Not trading Osuna a mistake?

[North_of_Border]

He was just recently the Jays biggest trade asset next to maybe Donaldson and Stroman. There was huge demand for the Dominant young closer with years of control. Jays could gotten a blank cheque from a team like Washington, just name one.

Now it's a different picture. He is struggling. He looks damaged physiologically. He could recover, but it's a red flag for a guy needed in pressure situations.

Plus the fact that the Jays might not need a dominant closer for a while now, just to be realistic. And with all the intriguing young potential relievers in the minors.... was it a mistake not trading Osuna at the height of his value?

[fouronesix22]

Im starting to think so

[bluerap23]

I would have traded Osuna if we could have packaged him with Tulo.

[Natural11]

I would have traded Osuna if we could have packaged him with Tulo.

The problem is Tulo's negative value may come close to balancing out the positive value you'd get from an Osuna deal. Would you want to give them both away just to shed Tulo's salary?

It's an interesting scenario to look at, but with Vlad/Bo a couple of years away, it may be premature to absorb a huge loss in dumping Tulo.

[Schad]

Yeah, no need to start eating money yet. Would be better to let a couple years of it fall off while retooling.

Also, if you're not good right freaking now, it's always a mistake to hang on to soon-to-be-expensive relievers. Relievers break; if someone wants to give you major value for one, take it.

[Skin Blues]

Yeah, it was a mistake to not trade Osuna. And no, we shouldn't package him with Tulo. That's the kind of thing bad management does; dump salary instead of taking better prospects. We need prospects more than we need salary relief. We aren't exactly in a prime position to go out and spend an extra $20M on free agents right now.

[Mehar]

Look at my posts before the All-star game in July. I said the time was now to trade Osuna, since his value will never be higher. Given his anxiety issues as well, you cannot predict the future. Some in the forum pushed back on the idea, saying we need Osuna for contention purposes in 2018. In a matter of two months- you see how even the so-called "Lights out closer", can struggle. You never fall in love with one closer forever, since they can break. I seen it many times in baseball following it the last two decades.

[Lateral Quicks]

Statistically Osuna is having his best season ever: 1.83 FIP, 11.6K/9, 1.4BB/9, HR/9 0.5. Those are outstanding numbers.

Even with the blown saves, I doubt his trade value is significantly different than it was a couple months ago. He's 22 with three years remaining of team control.

[johanliebert]

he should never have came out with that mental health issue. its now a talking piece for you fools. funny how quickly yall flip flop.

[Schad]

Johan, I hate actually doing mod things with a passion, but if you don't stop coming into threads to call people fools, idiots, etc, I'll be forced to.

[Skin Blues]

The blown saves aren't nearly as much of a concern as the diminished velocity. Most players increase their velocity steadily as the season progresses, gaining about 1 MPH. That slope should not be downward at all, but it looks like a steep cliff.

[Tanner]

Statistically Osuna is having his best season ever: 1.83 FIP, 11.6K/9, 1.4BB/9, HR/9 0.5. Those are outstanding numbers.

Even with the blown saves, I doubt his trade value is significantly different than it was a couple months ago. He's 22 with three years remaining of team control.

Correct. Even his 2nd half Era of 6.00 is misleading since it comes with a 2.38 Fip, 11 k/9, 6 walks, 55% gb%, and only 1 hr allowed. The .348 babip is a big reason.

Have to keep an eye on the velocity, but the Jays defence is trash and Osuna's not having good luck with balls in play. I mean, seriously? Might as well have started a thread about asking whether not trading Sanchez after 2016 was a mistake.

Relievers get hurt. Relievers don't always last long. Osuna might be one of the many causalities eventually. But teams are a lot smarter about stats now. Osuna hasn't been as bad as his Era indicates. He will still have value as long as he is healthy. Waiting for him to blow up and then say 'well we should have traded him before this happened' is a pointless exercise. Trade him when an opportunity presents itself. We are not getting Robles for him anyway, so just depends on what others are offering.

[-MetA4-]

Osuna is showing the obvious flaws of FIP based evaluation. He's missing his spots and getting hit around hard, period. While there may be some BABIP bad luck there, he is VISUALLY clearly nowhere near as sharp as he has been in the past, which overrides the whole "its his best statistical year ever" stuff. You're seeing the same **** that had Drew Hutchison as a FIP god a few seasons ago: he'd miss badly from time to time and get slapped around, but his base peripherals (K rate, BB rate) were always pristine.

[Schad]

There's probably a fair bit of bad luck, but it's not coincidental that the last four months have featured (by far) the highest line drive rates (on balls in play) off his fastball since his first month in the majors. Pitches that weren't massive mistakes at 96-98 get tagged at 93-94.

[Tanner]

Osuna's hard contact percentage and line drive % in the 2nd half of 2016 is almost identical to what it has been in the 2nd half of 2017, and it did not carry over to the following season. Another thing to keep in mind is he is keeping the ball on the ground during his poor 2nd half (55% gb%) so while the hits are harder than usual for him, a bit better luck or some better defence could have minimized at least some of his struggles. It could also be simple regression. Dude was in god mode in the 1st half. Kind of hard to keep that pace up all season.

The velocity being down and the hard hit rate is something to keep an eye on next season. But he really hasn't been as bad as his numbers suggest. Take the worst months of any reliever and it's not going to look good. Osuna's worst months are coming with a Fip in the 2.00's. I mean it could be a lot worse.

I'd still trade him in the off season if a good offer comes along but to suggest it's too late to trade him or they waited too long is crazy. Reliever volatility a lot of times is based on luck. Drew Storen lost a few ticks on his Fb when the Jays acquired him and fell off the map. No injury. Just bad timing for the Jays to get him. It's hard to predict reliever decline. It can happen suddenly.

[LBJSeizedMyID]

From what I've seen his pitchers haven't been as crisp as they were in previous years. That being said, I don't think you can consider Osuna like any other relievers. The reality is he should've been groomed as a starter, so chances are he'll bounce back next year. No need to trade him if his value is at a low.

[-MetA4-]

Its not just hard-contact but a complete collapse in how much soft contact he has allowed. He is down to a 9% soft contact rate in the second half of the season; which means that almost every ball hit has either been medium (52.2%) or hard (38.8%) contact. A significant increase in groundball rate with that low a soft contact rate is going to create a LOT of opportunities for balls to get through the infield. So while his hard contact rate may be virtually exactly the same as it was in the second half of last season, you must understand that he posted a a 26.7% soft contact rate in the second half of last season with a 50% FB rate. A softly hit flyball is the least likely of all contact to produce a hit. What you are seeing now is a replacement of those softly hit flyballs with a huge increase in medium and hard hit groundballs. Osuna isn't a groundball pitcher; so lets not mistake him for the relief version of Aaron Sanchez in 2014/2015 who was able to dominate out of the bullpen on balls hit on the ground.

[North_of_Border]

Jays will have to root for him to make a bounce back next year. Support him during his hard medical issue is going on. That's all they can do at this point.

Maybe even go the extra mile shut him down. Let him recover. Don't throw him to the wolves.

........ or trade him in the offseason for lesser value. But that would be a mistake


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[C Court]

Osuna is a young cheap controllable contract. Too early to give up on him, even though I am concerned.

[Skin Blues]

The main driver of his bloated ERA from the past 6 weeks is LOB% which is entirely unsustainable and not all all caused by his soft contact %. He could allow 0% soft contact and still wouldn't have a LOB% of 49%. There's nothing here to suggest a long-term problem going forward. If he's injured then that's obviously a huge problem, but the actual performance has been top notch despite his diminished velocity, even through this bad ERA blip. It's easy to create a narrative to explain his problems until you actually try to support that narrative with evidence.