So umm .. Edmonton Made A Move or Two

[Ted]

What do you do when your underachieving team that was a pre seasons playoff pick finally turns on the gas? What? Did you say trade everyone? That's right! Well ... if you're Chris Robillard anyway.

Let's see if we can figure this out. This will be a mainly Jackrabbits-centric piece because we're trying to figure out if they improved significantly.

We already did the "Trade the First" bit, so how should I organize these?

Episode I: CF's move and I eat crow

Sacramento receives:
CF Rocky Allen
RP Luis Ortega
SP Kinzo Iwamoto (R)

Edmonton receives:
CF Po-sin Shi
SP Freddy Delgado

Remember when I said it would be hard to move Delgado after his bad start? Yeah, me neither. That was some other idiot. Delgado has posted a 4.3ish era and mid 4's fip with the Mad Popes and should be decent depth for Edmonton's staff. The big piece here is Shi, or at least he should be. After a career best 5.3 WAR season in 2043, Shi has forgotten how to hit, and his ratings shown some scary signs that look like a one way ticket to lumpytown. He's been replacement level so far, whereas Allen, the guy who went the other way, has been almost a league average hitter and better defender. Shi is under contract for two more years at 12 mil. He's probably not a replacement level player, and his current ratings look like a 2-3 win player, if he doesn't slide any further, which I wouldn't bet on. Allen on the other hand will be a free agent. Edmonton seems to have taken a step back for this year with this swap. You wonder if the cost certainty on Shi is the motivation, or if Edmonton is hoping Shi can recapture some of the magic of last season.

The Jackrabbits also gave up Luis Ortega, which will weaken their 'pen. He could be off the books after this season (team option for 2045) and costs a little more than Delgado for one year. Overall this seems like a current year downgrade for the Jackrabbits, which is odd given how they've caught fire recently. They also paid a rookie level prospect in Kinzo Iwamoto to do so. Iwamoto is a 20 year old 6/6/6 right hander who has shown some interesting bumping of stuff and motion and has somewhat weak to okay development for his age. He could be really interesting.

I'll be honest, I don't get this one for the Jackrabbits. They got worse right now, and possibly got a burdensome contract in Shi who has had the kind of slight ratings erosion at 27 that makes you wonder if the big drop off is coming. On top of that, he's sucked this year, so this isn't even a "F it I'll take the risk, he's a stud right now" move. So yeah, not off to a hot start here. It seems almost entirely a gamble on Shi regressing to the mean and maintaining his ratings, and it feels like Edmonton may have hurt themselves too much in the short term to do so. Maybe this will make more sense in the context of upcoming moves.

Sacramento on the other hand does okay. Allen and Ortega are flip-able at the least, and they picked up a nice prospect. You could argue they sold low on Shi. You could also make the argument that given his performance and ratings erosion, the time to move him was now, before it becomes impossible.

Episode II: Why the hell not?

You ever see a trade and wonder, why the heck were they even talking about these guys? This ... isn't one of those. At first glance it isn't. Then you look at the players involved and think, "why now?" Then you look some more and it makes a little sense.

Des Moines receives:
3B Domingo Castillo

Edmonton receives:
RP Tokimasa Ihara

Tokimasa Ihara looks like a serviceable enough player. Lefty, 23, 6/6/5 as a starter, 7/6/5 RP. 3 pitchers. Starter stamina. He's just well .. stunk up the place. But he's 23 and cheap and left handed, so he'll get a lot more string to play out than most. Edmonton looks at this time to use his 8/8/6 ratings versus LHB in a LOOGY role. That seems smart and should replace some of the departed Ortega's production. Except that lefties are hitting Ihara more than righties this year. Oh well. I still think it's worth a shot.

They didn't give up anything really to do so. Domingo Castillo is a very marginal prospect, in that he currently doesn't project to be usable in the big leagues. His con/avk ratings are too poor to play in the bigs at 1B, and his defense isn't good enough to stick at third. Even with say a range bump to 6/9/9/2, he still probably will strike out too much to man third base. He has enough power and patience to be a monster with contact bumps, but he has to get lucky and get those to matter.

Seems like a solid move for the Jackrabbits. I don't think it improves them much, but it's a step in the right direction, and long term I'd rather have Ihara on my roster than Castillo if I was going to try and win ballgames in the next couple seasons.

For Des Moines, this is all about windows. The Kernels aren't going to win now or next year, so adding another bullet to the farm system makes sense, even if that bullet might be a dud.

Episode III: Stupid Salary Cap

Long Beach receives:
RP Jose Torres

Edmonton receives:
$1

This move is all about money. The Jackrabbits are on the books for nearly 120 mil next year. The difference in Shi and Allen's salaries, as well as freeing up money for more moves is also a concern. and that, well, stinks. Because Torres has been very very good for the Jackrabbits on a reasonable 3.4 million deal. He has a vesting option for next season at the same rate. I'm sure pacific teams are thrilled Long Beach got him so cheaply.

This is a plain old cap casualty for the Jackrabbits. Hard to grade Robillard poorly for biting the bullet, but it still stinks to have to do it. Good pickup for the Surfers.

Episode IV: The Grand Finale?

Charlotte receives:
2B Nolan Sterling (AA)

Edmonton receives:
RP Zhi-xin Chien

So here's where Edmonton tries to make up for the loss of Ortega it seems. I wish them luck. Chien has been less than impressive this season. He keeps failing as a starter, and that bloats his somewhat acceptable bullpen numbers. He's also cheaper in 2045 than Ortega, and I'm sure that helps. Nolan Sterling is a 20 year old IF who likely can't hit enough to even back up at the big league level.

Trade's fair. Whatever. Let's recap Edmonton's movies.

In terms of this year's performance:

In

CF Po Sin Shi .206/.287/.291 ZERO-POINT-ZERO WAR
RP Zhi-xin Chien 6.81 ERA 35.2 IP -0.1 WAR
RP Tokimasa Ihara 8.70 ERA 40.1 IP -0.6 WAR
SP Freddy Delgado 5.83 ERA 88.0 IP -0.6 WAR

Out
CF Rocky Allen .235/.299/.448 1.9 WAR
RP Luis Ortega 3.38 ERA 42.2 IP 0.8 WAR
RP Jose Torres 2.80 45.0 IP 0.8 WAR
Some prospects

I have no doubt that Edmonton will get better performance out of some of these guys than their numbers to date. They bought low on every player, but that's still 3.5 WAR going out and -1.3 WAR coming in. It's hard to not say that the Jackrabbits are objectively worse for this season after these deals.

In terms of salary:

In

Shi 12 | 12 | 12
Chien 6 | 2
Ihara .5 | .5 | .75
Delgado 4.29 | 3.5
Total 22.79 | 18 | 14

Out

Allen 8.85
Ortega 6.65 | 6.65 (TO)
Torres 3.44 | 3.44
Total 18.94 | 10.09 (3.44 without TO) | 0

Okay, so now I really don't get it. If you've been following along, I'd been under the assumption that future cap considerations were a factor, as the Jackrabbits did shed some expensive players. But they actually added more salary than the shed both in this year and future years, and now have a cap crunch in 2045 (119 mil so far) that will prevent them from extending Chandler Hall and Pedro Huerta on the cheap through their arb years. While is stinks that Hall is hurt and Huerta has been stinky, both those incidents likely lowered the cost of locking in their arb years at a nice price, and now Edmonton can't take advantage of that. Before these moves, they probably only needed to lose 2-3 mil from next year's salaries to make both deals happen (say just make the Torres to LB move).

So I officially don't get it. My take as I was writing this up is that perhaps Robillard was making the tough choice of ignoring his recent success in 2044, realizing the injuries would make it tough to make the playoffs, and looking to 2045 (Shi certain versus Allen pending FA, worse but cheaper pitchers on the roster, etc). But they not only look worse this year, but seem to be worse next year and now will have to take arb figures that could force them to shed anywhere from 9 million to 16 or 17 million in salary for 2045.

Either Robillard has some more moves coming or he's playing some 4D chess I can't follow. It will be fun to watch how this shakes out.

[aaronweiner]

I didn't want to interrupt your, um, dialogue in your podcast, but I thought you were insane to count Edmonton out. By the numbers they might be the third or fourth best team in the Johnson this year.

[Ted]

I didn't want to interrupt your, um, dialogue in your podcast, but I thought you were insane to count Edmonton out. By the numbers they might be the third or fourth best team in the Johnson this year.

It was the combination of injuries and ground to make up. I'd kind of forgotten about the depth of their offense because it had underperformed so far, and then when they lost their best hitter, I quit on them. Still, they amazingly have enough bats to lose one of the best hitters in the game, and I shouldn't have given up on them. Still, these moves don't seem to help.

Chris is very good though, so I may just not be seeing what he is seeing.

The other thing is that my threshold for contending is probably higher than others. I feel that if you can't confidently lay claim to a wild card spot, you should count yourself out. That is, if you wouldn't win your division in another year (but this year some monster is running away with things) you should look to next season. That's what I consider counting a team out. Making moves to try to scramble into the last wild card spot is generally a horrible idea long term, and usually doesn't work anyway.

So, some of my "Edmonton is done" talk, was based on a certain philosophy of competing and a likely different threshold than many for considering yourself a playoff contender.

[aaronweiner]

I have to agree with your analysis though. Dropping Halford and Villanuela (easy choices really) next year they're still $2.5 million over the cap. They can get under by dropping Chien and some minimum players but they'd better be really in love with Shi.

[crobillard]

Last time I came in last place for the wild card and made a huge gamble trading away an entire infield it worked out pretty well for me. I don't think Torres, Ortega or Allen were nearly significant enough to revert any recent success we've had. I didn't plan on having any of them next year. This was me getting some value. I'm sure if Shi want to FA this offseason he would get around 8-10 mil, so I'm overpaying a bit to keep him to 2.5 years. As far as the finances go, I'm confident I can make it work next season. I like Shi. Always have. I might regret the move, but there were some future considerations in making these trades. I think Ihara can be a lot better than he has been this season, same with Shi (although I'll admit that I might just be picking up another Rocky Allen, hot in his earlier years and faded quickly).

I can see the argument on cutting arbitration costs. It's probably one of the things I really need to get better at and it will help my team financially in a big way, but I rarely ever buy out the arbitration years. When I've tried it's rare that the player and I have come to an agreement and I just piss them off. I recognize the value, I'm just poor at it.

The trade can be summed up as players I wasn't planning on having next season anyways and I'm buying into what I think the potential will be for the players I am receiving. I don't expect a 5 WAR Shi, but I think he will be better than replacement level from this point forward. Ihara and Chien should provide some depth that I've been very concerned after having so many pitching injuries this season. Delgado was more of a throw in. He might be alright in Edmonton. We'll see.

Good write up though. I enjoy reading thoughts on my trades. I have trades I don't feel very good about in the past, but I think this one will turn out alright. Probably the biggest point I can make though is this wont change the Jackrabbits season in any big way. Ortega, Allen and Torres performed well this season, but I think I can replace their production and at least get more flexibility while getting more potential production out of Shi. It's the cost of the deals that make it most questionable for my team, but it's only a couple seasons. This wont prevent me from signing anyone important long term.

[Ted]

@crobillard Thanks for the response. I do hope that whenever I'm critical or questioning, people take it the way you do. I am not paid nearly enough to have the in depth knowledge of each team to the degree needed to correctly evaluate every move, so there's always more than I see. I agree that you bought low on a bunch of guys.

[FuzzyRawley]

Nailed it. Had a guy who clearly wasn't going to have a good season in DM cause we suck and everyone on the team is angry so might as well get something for him.

I hate to use the term, but the Kernels are in a full rebuild which means picking up prospects where we can. Doubt this will do anything for me other than build some depth for further trades down the road.