Thanks for the memories, Dubie. Tough, but you develop, not pay, players with his profile. Nick Allen was a 3rd-round pick of the A's in 2017. He made his MLB debut in 2022 with Oakland and .spent three seasons there before getting traded to the Braves. In 135 games last season, Allen slashed .221/.284/.251 with no home runs and 22 RBI in 416 plate appearances. Allen has always had a reputation as a stellar defender, but he has also faced questions of whether he'd ever be able to hit enough. So far, the answer has been a resounding no. Allen also has significantly less defensive versatility than Dubon, who played everything competently, but as we've seen, he was woefully exposed on offense when he had to play every day. Then again, Mauricio Dubon was awful on offense when he first came to Houston and he wound up being slightly competent with the bat during his tenure here.
$$$. Maybe they like Nick Allen more than anyone should, but more likely they didn't get anything worthwhile from anybody else.
Stupid trade. Nick Allen is worse than Zack Short. However, Allen was the 12th most valuable defensive player in baseball last season (fangraphs). Dubon was 11th.
Yeah, I get the money aspect…I’m just saying I don’t want Nick Allen. He’s not even going to be making the minimum. If you’re shedding salary, why are you taking on a bum that’s going to be projected to make $1.5M?
Didn’t Nick Allen go all season without an error last year? crappy trade. Salary dump edit: looked it up. He had 5 errors. He is a damn good fielder though
Allen could have value if he is strictly used as the 13th man in a defensive replacement role. If he gets more than 200 plate appearances something went horribly wrong. I actually wonder if this might portend a Pena trade, with Houston viewing Allen as an oft used defensive replacement for Correa at SS. But more likely they are just thinking he will come in for Altuve at 2B, allowing them to view Altuve as the “everyday” 2B. Definitely not a move I would have made or predicted.
I'm looking forward to seeing what Dana does with Dubon/Urias/Meyers and hopefully Walker's money. That will determine how good this offseason is.
Yeah they cleared $10M with Dubon/Urias, and moving Sanchez/Meyers would clear another $10M. That’d give them ~$40M to play with.