Mallex Smith

yeezus said:
Right, that's what i said.
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What you said was:

Giving the benefit of the doubt to the opinions of professionals like Hart and the FO over your and nsacpi's is hardly crazy, but you'd think it is.

Message board posters will never be professionals like Hart, thus you're implying we can't question the trade
 
nsacpi said:
As I said combine and weight their numbers any way you think appropriate.
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I am curious why you chose them, though.
Eury hit 10 points higher, with his worse ISO at both stops, FAR worse BB%, and slighly better K%.
Yeah, I'd say Mallex has been a good bit better. And he still has 159 less ABs this year than Eury that year, so let's see where his AAA numbers finish.
 
sturg33 said:
What you said was:

Giving the benefit of the doubt to the opinions of professionals like Hart and the FO over your and nsacpi's is hardly crazy, but you'd think it is.

Message board posters will never be professionals like Hart, thus you're implying we can't question the trade
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That isn't what I'm implying.
But yes, I think the notion that Hart was clueless to the market and just now getting it while people like you understood it all along is silly.
 
gilesfan said:
Hes young so no giving up on him, but there is a reason people say hold off on judgment until at least AA.
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This is true. The jump to AA is one of the hardest jumps there is for a player. He's young so repeating a level isn't necessarily a bad thing. If he struggles again next year though he'll pretty much lose his prospect status.
 
yeezus said:
I am curious why you chose them, though.
Eury hit 10 points higher, with his worse ISO at both stops, FAR worse BB%, and slighly better K%.
Yeah, I'd say Mallex has been a good bit better. And he still has 159 less ABs this year than Eury that year, so let's see where his AAA numbers finish.
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I confess to cherry picking his AAA numbers because they were so good. Just like Mallex's AA numbers are exceptional. But we can come back at the end of the season and combine their full season age 22 data. I'm not anti Mallex. But I do think we need to be aware of how players who have put up numbers similar to him in the same leagues he is playing in their age 22 seasons have turned out in the major leagues. There is a range of outcomes. And we need to be realistic about the middle of that range where most of those outcomes are clustered.
 
nsacpi said:
It isn't impossible to do the same. My critique is that we should have been doing this. Or at least been less willing to just take on the pitching just because this is what other teams offered. There is a problem with waiting. The massive glut of pitching on the FA market is going to move the exchange rate against us.
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Should have been doing what? What should we have done? Traded Jeff Samardzija for Addison Russell (who, by the way, probably won't be better than Olivera the next 2-3 years)? Who should we have traded for Russell last year? I don't think they would've done it for Wood; Samardzija was having a fantastic, ace-like season, Wood was not the caliber of difference-maker Samardzija was perceived to be last year.

You don't get to be a baseball GM in a vacuum. You can't just say "they did this, so we should have, too." It ignores context and situations.
 
nsacpi said:
I confess to cherry picking his AAA numbers because they were so good. Just like Mallex's AA numbers are exceptional. But we can come back at the end of the season and combine their full season age 22 data. I'm not anti Mallex. But I do think we need to be aware of how players who have put up numbers similar to him in the same leagues he is playing in their age 22 seasons have turned out in the major leagues. There is a range of outcomes. And we need to be realistic about the middle of that range where most of those outcomes are clustered.
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I don't think his AAA stats were "so good," personally. .057 ISO, 4.6% BB, 116 wRC+. Good, sure. Not exceptional. Mallex's overall numbers this year are likely to be much better.

I also don't think anyone is proclaiming Mallex anything. There are definitely big question marks on him. There's also some stuff to like, and he's had pretty good results so far. I'm excited to see what he can do. He may well flop.
 
nsacpi said:
It isn't impossible to do the same. My critique is that we should have been doing this. Or at least been less willing to just take on the pitching just because this is what other teams offered. There is a problem with waiting. The massive glut of pitching on the FA market is going to move the exchange rate against us.
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Your assumption in these deals is that quality position players were available and offered. No one could speak to this except the johns. Likely not, as everyone knows there isn't enough position players to go around.

The alternative is to take what would be viewed as lesser prospects that were available, just because they were position players is ...not sound.
 
The Cubs two best young hitters they got at picks #2 and #4. This cannot continue to be ignored. They were fairly obvious picks that many teams make. Unless you're arguing we take a pitcher over Bryant at #2 (I would not make that argument) then this is significant. If we stunk enough to get the #2 pick (thanks, Wren! /s) we'd have Kris Bryant and all would be swell. In fact, Wren took a pitcher that year, and it wasn't a good pick in hindsight. Aaron Judge went with the next pick, after we took Hursh. So who was focused on pitching?
 
Tapate50 said:
Your assumption in these deals is that quality position players were available and offered. No one could speak to this except the johns. Likely not, as everyone knows there isn't enough position players to go around.
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It's also ignoring that that trade was made when Wren was the GM. If there was a market we should've exploited, he missed it, I suppose.
 
Tapate50 said:
Your assumption in these deals is that quality position players were available and offered. No one could speak to this except the johns. Likely not, as everyone knows there isn't enough position players to go around.

The alternative is to take what would be viewed as lesser prospects that were available, just because they were position players is ...not sound.
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You make good points, but the people in charge have come out and said all offseason they were going to focus on pitching...and did throughout trades and the draft. Whether that was right or wrong; that is what happened. Then a few months later they talk about how we don't have any hitting.......
 
Tapate50 said:
Your assumption in these deals is that quality position players were available and offered. No one could speak to this except the johns. Likely not, as everyone knows there isn't enough position players to go around.

The alternative is to take what would be viewed as lesser prospects that were available, just because they were position players is ...not sound.
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I'm not an insider so I don't have details on who was available at what price. I did point out that position players like Russell and Donaldson were moved in the past year.
 
nsacpi said:
I'm not an insider so I don't have details on who was available at what price. I did point out that position players like Russell and Donaldson were moved in the past year.
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Again: Russell was moved when Wren was the GM. So apparently he missed the boat. Not sure how this falls on the Johns.
also again: The year Bryant was drafted, Wren took Hursh. Aaron Judge went a pick later. So Wren wanted pitching, too. Thing is, that pitcher hasn't worked out at all.
 
gilesfan said:
You make good points, but the people in charge have come out and said all offseason they were going to focus on pitching...and did throughout trades and the draft. Whether that was right or wrong; that is what happened. Then a few months later they talk about how we don't have any hitting.......
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There are more than two ways to skin a cat, and no one perfect way to rebuild. We develop pitching much better than we do hitting prospects. I think we ID'd that strength and played to it. We had just as few impact pitching prospects at the time as we did hitters, which was next to nothing. Top end pitching is great currency, with a high attrition rate... show those assets as valuable and move them before they get expensive can be a great way to reload.
 
gilesfan said:
You make good points, but the people in charge have come out and said all offseason they were going to focus on pitching...and did throughout trades and the draft. Whether that was right or wrong; that is what happened. Then a few months later they talk about how we don't have any hitting.......
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Right.

This is from the NY times in an article dated July 27.

"We’re trying to build as much upside, impact pitching, as we can." ---John Copollela

And I think this neatly summarizes what the FO was trying to do up until the Olivera trade. Pitching was the priority. Other teams offered pitching, and we were glad to take it.
 
nsacpi said:
I'm not an insider so I don't have details on who was available at what price. I did point out that position players like Russell and Donaldson were moved in the past year.
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With pitching being the focus in both returns other than Lawrie, who was a replacement for Donaldson.

I don't think its very fair to point out that the FO is ignoring what the market does if you simply don't have any insight into if it was true or not. We haven't had any leaks or rumors to the effect we were in on position players and chose the pitchers either.
 
Tapate50 said:
There are more than two ways to skin a cat, and no one perfect way to rebuild. We develop pitching much better than we do hitting prospects. I think we ID'd that strength and played to it. We had just as few impact pitching prospects at the time as we did hitters, which was next to nothing. Top end pitching is great currency, with a high attrition rate... show those assets as valuable and move them before they get expensive can be a great way to reload.
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Do we really develop pitchers better? Heyward, McCann, Freeman, Gattis, Furcal, Salty, Andrus, Escobar, etc? I don't think we've developed pitching that matches that.
 
nsacpi said:
Right.

This is from the NY times in an article dated July 27.

"We’re trying to build as much upside, impact pitching, as we can." ---John Copollela

And I think this neatly summarizes what the FO was trying to do up until the Olivera trade. Pitching was the priority.
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I think they saw an opportunity to get an impact bat at 2B on the cheap ($$-wise) and used their glut of pitching to get it. The org. clearly loves Olivera.
 
And I also think the notion that the Olivera trade signals that the FO is saying "oops!" is incorrect.
 
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