three truths type of hitter, which Baez certainly could be, but to what extent remains to be seen.

[Guest]

Schmidt is the best case analogue to hope for with Javy.

[RammyFanny]

The people that I tend to take issue with about Javy are the ones that don't seem to realize how insanely young he is on the developmental cycle (ie: those who put a ton of stock into his MLB stats last year). 21 is sooooooooo young to debut.

 

For example, Kris Bryant played his entire junior season of college baseball at San Diego at the age of 21. The same age Javy was batting 2nd in the major leagues.

 

Like, take sneaky's comparison list for example . At 21, Alfonso Soriano wasn't even in the United States. Ian Desmond debuted at 24. Danny Espinosa was in college/low A ball at 21. Brandon Wood just started AA. You can drop almost anyone in the MLB at 21 and they'd be god awful.

 

That's not to say a Javy is guaranteed to improve in the tons of extra developmental time he has, but he has two things going for him:

 

1) he has shown rapid improvement at almost every level when given time to make adjustments (before quickly being promoted and then rinse/repeat)

 

2) he doesn't have to turn his k-rate and walk rate into amazing numbers, he needs to improve them to be "acceptably bad" vs "historically bad" and he'll still be an extremely valuable and rare commodity considering his position and power.

 

Now of course it's probably going to take a few years to get there, so I can understand some people wanting to trade him now if you want immediate results in the W/L column. But people insinuating he is/will be a bust are way to premature imo.

 

I would have been open to mitigating risk and trading him for someone like Donaldson. But Hamels at 31 being paid lots of money (even if it's below market value).... Ehhh. But I hate pitchers so I assume everyone's arm is going to fall off.

[SouthSideRyan]

I'm not a doom and gloom kind of guy either as I'm still keeping the faith, but if he can get better than what he is now without reaching his beast mode peak, I can see Dan Uggla circa 2011 numbers with fewer walks, more K's, but with much better defense.

 

.233/.311/.453/.764 36 HR 82 RBI 62 BB 156 K

 

That was Uggla's 2011. Uggla was worth 1.8 rWAR and 2.2 fWAR that season with below average defense (-9.8 on FG and a -1.0 dWAR). Baez would likely be putting up positive defensive numbers (albeit not insane GG style numbers) so I imagine he'd probably be a 3 win player on average in that particular situation, IMO. It's a far cry from what he'd be capable of doing if he ever figures out how to be more selective and hit for more contact, but I don't think it's unrealistic to hover around numbers similar to that. Uggla was very much a three truths type of hitter, which Baez certainly could be, but to what extent remains to be seen.

 

The run environment has gone down a lot since 2011. It's not really a fair comparison.

[Guest]

For the doom and gloom guys on Javy:What do you truly see him becoming?

 

pedro alvarez

[Tangled Up in Plaid]

brett jackson

[Guest]

The people that I tend to take issue with about Javy are the ones that don't seem to realize how insanely young he is on the developmental cycle (ie: those who put a ton of stock into his MLB stats last year). 21 is sooooooooo young to debut.

 

For example, Kris Bryant played his entire junior season of college baseball at San Diego at the age of 21. The same age Javy was batting 2nd in the major leagues.

 

Like, take sneaky's comparison list for example . At 21, Alfonso Soriano wasn't even in the United States. Ian Desmond debuted at 24. Danny Espinosa was in college/low A ball at 21. Brandon Wood just started AA. You can drop almost anyone in the MLB at 21 and they'd be god awful.

 

That's not to say a Javy is guaranteed to improve in the tons of extra developmental time he has, but he has two things going for him:

 

1) he has shown rapid improvement at almost every level when given time to make adjustments (before quickly being promoted and then rinse/repeat)

 

2) he doesn't have to turn his k-rate and walk rate into amazing numbers, he needs to improve them to be "acceptably bad" vs "historically bad" and he'll still be an extremely valuable and rare commodity considering his position and power.

 

Now of course it's probably going to take a few years to get there, so I can understand some people wanting to trade him now if you want immediate results in the W/L column. But people insinuating he is/will be a bust are way to premature imo.

 

I would have been open to mitigating risk and trading him for someone like Donaldson. But Hamels at 31 being paid lots of money (even if it's below market value).... Ehhh. But I hate pitchers so I assume everyone's arm is going to fall off.

The problem with Baez is that he had a half a season to show some development and he showed no development. It's not an adjustment period if you do not adjust. I'm worried that he's so confident he's not coachable.

[Vinestal]

The people that I tend to take issue with about Javy are the ones that don't seem to realize how insanely young he is on the developmental cycle (ie: those who put a ton of stock into his MLB stats last year). 21 is sooooooooo young to debut.

 

For example, Kris Bryant played his entire junior season of college baseball at San Diego at the age of 21. The same age Javy was batting 2nd in the major leagues.

 

Like, take sneaky's comparison list for example . At 21, Alfonso Soriano wasn't even in the United States. Ian Desmond debuted at 24. Danny Espinosa was in college/low A ball at 21. Brandon Wood just started AA. You can drop almost anyone in the MLB at 21 and they'd be god awful.

 

That's not to say a Javy is guaranteed to improve in the tons of extra developmental time he has, but he has two things going for him:

 

1) he has shown rapid improvement at almost every level when given time to make adjustments (before quickly being promoted and then rinse/repeat)

 

2) he doesn't have to turn his k-rate and walk rate into amazing numbers, he needs to improve them to be "acceptably bad" vs "historically bad" and he'll still be an extremely valuable and rare commodity considering his position and power.

 

Now of course it's probably going to take a few years to get there, so I can understand some people wanting to trade him now if you want immediate results in the W/L column. But people insinuating he is/will be a bust are way to premature imo.

 

I would have been open to mitigating risk and trading him for someone like Donaldson. But Hamels at 31 being paid lots of money (even if it's below market value).... Ehhh. But I hate pitchers so I assume everyone's arm is going to fall off.

The problem with Baez is that he had a half a season to show some development and he showed no development. It's not an adjustment period if you do not adjust. I'm worried that he's so confident he's not coachable.

 

Articles I have read seem to suggest the opposite most of the managers/coaches he's had rave about his coachability and if anything he was listening to to many people last year he was getting suggestions from everyone and it was overload. I think Maddon will be very good for him and this new coaching staff hopefully he learns to try and focus on the important things and simplify everything. In the end I don't know what will happen but I think he's got a very good shot at being an above average major league infielder and maybe much better. I think people should be a little more optimistic on him.

[Sammy Sofa]

hopefully he learns to try and focus on the important things

 

What does this even mean.

[Vinestal]

hopefully he learns to try and focus on the important things

 

What does this even mean.

Im not even sure honestly... hopefully he figures out what's important and whats not is what I should have said.

[davell]

brett jackson

 

I can't tell if this is a joke or not. I do know Javy was in the majors when Brett was in short season though. And I know that Javy has as good of bat speed as there is, while Brett's was questioned as to whether it'd play in the majors at all.

[Cubswin11]

brett jackson

 

I can't tell if this is a joke or not. I do know Javy was in the majors when Brett was in short season though. And I know that Javy has as good of bat speed as there is, while Brett's was questioned as to whether it'd play in the majors at all.

Fine, Mike Olt then. Just it won't take a freak head/eye injury to derail him.

[RammyFanny]

brett jackson

 

I can't tell if this is a joke or not. I do know Javy was in the majors when Brett was in short season though. And I know that Javy has as good of bat speed as there is, while Brett's was questioned as to whether it'd play in the majors at all.

Fine, Mike Olt then. Just it won't take a freak head/eye injury to derail him.

Also in low-A ball at the same age when Javy earned a promotion to the majors.

Edited February 15, 2015 by RammyFanny

[RammyFanny]

The problem with Baez is that he had a half a season to show some development and he showed no development. It's not an adjustment period if you do not adjust. I'm worried that he's so confident he's not coachable.

Dude, he was 21. In the major leagues. And he didn't have half a season, it wasn't even 1/3rd of a season. It took Rizzo, and most other 21 year olds, 3 seasons in the majors (at Javy's age) before (we hope) he really figured it out. Adjustment periods in the major leagues aren't 50 games.

 

Javy monthly splits at Iowa (insanely young for the level):

 

April: .617 OPS. 35% K-rate. 6.3 BB %.

May: .738 OPS. 34% K- rate. 6.7 BB %.

June: .815 OPS. 29% K-rate. 9.5 BB%.

July: .999 OPS. 23 % K-rate. 6.6 BB%.

 

It's like this at almost every level (unless he just dominates from the get go). The dude adjusts to every league he's been at, and never even gets left at the level long enough for his adjustments to show through to his overall numbers there. The major leagues are very difficult, and will probably take longer to adjust to. Much much longer than 2 months or whatever you were expecting him to prove last year post call-up.