Another major trade

Spencer picks up another potentially high end starter, although Verlander has an awful lot of questions associated with him. Initially I wasn't quite sure what to make of this deal. Based on names alone, it seems like Spencer comes out ahead, but Verlander has been absolutely horrible so far this year.

For Caleb, the deal addresses his weakness in the outfield, without giving up any players that he was currently starting every week. Damon should be good for a 10 to 15 homerun season with 20 bags, which is looking like it will be a competitive category, especially with Spencer giving up Damon. He'll contribute with runs, but he won't contribute much to RBI totals or address the problems with average. Eveland is a solid, albeit unspectacular starter, pretty much the exact opposite of Verlander. Although he won't offer lofty strikeout totals, he and Greg Smith provide solid fall back options if injuries or ineffectiveness pop up with his pitching staff. I'm not sure Blalock is worth much in this deal. With such a small sample size before he got injured (again), it is hard to say whether or not he had turned a corner, or was just having a hot streak.

For Spencer, this is another attempt to roll the dice on pitching. As I commented before, the only way Spencer is competitive this year is if his pitching staff manages to turn it around. Verlander showed last year that he has the ability to dominate, and the team keeps saying there isn't anything physically wrong with him. I did hear Keith Law say that Verlander seems to be tiring very early in games, as early as the 3rd inning, and that perhaps the IP on a young arm are starting to catch up with him, just like they did for Bonderman. Also, it isn't as if Verlander has been unlucky this year. His strikeouts are way down (5.0/9) and his walks are way up (3.7/9), leading to a QERA of 5.40, not particularly different than his current ERA of 6. However, even if Verlander doesn't turn it around, Spencer ends up with a potentially valuable keeper in Saltamacchia.

Overall, I think I like this deal better for Spencer than for Caleb. He gets the high risk / high reward gamble relatively cheaply (Damon can easily be replaced in his line-up), and I'm just not sure that Caleb is significantly better off after this trade. He could have held onto Jose Guillen and waited on a Verlander turn around. Thanks to some good work on the waiver wire he had the pitching depth to wait it out. Although the stolen bases will definitely help, but I think the price was too high for a marginal upgrade.

Some thoughts on Cano

At first I thought that Spencer was making a mistake giving up Cano and Baldelli, two solid young players with keeper possibilities. Of all the teams, he had one that could sacrifice speed from a middle infielder for batting average (which is lacking from speedsters like Podsednik or Figgins) and a bunch of runs from the Yankees strong lineup. However, looking more closely at Robinson Cano's stats, this season is looking like an absolute disaster for him unless he quickly develops more plate discipline. Unlike Dye (or Baldelli for that matter), Cano has a perfectly reasonable BABIP of 0.290. His success in 2005 (0.320) and especially 2006 (0.363) was driven by BABIP. On top of the BABIP drop, he also isn't putting the ball in play nearly as often. His strike out rate is up from 10% and 12% all the way up to 20%. A high strikeout rate isn't necessarily bad, lots of excellent power hitters have high rates, but for someone who doesn't hit a lot of homeruns and relies on putting the ball in play and legging out a single that kind of spike in K rate cripples their value.

The reason his numbers are down is pretty clear - he's chasing an awful lot of bad pitches. According to the Stats Inc. data available on ESPN, he's chasing around 50% of pitches inside (58% up and in, 53% in, 41% down and in). He's also chasing 76% of the pitches that are high and over the middle, which is the highest percentage I could find doing a quick search for some notorious hackers.

If Cano can stop chasing pitches and Baldelli can stay healthy, Youk! might come out ahead on this one. But Dye seems like a much safer better bounce-back possibility to me, even if he isn't worth a keeper slot. He's also the best player in the trade, and Youk! doesn't have a clear starting spot for Baldelli (or Cano for that matter if Jose Lopez can match his 2006 season), so Spencer's everyday line-up gets a much needed power and RBI boost.