We recently received an email from a reader about trading to lock up the title this year in a keeper league. Specifically, Mikey is wondering whether to trade away Jose Bautista in order to strengthen his SP rotation. Mikey is currently well ahead in HR, RBI, R, and TB, while leading in OBP but not by much. Understandably, he's been thinking about dealing from his strength, offense, to get a SP. He's currently in 1st place but doesn't feel like his lead is safe. The kicker is that he's playing in a keeper league in which he'd be able to keep Bautista in the 16th round next year. The best offers he's received so far are;
Deal 1) Bautista + Lohse for A-Gon + David Price
Deal 2) Bautista + Scherzer + Garza for Ryan Howard + Felix + Scott Baker
Mikey's current SP rotation is: Ubaldo Jimenez, Tim Hudson, Kyle Lohse, Matt Garza, Max Scherzer, James Shields, and Erik Bedard
Below the Savants each take a crack at this particular puzzle.
Aaron: In a word, no and no. I think you can reject the second offer out of hand since the Bautista side is probably a touch stronger even without any consideration of the keeper value. I love Scott Baker but Garza and Scherzer have real value and while I'd rather have King Felix than either you're really not getting ahead much on this deal. Deal #1 is definitely better for you as A-Gon has a better track record and will almost certainly put up better RBI numbers than Bautista while you get a big upgrade going from Lohse to Price. Still, I can't get over the lost keeper value you're giving up. I ran a study on round values for one of my slightly deeper leagues earlier this year and found that a 16th round pick is worth about $6. If we assume that in your league a 16th round pick is worth about $5 and Bautista will be a $40-45 player next year then you're giving up $35-40 in value by trading him. Sure, that value doesn't affect this year's race but it's real value that you're losing, and that's assuming that you keep him for only one year. For this trade to be worth it I think you'd have to be getting a Halladay or Lincecum along with A-Gon, not just a David Price. Obviously that means that it's pretty unlikely that you can get a deal done that's good enough for both parties but that's a fact of life when it comes to keeper leagues. Just like in real baseball contract realities can make it very difficult to acquire certain players.
So try to hold on for this year, maybe targeting under-performing aces like Chris Carpenter, Ricky Nolasco, or Ryan Dempster. The head start you'll get for next year will more than make up for any nail-biting that you might have to endure over the next three months or so.
Lee: My feeling is simple. Keeper values exist to leverage a championship run. I'll always trade an awesome keeper if it locks up a win. A real win is much greater than 3 or 4 hypothetical ones. Still, there is some common sense to be had about how lopsided a keeper value can be.
Let's look at the first trade, specifically. Basically, you're trading the rights to Joey Bats in the 16th round for David Price; I say this because we'll make the assumption that Adrian and Bautista will be a wash for the remainder of the season.
My concern? Is one pitcher's 15-18 starts really going to help your ERA/WHIP that much, or are you just hedging your bets on cheap wins?
If we assume you're middle of the road, I'll peg your ERA at 3.8, and WHIP at 1.3, and you've used about half your innings. If we assume your 6 other starters perform as they have to this point, Price's FIP+xFIP average of 2.9 will only account for 1/7th of your remaining innings.
I'll pick a decent IP average, 1400. This means Price has saved you 10 ER for the 2nd half of the season over a pitcher with a 3.8 ERA. He's dropped your ERA by .1 by himself for the season.
I think if you deal Bautista, getting multiple pitchers to offset your expected results in the second half would be smarter. Manager B, if talked into having the deal be Howard, Felix, and Baker for only Joey Bats may be a starting point. Make sure you hammer home to trade partners just how valuable Joey Bats is. A comparable, but lesser, bat plus two SP upgrades would be the only fair option you could start with.
When you consider 2012 and beyond, I think his extremely favorable keeper value makes him virtually untradeable; you simply won't get enough back if your pitching needs that much help. Sit on him, and deal a different piece of strength for a more fair upgrade. No matter how much another manager gives up (like the equivalent bat in trade A), if they are already out of it, they have nothing to lose.
Only considering this year, I think if you have to pick one of these deals, I'd still pick Deal A. Why? As I said before, you're basically getting David Price for free because you'd be dropping Lohse anyway. Even though you lose the keeper value, it's irrelevant if you win the league (and if you have other options). Deal B has you trading two buy low candidates, one of which could easily match Baker in the 2nd half, in return for a downgrade in hitting and a modest bump by Felix? That trade would actually be very fair if Bautista didn't have an absurd keeper value, but it's clearly the lesser of the two.
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