SB Nation User Blog: VolsnCards5

Zimming through a Trade Proposal

VolsnCards5 — Thu, 04 Jun 2009 16:34:38 -0000

Which player would you rather have? Both are 3B:

Player A: .301/.367/.516 WOBA .383 UZR/150 16.6

Player B: .270/.372/.483 WOBA .371 UZR/150 5.0

As the Cardinals are currently constructed, you'd probably love to have both of these players. Both are middle of the lineup types that would certainly give our anemic offense a boost. And both can more than hold their own at the hot corner. Obviously, however, Player A is the who you'd rather have assuming all other things are equal. Player A becomes even more attractive when you realize that he is 24 while player B is 32.

How much does the fact that Player A would cost premium prospects change your feeling about him? Add to that that Player B would cost no prospects at all? That may change things just a bit, but I'd have to say most would still like Player A more.

Ok, enough of this secrecy. If you haven't figured it out by now, Player A is Ryan Zimmerman and Player B is Troy Glaus. Zimmerman's stats are his updated ZiPS projections and while I know that projections are just that, his number through June 3 show that he could potentially exceed these numbers(.322/.391/.550 WOBA .401). Glaus's numbers are from 2008(only his second plus defensive year since 2002 by the way). Zimmerman's .358 BABIP is unsustainable which means his BA and OBP will drop, but his ISO is a hefty .227 meaning he will probably still be very productive even with the anticipated dip in BA. In summary, Zimmerman is a baller and I'd love to see him in a uniform that has birds on a bat.

I'm going to look at the McClouth deal as a starting point for this. Notice I said starting point because, lets face it, Zimmerman is better than McClouth. They are, however, both the face of their respective franchises and probably the best offensive players on the teams, IMHO. The guys over at futureredbirds.net seem to think that the Braves got the raw end of the deal, and I tend to agree with them(not to mention look to them for all of my prospecting needs). An equivalent of the deal that landed McClouth would be Daryl Jones, Clayton Mortensen, and a throw in pitcher. This will obviously not land us Zimmerman, as a two 4 star prospects+a throw in offer will be laughed at very quickly. What about a 5 star, a 4, a 3 and a guy who I think should be a 3-star? The deal I am thinking about is Brett Wallace(5 star), Chris Perez(4-star), Bryan Anderson(3-star) or one of our AAA pitchers(Mort, Boggs) and Allen Craig.

Here's my thinking. Wallace becomes the Nationals answer at first base. Nick Johnson is always hurt and Dmitri Young is, well, Dmitri Young. Wallace becomes very expendable for us if we have Zimmerman and Pujols as he doesn't have a position outside of 3b and 1b(not seeing LF as a viable option, though we have had Duncan there the past 3 years). The Nats get their closer in Chris Perez and we have minor league relievers who can take his spot(Todd). They can take their pick of Anderson, Mort, or Boggs depending on their needs(may actually choose Anderson with all of the pitching they have in the pipelines plus Strasburg). Allen Craig becomes the Nats third baseman. I think Craig is underrated. He can hit for power, puts up an ok average and from everything I have read, can handle the hot corner.

I think with this deal, we answer a huge need for this year and for the future(Zimmerman is signed to a team-friendly contract through 2013(09:$3.325M, 10:$6.25M, 11:$8.925M, 12:$12M, 13:$14M). We answer this need without giving up too much. A lineup with Rasmus, Pujols, Zimmerman as the 2-3-4 makes me salivate. This would also show Pujols that we are serious about winning, which can only help when we start with extension talks. DeWitt has said he is ok with adding some payroll this season as well. Oh, and for those of you are wondering about park factors ESPN has Busch and Nationals Park as almost identical.

So, would you guys do this deal? Do you think the Nationals would do this deal? What would it take?

All Stats from Fangraphs.com

Prospect ratings from Baseballprospectus

Contract info from Cot's Baseball Contracts

Draft Question

VolsnCards5 — Tue, 17 Mar 2009 02:10:14 -0000

FOOCH'S NOTE 7:31PM: This seems like another useful exercise in mock drafting. Glad to see we've got somebody who recognizes the team doesn't need to go QB in the first round.

Hello Niners Fans. StampedeBlue is doing a mock draft, and I've been selected to pick for the Niners. The plan for us right now is to just do the first two rounds, and I'm looking for your thoughts on San Fran's team needs. Having the 10th pick puts you in a good spot in my opinion; you're going to have a chance to get a real difference making player but not have to spend quite the ungodly amount that a top 5 pick gets. I also feel like teams in the top half of the draft pick based on team need more often than not. So, please, let me know what Singletary and his team most needs. I feel like you guys are comfortable enough at QB to not take a risk on Stafford of Sanchez were they there at 10. Am I right, wrong, misguided? Thanks in advance for your responses.

P.S. When I was a kid, the 49ers were the team I most closely followed(not a huge fan) As you can tell my my name though, I am a midwesterner who enjoys UT football, so when Manning became a Colt, things changed. I still hold a place in my heart for those mid 90s Niner teams, and still hate Brett Favre and the Packers because of that rivalry. Anyways, I was really excited to be chosen to pick for the Niners.

Santa: A Cardinals Fan?

VolsnCards5 — Sat, 13 Dec 2008 01:02:47 -0000

I was thinking up my Christmas wishlist the other day and I started looking at it from a Cardinals perspective. Before you close this window, this is not a Hot Stove wish list. This is what I want Santa to give to current Cardinals to help make them better players, thus making us a better team. Basically, I wish Santa would wrap up certain skills and put them under the trees of different Cardinals.

1. Pitch recognition skills for Tyler Greene-From what I've heard, Greene has some serious issues with recognizing pitches. His numbers seem be bear this out as StatCorner shows that his swinging strikeout % in AA the last two seasons were 17.8% and 18.7%. League average is around 13%, so making contact seems to be a major problem for Greene. This sucks for Greene because when he does make contact, he has some pop in his bat(ISO of .204 and .190 the past two AA seasons). I don't have the time(or the know how) to go through his numbers and figure out what his OBP would look like if he just struck out swinging at the league average(13%). Getting pitch recognition skills for Christmas would certainly increase his BB% which was 6.8% and 5.6% over the past two AA seasons(not good). It would also increase his batting average(duh). When coupled with his solid defense, his higher OBP would make Tyler Greene a pretty decent player. There's your 2B over the next few years right there.

2. A Slider for Jason Motte-This is pretty self explanatory. If he had a legitimate slider(or any breaking pitch for that matter) to go along with his 98mph fastball, he'd be nearly unhittable. In the long run, I'm not sure he can get by with just his fastball, but with a slider, we no doubt have our set-up man/closer/trade bait over the next 5 or 6 years.

3. Command for Chris Perez-Also pretty self-explanatory. He's got a nasty fastball and a nasty slider, he just needs to be able to consistently command those pitches. If he does, there's our closer/set-up man/serious trade bait.

4. Some power for Bryan Anderson-If Anderson had a little more pop, he would be a fantastic catching prospect. We all know about his prowess with the bat in terms of contact and the fact that he is getting better behind the plate. If he could increase his power, he would be an incredible trading chip for us(or we could trade Yadi and use Anderson). His ISO in AA in 2007 and 2008 was .090 and .138 and in AAA in '08 it was .098. He's a singles hitter plain and simple. If he could just add some doubles and the occasional HR, we would have ourselves a top tier prospect.

Thats all I have right now. Anyone else have Christmas wishes?

This might just work....

VolsnCards5 — Tue, 11 Nov 2008 16:46:51 -0000

Hang with me for a few minutes. I think I might have a way to fill two "holes" without making any sort of transaction(read: trade, FA acquisition). We would still have other holes that needed to be filled, but simply by tweaking the way we look at one of our pitchers, I believe we can plug some gaps.

I have very little confidence that Chris Carpenter will be able to be an effective starter next season due to his nerve issue. I also believe that he can pitch next season. That may seem like a contradiction, and maybe it is, but I still believe it. If I'm right about his injury(which the Cardinals have not been completely forthright about everything, so i may not be) his problems stem from overuse. This is obviously not good for a starting pitcher.

Chris Perez is the Cardinals closer of the future. The future is closer than it was at this time last year, but I'm still not sold the future is here. I'm not sure we should heap all of the pressure involved with being a closer onto young pitcher next season without a little more apprenticeship. That being said...

What about using Carpenter as our closer next year? He could pitch 3-4 times a week and leave the other save opportunities for Perez as Carpenter rested. According to stlcardinals.com, the BOB had 73 save opportunites last season, converting 42 of them. Granted, we had the 2nd most save opps in the majors(most in the NL) so that number may come down some next season. But lets say we get 60 save opps next season. Thats roughly one save opportunity every 3 games, right at 2 per week. If carpenter pitched even 2-3 times a week, he would probably get 70% of our save opportunites, leaving Perez to pick up the other 30%. Carpenter definitely has the stuff to efficiently shut a team down for one inning. Since the beginning of 2005, Carp has thrown about 14.3 pitches per inning(info from fangraphs). Going right at batters may cause the number to go even lower. So, we could have a high quality closer, and it won't cause any unneccessary overuse of Carp's arm, all while giving Perez a pretty good share of save opps. That is one hole "filled."

This would also allow us to fill a second hole: 4th/5th starter. Adding Carp to the pen would allow us to move McClellan to the rotation. McClellan to the rotation has been discussed ad nauseum on this site. He defnititely has the stuff to be a pretty solid starter, the question lies in his arm health. McClellan kind of remind me of Wellenmeyer though; I doubt we could get 32 starts out of him, but it would not surprise me if he was able to start 25-28 games and go close to 6 innings in those game. He had control problems as a starter in the minors, but sorted those out for the first 4 months of last season. Maybe if he has a full offseason working out to be a starter, he could be a reliable guy with nice upside to add to the rotation.

A rotation of Waino, Welly, Lohse, McClellan, and Piniero/Boggs/Veteran cheap FA doesn't look that bad. And a bullpen anchored by Motte to Perez to Carpenter, sprinkled with a little Franklin and hopefully Springer isn't awful, as long as we add 2 Lefties to the mix.

Thoughts?

Jonathan Sanchez?

VolsnCards5 — Wed, 17 Sep 2008 12:28:07 -0000

I was perusing mlbtraderumors.com and came across the chat they had yesterday. It seemed that more than one Giants fan believed that Jonathan Sanchez would be made available this offseason in a bid to get infield help, specifcally power hitting corner infield help. They have pitching coming up through the pipelines with the likes of Madison Bumgardner(or is it Roenhauser? Gardenhoser?) so the fans think Sabean my spin Sanchez for a young power hitting CI. The guy that runs mlbtraderumors.com implied that they may wait to trade him till next year's trade deadline, just to make sure their young pitchers can handle AAA first and show they are ready for the bigs.

My suggestion is to trade somebody for Sanchez. I'll talk about who that somebody could/should be later. First, I'll focus on Sanchez.

According to Cott's, he had just under 2 years of ML service, so I think he is under team control for 4 more years, with arbitration starting after next season. That is a good thing that will probably drive his cost up a bit. His numbers look pretty good, even though his ERA is a little high. His peripherals are good enough that you can see his upside and his FIP is somewhat encouraging. Maybe in front of a little better defense, that ERA will drop. These numbers, his age, and his cheapness make him a solid option as a number 3/4 type starter. Trading for him would obviously be cheaper financially and in terms of draft picks that signing a Derek Lowe, AJ Burnett type. I don't know anything about his mechanics and he did have a trip to the DL this season with some rotator cuff tightness, but besides that, I can't find any other signs of injury. Someone who knows pitching mechanics may be able to better speak to what kind of injury risk he may or may not be.

A rotation of Carp, Waino, Welly, Sanchez, insert name here(Boggs, Looper, Piniero, McClellan?) looks pretty solid to me. Sanchez's Southpawedness balances it out nicely. Plus, if he does not cut it as a starter, then you have a cheap LH reliever who held Lefties to a .220 average this season(though they did slug .409 against him...ughh).

Now to the question of who to trade for him. The Giants seem to be looking for power hitting CI's. Fortunately for the Cardinals, we have a surplus of those type players in our system. Steve Hill(1B?), Allen Craig(3B), David Freese(3B), and Brett Wallace(3B) all fit the bill. I'm not going to mention Brett Wallace anymore because I don't think we can trade him until June, and even then, right now, he's untouchable for me. That leaves Hill, Craig, and Freese. I think Hill's lack of a true position could cause problems, but I also think that he can play 1B and know that he can mash. Craig plays an average to above average 3B and call also mash. Freese plays a good 3B and can mash and hit for a pretty good average. His MLE is .264/.318/.446 with 19 HR, which is not a lot worse than what Glaus has put up in St. Louis this season. I actually think that Freese's average would be slightly higher than that(along with a bump in OBP). I don't know exactly what the Giants want, but I'm guessing they want a major league ready player. Hill and Craig are not, but I believe Freese could definitely hold his own as the starting 3B for a team like the Giants. Would Freese be enough to pry Sanchez away? Would we need to throw in a C-level prosepect to make it work? Maybe even one of our flamethrowing RH relievers we have in the minors? I don't know, but I definitely think that Mo should call Sabean and try to work out a deal.

I'd hate to see Freese go, because I think he could be a valuable reserve for the Cards next season. But I think by trading for Sanchez, we could save money to make a run at Furcal or Hudson, which would go long way in helping our MI and offense. Plus it would give us at least 4 cheap years of a solid #3 starter. Dave Duncan does scare me with young lefties though.

Thoughts?

Dream Offseason

VolsnCards5 — Sat, 06 Sep 2008 01:43:09 -0000

I think I have come to terms with the fact that this season's playoff push is a lost cause. These Cardinals have put me through a thrill ride. And to be honest, I wouldn't have it any different. Of course I would have loved for the Cards to have won 162 games and swept through the playoffs, but considering that is never going to happen, and that this team was left for dead at the start of the season, I think this has been one of my favorite seasons as a Cardinals fan.

Anways, I have been thinking about the offseason a lot the last couple of days. I have come up with my dream offseason. These aren't complete fantasy moves; no Alex Rodriguez for LaRue straight up or signing C.C Sabbathia to a team friendly affordable contract. These are moves that I think the Cardinals should and more importantly could do(or is it could and more importantly should, I don't know)

I will also preface this by saying while I'm not sure about salary numbers and the like, I am trying to be reasonable as possible. Like I said, I think these are moves the team could afford. I am also going with rumors that have been put out there about players that could be made available by other teams(I'm looking at you Tulowitzki)

1. Release Adam Kennedy--Simply put, he is taking up a roster spot that could go to a cheaper, more productive player. As I said, I don't really know how salaries work, but if it's as simple as giving him the $3mil we still owe him to go away it has to be done. The other option is to eat a large part of the contract and trade him. Not sure what we could get for him, probably no more than that well traveled jack of all trades, Player to be Named Later.

2. Resign Felipe Lopez for no more than 2 million a year and Miles for no more than 1.5 million, or find veteran equivalents for the same price. Whatever you may think about these two, players like this are needed on all teams in order to be successful. A certain level of grit is required, if you will. Let these two, Brendan Ryan, Hoffpauir, and Brian Barden battle in Spring Training for the starting 2B position, and use the others as utility/backups or send them to Memphis. Having these offensive juggernauts at the keystone is ok because.....

4. Trading Rasmus, Mortensen/Garcia, and Anderson for Tulowitzki. Obviously he may not really be available. And even if he is, then obviously start with a lower offer and don't go any higher than this, but this kid is a dynamic talent at a prime position. We have a glut of outfielders, so while it would wrench my heart to trade Rasmus, getting 4 years of cheap Tulo would be the only type of deal I would be ok with losing Rasmus over.

5. Re-sign Braden Looper. I struggled here between this and signing Derek Lowe. Without looking at any numbers to back me up, I feel like Looper would be close to the same level of ability for less cost and at a younger age. Maybe 7-10 milion/ year for 3 years. It may take more than that and I might be completely wrong about him being close to as good as Lowe. If so, I reserve the right to change my mind.

6. Don't re-sign Loshe. Hope that a team with unprotected draft picks decide to sign him and take our picks and run.

7. Start working to extend Pujols beyond 2011. Maybe even do it. For the sake of sanity, humanity, clarity, any other ity's Pujols has to be a Cardinal for his whole career.

Thoughts? Ideas? Changes?

The Good, The Bad, and the Uggla

VolsnCards5 — Sun, 17 Aug 2008 17:45:26 -0000

Word out of Florida, according to mlbtraderumors.com and SI, is that the Marlins are considering yet another firesale. Since a lot of their players are arby eligible this offseason, they will either have to trade them away, or double their payroll(which we all know they won't do). One of the names mentioned as being a trade candidate is Dan Uggla, hero of the All-Star Game.

I'm not the type of person that knows sabermetric stats such as VORP and win shares so I really can't speak to all of that in-depth stuff. What I do know is that Uggla, even if he doesn't have the same season at the plate next year as he did this year, would be quite the offensive upgrade over our current crop of 2-baggers. My question to all of you faithful VEB readers(especially those of you who are good with said statistics)is: Should the Cardinals consider trading some prospects in the offseason for Mr. Uggla? He will be cheaper than Orlando Hudson methinks, so the Cards would save some money(I am assuming Mo will do everything in his power to improve our MI situation, maybe I am wrong). Are his deficiencies at the keystone such that his bat will never make up for his iron glove? What do you guys think he will get in arbitration? And lastly, but most importantly, who from the farm system would you be willing to give up to get him?

I feel like if we really wanted him, we should go no higher than Jay and Mortensen...or some combination like that. That may even be too much. The Marlins know how to drive up the price, but I gotta think the Cards would have the upperhand because the Marlins seem to really be looking to ship him out.

Thoughts?

Furcal-Free Agent in the Cards?

VolsnCards5 — Fri, 02 May 2008 16:15:21 -0000

MLB Traderumors.com pointed out that Rafeal Furcal would be a free agent this offseason. The website seems to think that Furcal will get 5 years and 75 million dollars. He lists the Cardinals as a team that might take a look at the shortstop if he hits the open market(apparently the dodgers are interested in extending him).

I think the Cardinals have to at least take a look at Furcal. I realize that is a ton of money to a 31 year old, but he would satisfy a few needs for the Cardinals.

Leadoff hitter: Granted, Skip has done a solid job this year, but can you imagine Furcal's speed at the top of the lineup? If LaRussa ever did decide to actually run a little, Furcal could bring a new element to this lineup. This would also allow Rasmus to bat #2 or even down in the order so all of the pressure of the leadoff spot won't be on our young outfielder.

Quality shortstop: Furcal is a plus defender with a huge arm. Defense up the middle is key to Cardinals pitching success, with LaDuncan preaching pitching to contact

The Bridge to Kozmaville: Pete Kozma has been playing lights out in A- ball, but he is at least 3 years away, probably more like 4-5. Signing Furcal would bridge the gap so we don't have to sign one year stopgaps like Izturis over the next few years.

Furcal is going to want a max contract, so he could very well be priced out of the Cardinals range. But I think that we have to take a look at him this offseason if he is available. He would just serve so many purposes for a team that has a real legit chance of being good next year if everyone progresses as expected(Rasmus, Perez, Motte) and gets healthy(Carpenter).