For years we’ve heard all about how on-base percentage was so terribly underrated in baseball, while speed and defense were incredibly overrated. The entire tenets of the “Moneyball” era have been adopted by general managers across baseball. Every team wants to find the guy who can work the count, who doesn’t strike out, and who looks to be grossly undervalued by his organization.
How exactly do we define value anymore, though? Obviously a guy like Alex Rodriguez or Vladimir Guerrero who can absolutely destroy the ball is valuable. Johan Santana and John Smoltz are incredibly valuable because their pitching seems unaffected by the amount of luck that surrounds your typical pitcher. And value clearly isn’t the high-OBP, low speed and defense guys, because everyone considers those guys somewhat valuable now, thanks to Billy Beane.
So, then, what IS undervalued in baseball? More and more, its starting to look like “tools” guys are becoming your diamonds, while every G.M. mines for his OBP gold. Take two trades that received varying degrees of attention this week as your example.
The Rays dealt Elijah Dukes yesterday in a trade that many people felt needed to be made. His Major League peripherals last year weren’t very good – if extremely unlucky – but he’s always been defined as a “toolsy” kind of player. Jim Bowden in Washington obviously felt the tools were worth it, because he gave up a highly-touted lefty to get him. Bowden, it would seem, is one of the last “toolsy” G.M.’s left in the game.
In another deal you might have seen, the Mets dealt Lastings Milledge to those same Nationals for Brian Schneider and Ryan Church. Milledge is another player with incredible “tools” that’s never really put it together, particularly at the big league level. A player of Milledge’s caliber – let’s say 10 years ago – would have fetched a far steeper price, I suspect, than two moderately good Major Leaguers. No offense to Schneider and Church, but you can find one of them on pretty much any roster in the league. The Mets gave up great “tools” for decent stats.
Does that mean that “tools” are the new Sabermetrics? Probably not, but as each organization begins to look more and more like each other organization, teams are going to need to find a way to stand out and find value in an otherwise cookie-cutter market. If a G.M. were able to put together 25 “toolsy” guys pieced together from other organizations on the cheap, would he be able to make a run at the pennant? Would he be touted as the next Billy Beane? Would it again radically alter the baseball landscape?
I want to hear what you guys think about this one. How can you define value in baseball now, if the players we once thought of as unvaluable are now those we covet most? Are we doomed to have a system where every G.M. looks for the same kind of player, and find 30 “Moneyball” franchises whose only differences are the amount of money the owner is willing to pour into the system?
December 4th, 2007 at 7:26 am
A very interesting question. I either heard or read some discussion along those lines recently, although the alternative "underrated" factor was not tools. It may have been middle relievers, but obviously that ship has sailed. I think for a while Beane was targeting defensive skills, but I am not sure.
One slight quibble. While Dukes is certainly toolsy, he combines that with baseball skills. Unlike someone like Joel Guzman for example, he is a patient hitter and a smart ballplayer who uses his tools well. I think Beane would have loved having him at one point absent the other issues.
December 4th, 2007 at 7:46 am
How about free agent Shawn Green, 130 games (117 starts, 10 at first base), 446 at-bats, 62 runs, 46 RBIs, 10 home runs, a .291 batting average and 11 stolen bases in 12 attempts. Green could serve as a well-suited backup at first and in the outfield. Green’s strong finish — a .411 average with 12 runs in 56 at-bats in September
December 4th, 2007 at 8:35 am
I would like Green, but he has already said that he doesn’t want to play a smaller role, and he wants to be on either the West Coast or a contender. We could be becoming one right now, but there’s no telling yet. I don’t see Green in the Rays uniform.
Can we finally stop talking about Dukes now? Who cares how smart of a ballplayer he was. It doesn’t matter because he’s an idiot when he leaves the field. He’s in D.C. now where it’s probably going to be even worse for him now. He may end up in prison by the end of the week up there. I just think it’s funny that we got the guy we wanted from the Nats when 3 weeks ago, before Milledge landed there and before the Dominican blowup, and the Nats wouldn’t fork Gibson over. Now, with the trade for Milledge and the blowup, they give us exactly the pitcher we wanted? Thank you Mr. Bowden! Guzman could still be a great ballplayer, and hit 30+ HR if given the opportunity to get 500 AB’s. He’s just gotten so much bigger in the past couple of years that his body is still adjusting. I like him a lot if he can get control of his body now.
December 4th, 2007 at 1:15 pm
I think he had his reasons for "being and idiot". It is sad but not entirely his fault. He was a very young man with alot going on in his life. Who could he turn to for a role model? His father? Carl Craford? Didn’t Sheffield offer to do that for him?
As soon as the Crime Dog got involved in his life he made strides. Just because he blew up in the dominican league doesn’t mean anything. People blow up every week on ESPN. I don’t think he was traded because that was the last straw, he was always being shopped and now they got what they wanted.
December 4th, 2007 at 1:27 pm
This is the big misconception about Moneyball. The lesson wasn’t about how awesome big, lumbering high OBP guys were (beyond that fact that OBP is cool because not making outs is the ultimate goal in baseball).
The lesson that many people missed is that Moneyball was always about exploiting market inefficiencies to construct a winning ballclub on the cheap. For a while, this was OBP and 3-run homeruns at the expense of speed and defense. Then, Beane moved on to a shutdown bullpen of cheap relieavers and a dynamite defense (IIRC, the A’s led baseball in defensive for a couple years in a row around 2004ish). It appears that discounted players with the "injury risk" tag and "tools" guys may in fact be the next inefficiency. I’m suspicious that this may end up being a somewhat cyclical thing, with the smart GM’s being the ones ahead of the curve and the bad GM’s being the sheep that follow the crowd to overpay once the inefficiency is gone.
December 4th, 2007 at 1:49 pm
Elgradeplatano, there are people everyday who have worse problems than Dukes, and those people rise above all of it. Dukes just simply has never learned how to deal with adversity. It’s not about finding a role model. Besides, he hasn’t really wanted to be helped until just recently. You can’t help someone who doesn’t want it. And it’s true that he has been shopped for a while, but this really was the last straw. The Rays can paint the picture however they want for the media, but I have a good feeling that once the Dominican thing got out, Stu probably got on the phone with Andrew and just finally said, "Make something happen as fast as you can." Dukes’ teammate down in the Dominican even said that he was glad another teammate grabbed Dukes because everyone thought the situation would have gotten a lot worse. That’s not a good thing. I wish him well in the future, even though I doubt D.C. will be able to accomodate what he needs to succeed. I’m just glad we don’t have to worry about him anymore.
December 4th, 2007 at 5:27 pm
There are people everyday who have less problems than Dukes do worse things than him.
SO he never wanted help before, now he does, that is what matters. If he didn’t show that he wanted help and this happened, then fine let the door hit him on the way out but he was trying.
The Carl Crawford situation could have gotten alot worse last year if someone else didn’t get involved. Teamates get involved alll the time to stop things from happening.
Dukes was never shown how to deal with adveristy there is a difference.