Hot Stove Thread 2014-15

Yeah, that.

 

+1

 

Wait. The Cardinals just dealt their 5th best starter for the leagues best defensive corner OFer with a career 115 OPS+?

Martinez and Gonzales are better pitchers than Miller anyway. Heck, Walden might be more valuable to this team as constructed as Miller.

 

Miller's 24. I don't think his upside is "5th starter."

He's also under team control for four more years. Heyward's possibly gone after one in St. Louis.

 

His peripherals have been dropping since mid 2013. This is the perfect time to get anything for him. I don't think he will be a very good pitcher, honestly.

 

You can say the same for Heyward. He was great as a rookie, pretty good in his third year and has been incredibly average or worse most of the time otherwise.

Heyward is a great baserunner and can draw a walk, but there's not much else to like to about his offensive game at this point. If he wasn't 6-foot-5 and built like a Greek God, that would be acceptable.

But you can't help but see the potential for so much more. He'll drive you crazy that way.

 

He is plus 20-30 runs saved defensive per year with a 110-120 OPS+ bat and +20-25 SB per season at a nice clip. That is like having an average fielding RF with a 140 OPS+ or a bad RF with a 160 OPS+. That is a HECK of a MLB ballplayer.

Baseball is so much more than about HRs and RBIs.

 

Who said it wasn't?

I've watched nearly every game Heyward has played for five years. Not saying he won't one day be great and that he isn't already pretty good, but thus far he's largely been less than the sum of his parts.

The Cardinals might be able to stick him in the 6-hole and get their money's worth out of him. But the Braves needed him to be a middle-of-the-order run producer, and he had a .384 slugging percentage last year.

And I didn't even mention his tendency to wind up on the DL, which he's done 4-5 times in his career already. Guys don't tend to get more durable as they age.

 

Agreed. I think part of this was the Cardinals not liking Miller that much.

I heard Buster Olney talking about this one on ESPN Radio today. He said the main reason the Braves made the move was that Heyward will be a free agent after 2015.

 

Given how anemic the Braves' offense was last year, it's hard to think trading for one of their bats is a good thing.

 

Looks like the Cardinals traded for his glove.

They do need better hitters, though.

 

Maybe so, but the Cards must be in great shape as an organization of they can afford to get rid of a prime prospect to shore up right field defense.