I think I’ve written a ‘Trade Billy Butler’ post every year for the last three years, which might indicate that I don’t like Butler as a player. The truth is I am a Butler fan. I think he’s a very good hitter. Not a great hitter, but a very good hitter. He’s smart, gets on base, hits for some power, and despite some oddly uninformed narratives, hits very well with runners on base.
But playing fantasy general manager, which is what the
off-season and indeed fan blogging, is really all about, means trying to
understand a player’s true value relative to other players’ value and the
team’s success.
That’s why I write a ‘Trade Billy Butler’ post every
off-season, and that’s why I’m writing another right now. Really, this post
gives two trade scenarios. One is more a long-shot fantasy, but the other is,
in my mind, a plausible scenario, one that requires sacrifice on both ends.
This scenario isn’t complete speculation either. Recent
reports indicate that the Royals are talking with the Blue Jays about trading Butler
for something. Some say Butler and prospects to the Blue Jays. Some say Butler
to the Blue Jays for some prospects and something. Let me first state that the
Royals will not trade Butler unless they get a Major League return, a player
who can help them in the majors in 2014 as a starter.
So, here are two trade scenarios that I think the Royals
should pull the trigger on if it gets to that point:
1)
Butler for Adam Lind and Marcus Stroman/Daniel
Norris/Mitch Nay
2)
Butler and (any two of) Orlando Calixte/Cheslor
Cuthbert/Miguel Almonte/Elier Hernandez/Jason Adam for Jose Bautista
The first scenario is much more reasonable than the second
(especially now that the Royals gave Omar Infante money). So, I’ll touch on it
first.
The Blue Jays have a decent farm system, not stellar, but
decent. They have three players on MLB’s 2013 Top-100 Prospects list. Stroman
and Norris are at the back end of that list. Nay isn’t on it. But let’s look at
the major league components first.
Butler is clearly better than Lind, mostly because he’s more
consistent, more reliable. Lind has had one really good year and one pretty
good year. He’s also had three pretty bad years, sometimes due to injury,
sometimes do to ineffectiveness, sometimes both. Butler has never really had a
“bad” year offensively. He’s had some down years, but even his down years are
good years (except for maybe 2008). He’s had a wRC+ over 100 since 2008, and
actually every one of those has been 116 or higher. He’s also played in at
least 158 games since 2008.
But if Butler is better than Lind, why would the Royals make
the trade? Especially if they’re trying to win now? Well, that’s more
complicated. Start with this: Butler is better offensively, and better overall,
but he’s not THAT much better overall because DH’s have no defensive value and
Butler has a very negative base running value. Lind isn’t fast and has a
negative base running value as well, but it’s not as bad as Butler’s, probably
because Lind doesn’t hit into as many double plays (Lind hits left-handed. I’m
guessing this helps). In fact, the yearly WAR numbers for both Lind and Butler
aren’t much different if you look at Lind’s healthy years. Lind was worth 1.8 fWAR
last year. Butler was worth 1.4. In his down years, Lind has been worth as low
as -1.0 fWAR. In his best year, he was worth 3.4. In Butler’s best year, he was
worth 2.9. All these numbers are in the way of saying there isn’t as big a
difference between the two as one might think unless Lind has the worst year of
his career and Butler has the best.
Of course, the Royals can do their best to put Lind in a
position to succeed. Lind’s biggest issue is usually health, but other than
health, he has a wicked platoon split. Over his career, he hits lefties at a
.219/.261/.342 slash line, while he crushes righties, .286/.343/.508. The
Royals happen to have a catcher who could occasionally use a day off playing
DH, and he just happens to crush lefties. The Royals also have a fourth
outfielder (Justin Maxwell) who hits lefties very well over the course of his
career. Let Lind hit the righties and Maxwell and Salvador Perez hit the
lefties. Simple.
But the main reason the Royals are considering and probably
should trade Butler is position flexibility and position value. Even if Butler
is gone, the Royals might still be able to get the same value out of the DH
spot with a combination of players. This will allow them to rest players like
Perez but keep their bats in the lineup. It will also allow them to mix and
match the DH position with less expensive players. Oddly, they seem to be
evolving in their thinking to realize that it might not be the best idea to pay
a player $12 million just to play offense and hurt you on the bases, to put up
2-2.5 fWAR in a good year. Instead, it seems they want to save the money on a
DH and put other players in when the situations calls for it (Lind hitting righties,
Maxwell hitting lefties).
This scenario has tertiary benefits as well. It removes the
awkward decision Ned Yost has to make in NL ballparks (Butler or Hosmer). Lind
is a Butler-like defensive first baseman. There’s no pressure to play Lind over
Hosmer. Lind also has a more appealing contract. He makes less money this year,
much less next year with a team option of $7.5 million (Butler has team option
for $12.5 million), and has another team option at $8 million in 2016. Butler’s
contract is up after 2015.
If the Royals were to trade Butler for Lind, they should
demand a prospect along with him, probably not the Blue Jays’ most coveted
prospects, but each of the three I put forth have issues. Many question
Stroman’s ability to hold up as a starter (he’s very small). Norris has had
control issues in the minors, and Nay is still very early in his development.
Still, each of these prospects has the potential to be an above average major
league player.
That’s scenario one. The Blue Jays get the better/more
consistent major league player. The Royals get more flexibility and a good
prospect while still having the potential to get good production from the DH
spot.
Scenario two is the reverse of scenario one because the
Royals would be getting the better player and would need to provide prospects
in return.
I’ve already written on what Butler is. Bautista is just a
better version of Butler. He hits for more power. He walks more. He runs
better. His defense isn’t great, but it’s probably better than Butler’s, and at
the very least, he provides more defensive flexibility than Butler. Bautista
doesn’t have the high batting average that Butler does, but his OBP is still
pretty high (career .361).
Issues with Bautista? He’s been hurt for parts of the last
two seasons. He’s 33 years old. He makes $14 million a season for this year and
next with a $14 million option for 2016. But other than that, he’s one of the
premier power hitters in baseball, which is why giving only Butler won’t
suffice.
That said, the Royals aren’t desperate to trade so they
shouldn’t be giving up top prospects like Kyle Zimmer or Yordano Ventura. But
the Royals have a pretty obvious break between their top-tier prospects and the
rest of the bunch. As I see it, they have seven top-tier prospects. (Zimmer,
Ventura, Raul A. Mondesi, Hunter Dozier, Sean Manaea, Jorge Bonifacio, and
Bubba Starling). After that, they still have some promising talent, Almonte for
example, but there’s a clear difference between the Royals’ seventh best player
and their eighth (perhaps with the exception of Almonte who I like a lot). It’s
relatively safe for the Royals to give up two of the second-tier prospects in a
package with Butler for a hitter like Bautista.
Do I think either of these deals will happen? No, because
it’s just a much safer bet that deals won’t happen than that they will. Also, I
think the Royals often over-value their own prospects with the heart-crushing
exception of Wil Myers who they clearly undervalued. This causes them to hold
onto players instead of cashing in on their maximum value (see Mike Montgomery,
John Lamb, Chris Dwyer, Clint Robinson, Johnny Giavotella, and others). In
fact, I struggle to think of a prospect the Royals traded away at his peak. All
the players I just listed were either allowed to decline significantly before
trading (Montgomery and Robinson) or languish in the system after losing
significant value. To be fair, the Royals weren’t in a win-now mode until last
year so most of these players were going to be given a chance to succeed or
fail and many failed (as is going to happen. It’s a numbers game).
So, a trade is unlikely to happen. But it should happen. As
I stated before, I like Butler, but good, small-market teams do not pay that
much for a full-time DH when they can try to get solid production out of a DH
rotation for much less. It might be worth it, if they can get HUGE numbers from
Bautista AND get the position flexibility he provides (he’s played very little
first base, but it’s not that hard; Butler does it). This would actually cost the Royals a little
more money, but would be a big, all-in push for this season.
Whether it’s to the Blue Jays or another team, it makes
sense to trade Butler and move into a different system for the DH because true
DHs, players who are worth it, are difficult to find.
