Astros acquire Christian Vázquez for Enmanuel Valdez and Wilyer Abreu.
- Thread starter soxhop411
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I meant he's all bat and doesn't have a natural position. But it's about the best possible outcome the Sox could have expected for Vaz so I like it.
Bloom was hired in 2020 right? So assuming they don’t go on some magical run this season that’s 33% of his years they got to the alcs...I’d be fine with that number going forward.
Only 173 PA but there were only two players the same age as Valdez who put up a better OPS in the league. I think if this kid was coming along this year in our system we'd be pretty happy with him.
Vaz was the hero in the best regular season game I've ever been to, hitting a walk-off three run jack to CF to beat the Indians 12-10 on this very day exactly 5 years ago:
View: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Q0DHNxwvAE4
That also featured one of the best defensive plays I've ever seen in person, Cleveland CF Austin Jackson robbing Hanley of a sure HR that would have pulled the Sox to within 1 at the time. It was such a great play that even though it was our guy that got robbed, and we were still losing, all of Fenway gave Jackson a standing O.
Thanks for the memories Vaz, and I hope you play a big role in YED.
View: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Q0DHNxwvAE4
That also featured one of the best defensive plays I've ever seen in person, Cleveland CF Austin Jackson robbing Hanley of a sure HR that would have pulled the Sox to within 1 at the time. It was such a great play that even though it was our guy that got robbed, and we were still losing, all of Fenway gave Jackson a standing O.
Thanks for the memories Vaz, and I hope you play a big role in YED.
Thanks for this. I don't know why commenters treat players like robots. The player might say "I know it's a business", but I'm sure it's a challenge no matter how much money they make.
Scouting reports that have been posted. They say his best position is probably 2b, though.
One said his defense was fringy, which would be fine if he hits enough. Depending on what fringy means. It doesn't say fringe average.
He should be our starting 2nd baseman ~tomorrow.
As much as I've enjoyed the Yolmer era...
So this is this third season with him at the helm...and in 1/3 of those seasons they were a couple wins away from competing in the World Series. If that trend continues I’ll be happy with Bloom (obviously I’d hope that in some of those appearances they actually advance...and win it all).
Probably could go in a different thread but bottom line is Bloom trying to turn the sox into the Dodgers takes time. I think step 1 - stocking the farm system - is pretty close to complete. Step 2a is having a few of those guys performing well at the major league level, so you can afford the higher priced guys in their primes. I realize it’s simplifying it a bit but having Walker Buehler pitching like an ace for almost no money last makes it easier to pay Kershaw like an ace even though he didn’t pitch like one. Step 2b is keeping the correct young guys in the fold...on that front I will be disappointed if Devers isn’t resigned (while also understanding if he wants 12 for 450 I’ll understand why the Sox don’t give it to him). And as has been alluded to in other threads, competing at the major league level while trying to (and if rankings are any indication, succeeding) completely overhaul the minor league system isn’t easy.
You win! You're the smartest, most statistically savvy poster in the history of Sons of Sam Horn. Congrats; collect your prize at the doors as you exit.
But he was going to have to think of that in another two months and likely with a pay bump.
Vazquez, Diekman, and a PTBNL for Pham, McGuire, Valdez, and Abreu. If you cut out the sentimental part, that's a a deal to make. It's been a good day so far.
Unless the guy can hit a ton, but can't field for shit I prefer that we're not looking for future DHs. That slot is just too important these days to turn over to a guy that can't field a position.
Fair and balanced take. Valdez at 2B and Casas at 1B could improve the right side of the infield reasonably soon. Devers is their priority but, at some point, if his greed exceeds the fair value of his premium not discounted contract, they will not keep him. Last season the collective wisdom was that Bloom was a genius. This year, everybody is skeptical.
We still do not know what the Sox could get for JD Martinez, Eovaldi or other veterans if fair trade offers are made for them. Age makes a difference. Has anyone mentioned that Vazquez was worth two under age 25 blocked minor league players where the Astros dealt from their surplus. It's possible that neither of them will be heard from again but Vazquez is about to be a free agent during the post prime years of his career. Shedding older players eating up payroll for younger cost controlled players is the right move in a season where the best case scenario is that they make the playoffs again with no real chance to contend for a championship.
The 2022 Sox are an injured, under achieving and somewhat aging team. Spending smarter rather than wastefully is the only way the Sox can compete. Bloom's utilizing some Rays techniques is not the disaster that many whine about. Finding homegrown players who can be extended to buy out their arbitration eligibility and early free agency (something that the Rays do not do) will make the Sox more competitive as contenders.
Rick Aguilera is imprinted on my brain forever, but I guess I was young and mega-impressionable at the time.
Agreed. And it is entirely possible Vaz may sign back with us after this season.
Vaz currently has a 111 wRC+ which puts him easily in the top third of starting catchers in MLB, especially depending on where you set the PA cut off. The only better available catcher is Contreras.
No, Fangraphs has them at 25.6% right now, so not exactly contradicting my point.
That said I have no idea how to actually gauge this return.
Baseball America has Valdez as HOU's 12th best prospect in their midseason update after OPSing 1.016 across AA and AAA this year at 23. Meanwhile Abreu is a great athlete (23 SBs) that already plays a major league center field (unlike, say, Jarren Duran) so provides 4th outfielder floor with offensive upside (.858 OPS at AA at age 23). Seems like a solid haul and probably two guys that the scouting department were targeting in a relatively weak system.
He's 18th among all catchers in fwar, 4th in the AL east. Even if you use bwar which likes his defense more he's still 4th in the AL east.
https://www.baseball-reference.com/about/war_explained.shtml
The difference between Vazquez and the best catcher in the league is within WAR's margin of error. Just throwing it out there as the definitive measure of player value in 2/3 of a season is completely misusing the stat.
4th in the AL is pretty meaningless unless you want to argue that the distribution of talent at the position within a division is somehow indicative of player value and potential return. As for which WAR, I'm a little skeptical of using any value that is so heavily dependent on single season defensive numbers to slot their value.
Edit: or what Max said.
Ok, a full season value of 1-2 wins means 1/2 season of .5-1 win, since we're talking catchers it isn't really 2/3rds of a season. You could give him a whole extra win of fwar and he'd still barely be top 10.
It’s sort of irrelevant that he was the 4th best catcher in the AL East by whatever metric you choose to use - the catchers in the division are pretty darn good, weren’t available in a trade, and the statistical noise in the defensive component of the selected stat is far from definitive given the variance between fWar and bWar. Additionally, OCD is looking at an offensive statistic, which would put him top ten as a catcher offensively.
Anyway, I think the return for 2 months of Vazquez is fair - organization needs near major league ready positional depth with upside badly and Valdez seems like he may be on the rise.
Can someone explain what the hell happened to Owens? His minors numbers are pretty incredible.
Looks like he hit 23yo and couldn't find the strike zone anymore. As of last year in indy ball, still couldn't.
Can someone please post which minor leaguers hit homers tonight? I want to see whom Chaim’s trading for tomorrow.
I went to a ton of his starts in Portland back when I lived there, and this was my impression. Dude had a plus plus changeup, and most of the AA hitters would spin themselves into the ground trying to hit it. But his fastball was straight, low 90s, and his command of it was just laughably bad. The curve was fine.
He would throw the fastball above the zone, and then throw the change down and a lot of the hitters would react like they'd never seen a changeup before. Tons of whiffs, tons of popups, tons of 1-3 outs. So he destroyed the low minors, but once he rose to levels where guys had the patience and pitch recognition to avoid getting themselves out flailing at the changeup early in the count, he just walked way too many to succeed. His fastball could not play in the zone, and it's not really clear if he could reliably get it there anyways. MLB hitters just stopped swinging, basically, and he walked like 5 per 9. He still had respectable strikeout numbers!
Still playing baseball, fwiw. Not very well, but playing. . https://www.baseball-reference.com/register/player.fcgi?id=owens-002hen
So they didn't disrespect him and trade him out of nowhere and hang him out to dry with the media? Shocking.
I'm sure they didn't want it to leak while he was still out there, but they can't control that.
Hey. This is the major leagues. The only narrative that matters is the first one. And that one is only any good if it's delivered within 35 seconds of the event.