Atlanta Braves and Oakland: is there a deal for an outfielder possible?
The Atlanta Braves need an outfielder. That’s not news, and lots of suggestions float around the blogosphere every day. One of our readers had an idea worthy of further discussion, so I thought I’d present the details so we can do that.
One of our frequent commenters here – Mark Delgado – suggested the following trade. The Oakland Athletics would get Max Fried, and I assume a player to be determined. In return, the Atlanta Braves would get outfielder Ramon Laureano and minor league reliever Kyle Finnegan.
I’m very high on Fried, but I’m not married to him, and Touki Toussaint fills almost the same role though he’s a RHP while Max slings it from the left side.
Initially, I wondered about the parties involved. Most trades I see discuss Major League players or well-known prospects, but Mark digs into the minors more than most and comes up with players that require research, so I had to go looking for information.
As I investigated the players involved, I decided Finnegan looked like a lottery ticket reliever who needs a new home and worth a shot. Looking at Laureano, I soon understood why Mark likes him so much.
Ramon Laureano
The Astros drafted Laureano in the 16th round of the 2014 Rule 4 draft. After a slow start in rookie and low A ball, the 21-year-old Dominican from Miami lit up A+ ball in 2016 posting a .317/.426/.519/.945 line in 80 games.
That earned him a move to AA Corpus Christi where he continued to mash, hitting to a .323/.432/.548/.981 line in 124 AB over 33 games.
Then 2017 happened. In 123 games his line crashed to .225/.296/.367/.663, and he fell from being #13 on the Astros’ prospect list to #29.
Houston’s system featured a plethora of outfielders, and rather than take a chance that those numbers were the real Laureano, they traded him to Oakland for an A+ ball arm. Given the opportunity to make that decision again, they probably wouldn’t make that trade.
The 2018 season
Laureano started 2018 with a broken finger but returned to hit .297/.380/.524/.905 with 14 homers,12 doubles, striking out 70 times and walking 31 in 284 PA. That earned him a trip to Oakland.
Once he put on the green and gold, he was there to stay. In 176 PA he hit to a .288/.358/.474/.832 line with five homers, 12 doubles and stole seven bases in eight attempts. Those numbers were good enough for 2.1 fWAR, a .357 wOBA and 129 wRC+.
Laureano played mostly right field in the minors, showing off a plus arm to notch 16 assists. That arm, his speed, and a bat that profiles at 10–15 homers profiles as a center fielder in major league play.
Kyle Finnegan
The Athletics selected the righty in the sixth round of the 2013 draft. Originally a starter, he moved to the bullpen in 2016 and seemed to find a home. In 30 games for AA Midland, he threw 42 innings, struck out 41, walked 20 and finished the season with a 2.14 ERA and 1.21 WHIP.
Finnegan split time between AA and AAA in 2017 and seemed to be adjusting well when the season ended. He started this year in AAA, but injury interceded and he missed a month from mid-May to mid-June.
When he returned he went back to AA and finished the season there, pitching to a 2.16 ERA – 2.53 FIP – with 28 strikeouts in 25 IP.
I ask Ben for a scouting report. He tells me he Finnegan’s velocity sits in the mid-90s, his changeup features excellent late sink, and his low 80s slider often shows more straight drop than sweep making it more of a curve than a slider. Here he is in motion.
Those two pitchers give him a consistent 60+% minor league groundball rate that allows him to work his way out of trouble if he walks a batter or two. He has a loose, quick arm, and some websites indicate his heater is back to the 97 mph heater rage.
Walking batters is something he’s had trouble with in the past, but since Oakland shortened his stride, he seems to improve on each year.
The deal and excess values
While the numbers are marginally different, Laureano projects much like Atlanta Braves outfield prospect Drew Waters. These ranks come from Fangraphs.
Laureano is still pre-arb and under team control through 2024.
I used the trade calculator originally created by Skye Kalkman back in 2009 – updated to 2018 WAR values – for the excess value (EV) calculation and assigned a $600K salary to each of the three pre-arb years.
In limited service with Oakland in 2018, Laureano produced 2.1-fWAR. I projected him to do a little better each year and level out at 3-fWAR. That’s likely high, but if you’re trading for a prospect, you should expect him to improve.
I based the arbitration salaries on the 25/40/60 formula; that may be low if he produces as I project, but clubs tend to hold those down unless they extend the player.
Any deviation from the real numbers applies universally. As a result, inaccuracies in the projections are equivalent and offsetting.
If you drop Laureano’s expected fWAR to 2.0 for each year, the EV drops to $83.1M.
Finnegan is still a prospect, and while he’s not a top 100 prospect, he’s a 50FV pitcher per Fangraphs. Their Big Board lists values for the top 131 prospects. A 50FV pitcher outside of the top 100 is worth about $9M.
That makes the deal worth about $110M in excess value + future value.
Putting a future value on Max Fried depends on whether you see him as a prospect who ranked as high as 50 across three lists, or a major league starter.
As a 50 FV prospect, Fried’s FV falls between $27M and $29M. If you consider him a Major League pitcher whose WAR increases with experience, his FV becomes higher. I used the latter premise because that’s how I see him. The Athletics could see it differently, at least when negotiating.
For this exercise, I assumed that in their magnanimity, they would agree with my valuation.
Coincidentally, Fried’s under team control for six years, just like Laureano.
Using that calculation sending only Fried in exchange for both players isn’t equal value. If the Atlanta Braves sent Kolby Allard and Adam Duvall as well, the trade would be equitable; but this is Oakland, and they have other considerations.
The Oakland paradigm
While everyone watched Seattle start, trip, fall over and get replaced by the Angels who emulated their ineptitude, Oakland won 97 games. A group of players most fans couldn’t name scored 5.02 runs/game – #4 in the AL – and allowed 4.16 runs/game – #6 best in the AL.
Their bullpen saved 44 games of 63 opportunities (19 blown saves) and lost just 17, second best in the AL behind Boston. The offense hit 227 home runs second only to the Yankees. That’s no mean feat when you play half your games in the Grand Canyon . . . err Oakland Coliseum.
Atlanta Braves
If you want to hit a home run, the ‘O-CO’ is not the place to go. It’s the 5th hardest homer park in baseball; third hardest for LHH and tenth hardest for RHH.
Not surprisingly they want to win again so trading a budding star isn’t high on their list, especially when he’s inexpensive.
Atlanta Braves fans bemoan the size of payroll increases, the Athletics’ are always looking to save a dollar or ten in payroll costs, so there might still be a trade there.
Another option for the Atlanta Braves
The 2019 Oakland outfield as projected today consists of Nick Martini, Laureano, and Stephen Piscotty backed up by Mark Canha, Chad Pinder and Dustin Fowler.
All of those players are inexpensive for most teams. But this is Oakland, and they might like to free up a couple of million to reinforce another area. If so, then Piscotty might be available.
Perhaps Piscotty
If you aren’t aware of the back story, the Cardinals traded Piscotty to Oakland last December so he could be near his mother whose illness had become more serious. Sadly his mother – just 55 years-old – passed away due to ALS five months later.
Piscotty played well for Oakland as these numbers from Fangraphs show.
At first glance, he appears to have a reverse split. However, a closer look at the numbers shows that Piscotty’s 2017 season – the year his mother’s illness became worse – skews the numbers. Removing that year and looking at 2015,16, and 18, or just 2016 and 2018 show a reverse split too small to consider.
Other considerations
Defensively, UZR doesn’t like Piscotty. It could be his lack of speed causing his bad ratings; he has just average speed. That meant the wide-open pasture of the O-CO did him no favors. When he played right field in St Louis, he posted +8 DRS in 2017 and +4 DRS in 2016.
Piscotty earns $7.3M each of the next two seasons and $7.6M in 2021 and 2022 with a $15M team option for 2023. His excess value is roughly the same as that of Laureano and Finnegan combined.