Yea...We are shopping Isam. Big Deal. Not because we don't believe in his ability.(63.09)

[niles08]

"Yea the rumors are true, we are shopping him around."

The words coming from Omaha GM Justin Niles shocked some in the fan base while others shrugged their shoulders.

With the emergence of Derek Hopkins and Jesus Llado, Rosenblatt quietly began putting out feelers last week on shortstop Badr Isam who they inked a massive deal over the off-season. That while top prospect Alan Hedges mashes the ball in AAA waiting for his call up as one assumes Jesus Llado would shift over to 2nd base at that time.

While it's unknown how serious the team is on moving him, doing so will be no small task for the team. Isam is making $30,000,000 this season. Not many teams have $30,000,000 to their name in regard to being under on salary cap. The good news is that Isam's contract quickly drops after this season to much more manageable and arguably "team-friendly" levels. Niles will have to get creative in order to move Isam this season assuming a team rings up his phone.

And the other question is, what exactly is value even? I mean, most scouts have Isam rated as a below average shortstop now in the latter half of his career. His range is suffering, as it is a 7 by those same scouts. What does that mean though? Maybe not as much as thought.

Isam currently is sitting at -1.9 ZR on the year in 44 starts. Many analysts use the ZR metric as "runs saved" or "runs given up" vs the average defender. That says he has given up 2 runs worse than the average defender.

That -1.9 ZR ranks him 11th defensively among 18 shortstops with 40 or more games started at the position. #3-13 on that list however are separated from a positive 3 ZR to a negative 3 ZR (6 runs difference) so not much separation middle of the pack.

Isam's 104 wRC+ places him 9th out of 18th and his Runs Created of 29.0 places him 6th among those same shortstops. Despite Isam's WAR projection of 1.1 currently on the season, when comparing him to a Pedro Gongora who has a 3.2 WAR projection but is projected to have just an 81 wRC+ where is the line drawn on value?

At the end of the year based on current projections, Gongora is going to finish with 53 RC and a 16.2 ZR for a total of 69 runs "responsible for". Isam is on pace for 85 RC and -5.4 ZR for a total of 80 runs responsible for...however 2 less WAR.