The wisdom of trading "prospects" (part 1)
Many's the time they turn out to be suspects, but this trade helped make a team a contender.
As teams begin to put together their 2023 rosters, we’re at the point where most of the squads think they have at least a sliver of a chance at October glory. One of those teams is our local Baltimore Orioles squad, but they concede they have a few holes to fill - particularly that of stud ace starting pitcher. (Hint: Kyle Gibson ain’t it, and John Means won’t be back until midseason, maybe.) The one asset they seem to have in that regard is an exceptionally deep farm system considered to be the best in baseball, chock full of alluring prospects a rebuilding team may be interested in as a trade for said star pitcher.
These kinds of trades are generally conducted more at the midseason trading deadline, but it wouldn’t be out of the question to see one before teams head to Florida and Arizona for spring training next month.
Since I’m talking about the Orioles, over the next few posts I want to look at two trades of theirs that have brought differing results, then close with a prospect trade my Tigers made almost two decades ago that involved a surefire future Hall of Fame player. (Not my Shorebirds one, the one in Cooperstown.) It’s a nice three-part series that reminds us of how hot the stove can be.
While it’s not a perfect yardstick, the way I like to judge the wisdom of trades is the WAR a player accrues for his team. Obviously the “suspects,” those players who never pan out in the majors, are worth zero WAR to a team - unless they sucker some other team into trading for them, in which case they could be valuable in the player received.
Let’s look at the first trade I have in mind, which occurred late in the offseason of 2008, just before spring training began. The Seattle Mariners, who were contenders in 2007 with an 88-74 record, finishing six games out of both their division title and wild card, were looking to get over the hump with a stud pitcher. Enter the Baltimore Orioles, who had 28-year-old Eric Bedard, a guy who had won 28 games in the previous two years and gotten Cy Young consideration for his 2007 campaign despite being on a team that only went 69-93. Bedard also had two seasons of control before free agency; however, his success was escalating his arbiration-based salary rapidly. Still, the Orioles commanded a steep price, with five players being exchanged for Eric.
As it turned out, Bedard pitched 2 1/2 injury-wracked seasons for the Mariners, compiling just a 15-14 record in 46 starts. Ironically, his third, partial season with the Mariners was the one where he finally approached his workload with the Orioles, but his last eight starts were made as a member of the Red Sox, who acquired Bedard in a three-team deadline deal in July, 2011. (Bedard essentially missed the 2010 season due to injury, as he made just three minor-league appearances.)
So out of this deal the Mariners received 4.2 WAR from Bedard. However, he was traded away for what turned out to be two players: Boston provided minor league utility player Chih Hsien Chang, who never made the major leagues (but would eventually wind up in the Baltimore organization as a minor league free agent for the 2014 season before lauching a long, successful career back home in Taiwan) and, from the Los Angeles Dodgers, outfielder Trayvon Robinson, who compiled a (-0.1) WAR in two seasons up-and-down with the Mariners before - ironically - being traded to Baltimore for infielder Robert Andino (as in the curse of the…) in November, 2012. While Robinson never made it to Camden Yards, spending a season split between Bowie and Norfolk before being let go, Andino subtracted another (-0.4) WAR from the Seattle ledger of the Bedard deal as he struggled in 29 games for the Mariners before being shipped off to Pittsburgh for a player who was never named. Overall, Seattle got a total of 3.7 WAR and their perceived 2008 charge to the top of the AL West was a complete failure as they tanked to a 61-101 record, worst in the American League and only ahead of the woeful 59-102 Nationals.
On the Orioles’ side of the ledger, most casual fans know the biggest name in the deal coming the other way from Seattle: outfielder Adam Jones. He turned out to be a five-time All-Star, four-time Gold Glove winner, and a Silver Slugger for a season, spending a decade patrolling center field for the O’s. By himself he was worth 32.5 WAR. But aside from minor league pitcher Tony Butler, whose tenure as Orioles property was derailed by an injury suffered while pitching for Delmarva - he spent the next several seasons vainly trying to resurrect his career in two other organizations and independent league baseball - the others helped the Orioles major league team in various ways.
At the time of the trade, the centerpiece for Baltimore was considered to be relief pitcher George Sherrill. Indeed, Sherrill made his lone All-Star appearance as a member of the Orioles in 2008 and was having another solid season for an Oriole team again well out of the pennant race when he was flipped to the Los Angeles Dodgers a day before the 2009 trade deadline. Sherrill’s 1.8 WAR in a season and a half adds to the Orioles’ total, but the players he was traded for also were a net gain, particularly pitcher Steve Johnson, who was a valued member of the 2012 Oriole wild card team. Johnson accrued 0.9 WAR in three seasons with Baltimore, enough to overcome both the (-0.7) WAR contributed by third baseman Josh Bell, who managed to stand right on the Mendoza Line in his two partial seasons in Baltmore, and the (-0.1) WAR added by Mike Belfiore, a literal “one and done” player for whom Bell was traded for from Arizona. Thus, the Sherill part of the tree is a net 1.9 WAR gain for Baltimore, making the total 34.4 WAR.
Arizona also figured in increasing the value of Kam Mickolio, who gained 0.2 WAR himself in parts of three seasons with the O’s. But he turned out to be one of two players dealt to Arizona on December 6, 2010 for first baseman Mark Reynolds and a PTBNL. That named player, John Hester, never made it to Baltimore - spending just under a season in Norfolk as their primary catcher - but Reynolds more than made up for that, adding another 1.0 WAR in two productive Oriole seasons, including a 37 HR season in 2011. Mark left as a free agent after 2012, but increased the Mickolio part of the trade to 1.2 WAR and the overall total to 35.6 WAR.
Last but not least we have pitcher Chris Tillman, who spent ten seasons with the Orioles and was their staff ace for a time during their playoff run from 2012-16, making the All-Star team in 2013. While his numbers were grisly at the end, overall Tillman went 74-60 for the Orioles, making a total of 205 starts out of 210 appearances and playing the part Bedard was supposed to play for the Mariners quite well. His 8.7 WAR attained in that ten-year span brings the final total to 44.3 WAR for the Orioles against 3.7 WAR for the Mariners. The Orioles gained a longtime center fielder and maybe #2 starter in exchange for a guy who couldn’t stay off the DL for long.
Next week I’ll look at a more recent Oriole trade where the jury’s still out.