A note on trading prospects

[StatManDu]

Here's the Sox list of top prospects from 2004. Of the 10, there is one -- Chris Young -- I wish the Sox still had. The more I look into prospects and history, the more I am FOR trading them -- within reason -- to improve yourself ASAP.

 

THIS DATE IN WHITE SOX HISTORY: FEBRUARY 4TH

FEBRUARY 4TH

JEREMY SPOKEN: HE’S NO. 1

2004: Jeremy Reed was picked as the White Sox top prospect in Baseball America’s annual review of the team’s minor leaguers. The left-handed hitting outfielder hit at least .275 in each of his five stops covering three seasons in the Sox system. The Long Beach State product never made it to the Sox. He was part of the trade with Seattle that brought Freddy Garcia to the Sox on June 27, 2004 and he has been with the Mariners ever since. The rest of the list: 2. Kris Honel, pitcher; 3. Neal Cotts, pitcher; 4. Ryan Sweeney, outfielder; 5. Joe Borchard, outfielder; 6. Ryan Wing, pitcher; 7. Brian Anderson, outfielder; 8. Shingo Takatsu, pitcher; 9. Chris Young, outfielder; 10. Arnie Munoz, pitcher.

 

For more, see www.whitesoxalmanac.com

Edited February 4, 2008 by StatManDu

[Kyyle23]

Wait, Shingo was drafted?

[Vance Law]

Wait, Shingo was drafted?

No, he was simply listed as one of our top "prospects" having been picked up from Japan, but having never played in MLB.

[chimpy2121]

Not a big deal or anything, but Reed went to Long Beach State.

[StatManDu]

Not a big deal or anything, but Reed went to Long Beach State.

Thank you! I made the change. I appreciate stuff like that. My goal is to be as accurate, thorough and interesting as possible!

[elrockinMT]

Stat, I think you make a great point and the statistics might prove your point to a pont, but on the other hand there are a lot of teams that seem all to willing to give up proven players for prospects. I would venture to guess is that money is the motivating factor more than not in whether to trade anymore if what you do is pick up prospects. If not then teams like Tampa Bay, KC and others would be perennial powerhouses with all the young tgalent they pick up

[Jeremy]

The problem is that it's a small and unrepresentative sample. If you peruse BA's old top 100 prospects lists it looks a lot more like Russian Roulette IMO.

 

http://www.baseballamerica.com/today/prosp...ures/26983.html

 

Yet another way to look at it is by noting that Robin Ventura, Alex Fernandez, Frank Thomas, Jack McDowell, Magglio Ordonez, Mark Buehrle, Ray Durham, Joe Crede, and Carlos Lee among others were all White Sox farmhands at one time. Where would a team like St. Louis be if they adopted a "always trade prospects because they often don't pan out" approach and dealt Pujolz? Like most things in life, you need some balance and Kenny's approach right now is pretty extreme, considering that we probably have the worst minor league system in baseball right now.

[StatManDu]

The problem is that it's a small and unrepresentative sample. If you peruse BA's old top 100 prospects lists it looks a lot more like Russian Roulette IMO.

 

http://www.baseballamerica.com/today/prosp...ures/26983.html

 

Yet another way to look at it is by noting that Robin Ventura, Alex Fernandez, Frank Thomas, Jack McDowell, Magglio Ordonez, Mark Buehrle, Ray Durham, Joe Crede, and Carlos Lee among others were all White Sox farmhands at one time. Where would a team like St. Louis be if they adopted a "always trade prospects because they often don't pan out" approach and dealt Pujolz? Like most things in life, you need some balance and Kenny's approach right now is pretty extreme, considering that we probably have the worst minor league system in baseball right now.

I think the whole thing is interesting. ... I think the Sox have done a good job of keeping their good prospects and getting teams to take prospects that aren't so good. The above list is a good example of how good the Sox have been at keeping good prospects.

 

In the wake of the Gio trade, I could think of a handful pitching prospects the Sox unloaded that blossomed: Denny McLain, Doug Drabek and Bob Wickman. Other borderliners: Joe Borowski, Jeff Faserro, John Hudek, Buddy Groom.

 

I more apt to trust the Sox when it comes to trading prospects. The underlying desire here, though, would be for the Sox to beef up their scouting and farm to the point where they are signing and drafting better prospects!

 

 

[Vance Law]

Like most things in life, you need some balance and Kenny's approach right now is pretty extreme, considering that we probably have the worst minor league system in baseball right now.

 

Not dismissing your points, but another thing to note is the difference between trading our prospects for expensive aging veterans, and what we've done, bringing in Swisher, Quentin, and Richar. Traded 5 prospects for 3 young starting major league position players. With Fields, Danks, Floyd, Jenks...that's 7 of the top 15 important players at 27 or younger.

[StatManDu]

Not dismissing your points, but another thing to note is the difference between trading our prospects for expensive aging veterans, and what we've done, bringing in Swisher, Quentin, and Richar. Traded 5 prospects for 3 young starting major league position players. With Fields, Danks, Floyd, Jenks...that's 7 of the top 15 important players at 27 or younger.

After years of Baseball America ranking the Sox system among the worst and the dubious history of the Sox prospects, I figure if someone wants one or two of them and you can get something good ... do it. I guess it's the old "bird in the hand is worth two in the bush" theory.

 

 

 

[max power]

The problem is that it's a small and unrepresentative sample. If you peruse BA's old top 100 prospects lists it looks a lot more like Russian Roulette IMO.

 

http://www.baseballamerica.com/today/prosp...ures/26983.html

 

Yet another way to look at it is by noting that Robin Ventura, Alex Fernandez, Frank Thomas, Jack McDowell, Magglio Ordonez, Mark Buehrle, Ray Durham, Joe Crede, and Carlos Lee among others were all White Sox farmhands at one time. Where would a team like St. Louis be if they adopted a "always trade prospects because they often don't pan out" approach and dealt Pujolz? Like most things in life, you need some balance and Kenny's approach right now is pretty extreme, considering that we probably have the worst minor league system in baseball right now.

It seems like the sox have been pretty good at holding on to "can't miss" prospects when they've had them. The only exception I can think of is chris young.

[daa84]

After years of Baseball America ranking the Sox system among the worst and the dubious history of the Sox prospects, I figure if someone wants one or two of them and you can get something good ... do it. I guess it's the old "bird in the hand is worth two in the bush" theory.

 

im not sure that the sox have really been ranked among the worst by baseball america over the years....i mean they were second to last back in 88 and 89, but damn that was 20 years ago....

 

since 1984 BA has had us ranked as the following...

1984 - 4th (of 26)

1985 - 4th

1986 - 9th

1987 - 22nd

1988 - 25th

1989 - 25th

1990 - 13th

1991 - C- (they did grades instead of rankings, this would have put the sox among the bottom 8 though)

1992 - 20th

1993 - 7th (of 28)

1994 - 17th

1995 - 12th

1996 - 21st

1997 - 21st

1998 - 8th (of 30)

1999 - 12th

2000 - Can't find Info

2001 - 1st

2002 - 9th

2003 - 15th

2004 - 20th

2005 - 12th

2006 - 14th

2007 - 25th

 

of course that isnt to say that i generally disagree with you...cuz i do agree that prospects are nice, but if you can get proven guys (especially ones who are young and cheap and signed for a long time like swisher) than you go ahead and pull the trigger

[Vance Law]

im not sure that the sox have really been ranked among the worst by baseball america over the years....i mean they were second to last back in 88 and 89, but damn that was 20 years ago....

 

since 1984 BA has had us ranked as the following...

 

2000 - Can't find Info

2001 - 1st

2002 - 9th

 

And to further point out the relative meaninglessness of these lists and their rankings:

 

2001

Rauch #3

Borchard #23

Crede #36

Ginter #44

Dan Wright #61

 

One of those 5 (for which we were ranked the top farm system) turned into a major league starter.

While the 2 most successful major league players thus far from our system from this time, Buehrle and Rowand, were never ranked in their top 100 list, and the "can't miss" guys Rauch and Borchard...missed.

 

 

 

[Balta1701]

And to further point out the relative meaninglessness of these lists and their rankings:

 

2001

Rauch #3

Borchard #23

Crede #36

Ginter #44

Dan Wright #61

 

One of those 5 (for which we were ranked the top farm system) turned into a major league starter.

While the 2 most successful major league players thus far from our system from this time, Buehrle and Rowand, were never ranked in their top 100 list, and the "can't miss" guys Rauch and Borchard...missed.

It's actually an interesting exercise to go back through some of the old BA lists and take a look at how things turned out. Although they may have improved in recent years somewhat (can't judge a lot yet)...it looks to me like if you go back and look at their top 10's, top 20's, etc., they wind up batting about .500 in their top 10's on guys who turn out to be legit major league studs like you'd expect for top 10 prospects in baseball.

[Princess Dye]

in offseasons like this one it's nice to think about Jeremy Reed being, well, bad now.

[RME JICO]

It's actually an interesting exercise to go back through some of the old BA lists and take a look at how things turned out. Although they may have improved in recent years somewhat (can't judge a lot yet)...it looks to me like if you go back and look at their top 10's, top 20's, etc., they wind up batting about .500 in their top 10's on guys who turn out to be legit major league studs like you'd expect for top 10 prospects in baseball.

50% is brutal for experts. There are a ton of guys on this board who could do that year in and year out.

 

I also like when they list someone in the top 10 multiple times. Delmon Young was a top 3 prospect 4 years straight.

 

 

Sox highest positions in BA Top 100:

 

Konerko - 2nd in 1998

Contreras - 6th in 2003

Ozuna - 8th in 1999

Floyd - 9th in 2003

Quentin - 20th in 2006

Swisher - 24th in 2005

Jenks - 24th in 2006

Crede - 36th in 2001

Fields - 45th in 2007

Dotel - 45th in 1999

Thome - 51st in 1992

Danks - 56th in 2007

MacDougal - 79th in 2001

Vazquez - 83rd in 1998

Dye - 88th in 1995

Cabrera - 92nd in 1998

Uribe - 94th in 2001

* All others never listed in Top 100

Edited February 4, 2008 by RME JICO

[StatManDu]

And to further point out the relative meaninglessness of these lists and their rankings:

 

2001

Rauch #3

Borchard #23

Crede #36

Ginter #44

Dan Wright #61

 

One of those 5 (for which we were ranked the top farm system) turned into a major league starter.

While the 2 most successful major league players thus far from our system from this time, Buehrle and Rowand, were never ranked in their top 100 list, and the "can't miss" guys Rauch and Borchard...missed.

In hindsight now, if the Sox could have gotten a proven starter or hired gun for Jon Rauch in 2000 ... maybe they win the World Series. Rauch was just another of Sox prospects that they couldn't trade or were hestiant to trade. Among the others: Johnny Ruffin, Scott Ruffcorn, Corwin Malone, Royce Ring.

 

The more I think about this, the more I think the top job of a GM is to find a sucker to take your prospects for good players!

[bighurt4life]

It seems to me like KW has been a bit too happy to trade away our top prospects in recent years, I can only hope that he was right in trading away GIO DLS and Sweeny, we did get a proven player out of that deal but if those guys pan out it will be tough for KW to convince JR and the Sox fans that he deserves to keep his job. It is not only a GM's job to make sure that a team is immediately competitive but it is also his job to ensure the long-term viability of a team's talent, you always have to consider how a deal will affect you down the road.

Edited February 5, 2008 by bighurt4life

[StatManDu]

It seems to me like KW has been a bit too happy to trade away our top prospects in recent years, I can only hope that he was right in trading away GIO DLS and Sweeny, we did get a proven player out of that deal but if those guys pan out it will be tough for KW to convince JR and the Sox fans that he deserves to keep his job. It is not only a GM's job to make sure that a team is immediately competitive but it is also his job to ensure the long-term viability of a team's talent, you always have to consider how a deal will affect you down the road.

I agree with you. However, I can't think of more than a handful of prospects that the Sox have traded that have haunted them. Stated previously: Young, McLain, Wickman, Drabek, Bonilla. ... Who else?

 

I think the challenge for the Sox and KW now is to furbish the farm system with players that are good enough to keep.

[YASNY]

It seems to me like KW has been a bit too happy to trade away our top prospects in recent years, I can only hope that he was right in trading away GIO DLS and Sweeny, we did get a proven player out of that deal but if those guys pan out it will be tough for KW to convince JR and the Sox fans that he deserves to keep his job. It is not only a GM's job to make sure that a team is immediately competitive but it is also his job to ensure the long-term viability of a team's talent, you always have to consider how a deal will affect you down the road.

 

He is trying to insure the longterm viability of the franchise by trading prospects for Major League ready young talent. Swisher is just entering his prime and is under contract/control for a few years. Then you look at Quentin, Richar, Danks and Floyd. Will they all work out? Who knows at this point, but they are all potentially capable and on the verge of being in a make or break scenario. It's not a bad plan. If the scouting and projections are close to being accurate, it'll pay off.

[Jeremy]

I think the whole thing is interesting. ... I think the Sox have done a good job of keeping their good prospects and getting teams to take prospects that aren't so good. The above list is a good example of how good the Sox have been at keeping good prospects.

 

See, it doesn't look to me as though they're discriminating much about who they will and won't trade. If a team wants one of our prospects and that allows Kenny to get someone he wants in return, he'll make the deal. Pretty much all of the top guys have been moved aside from Fields and I'm not convinced that retaining Fields was planned. He just became less expendable because he ended up becoming part of the big league club out of necessity.

 

As far as the results, I think Kenny has been lucky some and we just haven't seen the repercussions of dealing a lot of these guys yet. I mean we've already had one guy come back to bite us and the odds that no one out of the group of DLS, Carter, Cunningham, and Gio pans out seem small.

 

Not dismissing your points, but another thing to note is the difference between trading our prospects for expensive aging veterans, and what we've done, bringing in Swisher, Quentin, and Richar. Traded 5 prospects for 3 young starting major league position players. With Fields, Danks, Floyd, Jenks...that's 7 of the top 15 important players at 27 or younger.

 

It's largely not the deals themselves but the underlying philosophy that alarms me. Doesn't it seem strange that Kenny wants to trade more or less every last one of our top young players? Even in deals for other young players? Maybe you can chalk some of it up to his dissatisfaction with how the farm system has been run recently but this type of behavior dates back for some time and the types of players Shaeffer has been criticized for the most - McCulloch, Broadway, etc. - are still around because they don't have much value.

 

Also, I have to take issue again with people talking as though we didn't get substantially older or more expensive by adding Swisher. Yes he's great, still relatively young, and signed to a very reasonable deal. You can't compare him with home grown prospects though. While he's about three or four years from reaching his peak, the guys we deals are more like 8 or 9 years away from their peaks. While he'll make a reasonable amount of money for an All-Star caliber player - roughly $35 million - over the course of the next five seasons, in Gio and DLS' first six seasons combined they'll probably make less than $5 million total. It's apples and oranges, unlike players like Quentin and Richar who don't have much more MLB service time than a prospect who's yet to make his major league debut.

 

It seems like the sox have been pretty good at holding on to "can't miss" prospects when they've had them. The only exception I can think of is chris young.

 

Which prospects has Williams held onto that have or will become good players? Fields is about the only one I can point to. That would make him an unimpressive one for two in holding onto can't miss guys. Counting Buehrle seems like a bit of a stretch since he was already on the major league roster when Williams got the job and ditto for Jenks since he was never a desired young player on our team prior to becoming an important cog. He's traded most of our "can't miss" young players: Reed, Young, and BMac. How much credit he deserves for the fact that Reed has been injured and unproductive and that BMac was mediocre last season is debatable; it obviously looks like he whiffed big time on Young.

 

And to further point out the relative meaninglessness of these lists and their rankings:

 

2001

Rauch #3

Borchard #23

Crede #36

Ginter #44

Dan Wright #61

 

One of those 5 (for which we were ranked the top farm system) turned into a major league starter.

While the 2 most successful major league players thus far from our system from this time, Buehrle and Rowand, were never ranked in their top 100 list, and the "can't miss" guys Rauch and Borchard...missed.

 

I don't think that's particularly damning. Everyone realizes that not all prospects pan out. That's not a reason for trading them all IMO. Probably the biggest reason prospects don't pan out are injuries to pitchers and that's exactly what happened with Wright and Rauch. Still, I think you're putting some spin on the results with these players. Despite, the worst arm injury a pitcher can suffer, Rauch is better than the two free agent relievers we just shelled out millions for so I don't think he's devoid of value because he's not a starter. It's devastating to think about what could have been if he was never injured but it would've been much more devastating to have traded him and then watched him have a Beckett or Peavy type career on another team.

 

In hindsight now, if the Sox could have gotten a proven starter or hired gun for Jon Rauch in 2000 ... maybe they win the World Series. Rauch was just another of Sox prospects that they couldn't trade or were hestiant to trade. Among the others: Johnny Ruffin, Scott Ruffcorn, Corwin Malone, Royce Ring.

 

The more I think about this, the more I think the top job of a GM is to find a sucker to take your prospects for good players!

 

Hindsight is great but GM's don't have it. Imagine the haul Minnesota could've gotten if they dealt Liriano right before he was injured? Well they couldn't predict the future so they didn't deal him.

 

Also, it's important to distinguish Rauch from guys like Ruffin, ruffcorn, Malone, and Ring, since he was 10 times the prospect any of those players ever were. Sure it's possible he would've been mediocre were he never injured but the odds are much more highly in favor of him becoming a top of the rotation starter and teams don't like to deal those types of players for rent a players in pursuit of a Championship. If we are going to employ hindsight, considering that we were swept in the first round of the playoffs in 2000, one good starter wouldn't have been of any value to us.

[Vance Law]

Also, I have to take issue again with people talking as though we didn't get substantially older or more expensive by adding Swisher. Yes he's great, still relatively young, and signed to a very reasonable deal. You can't compare him with home grown prospects though. While he's about three or four years from reaching his peak, the guys we deals are more like 8 or 9 years away from their peaks. While he'll make a reasonable amount of money for an All-Star caliber player - roughly $35 million - over the course of the next five seasons, in Gio and DLS' first six seasons combined they'll probably make less than $5 million total. It's apples and oranges, unlike players like Quentin and Richar who don't have much more MLB service time than a prospect who's yet to make his major league debut.

 

 

What's all this now? Are you bothering to make the distinction, "The team got "older and more expensive" by adding Swisher and also, "the team got younger and less expensive" by adding Richar and Quentin. Why would you not simply look at the overall picture to say that with the changes Williams has made, the 2008 team with Swisher, Quentin, Fields, Richar, Danks, Floyd is a notably younger team with more cheap and dirt cheap starters than we've had in recent years.

 

I don't think that's particularly damning. Everyone realizes that not all prospects pan out. That's not a reason for trading them all IMO.

You're referring here to the post I made about the 2001 BA top 100 list. As I state there, my point is simply how silly, meaningless , and poor that list (and therefore any list including this year's) is at predicting future MLB success. On both the fronts of who is included, and their relative rank order( "aw nuts, our guy is only #74 while the White Sox are kicking our butts with Borchard at #23"). They ranked our guys Rauch, Borchard, Crede, Ginter, Wright and no one else, while the correct order would have been Buehrle, Rowand, Crede.......

I made no case anywhere about whether or why or how prospects should be traded.

 

I particularly like, "everybody realizes that not all prospects pan out" as a rationalization for 1 out 5 prospects pan out. It's unreasonable to expect ALL of them to pan out. It's reasonable to expect them to be wrong 4 out of 5 times (or 6 out of 7 with MB and AR). My point, again, is that these lists with their rankings are overall a worthless indicator of future success. A counter-argument of "hindsight is 20/20" will not be valid. I'm not saying I could do a better job of accurately predicting the future. I'm saying the list isn't worthwhile, and that people like lists.

 

[Jeremy]

What's all this now? Are you bothering to make the distinction, "The team got "older and more expensive" by adding Swisher and also, "the team got younger and less expensive" by adding Richar and Quentin. Why would you not simply look at the overall picture to say that with the changes Williams has made, the 2008 team with Swisher, Quentin, Fields, Richar, Danks, Floyd is a notably younger team with more cheap and dirt cheap starters than we've had in recent years.

 

People are suggesting we didn't get older and more expensive with the Swisher deal and I simply clarified that we did. Our payroll is over $100 million and our average age is 28.1 I don't see this as a young cheap team even if it includes some young cheap players. The only move on your list that cut major payroll was the Floyd deal and that didn't happen this past off season. None of the other deals made the team less expensive.

 

You're referring here to the post I made about the 2001 BA top 100 list. As I state there, my point is simply how silly, meaningless , and poor that list (and therefore any list including this year's) is at predicting future MLB success.

 

That's a really bizarre logical leap.

 

On both the fronts of who is included, and their relative rank order( "aw nuts, our guy is only #74 while the White Sox are kicking our butts with Borchard at #23"). They ranked our guys Rauch, Borchard, Crede, Ginter, Wright and no one else, while the correct order would have been Buehrle, Rowand, Crede.......

 

So in other words, you have access to 1,700 player rankings and you're forming your opinion based on five of those 1,700 rankings?

 

I made no case anywhere about whether or why or how prospects should be traded.

 

I particularly like, "everybody realizes that not all prospects pan out" as a rationalization for 1 out 5 prospects pan out.

 

If you read the post carefully, you'll notice that I disagreed with your contention that four out of the five prospects didn't pan out. Any way you cut it, we're still talking about five players. If zero out of five "panned out" or five out of five "panned out," it still wouldn't mean much.

 

It's unreasonable to expect ALL of them to pan out. It's reasonable to expect them to be wrong 4 out of 5 times (or 6 out of 7 with MB and AR). My point, again, is that these lists with their rankings are overall a worthless indicator of future success. A counter-argument of "hindsight is 20/20" will not be valid. I'm not saying I could do a better job of accurately predicting the future. I'm saying the list isn't worthwhile, and that people like lists.

 

I'd say for them to be worthless the entire rankings (not just five of them) would have to be no better than random or it would need to be possible to better project future performance using some other factor (e.g. minor league stats). Are you saying that all evaluations of minor league players based on scouting projections are inaccurate or just BA's?