Greinke traded to Angels for three prospects; Rangers nearly won the bidding (Latest: revisiting this trade in December 2015; post 481)

[MrTPlush]

You have to make a determination if a trade was good at the time of the trade. It looked like we got good value for Greinke at the time of the trade. Looking back it really was a bad trade. Hopefully we have better scouts and analytics going forward than we did at the time of this trade so we will have more success.

 

Yah I don't think anyone is really complaining that it was a bad trade at the time, but that it just turned out to be a pretty horrendous in the end. At the time it looked like a decent trade that got us a legit SS prospect that we needed.

[Bombers]

This thread made for some interesting retrospective reading. And this is why people need to pump the brakes on condemning (or praising) the Lind trade. Not even seasoned GM's have a crystal ball that tells them how trades will work out. All we can do is wait and see.

+1 ... Anyone can critique, that is fine. Voice direction but you really just don't know. Whether it was Brantley turning out better than La Porta or Joe thatcher turning out better than Inman or Greinke to the Angels. No one really knows.

[DHonks]

Wait, don't we still have Hellweg, Pena, and Segura? Greinke became a monster after the trade. But we wouldn't have had him the last few years. I'd take that trade any day. We'll likely trade Seggy for something of value. Pena still has a chance to become a solid contributor. And Hellweg is like the new Ben Diggins (great talent, lots of groundouts, can't do it at MLB), but may just need more chances

[3and2Fastball]

In 2015 among MLB Shortstops, Jean Segura ranked:

 

18th in WAR

9 in Defensive WAR

19th in Offensive WAR

20th in wRC+

20th in wOBA

14th in Batting Average

19th in Slugging

2nd in Stolen Bases

12th in BABIP

 

He is a legit starting SS in MLB. He isn't Troy Tulowitzki or Brandon Crawford, of course. But he has plenty of value. He's far from the worst SS in MLB

[logan82]

Wait, don't we still have Hellweg, Pena, and Segura? Greinke became a monster after the trade. But we wouldn't have had him the last few years. I'd take that trade any day. We'll likely trade Seggy for something of value. Pena still has a chance to become a solid contributor. And Hellweg is like the new Ben Diggins (great talent, lots of groundouts, can't do it at MLB), but may just need more chances

Nope on Hellweg. He is a Padre.

[pacopete4]

In 2015 among MLB Shortstops, Jean Segura ranked:

 

18th in WAR

9 in Defensive WAR

19th in Offensive WAR

20th in wRC+

20th in wOBA

14th in Batting Average

19th in Slugging

2nd in Stolen Bases

12th in BABIP

 

He is a legit starting SS in MLB. He isn't Troy Tulowitzki or Brandon Crawford, of course. But he has plenty of value. He's far from the worst SS in MLB

 

Yes. He isn't my or quite a few peoples ideal SS because of his whack away type approach but he does have value and we'll see a return on him. Peńa is another guy that can become a big contributor this season. Hellweg, meh...

[3and2Fastball]

According to FanGraphs, Segura is 13th among all MLB SS's between 2013-2015 in Defensive WAR, 9th in Batting Average, 2nd in Stolen Bases, 11th in BABIP

 

It is true he falls below the median in wOBA & wRC+ .... it depends on where you place your value. The Royals have shown that athletic ballplayers who put the ball in play, steal bases, and play strong defense can help win a lot of games

 

Again I would say that Jean Segura for 2+ months of what turned out to be below average Zack Greinke was one heckuva trade. One of Melvin's better ones.

[MrTPlush]

Sure Segura ranks 18th if you would like to ignore all the SS that had injuries or just simply aren't getting starter at-bats because of the teams they play on, but could easily get full season at-bats else. If we consider anyone with 350 at-bats Segura ranks a crisp 31st out of 35 SS.

 

Lets not try to sugar coat things and make things bias in favor of Segura. Some of the SS that you are ignoring that are better than Segura are:

 

Jordy Mercer(Injury)

Ruben Tejada

Ryan Goins(I believe the guy who lost his job to Tulo)

Jose Iglesias

Adeiny Hechavarria(missed qualifying cut off by one at-bat)

Nick Ahmed

Carlos Correa(called up late)

Fransisco Lindor(same as above)

Jung-Ho Kang(don't think he started right away)

Brad Miller

And about 5 players slightly better than Segura

 

Sorry Jean Segura is one of the worst SS in all of baseball and it won't help a big group of SS is still continuing to hit the majors right now. The guy is not good.

[3and2Fastball]

Carlos Correa & Francisco Lindor look like potential superstars. It'll be interesting watching their careers.

 

Reminds me a little of when Derek Jeter, Alex Rodriguez & Nomar Garciaparra were all young players. Lots of tremendous SS talent coming up these days.

 

Hopefully Arcia can be one of the greats, too.

 

No matter how much we might disagree as to how we view Segura, I think we all realize that his place in the lineup is just a holding spot until Arcia is ready for MLB.

[MNBrew]

MrTPlush, you voice your opinions here very regularly and consistently do so with ample evidence to support your view, which on a board like this is usually much better than the alternative. It also seems you're not too likely to be able to be persuaded otherwise, which is also fine. But in the course of stating your passionate/compelling viewpoints, you often come across as though there's only one logical/viable outcome when that's not necessarily the case.

 

To put the above into context, you obviously think Segura is a lousy SS and have ample evidence to support the view. But it's possible he's not as lousy as you think. Personally I don't think he's awful but I also don't love him on this roster and figure his days in MIL are numbered given the other SS talent in the pipeline, whether that means days, weeks, or even another year or more. . . .

 

It's also possible that trading Lucroy and Braun are neither prudent or inevitable, and that if the front office believe that to be the case with one or both of those guys, they have greater and more justified logic than we may ever know of, although that's a concluding thought more pertinent to the Lind/Lucroy/etc. thread.

[3and2Fastball]

One thing I will add in terms of comparing players: there is value in players who are in the lineup every day. We can say "well this guy is better but he was injured" or "that guy was better but he was a backup to a star". I'm not real big on the "what if" game. I'd prefer to look at the facts of what actually has happened. Projecting future results based on the past is, of course, murkier

 

In a larger context look at the comparisons of Willie Mays & Mickey Mantle: Mays was clearly the better defensive player and had a better arm, but on offense Mantle obliterates Mays. However Mays averaged about 30 more games per season than Mantle. So in one fifth of the season while Mays was playing way better defense than Carlos Gomez could dream of all while hitting 40-50 HR's a season and being a disruptive force on the basepaths, Mantle was on the bench while his backup played. That's why I'd give the nod to Mays.

 

Now I'm not saying Segura is an All-Time great or anything, just using the above as a big picture example. Segura has been durable and hustles all out. There is value there. Would I rather have Tulowitzki for 85-90 games a season than Segura for 162? In a vacuum, yes. But in the larger context of a roster, and how much is owed Tulo, and depending on who else I have to provide offense, it isn't quite so clear.

 

Now for all we know Tulo may never get hurt again and Segura might average 40 games a season for the rest of his career. It's a roll of the dice when looking at player personnel.

[3and2Fastball]

Big picture, if asked:

 

Who would you want on the roster --- Tulowitzki at 15 million a year or Segura at 1 million a year, my choice would be:

 

Orlando Arcia

 

[Thurston Fluff]

In 2015 among MLB Shortstops, Jean Segura ranked:

 

18th in WAR

9 in Defensive WAR

19th in Offensive WAR

20th in wRC+

20th in wOBA

14th in Batting Average

19th in Slugging

2nd in Stolen Bases

12th in BABIP

 

He is a legit starting SS in MLB. He isn't Troy Tulowitzki or Brandon Crawford, of course. But he has plenty of value. He's far from the worst SS in MLB

 

Yes. He isn't my or quite a few peoples ideal SS because of his whack away type approach but he does have value and we'll see a return on him. Peńa is another guy that can become a big contributor this season. Hellweg, meh...

 

I think when you rank players you need to put that into perspective. If the difference between the tenth highest ranked player has on OBP of .290 and the 20th is .287 does the fact he ranks higher create any more value? I think the real question is: Is a player good enough to have value? For as much as I rag on WAR I am happy they attempted to answer that.