Trade Deadline: A Yearly Tradition Continues in Pittsburgh

7-28-23 – By Gary Morgan – @garymo2007 on Twitter

You’ve watched Carlos Santana play an excellent first base all year. You’ve watched him bat cleanup all season long. You’ve heard Derek Shelton as recently as last week talk about how very important it has been and is to have someone like Carlos Santana in the locker room and dugout.

Then you watch him traded for an 18 year old kid named Jhonny Severino.

The team in 2023 just got worse right?

Just like it always does at deadline time right?

Is Ben Cherington just the proverbial kid with a magnifying glass burning the wings off bugs (aka you)?

Who’s next?

Folks, I’m not going to try to comfort you here. Over the years I’ve explained countless times what a rental player is, I’ve explained why a team might want to go get a lottery ticket too.

The bottom line is this team started hot, raised expectations and then underperformed (including Santana mind you) so badly that they fell completely off the face of the baseball world.

Injuries were involved, poor coaching was involved, playing a ton of kids played a role, but above all, this team reached the deadline right where they have for every season under Ben Cherington.

The only real difference this year, they now have an entire class of players they’ve brought up to the Major League team. So instead of moving “good players” and knowing by in large what’s left on the team is crap, you’re left knowing it’s filled with young kids who you should expect will get better.

Let’s go through each player rumored, and I’ll even toss in Santana because the important thing to understand is why he was available.

Carlos Santana

Again, we know this one is already done, and we already know the return, but why was he available?

I mean, it’s clear they don’t have an internal prospect they feel strongly about playing there, so why not keep him, he was really playing well?

I’ll start here, they could have kept him, I wouldn’t have hated it, but let’s be very very clear, this was a 9 week decision. Carlos Santana isn’t contracted to anyone in 2024, so if he is indeed an answer, someone this team wants to get back in this room, they can, just like anyone else pursue him in free agency again.

So the calculation is very simple. Is it worth more to this club to keep Carlos for those 9 weeks or to bring in a lottery ticket?

Lottery Ticket? We’ve all heard the term when it comes to baseball, but why, what do we mean by that? Easy, a player like Jhonny Severino is classified as a lottery ticket because it’s a long shot that you “win” this trade, but at the end of the day if it costs a dollar (9 weeks) and the prize could wind up being a complete bust or you could be the lucky winner of a shiny new Oneil Cruz type talent (he too was a lottery ticket exchanged for Tony Watson), many clubs consider it a worthy and minimal risk.

Why couldn’t the Pirates get something they need at the MLB level in exchange for this player who clearly was good? We’re talking statistically the best 1B defensively in the league this year, and a solid switch hitting bat here.

Again, it’s that 9 weeks, and it’s also the types of teams that are in the market for a guy like Carlos.

Teams interested, well they’re in it, or close to in it, and they’re paying for a rental. How likely is it that a team that’s in it has a major league pitcher available to send back? Are they going to give you a near MLB first baseman, for 9 weeks of a veteran?

That 9 weeks is relative.

Lets say you’re selling 9 weeks of someone like Lucas Giolito, well, if he’s right, that’s a real starting rotation piece. In those 9 weeks he’ll give you 13-14 starts likely, and more importantly, he’s a guy you could start in game 2 of a playoff series. Carlos could play every game and start every game of a playoff series of course, but there are a lot more Santana’s out there than there are Giolito’s.

Still, the return for Giolito was a bit closer to the league, but still risky prospect.

Think of it like this, imagine you could sell a leased car. The value is different if you have 18 months left vs 9 months right? The value is different if you’ve taken care of it or it’s a really hot model, vs a car you haven’t changed the oil on and ran into a guard rail. Either way you’re selling something you don’t really own, and the person acquiring it, well, they’re acquiring the rights to use it for however long you have left on the lease.

Keep him? Again, sure could have, the lottery ticket is probably not crucial to the cause, but make no mistake, there’d be no reason aside from making you feel better, and maybe make a few players happy. Moving him could make a few players happy too if you catch my drift, this dude was the cleanup hitter like all year, now someone else will get those opportunities.

Bottom line, Carlos is 37, will of course be 38 next year. The likelihood that he’d be the best the Pirates could or should do in 2024 is about as high as Jhonny up there turning into a shorter Cruz.

Rich Hill

43 years old. It’s incredible that Rich Hill has done what he’s done for as long as he’s done it. I’ve said before, I wouldn’t trade him, if only because this team has lost Roansy Contreras and Luis Ortiz to underperformance, Mike Burrows, JT Brubaker and Vince Velazquez to Tommy John, they now have Mitch Keller struggling to hold onto the brilliance he found early in the season, an emerging and adjusting Johan Oviedo, Osvaldo Bido who probably isn’t a starter long term and is being given the opener treatment, and Quinn Priester who probably isn’t a guy who is going to light the world on fire until he learns to be a bit more crafty.

All that said, a lefty pitcher at this time of year, well, let’s just say he’ll draw more than Santana did interest wise.

I won’t repeat all the 9 weeks stuff, but rest assured, it applies.

If it was clear that Rich was like the 4th or 5th guy, and holding someone back I’d be all for moving him, but he isn’t. On this team he’s solidly number 2 or 3 and moving him is going to force this team to push someone like Jared Jones into action. Or to recall Ortiz before he’s actually unlocked what they were trying to unlock.

This is a situation that to me is different, much like moving Jose Quintana last year, so long as you have a plan for who takes the innings, and you like it, have at it. I love what they’ve gotten out of Oviedo whom they acquired for Quintana, but bluntly folks, that kind of return isn’t likely for Hill.

First, he hasn’t been nearly as good as Q was, second, he’s 43, rarely has played an IL free season, and he hasn’t landed on there this entire year which probably scares some teams.

If the return is similar to what they got for Santana, I personally think they get more out of just keeping him for the rest of the way.

I don’t expect the Pirates to agree with me.

Austin Hedges

I can’t see an obvious market here. Trading for zero bat guys isn’t something many competing teams will look to do.

If he has a selling point, it’s probably that he has a reputation for improving pitchers, and no doubt a group of veteran pitchers in the league who would love to throw to him down the stretch.

The return wouldn’t matter, to you or the team, if someone wants him, even for cash, I’m quite sure the Pirates would happily move him.

Bad players, overtly bad, don’t matter, aren’t’ easily moved, and almost never return anything that matters.

If they don’t move him, he’ll be a coach basically, and if he played 10 more games this year I’d be kinda shocked. In fact, when they start using Henry behind the dish (yes, they will) I wouldn’t be shocked to see the team just entirely bench him if not DFA.

Mitch Keller

This isn’t’ happening.

Mitch has 2 years of team control left, is just coming into his own, still young enough that extending him makes sense and on top of that he’s open to it and the two sides have already discussed it.

As has been said countless times now, you listen to everything. If a team calls, you listen. Why? Well, for one, what if they’re really really desperate and offer something insane? For another thing, when you hear them out, you’ll at the very least get a list of prospects that this team is ok moving. You never know when that intel might matter.

The Pirates can’t do this though, unless it would be so one sided even national reporters would call it an obvious overpay, because with this move, there’d be no avoiding the club admitting this rebuild isn’t in a good place.

You’d have to “sell” that this franchise is going to go out and buy 3 starting pitchers in 2024, and 2 of them are going to be Mitch quality or better, or the rebuild is set back.

I don’t believe them to be in this head space, more importantly, having heard some of the asks, yeah, no team is that stupid folks.

David Bednar

Different than Mitch.

Let’s just be honest, closers are hot at deadline time and teams tend to feel they’re more easily replaced than a starter. It would still be a set back moment, but again they could get a crazy offer, and it’s hard to argue a closer is irreplaceable.

I’d love to tell you this front office has learned from having Cutch around how important a hometown guy can be for the fan connection aspect of this whole thing, but at the same time I can’t sit here and advise extending a closer with a history of back issues much beyond his existing years of control.

Point is, if not trading the hometown kid is your only defense for why this should never happen, brace yourself, cause the day will come. Closers don’t usually stay closers for 10 years.

I don’t see it this year, but I’ll admit, I’ve seen a couple rumored offers that I’d have a very hard time saying no to.

Ji-man Choi

He’s just about in the same boat as Santana, except due to injury he’s only played in 20 games and has 64 at bats.

The Pirates were fine to move one of these guys, I’m not sure they should be fine moving both, especially as it looks like the Pirates will have to again sign a free agent first baseman in 2024.

Ji-man is 32, so if he’s a guy who you could sign for a couple seasons to provide a good bat off the bench worst case and a starting first baseman best case, it might be wise to keep him around.

If he’s moved, expect a very similar return to what they got for Santana.

I wouldn’t, and to be completely fair, had they traded Ji-man I’d advise the same for Santana. I wrote long ago they should move one of them, but I wouldn’t move both.

Conclusion

Bottom line, if you want this to stop being a thing, the team needs to stay in contention into later in July.

This isn’t about “they never keep…” because these guys by in large aren’t theirs to keep.

I understand the micro “good player gets traded, me sad” effect to it, but geez, I think I wrote in April the mix of players who might be trade bait regardless of performance, and they’re all here except JT Brubaker and Vince Velazquez.

It’s hardly a surprise.

That doesn’t mean you should shut up and enjoy it, it just means have a little perspective, the 2023 season always was, but now 100% is about youth, and this time youth that is supposed to matter.

This offseason needs to look different than we’ve seen. If it doesn’t I’ll be just as honest about that failure as I have been about some of this procedural crap we’ve watched waiting for all these prospects to arrive.