Goodbye JJ, Hello Defense
Rosenthal says it’s a done deal. From the M’s perspective, this is what’s being reported:
M’s trade RHP J.J. Putz, RHP Sean Green, OF Jeremy Reed, and 2B Luis Valbuena for OF Franklin Gutierrez, RHP Aaron Heilman, OF Endy Chavez, 1B Mike Carp, and “minor leaguers” from Cleveland.
Z’s first significant trade is certainly a big one – probably the most interesting trade the M’s have pulled off in five years. Let’s break down the pieces by win value.
Putz (+2 wins), Green (+1 win), Reed (+0.5 wins), and Valbuena (+1 win) represent a net loss of about 4.5 wins over replacement level players. Combined, they’ll make about $7 million in 2009, so it’s definitely a valuable group of players – productive and cheap. Putz and Valbuena are the real pieces of value, though – Reed and Green are role players. Valbuena could be a league average second baseman pretty quickly, and the Indians did well to spot him as a guy who could help them long term. I hate giving up Valbuena, as I was hopeful the M’s would sell high on Lopez and keep Luis as his replacement.
However, the M’s aren’t getting a bunch of crap in return.
Gutierrez is a +2 win OF (yes, even with a questionable bat, he’s a league average player) who instantly solves the center field problem. Heilman is a +1 win reliever with an undefined role. He wants to start but isn’t good enough to, so if they can convince him to close, that’s in everyone’s best interests. Chavez is a +1 win OF who will probably share time with Wlad (like Gutierrez, his defense is other worldly), and Carp is a +0 win prospect with moderate upside – think Lyle Overbay if he develops well.
The M’s ship off about +4.5 wins and get back +4 wins, so you could call it a big push overall, but that’s where the nuances come in. Here are the reasons I like this deal:
1. The +2 win player the M’s are getting back is much younger than the +2 win player they’re giving up, and they have him under team control for a lot longer. For where this team is, Gutierrez is more valuable than Putz.
2. One of Valbuena or Lopez had to go, because there was no way for them to coexist at full value. In that sense, the M’s swapped a prospect at a position of depth for a prospect at a position where they have a gaping hole. I like Valbuena better than Carp, but Carp has a much clearer road to a job in Seattle.
3. By acquiring Gutierrez and Chavez, the M’s just have given themselves the ability to run out one of the best outfield defenses in baseball on days where they send a contact pitcher to the hill. A Chavez/Gutierrez/Ichiro outfield will make Silva and Washburn look significantly better than they really are, and by investing in the defense, the M’s have made it possible that they could salvage some value from a pair of bad contracts.
To me, those three things swing this trade into the plus column for the M’s. That doesn’t make it a total home run – Heilman’s desire to start and the loss of Putz and Green make it much more likely that Morrow’s going to remain in the bullpen, Chavez is only under team control for one year, and Gutierrez’s right-handed bat isn’t a great fit for Safeco.
But in this case, I’d say the positives outweigh the negatives. It’s not an outright fleecing like Putz for Joyce would have been (and if that was on the table, I’d have done that before I did this, but it’s quite possible that was never offered), but I’d say that the Mariners are better right now than they were yesterday and they have a brighter future, and that makes this a good trade.
Baker reported that Joyce was apparently pulled from the Putz deal. Would the Tigers truly prefer Edwin Jackson over Putz? Either way, the M’s also received pitcher Maikel Cleto, outfielder Ezequiel Carrera and pitcher Jason Vargas from the Mets.
Vargas might be a sleeper. He was rushed to the majors by the Marlins, but had shown pretty good command, despite his extreme fly-ball tendencies. Could see him as a contender for a bullpen spot.
It sounds like the Rays may have jumped in ahead of us on Joyce; I’m skeptical about Jackson, but I can understand why the Tiggers would rather have him than Putz (even with the local-boy connection on J.J.).
My heart has been thunderstruck…
Even the fact we got about 7 players in this deal won’t heal it…
Jason Vargas will break your heart (if you let him).
Jason Vargas will break your heart, if you are silly enough to let him.
Good trade. The M’s give up several useful pieces but get some back. The outfield defense is awesome.
Now we all get to worry about how the starting pitchers and bullpen will sort out.
Flyball pitchers on the staff get a LOT better, I think.
Awesome. My gut reaction is that this looks like a wash from the wins perspective but that it’s great to be adding youth, defense, and upside and ditching age and predictability. It’s a fun trade, and one that will definitely get me to buy more tickets next year. For a guy that has been hammering on defense for what seems like forever, Dave has got to be absolutely thrilled at the possibility of an Chagutierichiro OF.
Chavez is gone after 2009 and so is Heilman. That seems to be counterproductive to the ‘building to the future’ theme.
Neither of those guys are good enough to be considered a real part of the “future”.
Maybe Z is thinking that if he can improve the defense enough to make Washburn, Silva, et al. appear better than he’ll be able to unload their contracts and/or trade them for more useful parts. That’s just my own speculation though.
Can anyone speculate as to why the Mets would acquire Putz on the verge of acquiring K-Rod. Is Putz going to be the 8th inning guy?
Yep
Heilman is a random bullpen arm, and Chavez is a 4th OF. We’ll live.
I just hope Morrow isn’t made to close. I’m all for Heilman or Batista taking that position.
This is a fun trade. Feel bad for J.J. though— one injured season and he has been demoted to the 8th inning. How far he has fallen from 2007’s dominance.
My only problem with this trade is the Morrow Factor. You’d think Zduriencik would be smart enough not to send him back to the bullpen, but there’s that queasy feeling that he might.
Hopefully we won’t regret trading Valbuena. That’s the only bad thing I can see about this deal.
EDIT: thr33niL, I hope you’re kidding about Batista.
EDIT: thr33niL, I hope you’re kidding about Batista.
Whether or not Morrow closes is totally independent from this deal. Still, if Morrow ends up closing, I’ll be pissed.
Given that Silva in particular isn’t going anywhere for a long while, making the outfield defense behind him better is what grown-up general managers do. If you have a lemon, make lemonade. The Ichiro/Gutierrez/Chavez outfield is cold water, ice and sugar (not necessarily in that order).
Still, the number of players we have in the lineup who can both field and hit is still two, isn’t it? I expect we’re not done.
Mhmmm… Endy Chavez
I support this as long as Morrow doesn’t close. If we were a real contender I wouldn’t mind Morrow closing, and maybe he could move to that later in his career. I wish F-Guit was a lefty but love the defense. Teams should absolutely focus on where they play and the M’s should focus on OF Defense as priority #1.
Very interesting deal I love the focus on defense. Future moves will make or break this but I kinda like it.
I am beginning to believe we might have made the right decision by hiring Mr. Jack Zduriencik.
Two and a half if Lopez continues. I share a few peoples concerns about the bats. Raul was our most consistent and he is gone. But WOW! We are better in the field! What an interesting season 09 will be!
Puts, best of luck to you! Hope you get a ring in 09! But you scared the crap out of me every time you took the mound in 08.
I love this trade. JJ is replaceable as the closer on the M’s, Reed and Green are replaceable parts, and only Valbuena is likely to be a long-term “gee, we wish we still have him” guy.
In return, the M’s make their defense much, much better, which in turn makes their pitching potentially much, much better. Washburn and Rowland-Smith will definitely benefit. Plus, we added some needed depth to the minor league system.
It’ll be interesting to see if Jack Z can perform the same surgery on the infield defense that he apparently has for the outfield. If he can do that, then maybe we’ll get to see the terrific rotation we thought we were going to have in 2008.
Either way, we’re already a much more interesting team than we were a few months ago.
By the way, didn’t payroll get decreased too?
1. LF Ichiro
2. 2B Lopez
3. 3B Beltre
4. DH ???
5. C Clement
6. 1B Branyan/Shelton
7. LF Chavez/Balentien
8. CF Gutierrez
9. SS Betancourt
Not exactly a lineup that strikes fear into the hearts of men, but one that runs down flyballs much better than last year (when the lineup also did not strike fear into the hearts of men). What’s the market for Bradley? The Giambino? Could you get either at 2 yr./$20 mil?
Zduriencik repeated they had not decided yet about Morrow, that he wants his coaching staff to actually see him, get their hands on him. Sounds like it may come down to spring training.
Stevie,
Give the man time to finish his roster construction, will you? He’s not done yet, and that might be the most exciting part of this.
I’m just glad that I’m reading about a Mariners trade without yelling in anger at the computer screen. We’re not talking about trading five guys for Cliff Floyd, or anything of that nature, so I’m relatively thrilled. The best parts for me are (a) it shows that Zduriencik understands things like the value of defense (very interesting when you consider what Milwaukee trotted out on defense the past two years), and (b) he was willing to trade Putz notwithstanding the “Thunderstruck”/casual fan factor. Winning fills seats, not slogans or gimmicks, particularly in the long run. Good stuff.
RRS is a pretty good replacement for Green and can spot start. If Bedard is healthy, Felix, Bedard, Morrow is a pretty good 1-2-3. Silva and Wash have a hot dog eating contest for 4-5 spots, and Batista becomes the long relief guy. Maybe give Lowe a chance to close???
Couple of things strike me.
1. Z certainly has picked up on the strengths and weaknesses of entire organization quickly, and is moving to address multiple fronts.
2. This guy has either been given way more leash than Bavasi or Bavasi was even worse than we thought.
and just for good measure
3. This is the most positive I seen ussmariner in probably two years
Long time reader; first time poster…
One the way home from dinner, I heard that JJ was going to the Mets and that was it! It made me wonder what we got back… However, the more I learn about this trade, the more it makes sense.
…Great comment by breadbaker about helping increase the value of pitchers we want to get rid of…
It seems that getting Franklin Gutierrez in a way is a step towards reversing the mistake of giving up Adam Jones. I am curious to hear comparisons of the two both upside and current value.
Also, I am wondering how this effects the supposed discussions we are having with Dunn and Kenny.
Also: this is a WAY different feeling than I’ve had in an offseason for a while.
Ya know, I remember watching that closer we signed from the Angels shine in 2003 with a Winn/Cameron/Ichiro outfield and then tank in 2004 with an Ibanez/Winn/Ichiro outfield. So maybe, just maybe our vastly improved outfield defense will make Washburn and Silva more attractive to other teams so we can trade them for actual, useful baseball players. ‘Doing the Hampster Dance’
GREAT trade for the org as a whole even if it didn’t provide the one “blue-chipper”. I would love to see them go after Furcal and move Yuni. Toss in a DH (Bradley?) and you have a team.
Typical,
I’m giving him time. I should have put in that I really like this trade, despite my fondness for J.J. I’m just looking at what we have at this moment and trying to figure out how we can make it better. Looks to me like we still have a pretty big hole at DH or 1B and in the middle of the order. My other concern is that, while Wladrankenchiro Gurveztien will be great at running down flies, they are going to get even better at running after groundballs. Viva El Punto!
If the deal ends up including a “deal” of Morrow SP for Morrow RP, I hate it. If not, I like it.
I read a headline that said “three-team blockbuster.”
Blockbuster? It’s more like a bloated indie film with a lot of little things going on for the various participants.
I really think it could turn out to be a win-win for the Mets and M’s. I’m not so sure how this trade works for Shapiro and Antonetti.
Here is Jack Z talking about the trade on KJR …
Jack Z on KJR
This is a joke, right?
Any organization ought to be able to replace a Sean Green and cheap. That you get value for putting him in a package is a good idea.
Same with Jeremy Reed, obviously.
We got all the mileage out of JJ we reasonably could expect. No one knows what his future will be like, but one of Billy Beane’s tenets was to trade closers before they self-destructed. In some ways, we might have been a year too late.
Thanks for the audio SeasonTix. Hearing Jack and his thought process overall made me feel better.
As soon as I saw the Trade I was stricken by the vapors!
Guiterrez and Carp, good defenders, solid position player prospects for a Closer?
Way to go Z!
P.S. I keep getting crap for this here but is there some sort of MLBPA spell-check for player names?
I have opinions but I also have two Jobs, so I’m sorry if my spelling isn’t the best when it comes to last names.
One more great thing about Franklin Gutierrez, according to this site , which is the first hit on google images, he’s totally hot. He’s a Mike Cameron redux in more ways than one I guess. Now I’m no Alyssa Milano, but Franklin does have those sleepy, oh so dreamy eyes… What none of you guys feel me on this one? Can’t a bro admire a guy’s eyes?
If he has an opportunity to jump into the mosh pit in centerfield after we win a playoff series, like Cammie did in 2000, I’ll be quite happy to say anything you want about his eyes. And he could look like the second coming of Don Mossi so long as we win with him.
I like having a CF again. Putz was one of my trio of favorite Mariners, Felix-Beltre-JJ.
I hope Morrow stays in the rotation.
…Can the group of Heilman-Batista-Lowe-Fields hold down the later innings for a whole season?
Yeesh.
We will be ok in the bullpen, better in outfield defense but who is driving in the runs and stealing bases?
meh, not too excited about this one. I think Guiterrez ends up looking completely lost at the plate in Safeco.
Still guess at least we didn’t get fleeced, just was just expecting more.
To me, whether we got fair value depends on how worthwhile the prospects are.
The most encouraging thing about this trade is that, from the moment I heard it on the radio this morning, I immediately recognized that Zduriencik understands the importance of defense. The M’s now have three OFs who can capably play CF.
Writers and commenters have mentioned Morrow as possibly moving back into the bullpen, a move of which I am not in favor. However, does this deal mean that the M’s are intent on signing Fields and moving him into the pen by at least mid-season?
Hey Guys,
I like the trade. I think we are getting a lot more in the minor league portion than people really believe. Luis Valbuena is actually the loss of the secondary parts that I think hurts the most. But remember we just picked up second base prospect Callix Crabbe who should numb the pain from this loss a bit. Also any ideas for the rule 5 today. Jordan Brown looks pretty interesting, as does Morlan from the Rays.
I know Im in the minority on this site, but i think Griffey would really help this team at DH and part-time OF. Left handed power that wont have to worry about Defense everyday. If he just hits I think he would hit 30HR and 75-80 RBI’s next season, which we would all take. Plus, i think he would come back to Seattle for cheap and could show the young guys how to play great D.
I was reading rotoworld with the morning coffee and came across this commentary about the Putz trade:
This kind of cheap innuendo masquerading as analysis really hacks me off.
I’ll miss JJ but he just wasn’t that effective last year and who knows if he’ll ever get back to anywhere near the dominance of two years ago. I’ll be very disappointed if Morrow gets moved back to the bullpen, though. I’d rather see a closer-by-committee than continue to see his growth as a starter stunted, especially if the team isn’t likely to contend next year anyway.
If we end up with two long term position players in CF and 1B out of this it will have been well worth the price. It’s heartening to see that Z’s first big move as GM was to shore up the defense.
Well, let me just go ahead and complete a USSM trifecta of posts bringing up topics we really don’t like discussing.
Josh Fields.
Yeah, I said it. Haven’t heard much about the kid…last I heard, the M’s and Boras were 500k apart and then the trail (at least in the most public media) seems to vanish.
Does this trade give him more leverage to force the M’s to bump up their offer? Or does his being a “them” pick instead of Z’s “us” direction suggest that the M’s are simply moving on with plans for a compensation pick and without him?
And would he even be worthy of fighting for the closer role right out of the gate–this summer, the talk was that he might be a decent set up guy…but I think that was assuming JJ in the true closer role.
I apologize for even bringing it up–but I have to admit that this deal made me curious.
(And it certainly won’t be a 2008 M’s team put on the field this year, will it?)
My guess is that Z must be close to finalizing the Fields deal or he wouldn’t have been shopping JJ as agressibely as he was… At the very least, he must be confident it is going to get done.
If it is healthy, the rotation is going to be solid… even more so now that the OF defense will be lights out… Z is moving the M’s in the right direction.
I really like the defense strategy. If it improves the numbers of pitchers like Washburn and Silva, then other teams might overvalue them and we can dump their contracts and potentially get something in return as well.
I can’t imagine that 500k would stand in the way of signing Fields if Z really wants him. It sounds like the kid could be ready to join the bullpen fairly quickly, possibly even out of spring training.
I’m not that worried about finding arms for the bullpen next year. What I really don’t want to see is Morrow taken out of the rotation.
Fields has nothing to do with nothing. If Zduriencik signs him, it will be at his price, not Fields’, and we won’t be counting on him anywhere above AA, given that he has 0 pro innings and hasn’t pitched since the CWS. My guess is that Z/W have talked with Peterson, and that their thinking lines up with Dave’s best-case scenario: they’ll try to make Heilman the closer. If he junks the slider and just goes with the fastball/change, he should do well in that role.
Last winter, I favored trading Putz in a package to get a decent SP.
As for this factoring into the Fields signing, I fear that Boras will use this as leverage in his client’s favor. Even if Josh isn’t ready to step in ASAP, the M’s need a closer.
I don’t know, I heard that Fields was the closest to being MLB ready of the early draft picks. If that’s the case I could see him in the M’s bullpen sooner rather than later.
But, yeah, I don’t think Fields figured at all into the Z’s thinking when he decided to trade Putz. He certainly isn’t counting on Fields to be the team’s closer next year.
If he signs, yes, there’s a chance he might move that fast on performance; there’s also a chance he wouldn’t. You don’t count on him.
This kind of cheap innuendo masquerading as analysis really hacks me off.
Not to mention it’s lazy “journalism” — we know why JJ suddenly improved over previous seasons: he picked up / perfected the splitter from Everyday Eddy.
Good trade for sure — losing a healthy Putz doesn’t really hurt the team unless you’re 100% ready to contend; otherwise you can throw a committee out there of Heilman/Lowe/etc until one sticks. Hopefully not Morrow. Losing an un-healthy Putz doesn’t hurt at all. Either way, restocking the farm system after years of Kim Jong Il-like pillaging is a win.
I’m also really happy for Jeremy Reed — I never felt like he got a full, fair shot in Seattle and think that he’s moving to a role and league that will better suit him.
He most certainly got a full and fair shot. He was a regular from Opening Day 2005 til he got injured in 2006, except that he was proving in 2006 he couldn’t hit lefties with a rake. His power numbers never improved and he was a simply awful base stealer (his lifetime percentage is 51%, which is “don’t even think of running” territory). His closest comp both by age and lifetime is the immortal Jermaine Allensworth, who was out of the league after his age 27 season. Jeremy Reed’s problem is that he didn’t produce, not that he didn’t get a chance.