Effectively Wild: A FanGraphs Baseball Podcast - Effectively Wild Episode 934: A Few Points of Trade-Deadline Discussion

Episode Date: August 2, 2016

Ben and Sam discuss Jonathan Lucroy, Rich Hill, the rebuilding Yankees, the price of relievers and multiple trade-deadline rumors they had trouble believing.

I said all this is all that I know. It's with me wherever I go. It's with me when I need a friend. It brings me good weather. It keeps me together. It picks me up with love Sam Miller along with Ben Lindberg of The Ringer. Hey, Ben. Hello. I used a lot of the play index yesterday, in fact. Yeah, I'm sure you did. It was a big day for play indexing. Yeah, it was. I suppose we'll talk about whatever trades were inspired to start talking about, but do you have anything before that? I don't think I do. I've been in full deadline mode for a couple days, so I haven't had any other independent thoughts Alright well I also don't have anything Although I will Say that I'm kind of excited

Later this week We're going to talk about Integrity Windows So pretty excited About that Do you know what Integrity Windows are? No It's a window company They advertise at baseball games oh okay

so there you go they've had advertised poorly you might say that all right uh okie doke um so i guess let's see you can steer this anywhere you want it to go if you want but probably the biggest most interesting thing that uh happened happened a couple days ago so we're a little bit late uh but then it played out over the course of the next couple days. And now Jonathan Lucroy is a Texas Ranger. And he got that way because he turned down a trade to the Cleveland Indians. Lucroy has been sort of strangely vocal about not wanting to be in Milwaukee as long as they sucked, and they still suck and continue to suck. And when he got traded to a contender, though, he did what people with no trade clauses often do. He used that leverage to try to get a better contract status for himself. It did not work,

which I think anybody looking at what he was asking for would have seen that it wouldn't work. He ended up not going to Cleveland, but he got traded to Texas anyway, where his no trade clause did not apply because he had a limited no trade clause. So I don't know if you had any strong emotion when this was happening. It sort of feels like old now, but it's also to some degree maybe the most interesting thing that happened at the trade deadline because we saw talked so much about wanting to play for a winner that he kind of painted himself into a corner a little bit where, you know, he was saying he wanted to play for a contending team at the beginning of the season. He was saying that when he demanded a trade or politely requested a trade over the winter. And he was saying that as recently as June in an interview. And obviously, that was not the only consideration for him, nor should it

have been. But it kind of put him in an awkward position just because he made it all about playing for a winner. And then he got this chance to go play for not only a winner, but maybe the biggest winner in the American League. And he said no. And so ultimately, it was about money, which is completely reasonable, but maybe made him look hypocritical to some people. And I don't know what he was expecting to come out of it, really. You know, like he had to think probably that this was going to be the outcome, that either he would end up staying in Milwaukee or the Brewers would just find another taker that

he could not block a trade to. So in that sense, it was sort of futile, but I guess he had to try to wield that leverage. And then when the Indians said, well, no, we're not going to avoid that option, then I guess he was sort of obligated to go ahead and veto as he had threatened to do instead of just saying like, well, all right, then fine. I cave, I fold, you win. But ultimately the outcome was probably going to be the same either way. It wasn't like there was going to be some team that came along and gave the Brewers all the prospects they wanted and also gave LeCroy the early free agency he wanted. Yeah, I mean, he was basically in a position

where there was nothing he could reasonably ask for. The only thing he could ask for was getting his, you know, getting to free agency a year earlier, basically erasing next year's year for the club control. And that's a massive part of his value. It would basically be like taking out, what, half, two-thirds of his value to the team that acquires him. So it's just a massive jump in terms of what he's asking for.

And then what most guys usually ask for at that point is maybe an extension, but Luke at that point is maybe an extension. But Luke Roy wouldn't necessarily want an extension. He probably is going to be hitting free agency at about the last possible moment that he's a viable as a star catcher in his 30s. And the team that is acquiring him is maybe the least likely, well, probably second least likely in all of baseball to give him the sort of deal that he'd be looking for. So there were no in-betweens. It almost felt like it was sort of just bad luck that he didn't have anything that he

could ask for. Like he couldn't ask for something that would add three or six million dollars to the cost for the Indians. He had to ask for something that was going to cost him like $30 million or something. It was weird. There was the weird line in the Bob Nightingale piece about this that the Indians also planned to play him

at first base once Jan Goms was healthy, including next year. It didn't make much sense. It didn't make any sense at all, but besides not making sense, Nightingale said that essentially this would kill his free agent value if Luke Roy was playing. In fact, Luke Roy would have been the backup catcher playing first base and DH, in essence, killing his free agent value.

Do you think that it would affect his free agent value at all? Well, I mean, I guess some other team could have looked at it and said, well, we still think he can be a catcher and so it doesn't matter. Could have looked at it and said, well, we still think he can be a catcher, and so it doesn't matter. Wait, you say some other team. You don't think that 29 other teams would look at that? Well, maybe not, because once he switches positions, then maybe some people wonder, is he going to be rusty? Is he going to need time to get his catching skills back? Will he have slipped in some way with a year of no catching? Maybe they'd even suspect that the Indians thought he wasn't capable of catching for

whatever reason. He had a concussion last year. Maybe they would be concerned about that. I mean, he's been very durable as a catcher this year, so there's no reason to think that he couldn't continue to do it. But if a team did something that made that little sense, then if I were a team looking from afar, I might wonder if it did make sense in some way that I wasn't seeing. So I think it could hurt, but it made pretty much zero sense. You know, A, not only

is there no reason why the Indians would want to play a worse player at that position than Lucre but also why would they Tell him that right now when they're trying to get him to accept a trade why would they say we're Not gonna make you the catcher next year they could always say sure you're gonna be the catcher And then change their minds next year when he's already under team control so didn't make sense For multiple reasons. Okay, here's a hot take from me. Moving him to first base while he is under your control is the best thing you could do for his free agent value. It makes it much less likely he's going to get injured in the next year and a half. It basically protects him from infinite chances to be concussed or to otherwise suffer injuries. It takes off 200-ish games of wear and tear on his body as a catcher.

Maybe not 200 because maybe he'd be the backup catcher, but maybe 100. And I think that there's at least people who believe that there's a cumulative toll on how many, just like a pitcher might have so many bullets in his elbow, catcher has so many bullets in his knee, in his knees or other parts of his body that are affected by the squat. And he would be putting up much better, presumably, offensive numbers because catchers take a hit in their offense when they're catching every day. And so this to me feels like, you know,

I don't really believe anybody would look at Luke Croy and say, well, they had two catchers. Therefore, John Luke Croy can't catch anymore. He's one of the elite catchers in baseball as a as a framer. He has that reputation. He's not a particularly old man. There's no indication that his catching defense is a problem or that that's why he was being moved. And so if you could, it's almost like the very rare instance where it's in his best interests as a player to not be, I mean, to be not fully optimized by the club that has him under club control.

I mean, he's getting year out from free agency and then and then only then wanting to start so that he can demonstrate that he can start. Well, Luke Roy has demonstrated that he can catch and now he it would be probably beneficial for him to take that year and a half off and not be exposed to all the things that otherwise kill catchers careers at this stage of their careers. Yeah, there's something to that. I don't know. You said there's no indication that he can't continue to catch. And I think some teams might take it as one if he doesn't continue to catch, just because you don't really see guys who can catch and are still good at catching move for no reason. And this would sort of be moving for no reason. And so if he were to do that, then I think people would start to wonder, oh, well, he's over 30 and maybe they don't think he can hold up or maybe there's some problem we don't know about.

I don't know. That's usually the progression for catchers is that they start getting up there in age and then they start seeing some time at first base or DH or whatever. And it usually spells the end of your days as a, as an everyday starting catcher. So I don't know how much precedent there is for guys going back and forth. I mean, I guess, you know, like Carlton Fisk maybe was playing all sorts of positions and still catching sometimes until he was in his mid forties, but I don't know how often a catcher would just take a year off and move to first base and then go back to being a full-time catcher for a significant period. I don't know how often that happens. Yeah. Yeah. I mean, it's not for no reason, though. It's that the Indians have a lot of

catchers, depending on whether you think that Jan Gomes is a credible major leaguer. But, you know, they have good young catchers. They have Gomes, who's under contract for a very long time. And unless they trade him, he's, you know, probably worth the contract. So you have to do something with those players. But anyway, all right, fair enough. Do you believe that it was actually the plan? Or do you think that this was spin to protect Jan Gomes relationship with the club once either once it became clear that Luke Roy wasn't coming or during the in-between period where it wasn't at least it wasn't a guarantee that Luke Roy was coming and the Indians had to preserve that relationship with a guy who is signed through, what, 2021 with them. Yeah, I guess that's the most plausible reason for it, because the Indians probably knew that they weren't going to get LeCroy, or they probably had a decent indication that they

might not get him as at least as soon as he made that demand. So at that point, then the most important thing becomes preserving your relationship with the guy you actually do have. Trying to think of what other reasons there could possibly be. I mean, maybe just, I don't know, like the Indians wouldn't want to make it look like they cheaped out or something or, you know, like they weren't willing to make the move. I mean, it wouldn't have made sense for them to make the move, but maybe the casual fan sees that and says, well, they should have been willing to do it anyway or something. And so this is a more on the field reason as opposed to a prospect or financial reason. I don't know. It's a stretch any way you look at it, I think. So I'm more inclined to believe that there was some kind of just misunderstanding or

no one actually thought that I don't really know where that came from all right next thing we talked already about the Aroldis Chapman trade which sort of shocked everybody for how much how much it cost to get a really good reliever for two months plus a postseason. And since then, there's been a lot of, I think, talk about how that trade might have or was going to or did sort of reset the market for top relief pitching and created a sort of a, I don't know if a bubble is the right word, but created higher prices for top relief pitchers. Andrew Miller was traded for, you know, a very good package, a top 30 guy in Clint Frazier, probably another top 100 guy in Justice Sheffield, and a couple of minor league relievers. That is, I mean, it's not as surprising as Chapman.

Miller has two years of club control after this, although they're not super cheap. two years of club control after this, although they're not super cheap. But still, that's top talent for a reliever, which a couple of years ago, we were all pretty sure you shouldn't do. And I wonder if you think, though, that the narrative held up through the trade deadline. The Giants gave up Andrew Susak and Phil Bickford for Will Smith, who's a young reliever under club control and a good power lefty. The Angels got practically nothing for Joe Smith. Mark Melanson was traded for basically another young reliever who has only about a year of service time Felipe Rivero Who will In the best version of his career

Will step in and be a closer for the next five years And in the worst He's a seventh inning guy for the rest of his career And let's see Were there other relievers traded? Well Jeremy Jeffress Oh yeah Jeremy Jeffress is part of the So it's hard to figure out

what his share of that deal was. So you almost have to throw him out. Anybody else? Zach Duke was traded. Tyler Clippard was traded. Yes, they were obviously not of the caliber of some of those other guys. All right. So with now the benefit of the entire trade deadline, do you think that relief pitching actually costs more than it did or than we thought it did a year ago? Or was it just the Chapman deal that was kind of the one freakish outlier? I think the Chapman deal looks like an outlier compared to those other guys. And we talked a bit about the reasons why the Cubs might've been in a position to give up a ton for him. And yeah, I mean, it doesn't seem like it was an across the board thing at the deadline. Miller just is a really valuable player because of the two years of team

control and also how good he is. So, I mean, do you think that the yankees got i guess they got more for miller but not uh like three times more or something you know not two and a half times more no i mean if you depending on like i i don't ever know how to measure guy in the majors against prospect you know over it's always hard but other other than, right, I mean, if you could make a case that Frazier and Torres are, you know, basically the same tier of prospect, and then there's not a Sheffield in the Chapman deal, but there is an Adam Warren, and Adam Warren's not a player that doesn't have value. He's in the majors. He's an established major leaguer who's making nothing. And then the other two parts are kind of, I don't know, close enough to a wash probably.

Yeah, right. So I think it's more of a Chapman outlier. The other thing, yeah, I guess the one other bit of information that we got at this trade deadline that wasn't a trade was that the Yankees reportedly were unwilling to trade Miller for Lucas Giolito. Yeah, right. I was going to bring that up. Giolito is the best pitching prospect in the minors, might be the single best prospect in the minors. Now, it's not a particularly robust prospect crop right now because of recent promotions, but all the same,

I mean, the top prospect in baseball for a reliever would seem like maybe an easy trade, and that didn't happen. They were reportedly, if any of this is true, reportedly unwilling to do that. So that, I guess, is also a data point here. Yeah. Do you believe that? I guess is also a data point here. Yeah. Do you believe that? That was a John Heyman report, right? Well, Heyman reported on the Yankees. Somebody else reported on the Nationals being willing.

Huh. It really doesn't make that much more sense to me than the Indians not starting Lucroix in 2017. So that's suggesting that the Yankees preferred Frazier and Sheffield and other pieces to Giolito. And I guess that would suggest that they really value a position player or they're just worried about Giolito for some reason. I mean, it seems like that would be a deal that I wouldn't expect anyone to turn down. Yeah, in a vacuum, you definitely would rather have, let's call Giolito number two or even number three. Even if we call him number three, you'd still rather have number three prospect in baseball than 25 and 75, right? Yeah.

And do I believe it? I mean, is it a, do I believe it? I don't know. And do I believe it? I mean, is it a... Do I believe it? I don't know. If the Yankees are... If they prioritized having a deeper farm, not just impact talent that could bust and leave them with nothing, but actually depth,

if that's sort of an actual philosophy that they're pursuing, then maybe I could believe it. But I don't know. It is hard to believe. I would guess that if you poll non-baseball team execs like the rest of us, I would guess that the overwhelming majority would take Giolito over the Indians package. Yeah. I didn't believe it when I saw

the initial report about the Yankee side. I hadn't seen that it was corroborated on the national side too. So the biggest, it seems to me the biggest counter argument to this supposed inflation is Mark Melanson, who is, you know, this is basically the same contract status as Chapman. He's a rental. He'll get, he'll be a free agent at the end of this year. And really there is no time period over the last four years, not one year, not two years, not three years, not four years where he hasn't been as good as Aroldis Chapman. He does it in a different way. He doesn't strike out batters the same way that Chapman does. He doesn't even strike out batters the way that

the average reliever does. But as far as allowing runs, he has, you know, better ERA than Chapman over that time, over each of those time periods. And, you know, the return on him is significantly lower. Maybe, I think, right? I think it is. Yeah. Again, it's always hard to know how to compare across positions, across service times, and so on. But, you know, Felipe Rivero is a young reliever who was, you know, never a great prospect, is not super young, isn't doing anything that we haven't seen before from 50 other 24 year old relievers. And, you know, it makes, I guess, some sense for the Pirates. They trade two months of club control of an expensive reliever for six years of a guy who's going to be cheap for a while. reliever for six years of a guy who's going to be cheap for a while. But like, to me, those Chapman and Melanson in, I mean, they really shouldn't be that different in terms of what they bring back. And so it's hard to know whether Chapman is the outlier in an overpay, or whether there's just something about the way that each of these relievers does it, that makes it impossible

to compare them no matter how many innings they have of comparable comparable relief work maybe it's just the case that teams don't want to have a closer who's going to allow the ball and to be put in play in the biggest moment of the year yeah which would probably be irrational right because malanson has been allowing balls in play as often as Melanson allows balls in play, and he hasn't allowed runs, so it doesn't seem like that much of a handicap. If there's a case for the Chapman model instead of the Melanson model in the postseason, I guess, it's that Melanson gets clean innings every time he comes in in the regular season, and so does Chapman. And given a clean inning, there doesn't seem to be any real difference between them.

They're roughly as likely to give up a tying run, winning run, three runs, eight runs, whatever, as each other. But in the postseason, you're probably more likely to bring a guy in with runners on in the eighth, maybe the tying runners on in the eighth, maybe the tying runner on third with one out in the eighth. Maybe the tying runner's on in the eighth. Maybe the tying runner on third with one out in the eighth. And if that's what you're really buying these guys for is that extra leveraged postseason moment that isn't the clean inning, that isn't the normal baseball closer inning, but is something that only a handful of pitchers in baseball are really qualified to dominate at, then maybe you say Melanson doesn't help us as much in October Maybe Maybe, it seems like a stretch I mean, I think the Melanson deal looks like

You know, highway robbery compared to the Chapman deal Or maybe the Chapman deal looks like highway robbery From the other perspective compared to the Melanson deal Yes So I had that reaction Me too All right, what else? Well, you wrote about Rich Hill. Oh, yeah, Rich

Hill. Pitcher of this podcast. Rich Hill got traded. He sure did. And you threw some cold water on the Rich Hill phenomenon. I know. I was transaction analysis. I was very disappointed. I was I was very disappointed. I went into this thinking, OK, so the argument against Rich Hill is that he's this weird, crazy outlier. And we don't generally bet on weird, crazy outliers. And Rich Hill, as the guy who was in Indy Ball one year ago today, no matter how good he is, is still the guy who was in Indy Ball one year ago today.

And therefore, you have to be very cautious with him. So then I wanted to find the counter outlier that he would be. And so I thought, okay, well, probably very few pitchers have had a stretch this good. And they're probably almost all great. And so to believe that Rich Hill would have a stretch this good and not be great would make him also an extreme outlier. And therefore, one way or another, he's going to be an outlier. So you might as well pick the one that you believe in.

And so I look to see the best 18 game stretches over the past 20 years, and including duplicates and overlaps, which are the large percentage of these are duplicates and overlaps, right? Like literally hundreds of Pedro Martinez 18 game stretches are phenomenal. But including duplicates and overlaps, his 18 game stretch is only like the 1300th best in baseball over the last 20 years. And that's still good. But there are, I think I said 79 pitchers who have had an 18-game stretch at least that good by FIP over the last 20 years. And so, I mean, you know, 79 pitchers is not a lot of pitchers. But like, if you look at the 79th best pitcher since 1997 by war, it's Ubaldo Jimenez, which is kind of about like probably how many good pitchers, you know,

like that probably is about how good you have to be to have a stretch like this at some point in 18 games. And, you know, the list has a lot of aces and the list also has a couple dozen guys who you don't think are that exciting. There are guys who you would add. I mean, I'm not saying that the Dodgers don't get better with this trade or that pretty much every rotation in baseball, in fact, yes, every rotation in baseball would be better with virtually any of the 79 players that have done this. But if you are like me and want to see Rich Hill as not just an upgrade, but the best pitcher in the American League right now, as Billy Bean put it, or as, you know, the second best pitcher in the postseason this year behind Clayton Kershaw because that's what he's done for an 18-game stretch. There is definitely reason to believe that a stretch this good is not Prohibitive of many bad outcomes Yeah right and that's surprising

I was I don't know somewhere between surprised and shocked To see how many players had Done the rich hill over that Time frame and obviously They hadn't all been coming from such a low Starting point but still And really there's I mean there's

There partly it's surprising because Most of them also don't get to Start from zero like Rich Hill His 18 starts are Starting from zero there's no 2015 stats besides These and there's no 2016 Stats beside these so it's really easy to look

Back and go oh wow since the start of 2015 He's done this And usually when guys do this, it's like seven starts at the end of one year and 11 at the start of the next year. And you never really get that super clean statistical record where it jars you into noticing it. But the other thing is that a lot of times we did notice. A lot of these guys who did this, we were writing about how great they were at the time. I wrote about Brandon Beachy, right, when he was in the middle of his Rich Hill stretch.

And you probably remember, you know, people writing things about Chris. I voted for Chris Medlin as my number five Cy Young the year that he did his Rich Hill stretch. And he only had like 110 innings that year. But I was so overwhelmed by how good Chris Medlin was that I probably, you know, probably a lot of us were writing irrational things about how good he was. Like especially when he was going into that wild card game. In fact, I bet if you go back and look at what people wrote about Chris Medlin going into the wild card game that he started at the end of his great year, there was probably a feeling that he was invincible. Just like Jake Arrieta, right? Going into last year's postseason, he was seen as invincible. He was at the end of a Rich Hill stretch. Now, Arrieta is, you know, legit. He's not Brandon Beachy. He's also, though,

come way back to earth since then. And he's a ace, but he's not the second best pitcher in baseball right now. And the, you know, Rich Hill stretch always leads you to think that he's not the second best pitcher in baseball right now. And the Rich Hill stretch always leads you to think that he's more Rich Hill than he actually is. And Rich Hill is probably not as Rich Hill as we think he is. This is not, by the way, I'm not revealing anything that everybody else hasn't been yelling at their podcast player for the last six months when I've been overwhelmed by Rich Hill. But yeah, there was some talk of an extension before the trade. And I don't know whether that was posturing or actually serious, but I was curious.

I was anticipating that extension amount just because it would give us a hard number for what a team thinks Rich Hill is worth right now. And I don't know whether because he went in the Redick trade also, it was the same trade. It's hard to pinpoint a value for Hill in isolation. So, I mean, the A's got some good prospects, but I don't know how to divide the bounty between Hill and Redick, especially because Hill's health status is somewhat suspect. Yeah, I, but I also was hoping to see better or extension negotiations done in public. I and I

didn't. But I think this is not evidence or anything. But I think somebody said suggested two and 38 million to Susan Slessor of the San Francisco Chronicle, and I think she said that she would bet on it being lower than that. I'm going to see if I can find that because I don't want to misquote Susan, but best guess what percentage of this trade gets credited to Rich Hill and what percentage gets credited to Josh Reddick. If you split the return up into 1,000 shares, how many of them would be because Josh Reddick was in the

deal? They basically have the exact same contract status right now. They're both free agents and they're both making like something like $6 million this year. So the money is like nothing. Yeah, I would say probably close to 50-50, I would think, just because of the uncertainty surrounding Hill. If he were healthy, then I'd say a higher percentage, but hard to know how many innings to count on from him in the second half. Yeah, he's only started twice in the last two months, and as I put it is everything about Rich Hill is vexing and the injuries are part of that there he has been injured for things that should have no

real lasting cost groin injury that he's recovered from and blisters those are things that obviously for the A's you wish that he had been healthy and pitching but for the Dodgers you're kind of probably glad. Like, does that add to his trade value?

I mean, he hadn't thrown 100 innings since 2007 across all levels. He was a reliever for a lot of that. So that makes it hard for him because he hasn't thrown that many innings. And he was injured for a lot of it, which makes it hard because he hasn't been able to stay healthy. So if you're the Dodgers or if you're any team that's thinking about trading him so that he can start, you know, game six of the World Series for you, you don't really want him pushing 245 innings by that point in his season. Thanks to the groin, thanks to the blister, he'll be maybe at

160, 165 tops, and that's aggressive, quite possibly at 130 or so and i think i think if i'm a team trading for him and i'm convinced that the blisters are something that my training staff is going to be able to handle and it's not going to affect his pitch selection i think i'm paying more for him now wow this is not just just for this argument just for this season this would not apply to yeah more if he's not catching yeah it is isn't it well i don't think you disagree because he has a long track record of fragility the fact that he has continued to have these nagging injuries would make me more worried than if he had been healthy all year. I'd be worried either way because if you've been healthy all year,

then you'd worry about fatigue. And now you're not as worried about fatigue, but you're just as worried, I think, that you just won't be able to start for other reasons. So I don't think it makes me feel any better. Yeah, that's also a position that I might have if I was trading for Ridge Hill. I think if I was trading for Ridge Hill, I would feel very excited and scared no matter what sets of facts you're giving me. It's just it's Ridge Hill. Yeah. All right. You wrote, by the way, you wrote about Luke Roy as the best player on the trade deadline market this year. Do you have anything

to say about Luke Roy's decline in framing over the last few years? Do you believe it? I believe it. I don't understand it really, but I believe it. I think those stats are pretty sensitive and they're supposed to give you a pretty good idea of how good someone is in a pretty small sample. And it is something that declines with age as far as I know, based on what Harry and Jonathan Judge and everyone has found at BP. It's not an extremely steep decline, but maybe his is steeper for some reason. When you look at him, I wouldn't say it looks like he's fallen apart or something. look at him, I wouldn't say it looks like he's fallen apart or something. So it's hard to say, and I haven't really dug into it to look at where he's not getting calls or is he setting up differently or something. And there are other theories about maybe it's like an umpire

retribution, like he became known as one of the poster boys of catcher framing. And maybe there was a backlash where umpires thought of him that way and then tightened up the zone with him behind the plate, which is plausible. But I don't know. It's somewhat mystifying. If it's accurate, then it makes him a lot less valuable, but still very valuable. I think I made up the $38 million thing, or maybe it was somebody else who covers the A's. But I am seeing Susan expressing some concern that he would accept a qualifying offer. Just that. She says $17 million is a ton for a 37-year-old with a long DL history.

I love the guy, but it's very risky. All right. Any others? Well, anything on the Yankees? I mean, we can always pick this up later as well. Yeah, we can. Did the Yankees get really good really quickly? Or, well, how'd they do?

What's your sense? I mean, there's a lot of guys they didn't trade. And there were a lot of people who were saying that it wasn't enough for the Yankees to sell. It was good for them to sell. It wasn't enough, though. They had to sell aggressively that there were eight pieces that should have been moved yesterday. And they only moved three, basically, but they got really good returns for all of them. I mean, like really in at least two cases, I think, much more than you would have guessed they'd get.

And with Miller, that's debatable, but certainly a very good return and some real superstar potential in that deal. So that's good. most. I think they're tied with the Brewers for the most mid-season top 100, I think, on Baseball America's list. Each of those teams has seven apiece. And I think that's a pretty dramatic reversal from where they were up until a couple of years ago. And I guess there's more they could have done. I think they probably got rid of the guys that they could get the most for. I mean, I think they probably got rid of the guys that they could get the most for. I mean, assuming that they weren't going to trade Batances or someone like that who they could keep for a while. Those guys were good ones to deal. And, you know, a lot of the guys they don't want, no one else would want either.

They could have maybe made a move for, you know, someone like Brett Gardner maybe would have had some value or maybe even C.C. Sabathia. No, Sabathia really seems like the one that is maybe the next one you would think to be traded. If they traded four, then he'd be the fourth. Because if you – I mean, yeah. I mean, look. Andrew Kashner brought back value. Andrew Kashner is terrible at pitching. And Wade Miley brought back a little value.

Wade Miley is terrible at pitching. CeCe Sabathia has been a pretty good pitcher this year. He's been better than, I would say, better than those two guys. He's a player that everybody likes and who has big game pitching experience. I mean, I would imagine that there'd be a lot of playoff teams that would love to have him starting the fourth game of a series for them, but maybe not. Yeah, I would think they could have gotten something for him. I'm impressed that Brian Cashman convinced whomever he had to convince to let him sell. It seems just based on his public comments, like something that philosophically he's been

interested in doing for some time, but hasn't been able to for whatever reason. And they were clear sellers, even if they didn't quite go as far as they could have. So I think they did a pretty impressive job of converting those guys into talent. I don't know whether this is a long rebuild. I don't know whether would you expect them to be good again in a year, two years, three years. A lot of the guys they got are not too far away from the majors, but I don't know. It's not like, you know, next year they're all going to be great, but I think it could be a, you know, fairly quick, at least maybe they're kind of having the 2018 specter in mind because they have the A-Rod and Teixeira contracts coming off the books fairly soon and Sabathia. And then all those 2018 free agents are available and maybe their young guys will be coming up at the same time.

So the Yankees with the best or one of the best farm systems in baseball is obviously scary for all the reasons that we've talked about. The Dodgers having the best farm system in baseball in the last year or so was scary. So a few years ago, they were trying to get under the luxury tax threshold because if they could get under for just one year, it would reset the penalties and they would save tons and tons and tons of money. And it went really badly. They didn't get there. It ended up turning into sort of a weird half measure approach that cost them some, well, cost them Robinson Canoe probably, right? Am I getting my off seasons correct? I forget. But it was awkward. I would say it was awkward and then ultimately unsuccessful. They didn't get under the luxury

tax threshold. I imagine that now with all these contracts you're talking about coming off the books with A-Rod and Teixeira and Sabathia coming off the books and with something of a stripped down roster that is a lot of people think gearing up to make a big run at the 2018 free agent market, that they will get under – that they will again – I'm going to ask you this, but I would imagine they're going to try to get under the luxury tax threshold again. Is that what you believe is the case? And if so, is it much easier this time? Is it going to be smooth this time? Can they do it without the awkwardness? Yeah, it seems like it would be easier this time. Just, I mean, at some point before that 2018 free agent class, they could do it because A-Rod's contract expires and Teixeira's and Sabathia's and then they won't really have that many more high paid players left unless they sign some more. for a while. And McCann will be up after 2018. So he's for a while too. But a lot of that money will be coming off the payroll. So yeah, you'd think they could do it as long as they don't splurge again. And in the past, they have kind of swung back and forth between not spending and spending. So we'll see whether Cashman actually has that on lockdown now. All right, let's stop there.

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