We often forget the prospect that fails for the next tantalizing kid to come along. This is even more true when the prospect gets traded. John Mozeliak and company deserve huge kudos for selling high on Brett Wallace and this interesting tidbit from Keith Law helps explain way.
The way Wallace’s rise to the majors has stalled out has been a hot topic among scouts this winter, since at the time he was drafted the debate was over whether he could play any position well enough to keep him off DH, not whether he’d hit. But the new consensus is that Wallace can’t cover the inner half because he doesn’t fully rotate his back side through his swing, ceding the inside part of the plate to the pitcher, and that it’s not fixable.
I can’t claim to have identified this problem when I expressed my distrust for Wallace’s top prospect status. My concerns were almost explicitly on his terrible physique and inability to catch a baseball.
It’s interesting to me that this problem with his hitting is being identified now because 1) it’s probably some of the same scouts evaluating him now as in 2008 2) hitting was never considered the problem and 3) it’s a supposedly mortal problem in terms of hitting. When a top prospect is traded as many times as Wallace was in such a short time span it’s usually an indication that they’re either very good or very damaged or both.
The point being that even if Brett Wallace were to right the ship and turn into an above average player, the Cardinals made a trade when his value was near it’s peak. They deserve credit for that.
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Very much agree, it was a great deal for us.
From a scouting perspective, this is one area that is really hard to judge. The aluminam bat (Especially the new ones) takes the inside part of the plate away from the pitcher. Where a ball would be a broke bat, or an out on the inside pitch is easily a home run in college. And that really isn’t that big of an exageration.
For this reason, that is why many college pitchers anymore must learn to pitch inside because that type of pitching was counter productive during their college years.
That’s really interesting, zuke. I’ve never thought about it like that
This is the tough part about evaluations of prospect-for-veteran trades. We never actually know what the team knows about a certain player. If the team knew that Wallace was a lemon, then Mozeliak did the right thing, which has turned out great. If the team didn’t know, and still felt he was a top-25 hitting prospect, then they likely gave up too much value for Holliday
specific variety: luhnow lemon
When you have lemons, you make lemonade, Holliday-style.
Looking at the Matt Holliday situation from all three teams he has played for I would rank the Rockies as an extraordinary winner, the Cardinals as a big winner, and the A’s as an extaordinary loser.
The Rockies got 20.8 WAR (fangraphs) from Holliday over 5 very good years that included a 2nd place MVP finish and a trip to the World Series. They then traded him to the A’s for Huston Street, Greg Smith, and Carlos Gonzalez. In his two years with the Rockies, Gonzalez has supplied 8.1 WAR, a 3rd place MVP finish, and a gold glove, all while making minimal salary. Huston Street has had two pretty good years for the Rockies, racking up 55 saves, about a 3.25 ERA, and 2.5 WAR over that period. Street was injured for about half of last year, makes too much money, but still appears to be effective. Also, he somehow finished 25th in the MVP voting in 2009, which is simply baffling for a reliever pitching to the tune of a 3+ ERA, but I’ll leave that alone. Greg Smith has been largely worthless, making 8 starts in 2010, but also didn’t cost much. So it looks like the Rockies replaced Holliday with a comparable player offensively, and a superior player defensively in Gonzalez, and got 2 serviceable years from Street. Good trading Rockies.
The A’s received Brett Wallace, Clayton Mortensen, and Shane Petersen from the Cardinals before the trade deadline. For about a half year of Holliday they got about 2.4 WAR, and decided to flip him before free agency hit because they weren’t in the playoff hunt. The Walrus was then flipped the following winter to the Blue Jays for Michael Taylor. Michael Taylor is currently ranked #10 on the Baseball America prospect list for the A’s, and batted .272 with 6 hr’s for the A’s AAA affiliate last year as a 24 yr. old. He also struck out almost twice as many times as he walked, leading to a less than promising outlook. Shane Petersen batted .265 with 4 hr’s as a 22 yr. old with the A’s AA affiliate, playing left field and 1b. He is still not all that old, but that bat does not seem to profile for the positions he played at last year. As a 25 yr. old, Clayton Mortensen pitched to the tune of a 4.26 ERA, while making 26 starts for the A’s AAA affiliate. His SO/9 was 6.10, and has also been arrested on suspicion of driving drunk since being traded. Overall, this haul for Holliday looks underwhelming at best, and a downright disaster at worst. I would designate the A’s as big losers surrounding their dealings with Holliday.
The Cardinals are obviously the easiest to evaluate. The big piece they gave up, Brett Wallace, looks like at most an average 1b, as outlined in the robot’s article. Also, Mortensen and Petersen aren’t putting a scare into anyone these days. Holliday, while expensive, earned his salary last year to the tune of 6.9 WAR, while also being a huge lift in late 2009 with about 3.2 WAR after joining the Cardinals. 10.1 WAR is great for less than a year and a half, and even taking into account his big payday, I would still consider the Cardinals big winners.
Just thought it would be interesting to look at Holliday’s effect on all the teams he has played for to date, as well as evaluate how well it appears the teams did in terms of trades, etc. Hope you enjoyed.
What’s scary is I see a little of the same in Zach Cox….. Anyone else?? I would not be opposed at all of trading him and one of our solid young pitchers for a 2b or SS that is a little closer to the bigs…. hell, let’s throw in Kozma and Stav too!
I’m a little frightened by Cox too, I admit. Admittedly he’s more athletic and less “bad bodied” than Wallace, but Cox’s swing looked a bit “armsy” to me when I saw him hit in the College World Series. I remember thinking that very thing when I saw Kozma’s swing the first time a video of him was posted on this very site. IMO Cox will need significant work in the field and at the plate before we can count on him at the majors, which scares me considering his clock is already ticking.
agree, if they needed a hogs, hould have got eibner
First off, just want to commend everybody who posts/contributes to this site on a regular basis for a job well-done. I have been a long-time follower, only second-time poster.
Rui, are you saying you believe even at the time, brett wallace (ceiling of a top-25 hitting prospect) along with an borderline#4/5 starting pitching prospect was not worth a top 25 (position player)Major leaguer? I understand you are making the statement under the assumption the cardinals didnt think he was already at his peak value. Az, I’m glad you have stated on here how barring an unforeseen injury/tremendous up-spike in production, this has turned into a guaranteed “win” for mo. Granted, one can point to an arguable excessive contract, but Matt is still one of the top-25 players in the whole game. I believe the cardinals absolutely made this deal knowing they had no worse than a 70% chance of resigning him.
Mcb, check out this article I wrote over at Gas House Graphs regarding prospect-for-veteran trades
http://gashousegraphs.com/2011/02/10/prospect-for-veteran-trades-market-inefficiency-or-just-the-market/
I’m all for packaging Cox and another prospect for a Grant Green type player. Would like to see that Freese can stay healthy and that Carpenter can be effective in AAA also.
He’s still only 24, still has time to figure it all out not like he got his leg amputated. Just seems like everyone’s already nailed his coffin shut.
It’s not that but to find any value you have to sell early.
One thing I wonder is whether anyone could really see this coming. If “bad body” is a generic catch-all for a body that looks weird, it doesn’t necessarily mean “bad” in the particular mechanical sense that this article is homing in on, and doesn’t mean this problem was predictable. If one can be confident that a “bad body” will lead to this problem or things like it, that’s a different story, and one that should be cautionary as regards Cox. But would the Cardinals have drafted Cox if they saw him as susceptible to the same mechanical problems as Walrus? I doubt it; they’re professionals, after all.
I still wish Walrus well, except when he’s playing against the Cardinals.
I wonder this, no one thought Cox would drop that low. I wonder how much we really scouted him. I’m sure we didn’t waste too many resources scouting Bryce Harper or Jamesion Tallieson. Wonder how much we actually scouted Cox or if we just drafted him on reputation.
From what I remember hearing, the only reason he really dropped was because of his demands for a major league deal and all the leverage he had from being a draft eligible sophomore.
Also, I’m not an expert on draft scouting, but I’m pretty sure that everyone near the top few rounds is scouted pretty well by most if not all teams. I would think that to be doubly true for college guys, and even more so for a guy like Cox from Arkansas, which is a good college program in one of the top conferences. I would think that even if the Cards didn’t think he would get to them, they still had plenty of intel to work off of. All IMHO
Agree that it is too early to give up on Wallace. Time will tell. That said, Any time you trade top prospects for a rental that doesn’t do much for you (a quick exit from the playoffs doesn’t do much for me) I find it hard to consider it a good trade.
If Wallace has a bad swing, he has fooled at least 4 teams already.
.353, .419, .604, 1.023
.312, .390, .532, .922
Ah…screw you!!! You didn’t hit very well for 3 games and dropped a ball!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! YOU SUCK!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Actually, its the opposite. If he is so good, why did 3 teams give up? Top Prospects are usually untouchable. Getting traded 3 times is not a good sign.
Also, you can’t really use hindsight as justification especially when the book is still out on wallace.
Besides, had they signed Holliday they would have lost their #1 draft pick.
So yes, I take a rental of Matt holiday and Zack Cox over Wallace.
As far as rental, Its the same as Derossa. You have to include Tyrell Jenkins (compensation) in the consideration as well.
Way too early to know if the Wallace trade was a good one. Fact remains is we went all in with DeRo and Holliday and it didn’t get us a ring. We were able to resign Holliday for what many thought was either too may years, too much per year or both. If Walrus struggles the next few years then its an obvious answer. If he turns things around and produces at a fairly good rate then its debatable. The point is there is no way at this point to say it was a good trade.
I see the trend but along those lines, didn’t hear a reference to Daric Barton either… another good hitting 1b the cardinals used to trade for a veteran. i.e. Mulder. Although that trade was a bummer because it included Haren instead of another pitching option.
Barton is still an on-base force and a good hitter but don’t hear him mentioned too much and certainly not as the top flight player he was projected to be.
There is something to be said for trading for a sure, proven producer with prospects aka Jocketty method.
Derick Barton was highly valued when there was a possibility he would be a catcher. Without the power, he is out of water at first base. He is much more athletic than Wallance and a good fielder. There is still time for Barton to become a Sean Casey type first baseman.
Trading prospects for proven producers works when you can extend the person and not just a few month rental.
I mentioned in this thread yesterday that I would be extremely open to packaging Cox and another prospect for a solid MI prospect. You don’t win championships with “average” major leaugers which I think at 3B that’s about all he would be. That being said, if we give Cox a chance to give it a shot at 2B and stick as at least an average major leauge defensive 2B then his value sky rockets. A .300/15/80 line at 2B would make his value tremendous, however, that line at 3B is average at best.
What do we have to lose at least giving him a shot at 2B?
Well, if they don’t feel he’ll be able to play 2nd, then you not only lose out on him being a 2nd baseman, but a 3rd baseman as well.
There’s a very good chance they treat him exactly as they did Wallace and at the first sign of him not fulfilling a 3rd base role, trade him off at his highest value.
If you convert him to 2nd now, and he fails, you’ve destroyed any and all value he holds.
I don’t see it. Teams experiment with marginal athletes at middle positions all the time, and when the experiment doesn’t work out, the athlete goes back to the corners where the bat will still play. Such “obvious” corner guys as Miguel Cabrera, Ryan Zimmerman, Chipper Jones, etc., all got minor-league trials of various lengths at 2B or SS before settling into the corner positions where they made major-league careers. They’re called “experiments” for a reason, and teams can and do back away from them. The real question is: will Cox’s bat play?
The difference with Cox is he’s a 1st round draft pick who was drafted as a 3rd baseman. If you dump him from 3rd before he even plays an inning, you are putting him into a position where people tend to end up.
Like with Wallace. Corner outfielders and big guys like him, if they can’t hack it in their original positions, end up at first base so long as they can still hit. Middle infielders end up at 2nd.
By moving a 3rd baseman to 2nd, means 2 things. 1) he can’t handle 3rd defensively, and 2) he can’t hit for power.
You’re basically moving a 1st round pick 3rd baseman to the lowest possible position. i.e., bad defense. bad hitting. Can’t play third. Can’t hit for power.
this saps all of his value. If the Cards had shifted Wallace to 1st base, they probably don’t get Holliday in return. He’s just not as valuable to any organization as a 1st baseman just like Cox isn’t as valuable as a 2nd baseman.
I disagree, Cox is more valuable at 2b for us because of Freese and Carpenter ahead of him and because his offensive toolset would be dynamic for a 2b but relatively weak for a 3b.
I would take a solid 3b prospect over a solid 2b prospect.
That line you mentioned would have been one of the best 3rd baseman in the league last year.
7 NL 2nd baseman had 15+ HR. 9 3rd baseman had 15+ home runs.
Maybe Cox at 2nd in future?
The follow-up question is why did the Cards draft such an unathletic player over his superior teammate (drafted next) or some other player with potential to be an all-around excellent player. Yes, I know we needed a third baseman, not a first baseman, but you need players with exceptional talent in the first round. This type of drafting leads to the lack of strong players for trades as well as to move up through the system and eventually strengthen the major league club. They got lucky that someone believed in Wallace enough to deal for him.
Who are you talking about? Is this about drafting Cox this year or Wallace? Everyone believed in Wallace at the time and even when he was in our system we just got rid of him at the right time. Wallace was the best choice for us at the time, he was the best college hitter in that draft and would always be at least premiem trade bait if it looked like he wouldnt stick at 3rd. That said drafting Aaron Hicks would have been great. I’m happy what we have though from the Wallace pick which is Matt Holliday.
Just checked Ike Davis is who you were talking about. He was drafted about 4 spots below Wallace. Would have been a nice pick to but ultimately trade bait unless we lost/lose Pujols.