I had quite a week at real work so I let the blog go bye (one of the perks of this not actually being a source of income or anything) and the Nats obliged by mostly stinking. They have slowly regressed (since BEFORE the trade deadline) to one of the worst teams in baseball but it's a little late to get to the true dregs and get the Nats a Top 1 or 2 pick in the draft. For a while now they've been heading toward a fight with the Marlins over 5/6. The remaining 4 (BAL, ARI, PIT, TEX) are just too out there to catch. I suppose the Twins could really try to tank and get in the mix with the Nats and Marlins. but annoyingly seemed to have fight in them yesterday.
Anyway - how's the kids? We'll go with overall AND last 7 days for you
GARCIA - .228 / .266 / .404 (last 7d - .185 / .214 / .481) You can pull something positive from here with his minor power bump this past week. Otherwise it's rough. He isn't walking enough or hitting enough in this extended trial. But if he can show some pop - maybe some sort of Danny Espinosa going forward? If not good, he was useful. Still super young though so there's time even beyond 2022 to see what develops here.
RUIZ - .121 /.194 / .152 w NATS- (.077/ .250 / .154) The good is no strikeouts. the bad has been everything else. Doesn't look good at the plate at all. Still though just called up in comparison to these other guys. Best first look at stats will take place at the end of the year, not now.
KIEBOOM - .230 / .319 / .366 (.130 / .200 / .130) - has his moments but starting to have enough ML time where you start to wonder if this is it. Not yet but next year as he goes 24-25 will definitely be the decision year. Maybe strikes out too much and doesn't give you much of anything particular. Also looks lost in the field.
ADAMS - .311 / .425 / .541 (.222 / .364 / .556) - barely playing now because Ruiz also needs at bats. He definitely strikes out too much but unlike the others has power when hitting so far to make up for it. 9 XBH in 73 PA with the Nats. An interesting piece who might make for a tough decision next year for the Nats if there's no DH and they get a 1B.
THOMAS - .293 / .383 / .515 (.185 / .333 / .407) - the new hotness also strikes out a bit much but has shown a very useful plate discipline that can carry him through times like this past week when he doesn't hit. Looks like a fine replacement for the old hotness
STEVENSON - .223 / .282 / .325 (.000 / .000 / .000) - 0 for 6 if you must now. Not a kid but relevant to this discussion, the old hotness is done. He actually had a very good week before that but he'll be 28/29 next year and mostly hits like crap when given more than 50 PAs. No reason for him and Thomas to be here and Thomas is younger, looks better, is under more control.
THOMPSON - 3.78ERA 1.860WHIP 5.56FIP 10.8H/9 1.6HR/9 5.9BB/9 8.6K/9 - I keep saying this guy doesn't strike out enough to make his wildness acceptable. He also gave up a couple of bombs and gets hit a lot. I wouldn't say give up on him but I would put him back in AAA next year to work on things because this isn't playing at the major league level. Yes only 16IP.
GRAY - 5.85ERA 1.450 6.86FIP 9.0H/9 2.9HR/9 4.1BB/9 8.8K/9 - In Gray's last 3 starts he has an ERA over 12. He's lost the zone and that means fewer Ks and more BBs and the guy can't do that because of his HR bugaboo. How bad is it? In about a 3rd of the starts Gray has wriggled his way into the Top 40 NL pitchers in HRs given up. At this pace he'd give up over 60 for a season. For guys with less than 50IP for a season (Gray is at 48) He's given up the 3rd most homers ever in the history of the game. And the other guys on the list have under 50IP because that's all they were allowed. He HAS to get the homers under control.
Patrick MURPHY (26) - picked up released Blue Jay - only 12IP so grain of salt 5.25 ERA 9.8H/9, 0.8HR/9, 3.0BB/9, 12.0 K/9. The peripherals would work in the majors. Unfortunately the key one here - that K number is anomalous. He just doesn't do that. The rest though... I could see him being last arm in the pen useful as a guy who won't give up a bomb, just another arm type. You need those.
Josh ROGERS (26) - 3.65ERA, 1.297WHIP, 5.27FIP, 8.8H/9, 1.5HR/9, 2.9BB/9, 4.4K/9. Yes in this day and age he's striking out that few batters. Now that won't work long term and his ERAs... pretty much everywhere since 2018 prove it. Why is he pitching and not selling cars? Early in his minors he had a heavy ball and good control and that can work with no Ks. But hasn't been the case last few years. I'd expect him not to be here next year
I wouldn't say things are grim but there is nothing really to hang your hat on right now. Again AGAIN it's early for a lot of these guys. Everyone but Stevenson and Rogers will probably be around next year and will have a chance to work on their issues. Guys like Garcia and Ruiz are young enough to have more than a year to get it right. But they need something to work out here and not Thomas is a good 4th OF, Murphy is a decent 5th reliever for a few years, type of things.
26 comments:
Pulled apart, these pieces look awful or "clearly needs more time." However, it looks like the offense is in the game most nights (just not last night) and the bullpen cannot hold a lead. Is this Bell and Soto carrying the team, situational hitting has improved, or what exactly? I am hoping there is good news here somewhere that your individual analysis isn't showing.
@SG That's a really interesting point. The offense as assuredly been fine since the trade deadline. Runs rank 17th. wRC+ ranks 11th. wOBA ranks 7th. WAR (by FG) ranks 15th and offensive runs over replacement ranks 14th. And base running is a mess (dead last) which both conforms at least to my eye test and means that these ranks are actually undercounting performance at the plate. Triple slash of .256/.334/.418 ranks 5th, 4th and 11th respectively. OPS ranks 8th.
So, in aggregate, the offense is fine. The question then becomes how is that happening with all the kids playing so terribly that the best of them looks like a good 4th OF?
Soto is expectedly doing a lot of the work, generating 2.2 of the 4.3 total WAR our hitters have earned since 8/1. 168 PAs (to lead the team) of 185 wRC+ will do that.
After that we have 115 PAs of wRC+ 138 from Thomas, 165 PAs of wRC+ 132 from Bell and 73 PAs of wRC+ 159 from Adams. FG has each of them earning 0.6 - 0.8 WAR over these ~40 games, which is a pace you'd be thrilled with from a starter.
And then the smaller positive contributions: Zimm with 47 PAs of wRC+ 133 for 0.3 WAR. And Yadiel has 139 PAs of wRC+ 101 for 0.2. Escobar has 152 PAs of 81 wRC+ for 0.2. Barrera had 46 PAs of wRC+ 93 for another 0.2 before he was sent down. Those all scale to ~1 WAR/160. Great for a backup, acceptable for your worst couple starters.
On the other end of the spectrum, Kieboom and Stevenson are barely over replacement with wRC+s of 93 and and 82 respectively. And Robles, Garcia and Ruiz have all been significant negative contributors (on pace for worse than -1 WAR/160). They've had wRC+s of 55. 77 and -2(!) respectively.
So, if you are going to run naive straight-line projections to say that Kieboom, Garcia and Ruiz are all looking like busts, you really need to pencil in Thomas as a borderline all-star and a resurgent Bell as a valuable contributor.
Another reason I'm still hopeful is that all these guys are pretty much killing it at AAA. It's not a lot of PAs (and that's also true for the MLB numbers above), but Stevenson has 58 PAs of a 194 wRC+. Garcia has 159 PAs of a 154 wRC+. Ruiz has 316 AAA PAs with a 144 wRC+ over two teams. Yadiel has 64 PAs of 141 wRC+. Sanchez has 64 PAs of 136 wRC+. Robles has 47 PAs of wRC+ 130. And Kieboom has 181 PAs of 113 wRC+ (that's the only one that doesn't "translate" into a league average or better MLB hitter).
A couple of those guys being non-linearly unable to make the leap to the majors can certainly happen, but not all of them. Most of those guys are going to be able to perform as league average hitters in the majors. A lot of players need time to learn the level.
My goodness, I didn't realize how good this team really is!
I mean, it's no great mystery. Pitching is the problem. In those 40 games, the team has a 5.65 ERA (28th), a 5.47 FIP (29th) and a 4.79 xFIP (26th). The starters have been bad and the bullpen has been worse. And then we have a bad defense and the worst base-running in the league.
We've earned our record. 185 runs for, 240 runs against since 8/1. That's a 100-loss pace by pythagorean. Not quite as bad as the 120-loss pace we're actually seeing, but if you add a decent amount of anti-clutch (especially on the pitching side) you get there.
The team isn't good or close to good. But the hitting is the least of our problems
Basically what Anon @ 9:23 said. If you want it simpler : Soto has been otherworldly. Bell has been an MVP candidate. The combo of Barrera/Avila/Adams which was 3/4 the C PAs was doing better than Soto. Thomas was near All-Star and they got some other contributions. But basically that's 1.5 best years in baseball history, 1 MVP, 1 A-S... you can do a lot with just that.
They've walked a ton - not just Soto either, though mostly Soto, while hitting for power.
At what point does one concede the Scherzer - Turner trade as a loss for DC? We won't see the value of our pieces for years, but LA is getting serious value. How would one measure this?
The trade of Scherzer and Turner was a win for DC the minute it happened unless you are worried about regular season wins over playoff wins.
You really can't concede that trade until MUCH later. Dodgers will get half a season of Max and 1.5 seasons of Trea. Let's be generous and say that works out to 4 WAR for Max and 9 WAR for Trea, for a total of 13 WAR. With Ruiz and Gray under control until the end of 2027, you have a total of 13 seasons between the two of them. In terms of strictly value, you just need them to average 1 WAR/year (this doesn't even factor in cost savings).
Now of course I'd still call that a losing trade, but if you expect their floors to be 2-3 WAR players (basically slightly above league average), the Nats win this trade handedly.
I'm sure most front offices do some sort of "time value of WAR" and weight now heavier than later, but I'm not sure what the "standard" for that is, so even still this trade will come out at least even as long as both Gray and Ruiz aren't total busts
It matters whether a trade was fair and balanced on the day it was made. LAD got star reinforcements with short contracts for this year's post-season run. They gave up some future stength and depth. Nats got 4 controllable prospects (2 very-highly ranked, near MLB ready) to help stock their depleted farm system. They gave up some potential for this year(of no value) and some potential for next year.
It was reasonably balanced on August 1. Going forward, who knows? Each team took a chance on getting what it needed.
People tend to overlook the money in these situations. 1/3 of a year of Max, 1/3 of Trea's Arb2 and all of Trea's Arb3 is going to cost LAD $36 million. In the disappointing-but-not-total-bust scenario of 1 WAR per year each, I think you'd be looking at arb raises to about $1M, $2M and $4M, making the total contract costs for both players around $18M. That differential should be able to buy at least 2 wins in free agency, which gives us a bit of a buffer to work with.*
On the other hand, the first WAR is the least valuable, so if they really top out at 1 WAR per year each, I still don't like the trade. I think fair value would require them to average 3 WAR per year combined. I think their expectation is above that but if one of them totally busts out (which is not at all impossible), we need the other to become a borderline all-star.
Oh, and @CP, time value of WAR is definitely a thing, but it actually cuts both ways. On the fundamentals, 5 WAR is less valuable to the Nats in 2021 than in 2023, and I'd think the supply and demand of the trade deadline changes how WAR-in-the-present is priced vs WAR-in-the-future and that there's not a generalizable discount rate that most teams are close to.
*I'm assuming that savings ends up being spent on improving the team. If we roll out a $120M payroll next spring, I take it back.
The easy answer to who won the trade? Which team wins the most World Series over the next five years.
Of course that's preposterous (half a year of Max, a year-and-a-half of Trea vs. years of control of Gray and Ruiz, etc., etc.).
But even ignoring one of this blog's thematic golden threads--the tendency to overrate one's prospects--a floor of 2-3 WAR for Ruiz and Gray may not be enough to turn this team into a future contender. Folding any player, even good prospects, into a bad organization is like folding egg whites into a rancid cake batter. (Look what Max and Trea were folded into.) And there's the rub: the Nats are a rancid organization, particularly in scouting and player development.
The Nats minor league teams don't play on Mondays, but tonight they should collectively scale the mountain of futility: 100 games below .500.
Their Low A team, Fredericksburg, has a record of 40-74. Their "best" team, High A Wilmington, is 51-61. Their AA team (where most organizations' most promising prospects reside) is a dreadful 41-73. (Their pitching is decent, but their hitting? Most of the hitters can't hit their plates with a fork.) In 44-66 AAA Rochester where all those young hitters are supposedly raking, the team's OPS is (are?) barely holding on to 15th place in a 20-team league.
You can gussy up the rebuild with every "they-only-need" and "just-wait-until" and "in-Rizzo-we-trust" you want, but I'm guessing Harper will be writing a lacrosse blog before the Nats get into another World Series.
@SM. You may be right the cupboard is bare, although I hope not. If anything, the LAD trade and the other deadline trades make even more sense if you are right. If the Nats are to ever be better, they have to start collecting prospects and hope to hit on some of them. Its not a matter of overvaluing them; amassing prospects is the currency that pays for the future.
For what its worth, I am in the "Rizzo we trust" camp, but haven't heard many people saying "they only need" or "just wait until." A quick re-load is possible if some pieces come together (particularly the young set of pitching prospects from the last several drafts), but it is far more likely that it will take several years. Sadly, we don't have the Rays farm system, but I am glad we don't have the Yankee's record of overspending and having almost no success to show.
The only caveat I would add, @SG (and I hope I'm right in the Nats' case), is that turnarounds sometimes happen surprisingly quickly. The best models since 2000 are the Red Sox and Giants, of course, and maybe the Cardinals.
This is for another discussion, but I think the primary roadblock to a relatively short rebuild is ownership. If the Lerners decide that now is the time to squeeze nickels until Jefferson's nose hairs pop out (viz. Scouting Department, Washington Nationals), then all of Rizzo's wily ways and moral and professional suasion won't be enough to hasten a rebuild.
(It's why, incidentally, I believe Rizzo will be gone about the time Juan Soto becomes a free agent.)
Should Baldonado be considered among the pitchers being tracked?
@SM I agree with you on one thing -- the only way it's a quick turnaround is if the Lerners maintain a payroll up near the cap.
The danger is there. The WS win could have mostly satisfied them. The Stras and Corbin busts gives them cover to say "It's just not possible. We're aiming at 2024."
And if your pessimism is around their decision whether to try and compete, well then you might be right. But if they do spend at the level they've been spending, there is no reason we can't compete as soon as next year - and my worry is that more generalized pessimism is, if anything, going to make it easier for the owners to pull back.
The time period for a soft rebuild has passed. So the Nats need to either spend a ton and hit on FAs, get lucky like back in 2019 when a bunch of players all clicked at the same time (like this years Giants), or concede defeat and spend a few years reloading the farm.
To SMs point, though, reloading only goes so far if you can't develop anybody. There's very clearly an issue in the Nats system where either the scouting, the coaching/development, or (likely) both are in need of an overhaul. You can't expect to polish every diamond in the rough, but you have to consider that a few pieces sent away in trades or left unsigned when they hit FA ended up being quite valuable for the other team
They need more from those trades for sure. Definitely seems like there's an issue with player development, aside from Soto (major outlier, for sure) we're not seeing many non-Top 1 or 2 in the system guys break through the way they do for other teams.
Disagree a bit on decision time being next season with Kieboom, I think they *can* do that since he's cheap and doesn't have internal competition but I'd argue they should cut bait because he seems more or less to be the reincarnation of Kory Casto. He still has enough of that POTENTIAL glint that Rizzo might be able to get something for him in a winter meetings trade, probably after liquoring someone up, but I doubt he hits well enough next season for teams to not just wait out his imminent DFA.
Re: the trades. Given that Max and Trea's 2021 contributions to the Nats consist of "throwing organization money down a hole," the only issue is whether the four guys we got for them are better than whatever Trea himself plus Max's compensation pick. The trade itself can never be a net negative, it's only an argument over whether there was a hypothetical better trade that could have been made instead, which is an even less viable thing to argue about.
The concerns over player development, on the other hand, are worrying. As SM and Cautiously point out, it's impossible to rebuild if you can't turn prospects into MLB players. Some of these young players have to turn into good major leaguers.
And as Anon. points out...the offense has actually been fine (and reasonable projections suggest that Soto will continue to be incredible, Bell and the aggregate catchers can be expected to be okay, Hernandez and Thomas will be useful, so there's not a difficult path to chart to "this offense could contend for a title"--sign a star SS and a Josh Harrison type, plus hope one of Garcia and Kieboom is good *enough* to be the equivalent of 2019 Robles.) The pitching, on the other hand, has been a howling disaster. Gray's had several bad games in a row, Corbin hasn't magically fixed himself back to a TOR guy, and honestly, none of the other people who've been pitching are even worth arguing about; you don't go to the playoffs with five #4 starters and one decent reliever. (Three #1 starters and two decent relievers seemed to work...)
Revisiting the Davey conversation, he was definitely worth -1 win today. Why with one out and a man on first are you not at double play depth...
Rogers: 5IP, 1 hit, 0 runs allowed
The bullpen: 4 IP, 10 hits, 8 runs.
The offense: 6 runs through 8 innings thus far.
I mean...the starting pitching isn't good. But the bullpen has spent the last two and a half months turning every batter into Soto.
I think it would be tough for the existing managers, Rizzo on down, to really support the newest methods, culture + technical insight, to grow better players. K long is good but they need six of him, like the Giants have. Also, other teams, like the Rays, and all the Rays GM spinoffs, seem to be moving toward lower variance, the opposite of rizzos strategy of three #1 starters (lose one, lose the season). But Rizzo still seems pretty good at signing free agents.
@ Anonymous 8:59. I really don't see the Lerner's as satisfied "because we won a World Series." We have seen some of that type of thinking in other cities (Detroit, Pittsburgh, and Baltimore come to mind). I don't expect to see it here.
The Lerner family is quirky for sure (especially about non-player investment), but they aren't cheap ($180+ million in player salaries). I don't see them satisfied putting a mediocre team on the field, at least not intentionally or to save money.
GCX - too old to be a kid. service time wise sure.
Grossman - "but I am glad we don't have the Yankee's record of overspending and having almost no success to show" see I don't get this. I get why you don't want to have no success. Success is great. But why care about how much not you spends? Personally, while succeed is most important T'd much rather have a team spend and fail then not spend and fail.
@ Harper. I assume the spell-checker got you. I have been reading you for several years and that is the first inarticulate sentence I have ever read. On substance, glad you pushed back.
I see two models: LAD and NYY. Both have extraordinarily lucrative TV contracts and don't have to worry about profit or cash flow. I see LAD as overspending strategically (and for that they have 8 or 9 pennants and now a World Series). Fair or not, I see NYY as overspending tactically--who is the next person with the persona to be a Yankee star. For that, they have 2 pennants and a couple of WC finishes in the last decade despite spending tens of millions of dollars more than anyone else.
I am all for overspending that makes sense (LAD), but am not impressed with overspending that seems will-nilly (NYY). I admire the Rays because they are so strategic--a plan to spend less and still be in the chase every September.
@SG
I think the fact that your example is LAD vs NYY is exactly Harper's point. Of course the Dodgers have been better at using their immense cash flow, and they have much more success to show for it. Like Harper said, (almost) every fan would prefer their team has more success than less and it's perfectly fair to hit Yankees ownership and management for only being pretty successful despite massive payrolls. (They are 2nd behind the dodgers in wins since 2010, though, so maybe prioritizing high-variance playoff success is distorting your evaluation.)
Harper's point is that there's no reason to actually care if the owners of these teams make any money. I want them to spend their whole fortunes down to nothing over the next 20 years trying to entertain me. (Well, rich person nothing -- say low 9 figures and then MLB makes them sell the team.)
I don't exactly blame them for choosing not to do that, but I don't give any owner any extra credit for putting more money in their pockets.
@10:33 Anonymous:
Exactly my feelings. Yeah, I want my ownership/front office to make smart decisions and spend wisely. But I want them to be the Dodgers (spending a huge budget wisely), not the A's or Rays (spending a tiny budget wisely). Of course, it's better to be the Yankees (large budget, shaky decision-making) than it is to be the Pirates (neither brains nor money).
But yeah, as a fan of a baseball team, one thing I do *not* cheer for is "Wow, the billionaire that owns the team I like pocketed an extra $20M by not spending!"
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