If JJ Hardy is non-tendered - Utility IF?

[Never Outhustled]

Hardy's offense has been disappearing and for all the grief about Escobar he has the same Obp as Hardy. Hardy may have already peaked and will be a FA after next season. I'd take Escobar easily over Hardy today.

Not on a contender. Contenders want to win now. Contenders trade future talent for now talent all the time. This isn't a discussion of who has more trade value. If we were a contender and we had both players, Escobar would be in AAA.

 

 

Also, Hardy has an OPS of 855 since the all-star break. He's always been streaky, but his 2nd half resurgance is a big reason why the Twins have pulled back in front of the Sox. Escobar has yet to have a single 700 OPS month.

 

I find it surprising I have to defend Hardy. I used to take the other side of the fence in discussions when posters stated "Hardy can flat out hit", "Hardy is becoming a good OBA hitter", and "Hardy is a perfect fit for the #2 spot". Turns out none of those things are true. What is true is that he's a very valuable SS because he is a strong defender with some pop in his bat.

[HiAndTight]

Hardy's offense has been disappearing and for all the grief about Escobar he has the same Obp as Hardy. Hardy may have already peaked and will be a FA after next season. I'd take Escobar easily over Hardy today.

Not on a contender. Contenders want to win now. Contenders trade future talent for now talent all the time. This isn't a discussion of who has more trade value. If we were a contender and we had both players, Escobar would be in AAA.

 

 

Also, Hardy has an OPS of 855 since the all-star break. He's always been streaky, but his 2nd half resurgance is a big reason why the Twins have pulled back in front of the Sox. Escobar has yet to have a single 700 OPS month.

 

I find it surprising I have to defend Hardy. I used to take the other side of the fence in discussions when posters stated "Hardy can flat out hit", "Hardy is becoming a good OBA hitter", and "Hardy is a perfect fit for the #2 spot". Turns out none of those things are true. What is true is that he's a very valuable SS because he is a strong defender with some pop in his bat.

You're using 92 AB's for Hardy to justify this argument?

 

Anyway, given the negligible difference between the two this year, the age difference between the two and the difference in cost, I disagree that most contenders would rather have Escobar.

 

It's not like we're comparing two guys who are having vastly different seasons, and one is younger, cheaper and likely to see substantial improvements, we're comparing two guys with .305 OBP's, a .251 to .263 BA and .654 to .699 OPS.

 

So I doubt many contenders would take the menial difference from Hardy to Escobar and forgo the 5 extra years of service time and potential from the 23 year old Escobar.

[RockCoCougars]

Frankly, Billy Hall would be a better option, because he can play any position on the field. I'm only half joking.

[Never Outhustled]

So I doubt many contenders would take the menial difference from Hardy to Escobar and forgo the 5 extra years of service time and potential from the 23 year old Escobar.

I still don't know what your talking about because they weren't traded for each other. Its pretty clear Hardy has been better than Gomez though. The Brewers gave up the better now player for nothing in return. Hardy will likely continue to be better than Escobar through next year. Now the Brewers have completely wasted 1 of Escobar's cheap years.

[TooLiveBrew]

The Brewers gave up the better now player for nothing in return

 

It's not like teams were beating down the door to get at Hardy, though. The market for him sucked, as I'd imagine it still does.

[Never Outhustled]

The Brewers gave up the better now player for nothing in return

 

It's not like teams were beating down the door to get at Hardy, though. The market for him sucked, as I'd imagine it still does.

 

I don't know how you know that, especially when Hardy was dealt so early in the offseason. The Brewers would have been better off waiting than accepting the 1st bad offer they got.

[TooLiveBrew]

You have no way of knowing whether or not that happened. Melvin's track record certainly isn't one of rushing into deals, bad or good.

[JohnBriggs12]

Last year Hardy was on 2nd 11 times when a batter hit a single. He scored less than half of those times (5 of 11). Escobar has been in that situation 10 times this year and scored 9 times.

 

You can't compare the 2 without mentioning that one can't run at all and the other will get you the extra base routinely. Escobar has hit in extremely bad luck this year. Despite having the highest line drive percentage (23%) among regulars, he's got the lowest Babip (.278). If his Babip were league average, he'd be hitting close to .270. I think a line of .280/.330/.380 is far more in line with his ability right now than his current stats.

 

Yeah his errors are a bit high, but he's also made plays Hardy can't make in his dreams.

[dadofandrew]

Escobar's a rookie, so he's gonna struggle at times...Weeks did for years, Prince still does on D. He's not going to peak offensively for several years, so I'm not sure why anyone expected him to do well. He might well be a slasher with a plus SLG someday due to his speed, but he's a work in progress. SS's don't hit much anyway, unless you have a Troy T or Jeter. Much like C's, the top 5 ruin the curve for all the rest.

[Never Outhustled]

You have no way of knowing whether or not that happened. Melvin's track record certainly isn't one of rushing into deals, bad or good.

 

I have no way of knowing when the transaction took place? Can't I just look at the date? It happened at the beginning of the offseason. Stop pretending like Melvin spent the whole offseason shopping Hardy, and the best he could find was Gomez. The truth is Melvin mistook Gomez for a real player, just as Melvin did with Kevin Mench.

[TooLiveBrew]

No, you have no way of knowing whether or not it was the first offer. It's very plausible that, since there wasn't much interest in Hardy at all, there wasn't much looking around for Melvin to do. Who are you claiming would have possibly given up more for Hardy at that point? What kind of player would you have rather gotten? Hardy wasn't going to get a useful SP, so aside from that I really don't know what you want from Melvin. He traded a disappointing player for another disappointing player, but at least the one he got back still had room to grow & plays a premium position.

[HiAndTight]

So I doubt many contenders would take the menial difference from Hardy to Escobar and forgo the 5 extra years of service time and potential from the 23 year old Escobar.

I still don't know what your talking about because they weren't traded for each other. Its pretty clear Hardy has been better than Gomez though. The Brewers gave up the better now player for nothing in return. Hardy will likely continue to be better than Escobar through next year. Now the Brewers have completely wasted 1 of Escobar's cheap years.

I'm not quite sure how you can't know what I'm talking about when YOU'RE the one who just a couple posts above is comparing Escobar to Hardy in terms of what contenders want and which player YOU would prefer.

 

Seems pretty simple to me. You're arguing that contenders would prefer Hardy because he's slightly better this year than Escobar.

 

Or am I mis-understanding this;

 

MJLiverock wrote:
Hardy's offense has been disappearing and for all the grief

about Escobar he has the same Obp as Hardy. Hardy may have already

peaked and will be a FA after next season. I'd take Escobar easily over

Hardy today.

Xcellence(Your response):
Not on a contender. Contenders want to win

now. Contenders trade future talent for now talent all the time. This

isn't a discussion of who has more trade value. If we were a contender

and we had both players, Escobar would be in AAA.

 

 

Seems to me it's pretty clear you're talking about Hardy vs Escobar, but thanks SO much for informing me again that they weren't traded for each other.

[TheCrew]

Also, Hardy has an OPS of 855 since the all-star break. He's always been streaky, but his 2nd half resurgance is a big reason why the Twins have pulled back in front of the Sox. Escobar has yet to have a single 700 OPS month.

A big reason? Really, he's hit 2 HR, has 12 RBI and scored 18 runs since the all star break - FWIW Escobar has 1 less HR, but the same amount of RBI's and runs.

 

Furthermore, Hardy raked in July and has been terrible in August - Minnesota was in 1st place on July 1st and only a .5 gb at the end of July, they have upped their lead to 4.5 games in August, right when Hardy has gone back to use usual ways: hitting .245 with 1 HR and 5 RBI's.

 

Anybody still watching Brewers games can see they Escobar continues to improve - let's not forget he is a rookie. I don't think there is a gm in the league that would take Hardy over Escobar.

[endaround]

Hardy's "terrible" August is still better than anything Escobar has done.

[TheCrew]

Hardy's "terrible" August is still better than anything Escobar has done.

Sure, if you want to strictly look at OPS and nothing else.

[TooLiveBrew]

OPS is one of the best stats in terms of correlation with runs scored, iirc. Hardy has also been significantly better on defense than Escobar overall this season.

[BREWCREW5]

Hardy is 28 and appears to be past his prime. I am not sure why so many here are so in love with him still.

 

Escobar is 23 and it is his first year in the majors. Relax. He is the future.

[TooLiveBrew]

That doesn't change the fact that Hardy has been better on both sides of the ball this season, which as best I can tell, is what was being discussed. Escobar has been healthier, but that's where his edge over Hardy this season ends.

[danzig6767]

No, you have no way of knowing whether or not it was the first offer. It's very plausible that, since there wasn't much interest in Hardy at all, there wasn't much looking around for Melvin to do. Who are you claiming would have possibly given up more for Hardy at that point? What kind of player would you have rather gotten? Hardy wasn't going to get a useful SP, so aside from that I really don't know what you want from Melvin. He traded a disappointing player for another disappointing player, but at least the one he got back still had room to grow & plays a premium position.

No question that people commenting in this thread have no idea about what teams Doug called in regards to Hardy and what other offers he may have received for JJ. I'd assume that Melvin let all of baseball know that Hardy was available.

 

Either way though, what Doug did get in return looks to be a complete bust unless you think Gomez will ever be able to improve at least fairly significantly at the plate because i'd put the odds of that happening at microscopic.

[MJLiverock]

That doesn't change the fact that Hardy has been better on both sides of the ball this season, which as best I can tell, is what was being discussed. Escobar has been healthier, but that's where his edge over Hardy this season ends.

Escobar has 428 PA vs. Hardy's 270 PA's this season. Someone would have to make up the Hardy missed games and it would have been Escobar getting called up. Thier OBP's are pretty much identical. The only difference is in slugging. Hardy has 104 total bases in 270 PA's and Escobar has 147 TB in 428 PAs. So if you rate Escobar down to Hardy's lower PA's he would have 12 few bases than Hardy in 270 PAs or if Hardy had the same PA's as Escobar and kept his slugging up that would be 17 more bases than Escobar.

 

Of course Hardy is as slow as can be and wasn't the greatest base runner so I would also remember an earlier post someone referenced Escobar scoring from 1st or 2nd when you know Hardy wouldn't have.

 

Escobar also has 10 steals with 4 caught for a net of 6. Hardy is at 0 with one CS and 1 steal. Even giving Escobar something like .66 of a base for his net steals subtracts about 4 bases from that 17 base deficit.

 

All in all given the negligible difference in OBP, basically a 13 base difference in slugging, and better scoring from 1 or 2nd, and just the sheer number of games missed by Hardy I would say their offense is pretty much a wash or even slighly favors Escobar because of the durability and the fact he would have been playing anyway.

 

If anything the trade of Gomez for Hardy was pretty much an even swap or even in the Brewers favor. Two guys with poor OBP, limited offensive games who can play defense. The difference being the Twins have to pay Hardy $5.1MM for that production while the Brewers only have to pay $1.1MM to Gomez.

[Never Outhustled]

That doesn't change the fact that Hardy has been better on both sides of the ball this season, which as best I can tell, is what was being discussed. Escobar has been healthier, but that's where his edge over Hardy this season ends.

Escobar has 428 PA vs. Hardy's 270 PA's this season. Someone would have to make up the Hardy missed games and it would have been Escobar getting called up. Thier OBP's are pretty much identical. The only difference is in slugging. Hardy has 104 total bases in 270 PA's and Escobar has 147 TB in 428 PAs. So if you rate Escobar down to Hardy's lower PA's he would have 12 few bases than Hardy in 270 PAs or if Hardy had the same PA's as Escobar and kept his slugging up that would be 17 more bases than Escobar.

 

Of course Hardy is as slow as can be and wasn't the greatest base runner so I would also remember an earlier post someone referenced Escobar scoring from 1st or 2nd when you know Hardy wouldn't have.

 

Escobar also has 10 steals with 4 caught for a net of 6. Hardy is at 0 with one CS and 1 steal. Even giving Escobar something like .66 of a base for his net steals subtracts about 4 bases from that 17 base deficit.

 

All in all given the negligible difference in OBP, basically a 13 base difference in slugging, and better scoring from 1 or 2nd, and just the sheer number of games missed by Hardy I would say their offense is pretty much a wash or even slighly favors Escobar because of the durability and the fact he would have been playing anyway.

I don't know why your going through all this work to figure out the value of these players, when all the factors you mention are included in the formula for WAR, except their formula is properly weighted.

 

WAR shows Hardy as more than twice as valuable as Escobar this year.

 

 

If anything the trade of Gomez for Hardy was pretty much an even swap or even in the Brewers favor. Two guys with poor OBP, limited offensive games who can play defense. The difference being the Twins have to pay Hardy $5.1MM for that production while the Brewers only have to pay $1.1MM to Gomez.

Hardy has been almost 4 times more valuable than Gomez. Gomez is awful. Beyond awful.

[MJLiverock]

WAR is flawed because of it's defense weighting and general creation of defense ratings. I broke down the offense to a difference of about a dozen bases not including the scoring from 1st. I even gave Hardy the benefit of the doubt about keeping his slg up over all his missed games. If WAR can rate a difference of a dozen bases as a major difference or give a guy with nearly identical offensive stats but misses a third of games a more valuable rating on offense it makes zero sense. 1.8 vs. .8 is all on the contrived D.

 

I never implied Gomez was good, the fact is that Hardy hasn't been good either especially given the salary savings the Brewers got. The fact that even after 4 or 5 years in the league Hardy can't hit enough better than Escobar to even notice.

[Never Outhustled]

WAR is flawed because of it's defense weighting and general creation of defense ratings. I broke down the offense to a difference of about a dozen bases not including the scoring from 1st.

 

Your flawed in your offensive numbers because you aren't correctly calculating stolen bases. Escobar doesn't have 6 net steals he has 2. 4 CS cancells out 8 steals. Then you give the stolen bases .66 value of batted ball bases. Thats inaccurate too. How many runs does a steal drive in?

 

The difference between these 2 players is not all defense as you suggest. Hardy has been 10 runs better than Escobar, not 12 bases better. Thats a significant difference.

[MJLiverock]

WAR is flawed because of it's defense weighting and general creation of defense ratings. I broke down the offense to a difference of about a dozen bases not including the scoring from 1st.

 

Your flawed in your offensive numbers because you aren't correctly calculating stolen bases. Escobar doesn't have 6 net steals he has 2. 4 CS cancells out 8 steals. Then you give the stolen bases .66 value of batted ball bases. Thats inaccurate too. How many runs does a steal drive in?

 

The difference between these 2 players is not all defense as you suggest. Hardy has been 10 runs better than Escobar, not 12 bases better. Thats a significant difference.

 

 

well fangraphs and Yahoo both have 10 steals and 4 CS. The stolen bases do contibute to his total bases even at a discounted rate. Quite reasonable to give credit for a SB especially if the assumption is going to be made that a double automatically drives in a run or a weight of a run. I stand by my point that the difference is negligible when baserimmomg is factored in and tilts in Escobars favor when games played is added in .

[TheCrew]

OPS is one of the best stats in terms of correlation with runs scored, iirc. Hardy has also been significantly better on defense than Escobar overall this season.

It sure is - but to make a broad statement that "Hardy's terrible August is better than anything Escobar has done" is flat out wrong, unless you look strictly at OPS. Which was my point.

 

Bottom line is this - if Hardy was as good as many on here are trying to imply that he is, he wouldn't be a non-tender candidate for the Twins.