It's strange that a top-flight pitching talent would be traded five times, but that's exactly what happened to Curt Schilling, CBS Sports' Dayn Perry points out. Schilling had been traded three times before his career really got going as a 25-year-old with the Phillies in 1992. As one might imagine, the teams that traded Schilling didn't make out very well — he was dealt with Brady Anderson for Mike Boddicker, then with Steve Finley and Pete Harnisch for Glenn Davis, then straight-up for Jason Grimsley. By that time the Phillies traded him, he was very valuable, but the Phillies only got Vicente Padilla and change for him, and when the Diamondbacks dealt him, the only players they got who turned out to have value were Jorge De La Rosa and Brandon Lyon. Here are more notes from around baseball.
- The Royals are interested in free agent DH/1B Kendrys Morales, Jim Duquette of MLB Network Radio tweets. The Royals already have a similar player in Billy Butler, but Duquette also notes that signing Morales would give the Royals the chance to trade Butler for pitching. The Royals would have to sacrifice their first-round pick, No. 18 overall, if they were to sign Morales, who declined a qualifying offer.
- Scott Podsednik is interested in continuing his career, Jason Mastrodonato of MassLive.com writes. The outfielder, who will be 38 in March, hit .302/.322/.352 with eight stolen bases in 216 plate appearances with the Red Sox in 2012. He did not play in 2013.
Well, Schilling was not very good until he hit 30. You could understand the Red Sox, Baltimore and Houston trading him. Phillies and Arizona traded him for financial reasons.
He was good from 92 on (age 25) and was the ace for the 93 WS team. He had some injury plagued seasons and was on some terrible Phillies teams in his late 20s.
I am scratching my head here.
The Royals drafted Butler.
In my opinion, he is an elite hitter. In other baseball types views, he is not.
He is popular with the fans.
Although while he is probably annoyed that he is a DH only, he is happy in KC.
I think it would be a bit silly for the Royals to trade Butler and sign Morales.
I think Duquette is wrong here and I am not impressed, just I am not impressed with what his brother Dan is doing with the Orioles!
especially considering they’d lose the 18th pick in the draft. won’t somebody please think of the children?
Well if they can trade Butler for a solid starter, then signing Morales would be a positive thing. The 18th pick in the draft is not going to help you next year and may never help you, but a quality starter will.
It would probably be more efficient to try and sign Ubaldo or another free agent, but this would work as well.
I assume the Royals would only do this if they knew they had a good offer for Butler. Unfortunately I don’t see anyone giving up a decent starting pitcher for Butler, who has good advanced stats, but isn’t a big power guy and isn’t a good defensive player.
I really think they’d be better off signing a starting FA pitcher, but he’ll probably cost more money than Morales and this is the Royals after all.
I think Butler would probably be attractive to all of those teams that would like Morales or Cruz without giving up a 1st rounder. I think KC could exploit that and possibly get a nice package from Baltimore (possibly picking up Gausman if the O’s have lost faith) or San Francisco another team needing some offense.
It baffles me also. The baseball Stat people, who proclaim to know it all? Seem to think that a guy like Butler that gets on base at a .350-.370 clip each and every year, but is pretty much a liability in the field should be traded.
It is David ortiz, minus a few HR. Morales doesn’t have much more power than Butler and I’d take Butler over Morales anyway.
Duquette is shrewd and sometimes ignores some of the advanced stats nonsense. Maybe he will make a pitch for Butler. The O’s need a big OBP guy and Butler fits that bill.
Idk if he’s an elite hitter but he’s definitely a very good one.He’s put up solid numbers and is a good offensive player.I can’t speak to the defense since I’ve never seen him play enough but obviously not that great considering he’s a permanent DH.The Morales thing works from a sense that Morales could be a better defender at 1st than Butler is.
While Butler undoubtedly has more on-base ability than Morales, their batting averages are often near comparable. This would indicate that the on-base difference is mostly in regards to their plate approaches. While Morales is a difficult player to assess due to a rather significant injury leaving a hole in his stats, recent performance would indicate he is back to his old self. Out of six years in which they both played, Morales has had a higher slugging percentage four times. Omitting injury years, Morales slugs just under .500 while Butler is closer to .460. Is this good enough reason to make the switch? It all depends on how the Royals want to build their lineup. I say go for it
Also worth noting is the possibility that the Royals could get a pitcher back for Butler in trade who they may be more comfortable with than what the free agent market has available, if not in terms of talent then dollars. The draft pick is interesting but has been a little overrated since the most recent CBA and a team with a legitimate chance to compete for the AL Central division in 2014 should be willing to look past that.
In my opinion, the Royals should trade Butler for a starter that is somewhat cheap, sign Morales, and wait for Sanatna to come crawling back
That aint happening Santana will sign for more money than the Royals can afford to pitch out there.
This whole thing is baffling to me, seems like a lot of work to just avoid an $8 million payday for Butler. Pay the man, he’s earned it!
Those that are saying the Royals need to just go out and sign a Starting Rotation Guy are on the money. Get someone on a three year 7.5 to 9 mil that has above average stats, their out there.
It’s really puzzling to me why the royals would even consider sacrificing their #18 overall pick in order to trade billy butler for pitching. That pick seems to be far more valuable to me. I think a better approach would be to pass on morales, let butler play…see where they are at the all star break and reassess their needs via trade at that point. Morales is a fine player but are the royals a good fit? Is losing #18 overall worth it? Hmm.
So what are they going to do for a starter? If Morales and Butler are about equal, then you are basically trading your #18 pick for whatever starter/package Butler can bring back which will be better than what you could get from the #18 pick.
Sign a free agent starter.
Signing a free agent starter is not in KC’s budget especially with the inflated salaries to average starters this offseason especially since they will be looking to sign Shields to an extension more than likely. Trading Butler for a decent starter with Baltimore perhaps could net you maybe Britton and a high upside prospect or maybe even Gausman is Baltimore gets desperate.
As far as the #18 pick goes, that pick range (17-26) has a success rate (career WAR of 8.0 or higher) of around 12%. I did the math earlier this year when discussing the Orioles signing Morales.
At some point the Royals are going to have to have some faith in their own system. Shields, Guthrie and Vargas are all imports, so is it the belief that home-grown products like Duffy and Ventura can’t complete the rotation? If so, then it’s time for a complete overhaul of the scouting and player development departments, since they haven’t produced a single reliable starting pitcher in GMDM’s seven years.
Replacing Butler with Morales is at best a lateral offensive move (both have 5.1 oWAR over last two years) which adds to payroll, Morales will cost at least $15M, more than Butler’s team option in 2015, and that’s not even factoring in how much the quality SP that would be acquired for Butler would cost — probably as much as Butler’s current $8M, which means re-signing Santana would be as financially feasible. It also deprives the Royals of a draft pick and team leader. It’s not even a defensive upgrade due to Morales’ declining skills; his -1.5 dWAR in 2013 was the same as Butler’s, although with more innings, of course.
$15 million? Well of course I wouldn’t sign him for that much. However, I think they can get him much cheaper. Maybe a 3 year/30 million deal in late February or even earlier if Morales realizes his market is dry. No one is going to sign him for $15 million per, well no one sane anyway. Then you have a 3 year replacement for Butler and whatever trade package Butler can bring back, perhaps a good starter or a reliever and a prospect or two.
So you see Morales signing for less than the $14.1M qualifying offer? Right now, the Royals are committed to Butler for 1 yr. at $8M or two for $20.5M, so I don’t see a substantial upside to giving Morales for $30/3 and then having to add payroll for the SP who the Royals acquire for Butler. I just don’t see the logic, especially when you’re not making a significant offensive upgrade. It reminds me of “Trader” Frank Lane, who seemed to deal just for the sake of it without any real plan.
I don’t see him signing for less than the 14.1 QO for one year, but I could him signing for less than that AAV on a three year deal. If nobody is offering $14 million and the market only offers $10 million…he will take it rather than sit out and make $0.
The upside is that you get an extra year of the same type of player as Butler for the same cost. Resigning Butler will be more expensive. Trading to add salary is what you do when you are working toward a playoff run. Otherwise why not just sell off everything and fight Houston for the first pick next year.
I get the impression that you view these guys as interchangeable parts without factoring in the team dynamic. Butler is one of the team’s leaders, a role Morales will not necessarily replace. It’s like the Cardinals saying they could find a pitcher of comparable stats to replace Wainwright, but not taking into account that he’s an important player in the clubhouse.
If the Royals are going to add payroll, they would be just as well off re-signing Santana. Maybe they could get him on a $30M/3 deal, as you suggest Morales might do if the market dries up, and not lose a 1st-round draft pick in the process.
Point taken on the clubhouse leadership role, but the Royals have been rumored to be shopping Butler even without a Morales signing. Also they are unlikely to sign Butler to a long term deal and Morales could be a transitional player signed to an extra year or two. Morales might not have a clubhouse presence like Butler immediately, but he is a solid veteran that could command respect in the clubhouse fairly quickly.
If they were to resign Santana instead of signing Morales, the would still lose a 1st round pick. Santana has the same compensation as Morales so if he signs elsewhere the Royals gain a 1st.
Royals have five hot arms in the mix for the 2nd and 5th rotation spots and bringing in an outsider pitcher just delays the development and production of a Duffy or Ventura or Zimmer. There isn’t an FA with equivalent ceiling to any of those three.
But if they have plans on making the postseason then they need a developed starter and not a struggling year like Hosmer and Moustakas and all of the rest of the top prospects. Their ceiling is likely to not be hit in 2014 and the Royals seem to be angling for a playoff run now.
Duffy is now at 100% after Tommy Johns, Ventura and Zimmer are not ready for a full seasons work in the back of the rotation and not really sure they are ready for more than spot starts. Royals need to actually see about securing a solid #2 rotation guy so that they don’t have to risk putting Hochever ( a true disappointment) or Davis (a potential disappointment) in the rotation.
My guess is they start with Hoch or Davis in the rotation with Ventura at Omaha for service time considerations, then call him up. I don’t see the Royals either trading important pieces and prospects or committing big money and several years to an FA. Makes no sense to leave any of the Young Guns in Omaha longer than needed for their development. Better is to spend the money on extending Shields and some others and bet on the system to produce the next #2. Cardinals had good luck with two rookie starters last year.
Okay are you planning on getting the Cardinals rookie starters from 2013 to join the Royals or do you think all rookies will perform that well? Neither is going to happen. The Cardinals rookie performance in 2013 is the very definition of an outlier.
Possible, but we won’t know ’til it’s tried. We have three Young Guns, so that eliminates the need for “all”. One of three good, two of three great, three of three and trade Guthrie.
0 of three = 10 more years in last place while rebuilding the farm for another go around. This is the Royals, not a big market team. They are only going to have a 4-5 year window for playoff contention before young guys leave for the big money. And before you say the Rays, they have only been competitive for 5 years after 11 years of utter futility at the start of their franchise.
Small market teams have to use prospects for proven talent. No matter how high the ceiling is for a prospect, they are still a gamble, and a pretty big one at that. The best way for small market teams to use the majority of them is as trade chips. You just have to hope that the ones you keep are the ones that work out. The Yankees, Dodgers, and Red Sox can afford to whiff on prospects because they can just buy a replacement in the next offseason. The Royals can’t do that.
Also, why would a team looking for offense trade a pitcher, when they could just sign Morales and hang on to the pitching depth? The proposals don’t seem to make much sense…
Check out the list of #18 picks since the beginning of time, at baseball-reference.com/draft/index.cgi?overall_pic…. You’ll see that other than late bloomer RA Dickey in 1996, you have to go back to 1974 (Willie Wilson, Royals) to find a real impact player on that list. There’s a possibility Sonny Gray (2011) or Corey Seager (2012) could be really good as well (too early to tell) but the point is that overall, losing the #18 pick is by no means a franchise-crushing blow.
ortiz is not a liability in the field. he isn’t a gold glover and he is more valuable to the team at dh because he stays healthy and he is a guy who can thrive without getting into the field.
Are you talking about David Ortiz? The guy that’s never played more than 70 games in the field and somehow put up a negative UZR in only 6 games at 1B last year? Yeah, think he’s a bit of a liability.
small sample size over career. watch him play. he doesn’t hurt the team when he plays in the field.
Jorge De La Rosa might be the only pitcher who got BETTER after going to Colorado.
Tyler Chatwood is better in Colorado than in LA. Jason Jennings was much better in Colorado than everywhere else. Pedro Astacio was much better in Colorado if you factor in park effects.
Chatwood is still pretty young, Jennings started out in COL and Astacio was still unbearable.
Yes but they were better in Colorado than elsewhere. Astacio had his best year as a Rockie even though he was frustrating at times.
Chatwood only had 1 season in Anaheim before the trade and his call up was out of need due to injury. He was not expected on the big league roster his lone season. The Angels were foolish to let him go but it is what it is. But I would not say his 1 season in Anaheim is a good comparison to his 2 now with Colorado.
They need Bultler to kill tiger pitching.
But then where will the royals play betancourt?
Hey Royals, here’s a novel idea.
Keep Billy Butler and sign a Free Agent SP.
How many times was Cliff Lee traded and for what? He’s got to be the most traveled ace of this era…
i got curious about that too , he got drafted 3 times apparently ! I checked B-R and he’s been traded 4 times.
The really curious about those 4 trades is that each time Lee was on the good side of an extremely unbalanced trade. In all three trades involving him for prospects, the prospects pretty much failed to deliver and everyone knows about the Montreal Colon debacle.
Don’t forget Dan Haren. He was an ace for several years, but probably isn’t anymore.
That was the first thing that I thought of too.
Podsednik should find somewhere to play, if he can hit near .300 with solid defense, I’m sure someone would want him.
He could be a great placeholder for Gregory Polanco. He won’t hit 30 homers, but gives the Pirates more speed and a guaranteed top of the order hitter.
I don’t understand why Pods has such a hard time finding a job, unless it’s personal reasons. He also missed all of 2011. His last 3 seasons that he did play, his 162 game averages (329 game sample size) have him at a .300 BA, a .344 OBP and 55 SB’s! If he can still run like that, and hit even close to that, then he shouldn’t have that much trouble at least finding a part time job.
It’s probably because he’s a 37-year-old OF who lacks power (88 career OPS+, 83 in 2013) and is only average defensively. Any club that can’t find that on its AAA roster is so beyond hope that signing Podsednik isn’t going to do it any good.
There are a lot of problems with a Royals plan to trade Butler for pitching. First they need to sign Morales or be sure that he will sign with them. That takes away a lot of their leverage since teams know that they essentially have to trade him from a fiscal and positional standpoint. Then they need to find a team that has a DH slot to dedicate to Butler that has pitching to spare that will help the Royals win and 2014 and be willing to part with it. That’s a tall order and a rather unrealistic one.
For that matter, why would a team trade a quality SP for Butler when it could simply sign Morales? The value of the kind of SP that the Royals would accept for Butler would be valued at least as high as a No. 18 pick and the difference in the contracts between Butler and Morales.
My wonder is the source of all this speculation on dealing Butler? Has anybody provided compelling evidence that the Royals’ FO is actively looking to make such a move? The best I’ve been able to glean is that the Royals would consider moving Butler under the right circumstances, but is not necessarily shopping him.
Some teams would rather trade a veteran starter that they can’t resign instead of losing a draft pick for a player. For example, David Price is worth much more than the #18 pick, but Tampa would trade him for a package including Butler instead of signing Morales and losing their first round pick. There is no way that example will happen, but you get my point.
As far as compelling evidence…this site is called MLB Trade RUMORS not MLB Trade Proof.
I’d love to see Pods back in MLB. He can play a respectable all 3 OF positions, still could steal a base with Boston pretty much any time in 2012, was a decent slap hitter then, just like he always was. he takes the Marlin Byrd “instant weight lifting course” and maybe he to could come up with a dozen or so HR out of the blue and sign a 2/16m contract after the 2014 season, like Byrd just did when Byrd couldn’t even get an extra base hit during the 2012 season (1), so Pods..All is not lost if you want to try your luck…
Edit:
My mistake.. Looked and Byrd had a whopping *3* XBH during the entire 2012 season.
how many xbh did you have?
My age (well over 50), overall health.. If i was to take that same overnight course Byrd and others did.. you just never know….
Don’t forget who Morale’s agent is;the reason he hasn’t signed anywhere.
If the Royals signed Morales and traded Butler the fans would be outraged. What a horrible rumor when Dayton has already stated that Butler would not be traded. Plus Butler is a way better hitter even in a down year like last year and costs less. Plus the Royals would lose a first round pick. Just sign Santana and you have a solid team.