Twins Trade Nolasco, Meyer, Cash To Angels For Hector Santiago

I live about 15 miles from Angel Stadium and coach HS baseball with a TON of Angel fans in my ear.

Santiago is 100 million times more popular with Angel fans than Ricky Fiasco is with Twins fans.

Hell, Donald Trump is more popular with illegal immigrants than Ricky Fiasco is with Twins fans

Not what I hear when listening to the games when driving, but ok. Nolasco is more disliked if you like. 100 million times ? hmmmmmm. The lack of going deep in starts was the main reason. Hard to rate dislike. Posters have done a good job documenting Santigo's work. I don't know that living within 15 miles of the stadium makes anything less or more true. Edited August 2, 2016 by h2oface

 

Interesting.  It appears his BABIP is fueled by his rather extreme FB tendencies: 47% this year compared to 34% league average.  He's also been above average at getting infield fly balls (5% better this year).  He's right at average for HR/FB, meaning the difference probably isn't his ability to stay in the ballpark in general.  In fact, due to his FB tendencies, we'd expect greater than average HR allowed, a bad combination when combined with high BB's.  You would think the walks and HR's would more than compensate for the fact that fly balls turn into outs at the highest rate (Low BABIP).  Something other than pop ups and K's are keeping those walks from scoring apparently.  

New hypothesis: Santiago gives up a disproportionate amount of solo home runs, attacking hitters with no one on base.  Santiago then picks when a runner gets on, looking for the pop up or strike out.  He's good at getting both.  His high pitch counts and short outings indicate picking.  Basically, he'd rather walk in a run than give up a grand slam.  Which is fine as long as he doesn't walk in a run then give up a grand slam.  So you would look at total baserunners/9ip and multiply by HR/9ip, and that would be the expected amount of runs plated HR's.  Then compare with the actual number of runs plated by the HR to remove even more luck out of the equation (premise whether a ball is caught or HR is somewhat luck).  Then look for trends to see if a pitcher has a skill of avoiding more damaging HR or is more or less lucky.  I get most of this would be within expected ranges for normal calculation of FIP, but for situations where you're looking at potential outliers, figuring out where the missing runs have gone (or in Nolasco's case, where extra runs came from) could be a useful tool .


 

 

Seems, really anti-Twinsian. Don't they want pitchers to attack with runners on base? I think he'll be giving up the grand salamis in no time with us. The Twins staff as a whole has the 8th highest HR/FB ratio and 28th worst in LOB%. 

 

Most people Meyer's size aren't frontline starters.  Not sure why that is. Maybe they have hard time consistently getting the ball in the low part of the zone, I don't know. There's obviously one glaring exception to the rule, but most people aren't inner circle HOF type pitcher like Big Unit.

 

it's hard to repeat mechanics, have a consistent release point, etc with levers that large. Which is why the Twins' love for ridiculously tall pitchers is weird. It's not any kind of market inefficiency, like short pitchers. 

 

 

 

And on top of that we exchanged Meyer, for arguably a lesser prospect: http://www.fangraphs.com/blogs/projecting-the-prospects-traded-yesterday/ According to Chris Mitchell's new and improved KATOH projection system for minor leaguers, Meyer, despite being slightly older and not-pitching much this year, still likes him better, pegging him to be worth 1.9 WAR over his career, vs 0.4 for Busenitz. Plus, the same criticisms I had for being against acquiring Light in the Abad trade I'd give here. If they were going to include Meyer, I'd have asked for a prospect lower in the minors (and yes, farther away), but with more upside. 

 

Furthermore, the fact that they didn't pull the trigger on Suzuki or Kintzler trades, which seemed like relative no-brainers (especially with demand as high as it is for C and RP this year) to me are huge failures. Plus, not selling Santana as pitching is always in demand at the deadline, despite getting Mejia and Santiago as rotation pieces seems incredibly short-sighted and gives additional credence to the idea that the Twins see themselves as competitors next year. 

If that's all they ever turn out to be, it doesn't really matter. 1.5 WAR over a career is nothing.

I really don't see how Santiago could be more hated than Ricky. For one, Ricky has been much worse.

 

For two, Ricky was really the first big free agent splash we ever made. In hindsight, the excitement when he signed was not because of him but what he represented. A new field, our first jump into the big kid pool.

 

So to see our fist free agent falter like that, then get rep after rep because of the deal. And knowing we may not want to jump back in the big kid pool again.....I just don't see it.

Never said hated. I said they were just as tired of him as the Twins were of Nolasco. I stand by my perception. Please don't put words in my mouth that I didn't say.

 

I originally also stated that this trade was a big so what and happy to not have to watch Nolasco grab his balls anymore.

Edited August 2, 2016 by h2oface

 

If that's all they ever turn out to be, it doesn't really matter. 1.5 WAR over a career is nothing.

 

Like I mentioned earlier, the return of each individual trade I felt is fair, the Twins got a marginally better ML starter back and gave up a marginally better prospect. But, it's the direction they went with the trade is why I'm not a fan. 

 

Edit: Added missing words

Edited August 2, 2016 by d-mac

 

Great post. I agree with pretty much every word of this.

If Santiago blocks May from getting another look in the rotation, then I think it makes the trade and instant loss, regardless of how Meyer turns out.

 

Agreed. In a vacuum, both the Abad and Nolasco trades where fair, but unfortunately that's not how trades are made or how they should be viewed. Neither help us much in the 2018 and beyond time frame, which is where the direction Twins should have been looking to go. May, Duffey in the rotation do help us, maybe they won't pan out, but they get next year to gain experience/ work on establishing themselves while we still aren't competing. They can be moved the pen relatively easy if they don't work out. And who knows, we could get some young, cost controlled starters that could end up in the #2-4 range. 

I don't know that living within 15 miles of the stadium makes anything less or more true.

 

It doesn't, but it exposes me to more Angels fans/media and less Dodgers fans/ media.

My friends are predominantly Angel fans (poor bleepers!) and I hear their complaints.

It just sounds like Santiago is not as hated as Ricky Fiasco is on TD and STRIB blogs.

Again, I never said hate. I said were just as tired of...... you can hate if you like, but your words, not mine.

Light is most likely Jim Hoey.

Having him on the 40 man means he most likely gets a shot before guys who might be better than him, but aren't in the 40 man.

I think D Mac was saying that we'd be better served, as a rebuilding team, by targeting an A ball prospect who doesn't need a 40 man roster spot.

Agree about the Hoey comparison. But I love trades for close, and have had enough of takes forever or never. My bet is he never sees the light of the show, or very little of it, especially with the walks and Twins Way.

 

 [Adding] Santiago as rotation pieces seems incredibly short-sighted and gives additional credence to the idea that the Twins see themselves as competitors next year. 

No offense, but there seems to be a bit of confirmation bias going on throughout your post.  You start with the assumption that the Twins are trading with the purpose of being competitive next year, and your analysis and conclusions lean heavily in that favor without really considering the evidence that points to the contrary view.

 

Mejia, Light, and Busenitz are all under team control for six years; that they might be useful in 2017 isn't indicative of the view that the Twins are hellbent on competing next year; rather it's an indication that there's less variance in such players as they are closer to the majors.  Low A guys are more sexy I suppose, but AAA/AA prospects have far better opportunity to contribute in the near and LONG term future. 

 

Turning two relatively no-value-or-NEGATIVE-value assets into Santiago (and Besenitz) is a coup.  Santiago is an asset, Nolasco was not.  Santiago at worse can be non-tendered this year.   If he produces next year and the team struggles, he can be traded as a rental at the deadline, likely to fetch far more value than Nolasco would in his place.  And whether we want to acknowledge it or not, we still need starting pitchers to bridge the gap to the talent that has only briefly appeared in AA.   There's simply nothing short sighted about flipping Nolasco for Santiago, because you flipped a negative-asset for a potentially low-risk positive asset. 

 

The sad truth of this deadline is that the Twins really didn't have that many valuable assets to trade, if you were expecting better deals than the one's we got, I think you overvalued Nunez, Nolasco, Meyer, and Abad.  

 

I agree, I was also disappointed to see Suzuki not get traded, but I don't agree on Santana.  

 

 

Edited August 3, 2016 by PseudoSABR

Meyer is now his new team's 12th ranked prospect.  This team has the worst farm system in baseball.

 

It is pretty clear that Meyer had some value, to make the trade happen at all.

That the Angel's believed he had value or was worth Santiago (and acquiring Nolasco) doesn't really mean he generally had much value, right?  Shoulder injuries, age, and lack of recent, sustained success point towards nominal value.  

 

In any case, according to one writer at Fangraphs Meyer has as much future value as Busenitz. 

 

And are you really suggesting that the Twins could get more for Nolasco than Santiago at next year's deadline? Really? That's what you're going with?

 

Agreed that we didn't have great assets to deal, so I too am generally satisfied with the deadline.

 

You could have just said this instead of picking nits. 

 

Meyer is someone else's buy-low hope and a prayer.  He had no value to this team and no foreseeable value in trade. To leverage someone's hope and a prayer into taking Nolasco is an unqualified victory.

Victory is mine, victory is mine. Great day in the morning, people, victory is mine. I drink from the keg of glory, Donna. Bring me the finest muffins and bagels in all the land.