Monday, June 28, 2004
BILL BAVASI, SUPER-GENIUS
Holy crap.
Carlos Beltran = 3B Mark Teahen, SP Mike Wood, C John Buck.
Freddy Garcia = OF Jeremy Reed, C Miguel Olivo, SS Michael Morse.
Oh, sorry. The Mariners also had to throw in Ben Davis.
Jesus Christ, how the hell did Bavasi pull this off?
How is a career 3.89 ERA starter worth more than a .287/.352/.483 career CF? The Boras factor must have hampered Baird even more than I thought it would.
With no offense to Wood, Buck, Morse (or even Olivo) let's talk briefly about the two main prospects here. Mark Teahen is an interesting player, but despite A's Director of Scouting Eric Kabuta prognostications, so far he's looking more like Joe Randa than Jason Giambi--and the Royals already have a Randa. Teahen has always been a good OBP guy, and was starting to show some real power in AA this year, with a .208 IsoPwr and 38% XBH. Unfortunately, he's regressed to his career numbers during his short stint in AAA, and it's hard to say with confidence that he'll amount to anything special.
Reed, on the other hand, is still adjusting to AAA after blistering through A and AA last year. The main problem seems to be that he's striking out a lot more without anything else to show for it. His IsoPwr in 2005 has actually dropped from last year (it's down to .147 after hoving around .180 last year), and only about 30% of his hits are still for extra bases. So much of Reed's game comes from his batting average that when he's not hitting .330 he starts looking more like Randy Winn than Tony Gwynn. But he's still maintained an exemplary BB/AB of .13 (last year he had .15 BB/AB), and anyone who hits .409 in 242 AB in AA has got to have the tools to make more consistent contact at the higher levels, right? He was Baseball Prospectus' #2 prospect going into the year, and swapping Garcia for him seems a classic example of selling high/buying low.
Neither Teahen nor Reed were tearing up the minors when they were dealt, but Reed has shown massive upside. While he's clearly slipped behind Upton and Wright on the prospect position list, Reed is still the kind of young player you give up Beltran for... I'm just amazed all it cost Bavasi was Freddy Garcia.
