Article: Twins trade Denard Span for Nationals' 2011 first round pick

[jokin]

This is called "rolling the dice", but then so is the draft. I believe that this trade indicates a change in philosophy from PtoC. Likely he will look like an early Garza with FBs that often beget foul balls rather than outs. He will need to improve his off-speed stuff, but that is generally said of most pitchers at his level. Mechanics? Unless you have actually seen him pitch (ex. Liriano) I would take someone else's opinion with a grain of salt. Blaming mechanics for a "gopher ball"?--isn't that the expected reason for said "cookie" anyway? It does appear as if 2013 may have fewer wins than 2013 but many have posted that: a) Willingham had a career year (so sell high!); Mauer wasn't injured; c) the bullpen was basically solid and d) Morneau had a much more productive year than 2011. Unless there is a substanial influx of major league talent by April we should expect "a step back".

Let's give this Myers guy a chance before we "Hoey" him.

 

 

Mechanics? This guy's release point covers all points of the map in the Lower 48 States. Here you go:

 

http://www.fangraphs.com/blogs/index.php/washington-nationals-pitching-prospect-alex-meyer-scouting-report-video/

 

It has become painfully clear that this is a high-risk/high-reward/potential crashing downside trade that desperate clubs have to make if they want to get back in the game. That and it insures the club continues marching towards its inexorable drop to a $65M payroll in 2014, which sadly appears to be the club's prime imperative at this point.

[Seth Stohs]

Read Dave Cameron's headline at FANGRAPHS. Nuff said.

 

Then read Keith Law's thoughts.

 

There can and will be lots of opinions about the deal. Reality is no one will know if it's a good idea for 5 years.

[DaveW]

Deleted.

[kab21]

 

"White"?

 

Seth mixed up his Alex's when typing fast.

[DaveW]

That and it insures the club continues marching towards its inexorable drop to a $65M payroll in 2014, which sadly appears to be the club's prime imperative at this point.

 

Yeah, that simply isn't true nor will you provide one shred of evidence stating such.

[Top Gun]

So what's new Twins get's ripped off agin!

[Seth Stohs]

 

"White"?

 

Seth mixed up his Alex's when typing fast.

 

Correct... I blame the Big Bang Theory too.

[E. Andrew]

Salary dump, Twins fans understand. Start over on the cheap, roll the dice and wait for Yahtzee, like in '82 and '02.

[mikeee]

This pops in my head after watching the video about taming meyer....

Maybe after the Nats had Mike Mcdougal for awhile, and saw this guy, they ran!!!! lol

As a Twins fan, I always loved it when Mcdougal came in to save it for the Royals. He never, ever, ever got

himself really figured out.

 

[Riverbrian]

Laughing out loud... If anyone has any doubt about how difficult it is to be a GM in the court of public opinion. Read this thread and then read almost any thread on this website.

 

I'm sure everyone realizes that we have disagreements between multiple posters on just about every topic.

 

Now imagine trying to be that GM who everyone is going to love. No matter what he decides to do. Someone is guarenteed to piss all over it.

 

If anyone hates Terry Ryan... That's OK I Guess... But please understand that if you were the GM... Someone is going to hate you to.

 

You can't please everyone.

[mikeee]

wikipedia says Mcdougal could hit 103mph.

[jokin]

Wow, taking things a little too personally, or what?

 

You are well aware that you are in violation of poster decorum for your perjoratives, right?

 

I never said "nobody likes it". I merely quoted one talking head second-guessing the trade, without editorial comment, and you jump all over me because we have a slight disagreement ( I actually will remain optimistic about Meyer until proven different).

 

Regarding Hoey, you didn't read my whole post, a post in which I clearly stated that Ryan made out better than Smith when trading a proven up-the-middle position player for a minor league hard-throwing pitcher.

 

I also published the comps at the same age and level of development, there was no attempt at correlation on the current state of each player and I clearly pointed out the Meyers numbers were accomplished as a Starting Pitcher.

 

Time for a cleansing breath.

[jokin]

That and it insures the club continues marching towards its inexorable drop to a $65M payroll in 2014, which sadly appears to be the club's prime imperative at this point.

 

Yeah, that simply isn't true nor will you provide one shred of evidence stating such.

 

There is no need to provide any more shreds of evidence, it's already ubiquitously abundant, from the Twins own mouths and actions.

[shs_59]

I love the trade

 

Meyer is a B+ guy for me.

 

Gibson and Berrios are only B's

 

I'd have Meyer right behind Sano and Buxton #3 in our system.

 

what bugs me a bit, is the fact we only got just 1 prospect for DENARD SPAN one of the better lead-off hitting CF's in BASEBALL. and his team friendly contract.

 

I would of liked to have Sammy Solis or Rick Hague or Jeff Kobernus in this deal as well. But its more of a quibble.

[jokin]

I love the trade

 

Meyer is a B+ guy for me.

 

Gibson and Berrios are only B's

 

I'd have Meyer right behind Sano and Buxton #3 in our system.

 

what bugs me a bit, is the fact we only got just 1 prospect for DENARD SPAN one of the better lead-off hitting CF's in BASEBALL. and his team friendly contract.

I would of liked to have Sammy Solis or Rick Hague or Jeff Kobernus in this deal as well. But its more of a quibble.

 

THIS. You nailed it. I will quibble though, Span's team-friendly contract alone should have been valuable enough to throw in a secondary ML arm or Middle Infield prospect to the deal.

[PseudoSABR]

Terry Ryan and PPMPPPP

 

In the category of "Payroll Paring Moves of Proven Players at Premium Positions", Ryan definitely has Smith beaten and deserves some credit. Hardy for Hoey ranks near an all-time low in Twins trading annals. Span for Meyer looks somewhat better, on paper anyways.

 

Let's look at some comparable numbers:

 

Jim Hoey 6'6"/205#s

Hoey combined numbers at age 23 playing at 3 levels (A/A+/AA):

 

IP 51/ERA 2.28/WHIP 1.11/K^9 12.9/BB^9 3.2

 

Alex Meyer 6'9"/220#s

Meyer combined numbers at age 22 at 2 levels (A/A+):

 

IP 129/ERA 2.86/WHIP 1.10/K^9 9.7/BB^9 3.1

 

Obviously, Meyer achieved the bulk of his numbers as a starter, so the comp is less than exact, but still... both pitchers come advertised with major mechanics issues.

Totally disingenuous comparison, and yet another reason not to take you seriously.

[twinstalker]

Keith Law is more respected than Dave Cameron? I think that is probably true among people who don't understand sabermetrics as well. In the same way Souhan is probably more respected than Gleeman.

[TheLeviathan]

Based on comments from Ryan on 1500espn on Monday and earlier in the offseason, he doesn't want to enter a prolonged rebuilding operation, so I would assume other moves are coming. Other than just possibly re-signing Liriano.

 

Ryan's definition of "prolonged" may be a tad different than others. If you shave his last rebuild in half it's still 3-4 years. In the midst of these ridiculous offseason predictions floating around here I've always felt it's better to build around your best nucleus of talent. Mauer is an elite hitter, but he, by himself, is not a nucleus. The group that was around him has fallen apart for a variety of reasons. Clutching to some faint hope of that isn't in the organization's best long-term interests. Ryan is sharp and I think the moves so far this year indicate his conclusion about the direction to take this team. Three years isn't a terribly long rebuild, especially since many of the Twins future nucleus could be seen for extended looks as soon as a year and a half into his tenure.

[jokin]

Terry Ryan and PPMPPPP

 

In the category of "Payroll Paring Moves of Proven Players at Premium Positions", Ryan definitely has Smith beaten and deserves some credit. Hardy for Hoey ranks near an all-time low in Twins trading annals. Span for Meyer looks somewhat better, on paper anyways.

 

Let's look at some comparable numbers:

 

Jim Hoey 6'6"/205#s

Hoey combined numbers at age 23 playing at 3 levels (A/A+/AA):

 

IP 51/ERA 2.28/WHIP 1.11/K^9 12.9/BB^9 3.2

 

Alex Meyer 6'9"/220#s

Meyer combined numbers at age 22 at 2 levels (A/A+):

 

IP 129/ERA 2.86/WHIP 1.10/K^9 9.7/BB^9 3.1

 

Obviously, Meyer achieved the bulk of his numbers as a starter, so the comp is less than exact, but still... both pitchers come advertised with major mechanics issues.

Totally disingenuous comparison, and yet another reason not to take you seriously.

 

Elaborate please on what is disingenuous about the comparisons, specifically.

[kab21]

Keith Law is more respected than Dave Cameron? I think that is probably true among people who don't understand sabermetrics as well. In the same way Souhan is probably more respected than Gleeman.

 

I think sabermetrics would say that Dave Cameron is significantly overrated. And this is coming from someone that understands and uses sabermetrics a lot.

[lightfoot789]

Love the Trade. I love the idea of having a solid young team from 2014 thru 2020 with complete control of most of my young contracts. It beats piecing players together every year like the Twins have been doing for recent years. The Brewers built their team with Fielder; Weeks; Hart; Giardo; & Hardy; (young guys) and found gems like Braun in later draft. The Twins can form a very solid team in 2014 with young prospects and continue to build thru free agency because they will have the money to pay top level FA's in 2014; 2015 & 2016. Great Trade & Start to rebuilding Twins organization.

[beckmt]

I also like the trade. It is a shot, but you win with pitching and the Twins do not have enough. Hope it works out, but room also has to be cleared for the outfielders on the way up. No saying if Hicks or Arcia or others can be better than Span, but this trade is the type the Twins should be making

[lightfoot789]

The Cardinals are another organization who stays great thru the draft 1st. Twins are getting there. Twins also have some hidden Gems in minors who can become stars (M. Kepler; J. Palanco; N. Roberts; R. Jiminez; A. Walker; T. Harrison; Clement; and all those young pitchers have a chance to be special). Give the change in philosophy a chance.

[John Bonnes]

Mark Sheldon, who is MLB.com's Reds beat writer (and used to be the Twins) wrote a bit about the trade. Basically, he's surprised that the Reds, who he thinks have arms that are closer to major-league ready, didn't make this move. He opines that the Twins must have really liked Meyer. It was an interesting though. His write-up is here:

 

http://marksheldon.mlblogs.com/2012/11/29/span-to-nationals-in-trade/

[DaveW]

Keith Law is more respected than Dave Cameron? I think that is probably true among people who don't understand sabermetrics as well. In the same way Souhan is probably more respected than Gleeman.

 

I think sabermetrics would say that Dave Cameron is significantly overrated. And this is coming from someone that understands and uses sabermetrics a lot.

+1

 

Also Keith Law knows plenty about sabermetrics.... we aren't exactly talking about Joe Morgan here.

I like Cameron and all, but I don't think he is even close to the end all be all on the subject, he puts a ton of personal bias into the majority of his articles, which is fine, but again like Kab says he is a over rated quite a bit.

[Teddy]

Wikipedia, mikeee? Really? Yeah, because that's such a bastion of gospel truth.

[bird]

Sickels ranked Meyer #28 among his pitching prospects in 2012. Detroit, Chicago, and Cleveland did not have a single name on the list of 50 prospects. The only AL West prospect on his list is KC's Jake Odorizzi, rated slightly higher than Meyer.

[Otto von Ballpark]

You can see Meyer's college stats here:

 

http://www.thebaseballcube.com/players/profile.asp?P=alex-meyer-3

 

His previous high innings total was 101, so perhaps he tired later this season in high-A. He was "shut down" at 129 innings, Strasburg-style. I like that he's already made progress with control -- hopefully the Twins can keep his K rate up.

 

Here's a cool article about him and his pitches:

 

http://www.milb.com/news/article.jsp?ymd=20120831&content_id=37671602&vkey=news_milb&fext=.jsp

[jokin]

Inevitable yes, but this is what I was afraid of, the inevitable reprecussions from the media:

 

. "

[NoCryingInBaseball]

I like the trade, but it seems that the Twins are still short about three pitchers for the starting rotation. I assume the Twins will be in the market for a decent Free Agent and a 3rd tier type but the names we hear in rumors are scary. Liriano and Pavano? Say it ain’t so!

 

I am now beginning to wonder if Terry Ryan might be planning another trade and dump most of Morneau’s salary this season for a starter. That would mean Parmelee would play 1st and one of the two guys (Oswaldo Arcia and Aaron Hicks) that are expected to see major league action this year would earn a starting role in the outfield.

Looks like next week will be interesting!