Article: Cubs Trade Target: Ryan Noda

[Matthew Trueblood]

As the Cubs cast a wide net in their search for a left-handed bat to bolster their lineup, they might need to consider switching away from the big-name free agents and focusing on a trade alternative.

Image courtesy of © Kamil Krzaczynski-USA TODAY Sports

It's impossible to sugarcoat this: Ryan Noda swings and misses at a catastrophic rate. He whiffed on nearly 37 percent of his swings last season, in his first exposure to the big leagues. Of the 362 batters who came to the plate at least 200 times last year, only eight had a lower contact rate. Noda, 27, struck out 34 percent of the time. It's why it took him so long to get a big-league look, and it's an ongoing threat to his viability as a hitter.

You can find many examples of a grooved swing in the modern game, but few are clearer or more glaring than Noda. When the ball isn't in the meaty part of the strike zone, he usually doesn't even touch it.

That's the bad news, and it's pretty bad. Again, this is a player who just broke in last year, on the wrong side of his 27th birthday, with the worst team in baseball. On the other hand, there's good news. When Noda connects, the ball goes. He ranks highly not only in average exit velocity, but in the 90th-percentile exit velo, too. He lifts the ball, but not the way many fly-ball guys do, where pop-ups or lazy, high flies become a problem. Noda's swing is designed to hit high, hard line drives, and when he connects, he does just that, at a high rate.

Put the good and the bad together, and you have a volatile but valuable profile. Noda hit .229/.364/.406 last year, and his power numbers were dampened by playing his home games in Oakland. That uninspiring raw line was good for a 123 wRC+. That's eerily similar to the 119 put up by Christopher Morel, and akin to some optimistic projections for Michael Busch.

Noda, like Busch, is an escapee of the Dodgers system, where there was never going to be room for him in the lineup. As he proved after being a Rule 5 draftee, though, not being good enough to crack the Los Angeles lineup doesn't mean you're not good enough to crack any of several others throughout the league. Noda's only viable defensive positions are first base and left field, but he acquits himself in each spot, and he's a credible DH, with all that power and the discipline not to expand his strike zone.

Adding Noda wouldn't cure what ails the Cubs, per se. They'd move from one slightly uncomfortable, highly fluid state on offense to another. They'd have to move pieces around constantly, to get Noda, Busch and Morel the amount of playing time each deserves, while also shielding each from bad matchups. If what they want is a hitter who will punish right-handed pitching, though, Noda is a good candidate.

Why, then, would the A's trade him? In short: he's of no use to them. Noda turns 28 in March. The A's will be moribund for the balance of his prime, and holding onto anyone with trade value who won't be good five years from now is a fool's errand for them. Instead, they could ask for any of a handful of young players who might have bigger warts or be further from helping the team, but who won't age out of their usefulness before the team's new park in Las Vegas gets built.

The Cubs have money to spend, and in addition to Cody Bellinger, guys like Brandon Belt and Joey Votto remain available. Already, though, Jed Hoyer has shown a greater appetite for moves that yield long-term value at lowish costs than for those that come with less risk but an exponentially higher price tag. Noda might be in the sweet spot.

Would you give up anything of consequence to mix Noda in with the Cubs' existing power hitters? Can they afford to wait on a slow-thawing market for left-handed thump? Let's kick around the options.

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[painhertz]

He's useless.  Cubs have better options in AAA,AA.

[Bertz]

I eyed Noda throughout last year (he's also a pretty cool dude one Twitter from what I've seen), but I don't think he's an option post-Busch.  I think the additional bat needs to be someone you can count on a little more.  I like Belt or, while not a lefty, Justin Turner as guys we can adding into the offensive mix.