It's also where you play Pence, and in the grand scheme of things, that's big. Both Taveras and Scott are mediocre, in terms of their production. But if you establish Pence in right, it's much harder to find a replacement with offensive capability in center than it is to find a right fielder with solid offense. Right fielders with superior offense to Willy are dime a dozen, and if Scott doesn't work out, there will be another quality offensive player brought in in the offseason. What makes a leadoff hitter any more important than having a 5/6 hitter who has extra-base hit power? Furthermore, it's not just Luke Scott. It's also Mike Lamb and Mark Loretta on the days Berkman plays right and someone else plays first. If you take one of those three bats out of the lineup, there's every bit the hole in the meat of the order that there is now at the top.
our current lead-off hitter posted a .702 OPS (including a miserable .302 OB%) thru the season's 1st half; how would replacing him with a more producitve player (taveras posted a .762 OPS, including a .371 OB%) not make the team better? in what alternate universe is this possible? not to mention how much better our woeful outfield defense would be. unless taveras was solely responsible for the anemic woes (and he wasn't), it's an irrelevant, meaningless point.
i wouldn't term taveras mediocre - he's third among NL lead-off hitters in OB% and is a FAR superior defensive player to luke scott. he also trails scott's OPS by a whopping 6 points. scott, otoh? yeah, he is indeed the very definition of mediocre.
Another thing to consider is that there's a good chance that Pence would not have been brought up when he was if it was Taveras/Scott in the OF. Not to mention, we still needed a #2 starter and Taveras was the most likely to be traded. You can be on either side of this trade, both sides have merit, IMO. But is disingenuous to say it was a terrible trade. People would be b****ing about Woody being our #2 had we not made the trade. And it's way too early to write off Jennings.
I'm talking entire careers, not one flukish first half of one season. Sample size. I'll be willing to make a tip jar bet with anyone that Willy posts a sub .340 OBP during the second half.
Of course, that assumes that the first 500 to 1000 at bats of a player's career defines them. Seems a bit silly, given that players are supposed to improve over the course of their career - especially young ones like Willy T who were called up to the majors before they were ready.
It also seems a bit silly, regardless of what year the player is in, to throw out the first 500 to 1,000 at bats and focus on one half of one season.
At what point is it significant? First, it was a fluke month. Then a fluke two months. Now a fluke half-season. At what point is it actually representative of what he is now?
Actually, I b****ed about the Jennings trade AND signing Woody, so that makes me ...well.....a b**** ! DD
That doesn't mean you have to trade him and two other players for a guy in the last year of his contract who had 1 good year out of 5 in the majors. As far as Pence goes - he likely would have been brought up to replace Scott when he got benched earlier in the season. At least you'd have more options than you have now. So if, instead of this trade, the Astros had traded Berkman for Kip Wells, I couldn't say its a terrible trade because otherwise we'd be b****ing about Woody being out #2? The trade wasn't necessarily terrible talent-wise. It was a bad trade because it traded cheap, future pieces (or tradable assets) in an attempt to temporarily fill a hole that would have to be re-filled in a year anyway, in an attempt to keep the team OK instead of below-average.
Well, Taveras is no Berkman, so that's not really a good analogy. Berkman is not a tradeable asset because we're not going to trade him. I'm going to hold off judgment until we don't resign Jennings and if we don't, see who we get in return. I still think our team is better with Pence/Scott than Pence/Taveras.
I'm not sure, but if his sample size now is representative of the player he really is, it's also fair to expect Luke Scott to be the player he was for the second half of last season.
But if we sign Jennings at this point is irrelevant - we could sign him as a free agent in the offseason even if we hadn't traded for him. Unless we sign him during the next few months before he's a free agent, the trade was 4 years of the other guys for one year of Jennings. But is the organization better off with Pence/Scott/Jennings than Pence/Scott/Taveras/Hirsh/Buchholz? That's my problem with the trade. It may have helped this year's team to be average, at the expense of the future. These are the type of trades you make to take your team from good to great. Not from sorta-bad to OK.
Maybe. Except that Scott was a few years older, had plenty of high-level minor league seasoning, and was playing above his minor league statistics. Willy is younger, is now playing at about what he did in the minors and was called up before he was ready (skipped AAA, 1 season at AA). Luke Scott never even batted over 0.300 or had a 0.400 OBP in the minors - it's a stretch to think he's suddenly a 0.330+ hitter with a 0.420 OBP. Willy T's numbers are very similar to his minor league numbers. Which sounds more like an outlier?
When his career averages represents what he is. Right now, its still mediocre, and will be until he has at least 2 more full years like this half one. For example... Berkman is having a fluke off-year... but it doesn't come close to representing how dominant he is (and has been). Do you think Berkman honestly lost it? Because it sure looks like everyone believes Willy magically found it. It does happen... the Astros couldn't afford to both wait on Willy, AND go into the season with no valid/proven pitching. And in the end, the offense is BETTER... and it isn't the reason why they're still losing.
Just to get back to this point, you're right... this is exactly what their thinking was. The only contention I have is that a merely "OK" team is going to win the NL central this season (just like last season). Milwaukee was expected to be "scary"... but wasn't some magic lock. So far, the Cardinals and the Cubs (the expected contenders, and thus the teams you try to make moves to measure up against) have been very mediocre. Some years you have to load up to win (1998, 2004)... some years, you got to make due with what you've got (and get what you can). Baseball is becoming more and more like the NFL every day (as far as mid-market vs. big-market.... the small market is still going to be disadvantaged). The Astros clearly knew that to waste another year on Willy (based on his first 2 years), and Hirsh (based on what they percieve as barely #3 stuff... which so far rains true) would be losing out on a big opportunity in a mediocre division... while you have Berkman, Oswalt, and Lee in their primes.
Well that's just silly. Career averages are completely and totally irrelevant to young players who are expected to improve with seasoning. Do you also expect Biggio to play to his career averages right now? By this standard, you'll undervalue about 90% of young players - basically, everyone but the Pujols types. And every year will be a "fluke year" for most young players since they are improving. In his first 6 seasons in the majors, Carlos Beltran apparently had 6 straight fluke years since each was better than his career average? Berkman's been very consistent for 5 or 6 years, and is in the prime of his career. Of course it's a fluke. Is there any reason (age, experience, ANYTHING) to suggest Berkman is on the downhill side of his career? Biggio, on the other hand, is obviously getting older, so when his stats trend downward, thats NOT a fluke. Never said it was.
I'd agree with this. Milwaukee has been the amongst the best in the NL thus far, but that wasn't realistic to expect. But to make a trade like that so you can have a 0.500 type team and hope to win a terrible division is still a bad idea. If you were talking Bagwell, Biggio, Clemens a year or two ago - then yeah, it's a last ditch "let's try to win before we lose them" type mentality. For Berkman and company, their primes are going to last 5 more years. And while the trade helps give them a better chance to be a 0.500 team this year, it hurts their chances to win in the other years of their prime.
If Willy had the kind of tools that Beltran, Biggio, and other players have (and is as highly touted as those guys were when they came up)... I wouldn't be questioning whether or not his career will live up to this half season. But, Willy's performance when he first came up was very much on par with his minor league issues (where he was a rule V castoff)... will hit tons of singles (many based on sheer speed), will strike out a lot, won't walk much, and plays questionable defense (at least he improved on that one while he was an Astro). He is what he is... and he was what he was over the last 2 years (of PLENTY of AB's). Asking him to prove it for an enitre year before declaring this trade as the worst Astro trade of all time isn't too much to ask. You act as if Willy had only a cup of coffee in the major leagues.... a Boki Nachbar-like experience with Houston. Willy was pretty consistent in his first two full years... and this year has been a drastic change.
