Then 2018 happened.
Nothing was wrong with 2018. It was just like 2016 and 2015 and the little he played in 2014. (OPS+s 69, 70, 73, and 75 respectively). He has a low average (.205-.231) and decent power (.129-.154) with a high strikeout rate (30.1%-39.5%!!! - ok that's the limited 2014 time) and low but not disqualifying walk rate (5.9%-7.5%) with some speed (SB 14-24 not counting 2014 here - not fair for a counting stat). That's not good enough by itself to keep a guy around but given his work in centerfield being above average for a team carrying at least one questionable corner the past few years you can see where you can fit that guy in. Defensive replacement, late-inning pinch runner, pinch-hitter when you are looking for a homer. He has his value. But last year should have made it clear his value is not as an everyday player if you can help it.
The Nats can help it. They have Victor Robles, a legit prospect, who hit .288 / .348 / .525 in his 20 games last year. Victor
When guys are held down in the minors it's generally to work on D but Victor is scouted out to have superior defense and is fairly fast as well. You can sort of think of him as MAT swapping average and contact (K rates around 20% in majors, under 15% mostly in minors) for power and six years younger. He projects to be just as good, if not slightly better than MAT in 2019 and has the chance to be much better.
So why is MAT playing with the big boys and Robles with the back-ups? There are two theories.The first one is that they are going to keep Robles down in the minors long enough to get another year of control out of him. The second is that they are trying to showcase MAT for a trade.
I'm all for the second, less likely, theory. Sure they need MAT. It's a step down from him to Stevenson or Bautista as your 4th OF. But really they are only the 4th OF for CF. Soto or Eaton would likely have Adams or Kendrick back them up. So you can afford to lose MAT and if you can trade him for a good relief arm, it seems like you should because the Nats need a good relief arm right now. MAT is a more important player in potential scenarios, but a good reliever is more important in the scenario as it stands right now.
I hate the first, more likely, theory. Teams have done this for a long while but as we talk more about the players market seeing a correction on the 30+ side, we focus more as well on the 20-25 side, where the players are vastly underpaid. There's a distaste for this sort of thing on some level which feels like not only cheating the player out of a year of money, but cheating your fans out of the best team today for a cheaper team down the road. Notice I don't say a "better team down the road" because 6 years down the road is too far to project that out. You'd like to believe that's ultimately the point, that saving money on that year of a contract means a better team, but the only guarantee is it will be cheaper if they want it to.
This plan fits in with the Nats' strategy since 2014*, which I would describe as serving dual masters. They have put together the best team they could for the current year while at the same time trying not to distrub their plans for any future year. Win now and win later. This was helped by a NL East that only put out a couple of decent teams, the 2015-16 Mets and the Braves last year. They could do it and let the lack of competition keep their head above water. Still even with a division that produced only 3 potential rivals in 5 years, the Nats fell to two of those and only managed 3 division titles. This year they have been afforded no luxury with 3 potential rivals in 2019 alone. Can the same strategy work? Can they afford to potentially give up a game or two** saving Robles for a year where no one knows how good the Nats can be?
I'd like to see Robles start day one. This isn't all-in. You aren't sacrificing a known, you are sacrificing an unknown - making it a bit harder for the 2023 Nats to be good, not knowing if that means you are hurting a pennant winner or a 65 win team. You can argue not signing a big contract making it harder to win in the next few years but betting on an unknown team a half-decade off instead of the known very good team in front of you? That's grabbing for two in the bush with one in your hand. That's dumb baseball.
*Why 2014? Becuase I see 2012 as a surprise year during their rebuilding plan phase and 2013 as a complete lack of an attempt to win now. They went into the season with Bernadina, Tracy, Moore, and Lombo as the bench for God's sake. They won the previous year and thought maybe they could just do nothing, except replace a closer who was actually pretty good at the time. Of course they couldn't do nothing else and it blew up and after that wouldn't be so casual about building the roster out.
**I know I know - Robles isn't like 6 games better than MAT but the point is they are worse and they have more a chance to catch a bad run when they are worse that they can't make up during that time.
How long would they need to keep Robles in Fresno (ugh) in order to squeeze another year out of him? Like July? Because in the 2019 NL East, that is quitting, plain and simple.
ReplyDelete"Victor gets injured pretty regularly." He does? We're all aware of the wrist injury last season, but what else? Also, the thing that has come up most often when discussing MAT vs Robles is defense. Regardless of what Robles is scouted to be, I think we are overvaluing defense a little bit here. And unfortunately WAR overvalues it as well. I'm not saying that MAT isn't a great defender in CF, of course he is. But what I think is more difficult to prove is this: how bad was our team defense with, say, Bryce in CF last year? Kind of hard to quantify how is impacted us winning/losing games. But I think we can all say how having MAT's bat in the lineup hurts our offense. Defense is important, but to me, it borders on trying to quantify managerial skills. Too fuzzy and over-analyzed. Just my opinion, but I hate hearing the argument for a player that BLOWS, that "well is defense is pretty gooooood.... I don't knowwwww...."
ReplyDeleteI guess this is why Jeff Mathis still has a job lol.
Ole - he missed time in 2016 to a injured hand thanks to a HBP. I thought that happened before 2016 too but don't see anything about that. so probably not injured pretty regularly.
ReplyDelete@Ole PBN. I would agree that defense is harder to quantify that offense. That definitely goes without saying. We basically HAVE the objective offensive numbers. But defense is most definitely easier to put a value on that managerial skills, which have basically zero basis for analysis. Defense does have various techniques for converting a player’s defense to numerical values. Now, AGAIN, I agree that you simply cannot say “he had X DRS” in the same way you can say he had X OPS+. 100%. But we have some idea. And we DO know how important to wins a player’s defense vs his offense is. The problem is measuring the defensive contribution itself. If that makes sense. So yeah, we should not incorporate defensive value metrics into WAR with the same confidence as we incorporate offensive value metrics and baserunning (which is somewhere in between the two in terms of ability to measure). But yeah. There’s a reason you keep around a huge bat who is terrible in field but not a guy who can’t hit at all because he’s a defensive wiz. What’s annoying in THIS case is Robles IS (by all accounts) as good defensively as MAT....but almost certainly superior at the plate and bases. (He’s as fast as Turner, I.e. anybody in baseball basically.)
ReplyDelete@Harper, Ole PBN: The main injury issue with Robles is he gets HBP basically more than anybody ever. Like....a ludicrous amount if i recall. And you worry with enough HBP he’ll hurt his wrist or hand.
ReplyDeleteI imagine another factor is the scouts wanting to Taylor's new swing a lot early on - in a way, they may know Robles better right now.
ReplyDeleteThe Nats aren't stupid enough to exile Robles to Fresno for the sake of another year of control, are they? Are they really?
ReplyDeletestop. Robles is going to be the opening day starter, he's not going to Fresno till June.
ReplyDeleteThey would have to store Robles until June, or around then. If they do that...yuck.
ReplyDeleteI don't think that they will trade MAT. He is an excellent fourth outfielder. The problem is that they have been stuck with him in top 3 status at various points every season. That said, if someone is willing to make a trade offer in line with trading for a starting CF I'd be all for it.
It just makes too much sense to trade MAT for a strong reliever and have Stevenson be that 4th OF/pinch runner. Make the deal!
ReplyDeleteOh. If it’s June (and not a week or two), I have no doubt that he’ll be opening day CF. I imagine Davey, etc might want to light a fire under Robles so it doesn’t seem like he is just being handed the job/entitled to it. (And so far he’s responding this spring.)
ReplyDeletePlaying service time games with Robles would be peak Rizzo-Lerner optimism. "Yeah we can get another cheap year of Robles by trusting our guy MAT for a couple of months. What's the worst that could happen?"
ReplyDeleteRobles has 52 days of mlb service time according to Cots.
ReplyDeleteYeah in order to get another year of service time the Nats would need to hold down Robles until June 3. It just makes no sense whatsoever. And there’s truly no basis for thinking MAT is a starter caliber player.
ReplyDeleteBoswell has a column that Nats pretty much HAVE to get Kimbrel. I just don't see it. I think he would be a risk after the second half of last year. Even if he's got a lot in the tank, the money/years he probably wants don't make sense for the Nats or possibly anyone else. I like the MAT trade idea--maybe SF for Smith, as others have suggested. AND I would sign Sipp. Kimbrel is just too iffy right now.
ReplyDelete@johnny c. Thing is....Kimbrel is probably done being a lights out game is over dominator...but his velocity was 96.8 avg (normal) second half of last year. He was just wild. It may just be his mechanics were a little off....usually when a reliever loses it he loses velo.
ReplyDeleteA v-e-r-y late comment on Robles.
ReplyDeleteI think I commented last year on the number of times Robles has been hit by pitches. Except for that freak diving-catch attempt last year, any significant playing time Robles has missed in his career is because he's been hit by pitches.
Question: Does Robles get hit by pitches very often? Answer: More than any minor leaguer in recent history. And not only often, but everywhere.
Robles has been beaned in Rookie League, Short-Season League, Low-A, High-A, AA and AAA. He's been drilled in the Arizona Fall League, in the Dominican Winter League, and even been beaned while rehabbing from being beaned. And in 93 plate appearances with the Nats? Beaned 4 times.
In 5 minor league seasons, Victor Robles has been hit by pitches 93 times. In 2016 alone, playing at three different levels, Robles was drilled a remarkable 34 times. He's been beaned 3 times in a game on two occasions. Twice in a game 8 other times.
If anyone should be girded with Barry Bonds-like armour when stepping to the plate, it's Robles.
And finally, this: In 2015, Michael A. Taylor had 511 plate appearances for the Nats in his age 24 season. He was terrible. And except for his brief brush with offensive glory in 2017, he's been terrible since.
Robles turns 22 in May. At this point, sending him to the minors for any extended period will almost certainly harm his development. Moreover, he is a better player than MAT in every way. That's right--in EVERY way.
If the Nats' organization--not the belly-up-to-the-post-game-buffet beat writers-- truly believes that the starting centerfield position is a touch-and-go battle between Taylor and Robles, then it might be time for Nats fans to think about switching to cannabis-infused beer.
Tony Sipp is a Nat.
ReplyDeletehttps://www.mlbtraderumors.com/2019/03/nationals-to-sign-tony-sipp.html
@SM. Amen on all of that. I wonder whether the Nats will eventually encourage Robles to move a bit off the plate. It may help his OBP but it’s not great for his durability obviously
ReplyDeleteReally happy they replaced Solis with Sipp (and at less than $1M of cost, besides). Upgrading from "a wing and a prayer" to basic competence is always good. This was an obvious move and I'm glad Rizzo made it.
ReplyDelete