Trading a Dodger Outfielder

Everyone knows the Dodgers have 4 legitimate major league outfielders, and would be willing to trade one.   Puig’s contract / control is one of the best assets in baseball.  Kemp, Ethier, and Crawford on the other hand all carry contracts that make them a negative trade asset.  If you can talk a team into Kemp’s upside, he does have some trade value, but the other two are clear overpays.  

You could move everyone around day by day and find time for everyone.  4 slots for 3 guys sounds like everyone gets to play 75%.  But between 20 interleague games with DH, and about 100 of the Dodgers 200 pinch-hitting opportunities, everyone can play about 80-85% of the time.  And of course, there will be injuries.  So it’s not the worst thing in the world to just do that.  And since the team has realistic World Series aspirations, carrying a legit DH is not a bad thing.

Player	LF	CF	RF	DH/PH	TOTAL
Crawford	525			25	550
Ethier	150	175	125	75	525
Kemp		500		50	550
Puig			550	25	575
TOTAL	675	675	675	175

Scott Van Slyke doesn’t get to play much if everything goes right.    But of course there will probably be multiple injuries to these guys over the course of 2014.

On the other hand, you could explore trades.  Third Base is the team’s most obvious hole.  If Uribe can’t be signed to a deal attractive to the Dodgers, plan B may be another free agent.  Now, you can start shifting the IF around too.  Hanley can play SS/3B and Guerrero can perhaps play SS & 3B in addition to 2B.  So in the absence of other attractive free agent 3B, they could go after a SS like Stephen Drew or a 2B like Omar Infante (who can also play 3B & SS) or Mark Ellis.    If they went for Infante, Mattingly could field about 150 different lineups next year between moving both the IF & OF around.  Star players are usually not too keen on that though.

Plan C is to trade an ‘extra’ outfielder to fill that infield hole.   So what 3B/SS could they possibly get, and how could a trade work?  Well, let’s use the framework laid out in the last couple posts –

1.     Project a player’s future performance over his contract in terms of batting, fielding, and baserunning, accounting for his aging.

2.     Convert to Wins Above Replacement

3.     Convert to $ at that year’s projected price of a win

4.     Compute the net value of the contract in each year

5.     Bring those net cash flows back to today with some discounting

When you do this exercise and start to evaluate prospects, they come out as incredibly valuable.   I am going to set the discount rate in step 5 incredibly high (30% per year) to account for how teams really seem to value future years compared to today.  Also, here’s a great review of top-prospect bust rates.  Even the most elite prospects wash out 40% of the time.  Very good legitimate prospects wash out 60-80% of the time.  So I’m going to factor that in as well.

The best assets are prospects that have just graduated to MLB and proven they can contribute (like Puig).  5 years of even average performance at minimum & arbitration salaries is worth a ton.  The Dodgers utility function may not really work out that way (they don’t want a 2WAR guy at $1M, they prefer a 3 or 4 WAR guy, even at $10-15M), but “the market” generally does.

So, what do the Dodgers have?

Name	Team	Pos	2014 Age	2014 WAR	Yrs	Owed	Contract NPV	Note
Puig	LAD	RF	23	4.5	6	$59	$75	estimated salary, assume no super2
Good Kemp	LAD	CF	23	4.3	6	$128	$8	Assuming recovery
Ethier	LAD	RF/CF	32	3.0	5	$85	$(5)	Assume option vests for 2019
Kemp	LAD	CF/RF	29	3.4	6	$128	$(9)	Pessimistic/Realistic projection
Crawford	LAD	LF	32	3.5	4	$83	$(11)

What could they get?  Well, if they wanted to trade Puig, they could get a crazy return, maybe even Machado +.  But nobody’s coming to the park to see Machado and buy Machado jerseys.  Puig has that must-see quality, and in LA, that is huge.  He’s not really going anywhere.    Kemp + money could maybe bring some of these other guys back, like Middlebrooks or Andrus.  Kemp + Money + prospects, maybe you could get Bogaerts or Zimmerman.  It’d be ironic to get Reyes and shift Hanley to 3B for him again, but with a contract extension in hand for happy Hanley, it’d presumably go better this time.

The Dodgers do have their own legit SS/3B prospect, Corey Seager.  If things go well, he’s a 4WAR/yr player from ~2017-2021.   So the ideal solution for them is to get a shorter term guy.  Of course, if you look back at the historical prospect bust rates, there’s only a 40% chance of Seager working out, and a 60% chance of him never even being an average major league regular - so “blocking him” can’t be a big concern at this point.

More realistic trades are along the lines of Ethier + for Daniel Murphy or JJ Hardy.

Name	Team	Pos	2014 Age	2014 WAR	Yrs	Owed	Contract NPV	Note
Machado	BAL	3B	21	4.0	5	$37	$63	estimated salary
Bogaerts	BOS	3B/SS	21	2.0	6	$19	$49	estimated salary
Rendon	WAS	3B/2B	24	2.8	6	$15	$47	estimated salary
Middlebrooks	BOS	3B	25	2.5	5	$17	$41	estimated salary.  Red sox have Cecchini coming up
Frazier	CIN	3B	28	3.4	4	$19	$40	estimated salary
K Seager	SEA	3B	26	3.0	4	$15	$39	estimated salary
Lawrie	TOR	3B	24	2.7	4	$12	$37	Estimated Salary
Franklin	SEA	2B	23	1.8	6	$15	$34	Estimated Salary
Zimmerman	WAS	3B	29	4.7	7	$106	$32	Assume defensive recovery
Ackley	SEA	2B/CF	26	2.4	4	$14	$31	Estimated Salary
Andrus	TEX	SS	25	3.9	4	$52	$27	Assume opt out in 2018
Moustakas	KCR	3B	25	2.0	4	$12	$27	estimated salary
Beltre	TEX	3B	35	5.4	3	$51	$27
Wieters	BAL	C	28	4.1	2	$17	$24	estimated salary
Holland	TEX	SP	27	3.0	5	$45	$19
Reyes	TOR	SS	31	4.5	5	$90	$15	Assume option in 2018
Prado	ARI	3B/LF/2B/SS	30	3.2	3	$33	$15
Dan Murphy	NYM	2B/3B	29	2.7	2	$14	$14	estimated salary
Hardy	BAL	SS	31	3.7	1	$7	$14	estimated salary
Headley	SDP	3B	30	4.2	1	$10	$13	estimated salary
Rollins	PHI	SS	35	3.2	2	$22	$10	Assume option vests for 2015
Price	TBR	SP	26	3.6	2	$30	$10	estimated salary
Aybar	LAA	SS	30	2.3	3	$26	$9
Porcello	DET	SP	25	3.0	1	$8	$9	estimated salary
Zimmerman	WAS	3B	29	3.6	6	$90	$9	With poor defense
Sandoval	SFG	3B	27	3.0	1	$8	$9
Aramis	MIL	3B	36	2.9	2	$30	$2	Assume mutual option taken in 2015
Sabathia	NYY	SP	33	3.7	4	$96	$(11)

Chase Headley would be perfect, although Padres claim to want to hold on to him until mid-season to increase his value.  They’re thinking he will prove his performance level is high.  But he’s not going to double his performance level, so they’re not thinking clearly in saying half a season of high-performance Headley is worth more than a full season of questionable-performance Headley.  Maybe Kasten can make them see the light. 

The Dodgers will be asked for their own prospects in a lot of deals.  Who do they have? 

Name	Pos	Age	Hoped NPV	Bust NPV	% Bust	Undiscounted Hoped Asset
Pederson	CF	22	$28	$13	60%	$80
Lee	SP	22	$13	$6	80%	$39
Seager	3B/SS	20	$25	$11	50%	$119
Urias	SP	17	$6	$1	80%	$51
Stripling	SP	24	$2	$0	90%	$5
Reed	SP/RP	24	$2	$0	90%	$7

The Undiscounted Hoped Asset is simply the sum of Hoped performance – the salary they’d get for that, ignoring that it happens in later years.  This is a good measure for prospects’ upside.  The Hoped NPV is a realistic case if they work out, not the dream case.  The Bust NPV is a relatively high floor – assuming for example Urias becomes a middle relief guy instead of a starter, but does at least pitch at the major league level. 

Even counting the 30% discount rate and the high chance of Bust, I still cant see how 2 years of David Price is worth 3 or 4 top prospects.  I suspect the shortcoming of the framework is how it treats a WAR as a WAR.  In practice, the market value of a 2WAR player is more than twice the value of a 1 WAR player and the market value of a 4 WAR player is worth more then twice the value of a 2 WAR player.  I’ll explore that later.