Post#18 » by TwistedLogic » Sun Feb 17, 2013 8:22 am
If a single Jays fan is able to complain at this point, it goes to show how much the Jays have spoiled their fanbase over the past few months. There are a lot of people that, in every point of their lives, will sit there and complain about what they lost rather than be happy with what they received. They'll be focused on the cost rather than the reward. This is why taking the entire offseason as a whole, you might look at all the prospects we gave up and think that we paid too much. Looking at it through a different lens though, you can start to get some clarity on the value that we truly gained. Instead of looking at it like "to get these players we had to give up ALL of this", here's another way to look at it.
People complain about the cost of what we gave up because they see it all as a whole. Let's break it down into smaller hypothetical trades and see if you get a different view of the past offseason. What if, instead of making the two big trades (one seven player trade and another twelve player trade), what if Anthopoulos made these six smaller trades?
Trade 1
Sent: Jeff Mathis
Received: Josh Thole, Mike Nickeas
Do you have anything to complain about in this trade? Three scrub catchers, nobody cares.
Trade 2
Sent: Anthony DeSclafani, Wuilmer Becerra
Received: Emilio Bonifacio
Emilio Bonifacio stole 30 bases in 64 games last year. That is a pace of 79 steals over 162 games. He has a career OBP of .329 and is one season removed from posting 3.3 fWAR. You give up two low-A prospects that most people probably never heard of, two prospects who have an incredibly unlikely chance of even making it to the majors based on how far away they are, I can't think of why anyone would have a problem with this trade.
Trade 3
Sent: Justin Nicolino, Henderson Alvarez
Received: Mark Buehrle
The lowest of the lansing-3 and a pitcher who can't figure it out for arguably the most consistent starter in the majors for more than a decade. Over the past twelve seasons, Buehrle has averaged 219 innings per year, and for every 219 innings he has pitched, he has accumulated an average of 3.94 fWAR. If either of these pitchers end up putting half the numbers that Buehrle has over either of their careers, it'll be considered a success. People don't realize this, and to be honest, I didn't either, but if Buehrle can actually continue being Buehrle for just a few more seasons, he will have a pretty strong hall of fame case for himself.
Trade 4
Sent: Noah Syndergaard
Received: Josh Johnson
You're giving up one unproven prospect, one that, though he has a big ceiling, has many question marks and has been said to have a possible end as a reliever. You're trading him for a guy who has posted an All-Star caliber season in three of the past four years, one of those seasons being Cy Young-level and the only exception being the year he was injured. The Royals traded the #1 prospect in the game, Wil Myers along with Jake Odorizzi for James Shields. Even without an extension this trade is easy. If they can work out an extension, it's a highway robbery.
Trade 5
Sent: Yunel Escobar, Jake Marisnick
Received: RA Dickey
If anyone argues against this trade, it'll be on the basis that "Dickey is a 38 year old knuckleballer pitching in the AL East", which will only go to show that they know nothing of what they're talking about. Even if any of those concerns were enough to be wary of Dickey, the price of Yunel Escobar and Jake Marisnick is ridiculously hard to pass up, especially given that Marisnick showed signs of struggles throughout the season, while Escobar was on his way out anyway.
Trade 6
Sent: Adeiny Hechavarria, Travis d'Arnaud
Received: Jose Reyes
You turn Adeiny Hechavarria into Jose Reyes and the cost of that monumental upgrade is the best catching prospect in the game. If someone were to try and make a case against this trade, their points would likely be based on Reyes' injury history. The fact that he has had hamstring trouble and is moving to play on turf. Even if you step over the fact that playing on turf has nothing to do with taking a toll on your hamstrings and the fact that playing on turf is actually a huge benefit for a slap-hitting speedster like Reyes, this argument, in its most bare and futile form, is still further broken. This is true because now that same injury concern can be pinned to d'Arnaud. While he hasn't had as many DL days as Reyes, he also has 0 major league experience, and his one major injury was a leg injury at the catcher position.
All six of those individual trades look like big wins, all trades that, based on what we know now, look heavily in favor of Anthopoulos and the Jays. Yes one of these prospects could end up an MVP and one of these All-Stars we acquired could end up with a career-ending injury, but those are not things you can account for when making a trade. When it comes to the criteria in making a great trade, when it comes to judging a trade's winner and loser, Anthopoulos is a clear winner in each of these trades. So whether you look at them individually or all together, the result is the same. A very successful offseason for the Blue Jays, one that no, not many others could achieve, even if given the same resources. That itself is a disastrous fallacy because Anthopoulos was not given those resources, he acquired them himself. He created that payroll space through shrewd decision-making like dropping Rios on waivers and trading away Wells. He added those prospects. You can't say "give those resources to another GM and they'll have just as successful an offseason". How about give the 2008 Blue Jays to another GM and see if they even get to the point of accumulating those resources and that level of trust with the owners in the first place. You can't say you're a fan of AA and then take away the credit for everything he has done and say anybody could do the same. That is not true in the least bit.
