Yesterday, one of those content generating non-story stories exploded on twitter. It’s a topic that is definitely coming, but thanks to a more or less innocuous piece from ESPN’s Buster Olney, that time came yesterday (with the help of a little click-bait framing from Bleacher Report):
That set the cottage industry of internet trade rumors (which are a breed unto themselves) running rampant. Which…. of course! Juan Soto is a generational player — maybe a multi-generational player. This would be the Red Sox trading Ted Williams after he hit .400. This would be the Yankees trading Mickey Mantle the year after he bizarrely lost out on the MVP to teammate Yogi Berra for the second straight year and before his two consecutive MVPs. This would be the Pirates trading Barry Bonds after his first MVP, but sending to the acquiring team via a time machine that magically made him three years younger (but still just as good — not quite sure of the logistics on that one).
OF COURSE, fans of every team (and every team itself) would be excited about the idea of acquiring a 23-year-old unicorn with three top 10 MVP finishes already on his rèsumé. With two and half years of elite production to look forward to, and a contract that hasn’t even hit arbitration yet, there’s nobody who wouldn’t want to be in on this deal (well, maybe not nobody — I’ll get to that in a sec).
So it’s not surprising that I opened my twitter account yesterday to see a long string of messages like this in my notifications (with copious replies from others):
Fans of every team started posting trade proposals which ran the gamut of — take our top six prospects to take this major league guy who kinda stinks, this former top prospect who’s regressing, and this other guy who’s never been on a ranking list in his life and …. voíla!
Seriously though, it’s a great question and a good thought exercise. The Athletic’s Grant Brisbee wrote an excellent piece this morning that made the essential point — if Soto is on the market, you trade whatever it takes. A point I thoroughly agree with.
But when it comes to the nuts and bolts of actually what it might take, we have a few problems. The biggest one is that there really isn’t anything to compare such a deal to, so as to give ourselves a blueprint to follow. We’re talking about a 23-year-old probably inner circle Hall of Famer here. Those guys just don’t get moved!
The only remotely similar trade this century (and off the top of my head I might say it’s the only similar trade of my lifetime) was the December, 2007 deal that sent Miguel Cabrera to Detroit. That’s not a perfect comparison to Soto for a couple of small reasons and one whopper of a reason. The small reasons are in the details — Cabrera was heading towards his 25th birthday when he was dealt with two years remaining before free agency (as opposed to — still 23 for the next six months and 2.5 years left). The bigger reason is that, given the revolution that has taken place in front offices — replacing old school baseball types with Ivy Leaguers who obsessively focus on efficiency and precise valuation — December of 2007 might just as well be the Stone Age when it comes to teams putting together trade proposals.
Still, it’s a start.
December 4, 2007 Traded by the Florida Marlins with Dontrelle Willis to the Detroit Tigers for Cameron Maybin, Andrew Miller, Burke Badenhop, Frankie De La Cruz, Mike Rabelo, and Dallas Trahern.
In more recent years, with front offices using more recent valuation philosophies, the most similar deal, at least in terms of talent level being moved, was the trade of Mookie Betts to the Los Angeles Dodgers. Of course, by similar, I’m meaning: not really similar AT ALL!!! But it says something about how far we are into the land of the improbable, the best comp I can come up for a Soto deal is one that is dramatically different.
Betts wasn’t 23 when the Red Sox decided to deal him, and he didn’t have 2.5 years of control left for the acquiring team. He wasn’t a pre-arb player making leks against the dollar. He was a just-turned 27 year old heading into his walk year toting a $30 million dollar arbitration salary. But he was similar in the sense that he was considered one of the top 2 or 3 players in the game at the time and was coming off four consecutive Top-10 MVP seasons.
Still, honestly, it’s not that great a comp at all. Still, if the Miggy deal can be our comp Yin, then Mookie can be the comp Yang when trying to get our minds around this problem:
February 10, 2020, Traded by the Boston Red Sox with David Price and cash to the Los Angeles Dodgers for Alex Verdugo, Jeter Downs, and Conner Wong
So what did these dealing teams actually get?
Good question, Mr. Rhetorical Man! When it comes to a prospect haul, Florida demanded and got the proverbial shitload in moving Cabrera. Maybin and Miller were not just Detroit’s #1 and 2 prospect going into the 2007 season. Maybin had been the #6 prospect in baseball that year according to Baseball America, and would repeat as the #6 prospect when BA’s Top 100 dropped a couple of months after the deal. Miller had been the #10 prospect in baseball prior to his 2007 rookie season. Miller had been the consensus top pick in the 2006 draft, but fell to the #6 pick due to a signability concern. He and his agent, Scott Boras, negotiated a big league deal with Detroit that ended up rushing him to the big leagues — probably a bit too soon for his own good.
Still, two top 10 prospects in baseball seems like a good starting point. As for the rest? De la Cruz was a top 10 prospect in Detroit’s system. Badenhop was in the back end of their top 30 (and ended up having a very nice career for the Marlins). Rabelo was another back end of the top 30 guy — but he was a catcher! You can never have too many of those in the org. Along with the prospect haul, Florida was able to off-load Willis, who was due to make $22 million over the next two seasons.
Naturally, Boston’s take was lighter — as the circumstances dictated. But it was still fairly significant. Verdugo had climbed to the #35 prospect in baseball before losing his rookie eligibility during the 2019 season (a 2.0 fWAR season as a utility player in LA). Downs had probably been a little over-hyped off one outstanding season, but he was the #86 prospect in baseball on BA’s Top 100, though just the 13th best prospect in the Dodgers’ system. Wong was a top 20 prospect in the Dodgers’ system, two years after being a 3rd round pick. AND of course, the Red Sox ridded themselves of half of the $96 million remaining on Price’s deal, as well as the $30 million coming to Betts — a tidy $42 million chopped off of the 2020 payroll (which would, of course, get chopped a lot more by later events).
It goes without saying that what the acquiring teams got was…. well, alot!
(yeah, I went there)
So What Would it Take to get Juan Soto?
What’s interesting about the two comparables is that, despite massive changes in how front offices operate, the sheer value exchanged actually makes sense. While deals today don’t always go full on quantity the way the Tigers did, the broad outlines of these two deals do make some sense, even at a decade plus distance.
For the 24 year old player with two years of control left, the Marlins received two Top 10 prospects in baseball, along with four other decently regarded prospects (three of whom went on to decent major league careers) and salary relief. For the 27 year old with one year of control left, Boston got a Top 50 prospect and a Top 100 prospect, a major-league ready reliever, and LOTS of salary relief. In retrospect, even the difference between $22 million in salary relief and $96 million feels more like a COLA than anything else. More importantly, the difference in prospect value between the two deals does feel about right to me.
So what does it take to get Soto: it feels like the offer should start with two Top 10 or, at least, Top 20 prospects, another one or two with major league value, and some salary relief. The salary part is easy — there’s Patrick Corbin’s rotting carcass of a deal right there for all to see: $59 million over 2023 and ‘24, plus whatever remains of the $23 million for this year. There’s also the roughly $160 million left for Steven Strasburg’s deal, but my sense is that Strasburg, who has full no-trade rights and for whom comfort level with a situation is reported to be incredibly important, isn’t leaving the DC area. So let’s write that one off.
As for prospects, how do the Giants stack up? Obviously the deal would have to start with Marco Luciano and Kyle Harrison. Luciano’s been a consensus Top 15 type prospect for a couple of years, give or take. Harrison broke into most publications’ Top 100s this year and is probably poised to make a big leap, based on his start to 2022. So figure a Top 15 and maybe a Top 50-30 guy?
It’s an enticing start to an offer, but is it “2.5 years of prime inner circle Hall of Famer” offer? That’s certainly more than the Red Sox got for Betts, but is it “1.5 years” of control more? I’m just not sure that a deal centered around that pair (and adding in a couple more solid pieces) is significantly enough more than Washington would be able to get next summer to make it worthwhile. My sense is that’s more of a “next summer” deal, when Soto’s control has shrunk, than a “this summer” deal.
Beyond that, the Giants frankly have a bit of a problem with many of their top prospects being in something of a “down arrow” cycle right now. Joey Bart is having struggles in San Francisco (and the Nats almost certainly had some conversations about Bart when looking to deal Max Scherzer last year, and ended up with a Dodgers’ catching prospect instead). Heliot Ramos is hitting .197 with a 61 wRC+ in Triple A, and was a below average hitter in the upper minors last year as well. Hunter Bishop and Patrick Bailey have both had disappointing starts to their careers so far, and Luis Matos has mysteriously disappeared for weeks now after struggling in the early going — a problem of a totally different nature. Presumably there’s a health issue there of some kind, but either way it makes it a difficult time to include him in trade talks.
The hard truth is that, right now, the Giants’ prospect capital (an icky term, but certainly one that expresses the way front offices think) just isn’t where they might have hoped it would be at this time last year. Which makes it a lot harder to swing a deal like this.
So if not the Giants, who?
Another excellent question from my make believe friend. Who could offer a haul that made giving away the most sensational 23-year-old on the planet? Does anybody have two Top 10 prospects hanging around they could dangle Washington’s way?
Well, yes, actually, but it’s complicated. Baltimore could certainly offer the prospects — they feature the top ranked hitter (catcher Adley Rutschman) and top ranked pitcher (Grayson Rodriguez) in the minors, and both would seem to be ready for their big league debut. Beyond those two, who started the season ranking #1 and #6 on BA’s Top 100, Baltimore also offers two more players in their Top 60 and a pretty deep group of those “interesting sorts of guys.” Yes, Baltimore could do this. The only problem is that Baltimore would almost certainly never do this — although moving Soto from possibly the least talented roster in the NL to the least talented roster in the AL 80 miles away would be comically ironic. Baltimore’s 97-year-rebuild plan seems to involve spending years glacially getting extremely cheap top prospects to the majors and then hoping that those guys win. Paying even the arbitration salaries that Soto has coming doesn’t seem in line with their business model, much less taking on a bad contract in addition. No, they’re out.
There are two other maybes. The Tigers had the #4 and #5 prospects in baseball to open the year in Spencer Torkelson and Riley Greene — both of whom are ready to play in the big leagues — and a deep farm behind that. They also have a wealth of young pitchers only recently graduated whom they might be willing to part with (looking at you, Casey Mize). The Tigers are supposed to be at the end of their rebuild (not looking good so far), so I don’t know if they’d consider parting with so many of their “foundational” pieces — but I’d suggest that it would be a good idea. And no team in the league should have a better understanding of that fact than Detroit!
The same is true in Seattle, home of the longest playoff drought in North American sports. A deal starting with #3 prospect OF Julio Rodriguez (who has now graduated from prospect-dom) and #12 prospect RHP George Kirby would certainly have some appeal. Trader Jerry might hope that he’s nurturing his own young Soto-like player in JRod, but getting the real thing would make a lot of sense for a franchise that hasn’t played a post-season game in 21 years. Seattle has great depth on their farm as well, whether you’re looking at slightly tarnished post-prospects like Jarred Kelenic, or up and comers like 20-year-old SS Noelvi Marté (currently one behind Luciano on BA’s rankings).
That’s about the list to my mind. Without a deal that starts with those kind of names, I just don’t see how this gets done this year. And with so much up in the air in Washington, it seems a weird time to being making such an epochal move. Mike Rizzo’s contract is up this year and — though it’s been up before — this really could be the end of his time in DC. Rizzo might be the kind of guy who thinks the next GM should get the opportunity to make that kind of franchise-altering deal, reshaping the roster to his own vision. I know that many think moving salaries is paramount for a team that’s been put on the sales block, but that’s not what we’ve seen in recent sales for the Marlins and Mets. With MLB putting their thumbs on the financial scales, the outgoing owners will always get their money, happy to pass any payroll woes on to the next guy.
It’s worth going back to the quote that started this whole uproar. From Buster Olney:
If they're not going to sign him [to a long-term deal], then they'll need to trade him," one evaluator said. "The question is: When?"
My sense of the “when” is: not this year. It’s just too hard to get equitable value back for someone like Soto. A year from now, when he’s only got 1.5 years left? Maybe. The winter after that, when he’s in Betts’ situation, with a $30 million arbitration award and heading into his walk year — those are the times the Giants might seriously be able to make a move on Soto. But as of now, there are precious few places that make sense, and the Giants really aren’t one of them.
There’s no bigger dream that Soto, but he’ll probably have to stay a dream for now, Giants fans.