The Royals had been in talks with the Red Sox (and as many as six other teams) about potentially acquiring Andrew Benintendi going all the way back to November, said assistant general manager JJ Picollo in an interview with Quinn Riley of Bostonsportswave.com. Another Royals’ assistant GM, Scott Sharp, did a lot of the legwork in terms of keeping Boston on the line, per Lynn Worthy of the Kansas City Star.
Despite the Royals’ belief in Franchy Cordero’s power potential – Picollo invoked the name of David Ortiz in comparison as a late-blooming power bat – Benintendi better fits the needs of their ball club. To replace the legendary Alex Gordon in left, the Royals had explored a pact with Jurickson Profar, notes Worthy. But the Padres’ three-year commitment to Profar ultimately proved a pricier acquisition than Benintendi by quite a bit in terms of pure dollars, especially since Boston is chipping in cash to help with his $6.6MM salary this season.
The Royals plan to utilize Benintendi near the top of the order, probably in the two-hole. The Royals have a noted need for on-base ability – Kansas City finished tied for 26th in the Majors with a .309 On-Base Percentage – and while Khalil Lee looked like a potential internal candidate to bring those skills to the table, the 26-year-old Benintendi is the more proven commodity. Even considering questions surrounding his recent performance and decline in foot speed, Benintendi has maintained an ability to get on base with a solidly above-average 10.5 percent career walk rate. If anything, Benintendi was over-patient in 2020 as his swing rate fell to 44.5 percent, though he also saw less strikes than ever with just a 44.1 percent zone rate in the extremely small sample season.
Regarding Lee, the Royals never spoke directly with the Mets about their speedy young outfield prospect. That leg of the deal was entirely cooked up by Boston, writes Ken Davidoff and Mike Puma of the New York Post. The Red Sox know Mets GM Zack Scott well considering his 16 years in the Boston organization, and they knew about his longstanding interest in Lee as a prospect. The Royals were aware of another team’s involvement, but didn’t hear about Lee’s ultimate destination until about 90 minutes before the deal was finalized.
I’m upset Benni was dealt!!!!!!!
Go pout in the corner.
Why? Guy’s projected to hit .260 and 8 hrs this year. Had to pay the Royals $ to take him. Get the hint.
They absolutely did not “have to pay the Royals $ to take him”. They included cash to up the return value. If they “had to pay the Royals”, they wouldn’t have gotten a major leaguer plus more.
if he wasnt going to be worth it they could have just non tendered him
No they couldn’t. He already had a contract running through 2021. He could not be non- tendered until after the season…
Doesn’t make much sense to refer to projections when it comes to a guy in Benintendi’s career situation. Projections aim to provide a 50th percentile outcome from among all outcomes, but if the range of outcomes is wide and the 50th percentile one not particularly likely it doesn’t mean much.
If Benintendi was dealing with…something…and has ironed it out, he would blow any projections out of the water. Or, if something broke and won’t ever recover, the current projections likely are overly optimistic due to including rebound potential.
He’s a pure dice roll, and interested teams surely would be interested due to believing in his ability to get back on track. Naturally, while Boston couldn’t “charge” full rebound price for Benintendi, the potential for a rebound and the value he would bring in that case had to be baked into a deal for it to be worth Boston’s while.
There us no point!
Benintendi had career OPS+ of 107. The Sox have already added Hunter Renfroe (career OPS+ of 106) along with Cordero, Winkowski, and 3 PTBNL’s. They’ve already broken even on that deal, saved resources and still have 3 players coming with 6 months to evaluate which ones they like best. Overall it was a smart series of moves going forward, even if Winckowski and the 3 players still coming flame out.
Should have been Bloom’s first move, one year earlier.
I’m glad we got rid of him. As a player, Benny had a little bit of everything but not enough of one thing. He just doesn’t make the impact we wanted him to. He never rose to that occasion. Better to get something now than nothing later.
Benny was a tale of two cities. Rookie Benny was coming off being the College Player of the Year where he squared up baseballs at a phenomenal rate and continued to do it batting 2nd in the line-up and using his speed and ability to hit to all fields to provide excellent contributions to the Red Sox..
During 2018 he was the two hitter and stayed there the whole year, he got comfortable and did extremely well. 2019, hair brain Cora moved him to #1, a typical Cora mistake that backfired like so many others. Benny wasn’t comfortable and either was Mookie at #2 so they failed for nearly a month before Cora put it back to what it was when they won a world series. It wasn’t broke but that’s Cora being Cora. Completely clueless manager.
Benny finished the year for the first time in 2019 at league average, down from his previous 3 seasons of averaging 115 in his OPS+. Then, in 2020 COVID hits, Benny has lost his identity as a hitter and is now trying to be a power hitter not a speed player who hits to all fields. He fails miserably then gets hurt. Where were the Red Sox coaches? Converting him to a power hitter. Should we blame the hitter? I don’t.
My belief is that his 3 years of taking the ball to all fields and playing with speed in his game, stealing bases and not trying to be a power hitter is his baseball talent. In KC, where the manager and coaching staff are far superior, he will thrive by returning back to the old Benny. That should have happened in Boston but the organization is so broken with Cora as manager and the people he has on his staff that trading Benny was best for Benny but not Boston. I wish him well. He was one of the players who got the short end of the stick from Cora, just like JD. I’m sure he’s very excited to get a new manager but he’ll miss Boston and the fans.
I don’t agree that the Sox should have brought cora back so soon after the cheating scandal, but as a cardinals fan who watched or went to damn near every game of the Matheny era KC does NOT have a better manager…. he’s not great with a bullpen and has a habit of alienating his younger players… tommy Pham getting traded randomly and heyward not resigning even though we offered more(hindsight it’s good he didn’t but we didn’t know that at the time)
Well said @kd17
sticards0911 – I completely respect your distaste for the way things are shaking out in KC but my little league manager was a huge step up from Cora. In April 2018 on the way to a ring the bonehead gave Mookie, the best player on the team, days off during weeks when there were rain outs and open days in the schedule. At that point I knew he was clueless. 2018 was a gift to him by a team of Red Sox players performing so far over their norm that even a putz for a manager couldn’t derail them.
I’m sure the KC issues are bad but nothing compares to Cora since the days of Don Zimmer. 60 years of baseball and Cora is the worst and Zimmer is second worst. Good luck with things in KC.
I find the sausage-making fascinating!
Without dissing Alex Gordon, who has been a solid player, do we really want to tag someone with a career 35.1 BWAR, a triple slash line of .257/.338/.410, and an OPS+ of 102 as “legendary”?
Gordon had a 5-year run where he was really good (2011-2015).
We do not
Legendary is an overstatement but it might generally fit in local Royal history, once you get beyond Brett and a few others. In Boston history, I think of Rico Petrocelli as a player locally was treated as royalty when he was at the end of his career. I don’t know his war or BWAR because I don’t check stupid subjective stats that cannot fully measure a player’s worth.
Rico had a swing custom made for Fenway. You’re right, he was treated like royalty, even to this day. Heads up ballplayer.
Ridiculous adjective…good player, legendary? You mean like Willie Mays?
Got drafted by the royals played his whole career there and won a ring he’s a royals legend
In k.c. he is legendary similar to the way Mauer was to Minnesota
Now don’t go out & provide pragmatic takes like the one you just offered here!
We won’t have such contributions on this forum…
It’s not a pragmatic take, it’s subjective and opinionated. Much like my own takes
Mauer is an all time catcher, Gordon was an above average left fielder for four years. No way they are comparable. Fully aware of my Twins homerism here but come on man
While a talented catcher for A WHILE, he played a large portion of his career at first base.
Spare us…
All- Time catcher he is not, and will never be. Had he stayed healthy enough to actually CATCH then MAYBE. And Gordon isn’t legendary. He was an amazing ROYAL. Both for the team and the city. Doesn’t make one a legend.
All time catcher? injuries prevent me from using the word LEGENDARY except on a local stage. Similar to David Wright in New York and Pedroia in Boston.
Idk Mauer is ranked 7th all time for catcher with Jaws metric, full disclosure did not expect to wave the Mauer flag today but why not
Mauer got the benefit of never having to leave his home town also… of course he’s a legend to twins fans… just like… but Alex Gordon is a legend in every sense of the word…. not because he hit 400 home runs and is gonna be a first ballot HOF but because he was that first true hope for royals baseball since GB retired… from 1989-2007 the best player the royals had was Mike Sweeney and that’s it… yeah Grienke started there but got out the first chance he got… Gordon is a legend because he put an entire city/fanbase on his back… yeah the stats don’t jump off the page at you but then neither do David Wrights when you really look at them… neither does Dustin Pedrioa, going back Michael Young isn’t a HOF but every rangers fan of the 2000s will say he’s a legend… white Sox fans with kenarko
Both Mauer & Gordon are legends and all time greats, in the city’s that they played for. Neither of them are legends in the totality of MLB as a whole. From the mid 2000’s thru the early teen’s Mauer was among the best catchers in the game. Unfortunately injuries cut his yrs short at the position & his overall #’s declined as a result as well.
Prospectnvstr: Since you’re so fond of commenting on another person’s grammar, maybe you should think about working on your own. Your first sentence alone contains four grammatical errors. Perhaps it is you that needs to learn how to proofread.
(Pretty annoying, wouldn’t you say?)
@steve but Mauer has a hall of fame case and won an MVP, unlike Gordon. Gordon was just really solid for a long time
190 HR, 749 RBI, 3X all star, 8 gold gloves. Not exactly the stuff of legends, but he was a decent player for 5-6 years. If the HOF calls him it’s because they butt-dialed him.
Yeah, let’s totally overlook his 3 All Star nods, 8 Gold Gloves, 2 platinum gloves, being selected 3 times as the Wilson defensive player of the year, game winning HR in a WS matchup, etc.
I mean you really have to wonder about people & their “perspective” sometimes…
meanwhile Arenado does that and we say he didnt deserve the GGs and is a bad hitter on the road. yeah, perspective.
Who says Arenado doesn’t deserve the GGs? Sheesh what game are they watching?
Why don’t you just reference Ozzie Smith at this point cause just like Arenado, both have nothing to do with this particular conversation!
That said, we live in this world that’s saturated with whataboutism’s even if it’s a random comp pulled out of the ether in a superfluous manner.
All legendary players should be hall of famers but not all hall of famers should be considered legendary.
I disagree. As a Mets fan our fan base cherishes players like Mookie Wilson and HOJO. They’re “Mets legends” but certainly not legendary in the grand scheme.
Pauly21123 hours ago
Yeah, let’s totally overlook his 3 All Star nods, 8 Gold Gloves,
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Freehan had 11 All-Star appearances, 5 GGs, and had 1,506 GS at catcher, compared to 885 for Mauer. I’m not arguing against Mauer, who was really good, but Freehan is way above him.
Freehand was terrific. Hell, tigers were too
Slightly before my time, but they were a fun team. Kaline was an obvious HOFer, Freehan, I think will eventually be a HOFer, Cash, Northrup, and Horton were maulers, and McAuliffe was very underrated.
Unfortunately, it felt like they developed some pretty pitching at about the same time as the maulers started to age.
Pauly – It’s not shocking when people make bizarre comments about players. Many don’t like Sale and he started back to back all-star games just a few years ago. Gordon was an excellent player. As a long time fantasy player, I had him in my minors and I thought he’d be a lock for the HOF but he never lived up to his hype. He was a stud but he didn’t always show it. An outstanding 3B that got move to OF as his defense didn’t live up to expectations.
I thought he was a clutch player as well. The problem is 8 gold gloves speaks to defense and if players got in on defense alone JBJ would be a HOFer. Alex played 14 years and 4 were HOF worthy. Another 4 were above average and the remainder were average or below average. Honestly, that doesn’t make the HOF but he still had HOF type years. My fantasy wishes he had produced as projected. Probably would have won a few more years.
I think that was a combination of 1) tongue in cheek, and 2) a reference especially to his defensive prowess. You don’t have to be an all-time great to be “legendary” with a wink. That’s how I took it, in this case.
*for KC
For the royals fans and what he did for that organization, I can see why they call him a “legendary royal”
Yes. Read the article above, where a journalist called him “legendary”…
This explains what KC wanted, and what the Mets wanted. What’s in it for Boston, besides the opportunity to pay KC’s left fielder?
Seemed like they wanted room to reunite with JBJ; surprised that hasn’t happened yet (JBJ’s crazy contract demands notwithstanding).
Four prospects with as much 24+ years of controllability at the MLB level, Franchy, & salary relief for a player obviously not in their plans moving forward come a year and a half from now.
Not a bad return at tol, lol…
Until the 3 ptbnl are revealed, you can’t begin to think about Boston’s end of the deal. Franchy was nothing more than a lottery ticket, and probably a failed one with the impending deadened ball.
Even then, it’ll take time to see what those ptbnl turn into, assuming they’re not 40man/st inventory chaff.
Why would the deadened ball hurt Cordero who has elite exit velos? Benintendi is more likely to be hurt by it given his average power to date.
A deadened ball helps hitters with lower/weaker launch angles and hurts hitters who are launch-angle reliant.
Benintendi even in his best year was not a launch angle guy, and so is set up to be more valuable in a deadened ball MLB. Assuming he isn’t broken.
averagejoe152 hours ago
Why would the deadened ball hurt Cordero who has elite exit velos?
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I was going to say the same thing. I’d have to think of other ramifications, but if my average HR is 400 feet, and yours is only 350 feet, then losing 10% of your distance figures to hurt you more than me.
Intuitively-speaking, I’m guessing that a deadened ball will be relatively better for the high-K guys, since their type of swing will be less damaged.
redsoxu571
The launch angle perspective is a valid point. I actually think it hinges more on whether he can cut back on the Ks again. if he’s worse than league average in Ks he’ll struggle, if he’s better (like in 2018) he should benefit since the benefit from a deadened ball hinges on putting the ball in play more often.
This also doesn’t address the idea that a deadened ball should really have no impact on Cordero. He won’t K more because of a deadened ball and his exit velos play at all launch angles. If he can fix his strikeout problem the ball won’t really matter.
A less lively ball (deadened is a misnomer) will reduce home runs accordingly. The 1.26 juice factor in 2019 and 2017 hopefully will fall back to something closer to 1.0. In 1961 it was 0.95 for Maris to pass Ruth with 61 home runs. In the Bonds and McGwire era in the late 90s it was at 1.1 and people thought it was the steroids (the public will believe just about anything fed to them). Today, supposed baseball experts talk about launch angle as if they discovered a new galaxy. Bonds understood launch angle in the 90s but nobody had named it yet. Just like Williams founded so many concepts on hitting that got repackaged and renamed as if someone invented the ideas 40 years after Ted wrote about them.
The juice in the ball, if they actually are successful in lowering it, will turn 40 home run hitters into 30 home run hitters. It’s not going to impact batting averages much but BABIPs will change. There will be less hitters being told they are lucky.
There should be lots of pitchers like Scherzer who will give up less HRs.
It sounds as if the PTBNLs are the key to the deal from Boston’s perspective.
Don’t get your hopes high. I never remember any great player as a PTBNL. Bloom dumped off a salary fir warm bodies
David Ortiz, who is mentioned in the article, was a PTBNL when he was sent to Minnesota
Otherwise, Michael Brantley, Tim Belcher, Coco Crisp, Moises Alou, Scott Brosius, Marco Scutaro, Jason Schmidt, and I’m sure many others with at least notable careers. Plus plenty of high ranked prospects that didnt pan out as hoped, but were respected at the time anyway
But what is that in terms of odds?
Impossible to know because there are very different kinds of PTBNLs.
Since we do not have an idea what value the Mets and Red Sox hold Lee to, we don’t know what range of prospect return they discussed as the return. Since Lee is a high ranked prospect though, you’d anticipate the return would be similar.
MLBTR getting fast and loose with the term legendary.
deal with it. In KC he is legendary, elsewhere not
Franchy is the next Big Papi, do we have a deal?
Bloom’s eyes get real big, think royals tell the truth all the time 24/7 – we have a deal but we’d like to also pay 6.6 million to get this done!
If you insist.
Not holding breath on Frenchy!
Moneyballer – Funniest comment of the day!!!
“Legendary”…….really
I am a Mets fan, but the fact that they parlayed Matz (a guy who they almost let walk over $5m) for their new #7 (Lee), an ML ready swing man (Reid-Foley) and a flyer (can’t remember) was a solid series of deals.
I’m having problems believing that GMDM & the boys had no idea who the suitor for Lee was until an hour & a half before the trigger was pulled. That seems odd!
Why? It’s almost an entirely separate trade. The Royals are only sending Lee to the Mets because Boston set it up. Since no one is going from the Mets to the Royals there was really no reason for them to know.
If one of, if not my best OF prospect which I’ve groomed since a teenager was all the sudden part of a deal who’s status is being brokered by another organization all together, yeah, call me crazy but I’d be curious.
Lee is a 45 FV prospect, this isn’t trading Wander Franco.
Also, for all the Royals knew, Lee was headed to the Red Sox. It legitimately didn’t matter from a Royals perspective if the Sox were going to turn around and trade Lee to the Mets.
Heck the Sox could have kept Lee for a week then made the deal with the Mets and it would have been the same result.
The Mets side of the deal is interesting, and shows how MLB clubs value players differently than Baseball America and MLB pipeline. Lee was a ranked prospect, in a not-too-shabby KC system; if the Red Sox wanted Winkowski that bad, they could have taken him in Rule 5 (he was eligible). And nobody nibbled on him on Rule 5 day.
Mets are also sending the Sox a PTBNL as part of the deal, it wasn’t a straight up Wink for Lee swap from the Mets side.
By not taking Winckowski in the Rule 5, and instead acquiring him this way, it shows they did not want to commit even a 40 man spot, let alone the 25 Man spot they would have had to have given him. As it stands right now, I show them at a full 40 without yet having to give Winckowski a spot
I read that Winckowski is possibly destined for the Pen already too, and taking him in Rule 5 would have likely guaranteed that. That appears to be why Jays didn’t protect, and others didn’t take him. Trading for him after he passes Rule 5 means he can spend another full year in the minors seeing if you can keep him a starter before even having to protect him on the 40 next season
But do we have indication they wanted him all that bad either? They flipped Lee to the Mets for 2 prospects, Winckowski and a yet unnamed PTBNL, right? They might just have some minor interest in Winckowski, but the other could be the more valuable piece they want more
I doubt the PTBNL is of much consequence. He’ll probably come from a list of non-30 ranked guys that the Sox want to look at against real competition, which of course they couldn’t do last year.
And yes, getting “Wink” this way doesn’t him being placed on either the 40 or the 26. Again, the Red Sox finished in last place in 2021; how valuable can those spots be? There’s likely about 5 guys on their 40 that could be cut loose with little consequence; that’s the nature of being a poor team, with a not-so-great farm system. And actually that number is probably higher than 5.
The value of the 26 man spot comes coupled with the part you ignored completely; keeping him in the minors to see if he can stay a starter.
The Red Sox get multiple seasons with him in the minors now to see if they can make him a starter. If they had taken him, they would have been forced to keep him in the ML pen the entire season. That is an entirely different player you are acquiring if had taken him in Rule 5
And I don’t know how you think you can figure out the return of the PTBNL, we have no idea really
bobtillman2 hours ago
I doubt the PTBNL is of much consequence.
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What leads you to that opinion?
Common sense. It’s on sale JoeB, head down to Target and get some!!!
I’m searching for a PTBNL (outside of the Tre Turner situation) who ever made an impact. I can’t even remember one that made a MLB roster.
But I could be wrong.
I listened a bunch above
“David Ortiz, who is mentioned in the article, was a PTBNL when he was sent to Minnesota
Otherwise, Michael Brantley, Tim Belcher, Coco Crisp, Moises Alou, Scott Brosius, Marco Scutaro, Jason Schmidt, and I’m sure many others with at least notable careers. Plus plenty of high ranked prospects that didnt pan out as hoped, but were respected at the time anyway”
KD,
I asked Bob why he thought the PTBNL is of low consequence.
I didn’t ask to hear your incoherent ramblings. At least you’re not posting 700-word diatribes today.
What you write is true, but given the expectation that the Mets have included at least one PTBNL in the deal it suggests that the PTBNL is a sizeable or even the primary value in the Met side of the return for Boston and not Winkowski.
It’s gonna be crazy to look back at this in a few years when Lee turns it to be the best player in the deal.
he is a kansas city royal legend. No doubt
The Royals were in talks with the Red Sox (and as many as six other teams) about potentially acquiring Benintendi? You might want to re-word that, TC.
He needs to start the season in the 7 hole. Not the 2. Once he proves himself in regular season games then maybe he can be moved up, otherwise he should not be near the top of the lineup after the last couple seasons he’s had.
How is Profar a pricier acquisition by quite a bit in terms of dollars? Huh? Benintendi will make more over the next two years than Profar will…
I think they mean once the third year where Profar is getting another $8.3M is factored in he’s more expensive.
Because Boston is sending $2.8M, Beni is going to cost roughly $3.8M this year. Then next year he’ll get an arb raise, but maybe to like $8-9M? So Beni over the two years is going to cost KC maybe like $11.8-12.8M, Whereas with Profar’s signing bonus, he’s getting $4.3M this year and then $7.3M next year for a total of $11.6M in the first two years but then he’s still owed another $8.3M and has a buyout after that too.
Cordero compared to Big Papi? these evaluators really need to chill on this dude.
Common mistake on your part that needs no apology. The citation was to compare them in terms of their late-blooming power potential profile, not in terms of overall caliber of hitter. For a similar sports comp, one football owner was once mocked for praising the “throwing” of a QB who is not a good QB…but the owner wasn’t saying that the guy was a good QB overall, just that his pure throwing velocity and accuracy was strong (the guy was awful at reading the field and afraid of the pass rush, which is why he was a poor QB despite his excellent arm).
not suprised the Royals werent in on the Lee part. probably would have thought Bloom was mental for mentioning that he wanted three lottery tickets instead of Lee and hugh up.
I don’t understand why the Red Sox didn’t just ask for Khalil Lee themselves. Instead they brought a middleman into the trade in the form of the Mets and let them walk away with the best long term piece in the trade
They very explicitly did not want Lee, obviously
KC was never in talks with the Mets it says, so that means the Royals were likely pushing Lee as the return, and the Red Sox just didn’t want him. But they realized that their old friend might be interested in him, so they could subsequently flip him to NY as they did. The Mets aren’t a middle man here, they are a dumping spot
Mostly because they have a player in their minors with just about the exact same profile as Lee in Jarren Duran. They don’t currently have any power hitting OF prospects, so the power potential of Franchy Cordero was more appealing.
Ronk3252 hours ago
I don’t understand why the Red Sox didn’t just ask for Khalil Lee themselves.
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Lee had 154 Ks in AA, in 470 ABs. That equates to 197 in 600 ABs. In AA.
Head-to-head I take Benintendi over Cordero. Trade makes no sense even without factoring the $2.8 million or PTBNL. I hope AB tears-it-up in KC. Chaim Bloom can kiss my …
I too question why all of a sudden people are looking at Frenchy as if he’s all that valuable, off his sub-Average hitting, poor fielding, replacement level season in 2020
I guess it is solely because he didn’t strike out at his normal extreme rates last season? So he’s showing he developed an eye?
But that change came because his contact rate skyrocketed, and his line shows he could do absolutely nothing with most all of the pitches he touched. All told, he looks like a better hitter in San Diego when he was just taking the Ks and hitting all the flies instead of becoming the weak grounder machine he was last season with the Royals
I don’t believe anyone is looking at Cordero as all that valuable, so your confusion makes sense in that it would be confusing if anyone was actually pitching him that way.
Cordero has for some years now been seen as a guy with the tools to be something very nice, but unlikely to seize on those tools. And it looks like he was valued that way in this deal too.
Yes, he was apparently oddly pitched by the Royals as if he is like Ortiz. I’m guessing because of that K rate change they induced, which also made him a sad grounder hitter. But beyond that, it just seemed in the trade article that Red Sox fans were praising him as the person they’d rather have than Benintendi anyway. I guess that could be more what they think of Benintendi’s ability at this point, or wishful thinking too, but it stuck out.
Meanwhile I look at Frency and just don’t see it. Should be serviceable for a year or two, and there’s some chance he improves, but his time seems to have largely passed
I think Franchy should spend the year in AAA and re-learn everything.
But this is hardly a Benni/Franchy trade. The money alone is likely more than enough to add another RP like Workman. And that doesn’t even include the other four prospects.
It makes no sense if he has been suffering a temporary slide, and all the sense if Boston feels (and is right that) he is broken and will not recover. If they held on to him and he continued his struggles, he would be a drag on the team and then eventually be gone for nothing, a la Blake Swihart after he was ruined by injury and then ran out of options. There was a time Boston could have “sold low” on Swihart once it suspected that his ankle would never be the came, but the team gambled on him getting back to what he had been and by the time it was fully clear he was toast and he was basically being wasted as a low-use utility guy there was no trade value left.
It all comes down to whether Benintendi is toast or now. I hope he isn’t, but if he is then this was the way to go for sure.
Blake Swihart after he was ruined by injury and then ran out of options.
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IMHO, Swihart was ruined by not being a real catcher. If he was even a decent catcher, his career .656 OPS would still play. Otherwise, he just didn’t hit enough to play anywhere else.
JoeB – Swihart was ranked one spot higher than Mookie in 2014 by the all knowing MLB baseball Prospect experts. So they were right? All Boston had to do was keep him at catcher? Oh yeah, and play him ahead of Vazquez who was better. Swihart like so many other Red Sox players was one of the ‘special’ ones. He always got better treatment than his skill set dictated. Much like a CFer who couldn’t hit but was incredible on defense and a pudgy 3B who can’t field a lick.
The Red Sox gave Swihart far more opportunities than most. They stuck with him failing longer than Benny and the sad part is Benny actually has a decent chance of returning to old Benny now that he’s away from the Red Sox coaching staff whereas Swihart sucked in Boston and everywhere he went. He was a very bad investment but someone in the front office liked him so he got over-rated in the politically driven prospect ratings. Just like Downs, the super star who has had 12 great games out of 289 but is ranked in the top 50.
Downs too will get that special treatment just like so many other privileged players with connections in the front office or ownership. Heck, Devers is going to make 24 or more errors in 2021 and he will have failed for 5 straight years without being moved. Being a chosen one means the decisions to do the obvious take much longer.
You seem to be replying to nothing but a bunch of things never said
u571 said the Red Sox could have gotten a fair return on Swihart if they had moved on from him earlier
JoeB said his value would have still been hurt greatly by the fact he wasn’t seen as a true catching option anymore
Neither post had anything to do with how Boston played him or opportunities they gave him or anything else. It was solely about the fact they should have traded him earlier, and a statement that his prospect value had already tanked anyway because he was no longer seen as a catcher by other clubs
And JoeB is correct in saying that. Had he stayed a legitimate catching option, his return on prospect status would be considered differently today. Thats because most of his inital prospect status came from the position he was believed to have been able to play.
JoeB – Swihart was ranked one spot higher than Mookie in 2014 by the all knowing MLB baseball Prospect experts. So they were right?
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Theoretically, there is no way of knowing whether they were right or wrong, at the time. Had he stuck at catcher, and maintained the .840 OPS he had in AA, they could’ve been right.
If you are talking in retrospect, they were obviously wrong. That’s the way it goes with a lot of prospects.
Past that, why not just stick with a single question or a single point, instead of the incoherent nonsense you posted in the last two paragraphs?
News flash, they don’t rate players defensively by errors anymore. We have advanced defensive metrics which are much more accurate than mere fielding percentage. And the individual teams have their own in-house metrics they use which are probably the most accurate.
JoeB – Swihart sucked. We all saw that. This isn’t new news. My point about how badly he sucked is shown in the fact that he NEVER had an OPS+ of 100 in 9 years playing minor and major league baseball. The best year of his career happened in 2013 before he was ranked ahead of Mookie. In 103 games at Hi-A Swihart hit .298 with an OBP of .366 and SLG of .428. Top 50 ranking worthy? NOPE. Mookie in 2013 played at Hi-A too. In 127 games he hit .314, with an OBP of .417 and SLG of .506. Would anyone in their right mind rank Swihart over Mookie based on those numbers? NOPE. That’s how bad the MLB prospect ranking is. It’s a political ranking not a performance ranking.
Swihart made it to the Red Sox a year after Mookie in 2015. He played in roughly half the games and showcased his hitting with 5 HRs, a .274 average, a .319 OBP (Terrible given it’s only 45 points higher than his average), a .392 SLG but he did steal 4 bases. I’m guessing that was his greatest value as a catcher. Most catcher don’t steal. He threw out 28% of the runners and had 16 passed balls. Vazquez after his rookie year in 2014 didn’t play in 2015 opening the door for Swihart to prove his rating was valid. With Sandy Leon playing like crap in 2015 Swihart should have locked down the catching spot but didn’t. In 2016, Leon had a great year and Vazquez was back and both knew how to throw out runners and Swihart didn’t so to keep the guy they talked up so much that he was ranked higher than Mookie, they tried him in the outfield because he had speed. Unfortunately his defense was comparable to Devers not JBJ and that experiment ended quickly.
He should have been gone by 2016.but he got to hang around 3 years after showing he couldn’t cut it as a catcher or outfielder. Benny had a league average year in 2019 and then a bad year in 2020 with an injury. They threw him out like yesterday’s trash. If he had been one of the “favorites” like Swihart, Devers or JBJ, Benny would have been given a shot to rebound from 2020 but that didn’t happen.
U571’s comments were spot on. JoeB you made a fool of yourself once more.
Darkstar61 – When a specific name is used like I just did with your name, that means the words after it are directed in response to that person. Its a very simple concept. My comment was ONLY directed at JoeB’s ridiculous statements about his value being impacted by him not being considered a catcher. The data above shows why he wasn’t good as a catcher or at any other position. The data directly contradicts what JoeB said. I completely agree with U571’s comments.
Obviously you are buddies with JoeB because you support wrong theories like him. Review the facts, Swihart got over-rated (like Downs) on the MLB prospect list. He proved he couldn’t effectively catch at the major league level by 2015. He got to stay until 2019 despite being of no value to club compared to an alternate person in his roster spot. He existed on the roster 3 years too long because he was one of the “favored” players by ownership and the front office. He didn’t get screwed by playing outfield, it was a weak attempt by ownership and the front office to justify them keeping him. It fooled nobody and both Leon and Vazquez were better than him. He needed to go.
His lack of success elsewhere in 2019 confirmed what everyone knew after 2015. Blake Swihart was not a major league catcher or outfielder.
Hammerin – News flash. Experts agree the WEAKEST part of the rating system is Defensive rating. Why? Because the parameters don’t consistently tell the true story. Devers is a perfect example. He cuts in front of Bogey and makes an off=balance throw to first and the runner is safe he gets no error or markdown using the new metrics. He should be marked down severely for his bad judgment but that doesn’t happen. It’s that bad judgment that should be factored into the new metrics but aren’t.
Fielding percentage is a fact. Many of the new metrics are estimates or rationalizations for what may have happened during a game or a season. Their accuracy being greater is being argued by the people that invented the metrics. That’s not an objective viewpoint.
You are free to believe whatever numbers you choose to but to profess that your numbers are more accurate than facts is a stretch. I’ll still take the 3B who can field at a .980 pace over the 3B that fields at .928 but has greater range.
Remember, your opinion is just that, an opinion on how to measure defensive ability of a player even if the guys that invented the new measures say they are better!!
Another 500-word diatribe. Everyone knows that Swihart has sucked. Is there some sort of mystery here that required you to re-write War & Peace?
Seriously, do you think anyone reads this?
JoeB – Learn to stop while you are behind!! My response was to you only and based on your latest comment, mission accomplished. It takes a lot of time coming behind all the wrong things you say and putting facts to them. Here’s a suggestion, check out the facts then write.
You are once again blabbering. Why not boil down your 700-word diatribe to 7 or less, lucid sentences.
I agree Park, I’m sick over Benni.
Willie Wilson was legendary. Alex Gordon, not in my eyes. Good, not great. Definitely, not legendary
Alex Gordon’s 9th Inning HR off Familia.
Is Franchy going to be one of those players who remind you of someone except they never live up to that comparison?
I think the Mets may have wound up with a steal in this trade…Time will tell!
Unless the PTBNL is Pete Crow-Armstrong or JT Ginn.
There has to be information the reader doesn’t have here? Some kind of off field issue or an issue between Benintendi’s ears or he just wanted out of Boston?
I’m not questioning the players the Red Sox got.
But bailing out on Benintendi with 2 more years of low cost contracts seems odd?
Yes, I can see some of Benintendi’s metrics have gone down in the last 2 seasons. But he was hurt in 2020, or at least that’s what was said?
But this is just the kind of player teams like KC, Tampa and Oakland, that try to play Moneyball, love to pick up.
It gets even odder that Boston had to pay some of Benintendi’s contract in 2021?
Does that imply KC thinks Benintendi’s only worth $3,800,000 ($6,600,000 – $2,800,000)?
My guess is that KC thinks he’s trade bait in July? Don’t see them paying Benintemdi’s arb contract in 2022.
Would have thought the Red Sox would have thought that too?
Most teams can’t afford to publicly admit mistakes and pay a player to play elsewhere as the Red Sox did with Benintendi and Price in 2020. But then perhaps cutting your losses is a smart move if you’re accustomed to trading commodity futures as John Henry did in another life to make his fortune?
It appears the Red Sox are playing a hybrid form of Moneyball perhaps?
With the ability to pay more when the risk/reward looks in their favor.
So if you look at the players the Red Sox have gotten rid of since 2019 you’ll get an idea on what they thought of the players they got rid of.
My 2 cents worth is that it’s, more often than not, an attitude problem relative to their performance vs contract valuation.
In other words John Henry didn’t think they were worth what either he was paying them or what they wanted to be paid.
SG – The plan is for Bloom to replace the entire 2018 WS team. Go down the list. The outfield is now gone. Bogaerts has an opt out so he could be gone prior to the opt out. Nobody at 2B is left playing 2B for them. Moreland is gone. Vazquez is the next to go and then eventually they move Devers so the team will be completely Bloom’s creation. I expect a healthy Sale to be moved at the deadline along with Eovaldi if he’s doing well. Bloom has turned this into a COMPLETE REBUILD. We are long past this being a re-tooling. Bad standings will be in the future for many years.
Bloom knows what he’s doing. The front office has told him to cut payroll and the Red Sox, with the financial resources they still have, will begin signing free agents next year and thereafter, as old contracts come off the books.
Hammerin – Anyone who can observe what Bloom has done and state that he knows what he’s doing is either related to him or lacks baseball acumen. Sorry, this guy’s a joke and a fool. He is a modern day Lee Harvey Oswald. He’s a patsie. A clueless patsie who believes big market teams behave like small market teams and they don’t.
If you can justify in your mind that tearing down the 2018 team makes sense then we have so little in common that I can’t see any reason to continue.
KD – Don’t think the goal is to replace “the entire 2018 WS team”.
Just think the Red Sox are trying to look more towards value and removing off field issues or perhaps overvalued players …. in their eyes.
Or players they have lost confidence in.
Or players that no longer want to play here.
I don’t think any player that plays in Boston, going forward, should expect to be treated differently than any other team would treat them.
SG – You might be right but time will tell. Lets look at the roster after 2021 and count the remaining 2018 starters:
Vazquez – Still here but ready to be moved
Moreland – GONE
Chavis/Nunez – Half GONE with Chavis likely to go soon
Bogaerts – Opt out in 2023 means value greatest in 2021 to trade
Devers – Free Agent in 2024. Need LT contract soon to keep him.
JD – Contract ends in 2022. Needs to hit to be moved
Betts – GONE
JBJ = GONE
Benny – GONE
1 and 1/2 years after coming to Boston Bloom has replaced 5 of the 9 regular hitters. The four remaining all have reasons to be moved. JD needs to go to clear cap space. Vazquez has no reason to go but Bloom will probably do it anyway to claim this is his team. Devers needs an extension or is a FA in a few years. Trade value greatest 2 years prior to FA. Bogaerts opt out could leave Boston worse off than they are now. Bloom needs to eliminate the opt out or move Bogaerts before his value goes down from a trade perspective.
If you want to argue technicalities that EVERY last player won’t be moved, fine there is a small chance ONE or TWO might stay but Bloom is motivated to make this his own team so he can take full credit for the success. Unfortunately, he’s going to take full credit for the disaster.
KD – Even if Bloom wanted to “get rid of all the 2018 team”, to make himself look good when he puts the next winner together, John Henry has the final say on who comes and goes so Henry would veto anything that ran contrary to Henry’s beliefs.
Also, don’t think Bloom wants to get rid of 2018 talent that does well elsewhere as it will make Bloom look bad.
SG – “don’t think Bloom wants to get rid of 2018 talent that does well elsewhere” You mean like Mookie winning the NL MVP the first year gone thanks to Bloom and Henry?
You suggested Henry has veto rights and that would stop him from dumping the 2018 roster? I’m confused. He dumped over half the hitters already and Henry did nothing. No vetoes to 5 of 9 former starters. Why would the last 4 be any different?
We can agree to disagree but time will prove that Bloom’s agenda is to make this his team. So far, that’s not a good thing. DD’s team was far superior. Money can’t be the issue since Henry made hundreds of millions of profits since he got the team and the value of the team has risen enormously as an investment so going cheap in 2020 wasn’t because of the money.
Bloom seems to be a fall guy to me. Someone to pin the blame on when this all blows up and someone who diverts the public from the real issue that destroyed the Red Sox, DIVERSITY. It’s not a coincidence that the two best black players were given away. Reporters need to get to the real story of WHY did Mookie want out. Did it relate to treatment of him and his family or was it bigger and as the leader of the team he took issue with the way specific members of the team were treated, like Price.
Bloom is nothing more than a distraction or diversion that focuses fans on the destruction of the team and moves the underlying reasons into the background. I think Price and Mookie are far better off where they are. I wanted him to retire a Red Sox but I take no issue with him leaving to find a more fair organization. I’m guessing Benny will thrive too.
The Red Sox environment right now is beyond toxic. You have a manager who got caught cheating twice and convicted once. You have diversity issues in ownership and possibly the front office. The organization hires a baby sitter for a 3B who can’t field but gets to stay at his position despite killing the pitching staff with his two dozen errors a year.
So many things wrong, so few things right. The house cleaning should have started at the top not with Mookie.
Benintendi reminds me of Xavier Nady, first good couple of years then falls of the table.
Royals won’t contend in 2021 or 2022 so they have no use for Benintendi.