The Aroldis Chapman Trade

Aroldis Chapman
Photo Credit: Keith Allison

Quick note explaining this post: I wrote most of this while traveling over Christmas.  I wrote most of this the night of the trade, but didn't post it because I wanted to proof it first.  And then I got busy.  And sad about the Reds.  And I forgot about it.  As a result, I just realized that I'd never made this post.  So, while it's hardly topical anymore, I'm posting it now, since I'm sure I'll want to refer to this post in the future.  Sorry for the 3+ month delay!!

Just as with the Josh Hamilton trade of yesteryear, the Reds made a major trade while I was traveling, dealing Best Closer in Baseball(?) Aroldis Chapman to the New York Yankees in exchange for a bullpen arm and three prospects.

Before looking at the trade, I did want to comment briefly on its backdrop: the domestic violence allegations against Aroldis Chapman.  I celebrated MLB's new domestic violence rules when they were implemented last year.  They addressed a long-standing issue in baseball (and other professional sports) in which on-field offenses like PED's are punished far more severely than truly horrific off-field actions, such as rape, domestic abuse, etc.  While Chapman's alleged behavior wasn't quite so bad as that of Alfredo Simon, his actions nevertheless sound awful.  I try to maintain a presumption of innocence when someone is accused of a crime, but one can't ignore the plight of the victims of these crimes either.  While it sucks that the Reds waited so long to trade him when it was clear that he should have been dealt last July, and it sucks that something like this caused him to lose so much trade value, I'm nevertheless happy that he won't be wearing the laundry of my favorite team this spring.

The Reds signed a 22-year old Aroldis Chapman as an amateur free agent in 2010 after he defected from Cuba, surprisingly beating out other teams in their biggest international signing to date.  He was originally slotted to be a starting pitcher, and despite a shaky change-up, his incredible velocity and wicked slider made him seem like a potential ace in the making.  Unfortunately, the opportunity to use his talents out of the bullpen proved too alluring.  While the Reds started the 2012 season planning to plug Chapman into the rotation, the Ryan Madson's elbow injury, along with the Reds' fantastic rotation depth at the time, allowed Dusty Baker (with the agreement of others in the organization, I'm sure) to move him into the bullpen, apparently in accordance with Chapman's wishes.  After a couple of rough performances by Sean Marshall, Chapman quickly took over as team closer and stayed in that role for four seasons.  In that time, he posted video game numbers: 1.90 ERA, 16 k/9:3.8 bb/9, 1.74 FIP.  He's been brilliant in that role, though I still think the Reds most likely made a significant error in not committing to him as a starting pitcher.  But, bygones.

Chapman enters his age-28 season as one of the top closers in baseball, a position he has held longer than anyone not named Craig Kimbrel.  Nevertheless, he is still "just" a closer, and has just one year of team control left before he hits free agency.  That, combined with the possibility that he might miss time due to suspension (edit in March: he's suspended 30 games), and the general taint of acquiring someone who probably beat up his girlfriend, meant that his market was not one that would bring a top-tier prospect back.  Instead, the Reds seemingly went for quantity.  Let's look at who they got in return.

Eric Jagielo, 23-year old LHB 3B

While I'm probably more down on Jose Peraza than is justified, there's a legitimate argument that Jagielo may well be the best position-player prospect the Reds have acquired in the past calendar year, save for the draft.  He is a former 1st-round draftee (2013).  He has struggled with injuries (which mostly seem like freak accidents to me, rather than recurrent problems), has excellent power, has hit at every level he's played thus far, and plays third base.  His walk rate slipped last year at AA, but he still hit for nice power and BABIP'd his way to a good OBP.  He does strike out a bit more than one might like, but it hasn't been spiking as he went up in levels, and he has the power to make up for the strikeouts.

The biggest concern with Jagielo seems to be his defense.  If he can stick at third base and be competent over there, he seems like a nice prospect.  If, on the other hand, his doubters are right and he is destined for first base (I've read he doesn't even have the athleticism for the outfield), then his bat is going to have to carry him.  Given that the Reds a) have a first baseman forever, and b) targeted him as a near MLB-ready talent, I have to think they think he can stay at third base for a few years.  Otherwise, it doesn't make a lot of sense...

Rookie Davis, 22-year old RHP

Everyone loves Rookie Davis's name, and I'm no exception.  2015 is often described as a breakout campaign for him.  After a rough performance in 2014 (4.93 ERA, although with better peripherals), his strikeout rate spiked in high-A this year while he simultaneously kept his walks and home runs allowed to an absolute minimum.  That strikeout rate slipped back down once he was promoted to AA, but he still held his own with a solid K-BB rate.  Davis reportedly throws pretty hard, but may struggle at higher levels unless he can develop a change-up.  He'll pitch as a 23-year old in AA next season.  If he can get his secondary pitches in order, he'll be poised to make a run at the Reds' rotation in 2017.  If not, it sounds to me like he is at least likely to be a good bullpen arm.

Caleb Cotham, 27-year old RHP

Caleb took a nice step forward last season after struggling to find himself in prior seasons, posting outstanding K-BB rates for the first time since 2011.  He ascended all the way from AA to the Yankees bullpen by the end of the season, and looked excellent at each stop.  He projects to be a solid middle relief arm next season, and seems likely to me to claim a spot in the Reds' pen this spring.  He's not an Aroldis Chapman, but he looks competent...and frankly, the Reds' bullpen looks to me like it will need all the help it can get.

Tony Renda, 24-year old 2B

Renda was a 2nd-round draft pick in 2012, so he has some pedigree.  Nevertheless, scouts don't seem particularly impressed with him, and he seems universally considered a generic throw-in.  He seems to make good contact, have some speed, and zero power, not so unlike another more ballyhooed acquisition from earlier this offseason.  He had a nice year in 2014, but didn't quite follow that up last year in AA.  If I were the Reds, I'd be looking at him in AAA this year.  If he can be versatile enough to play a little bit on the other side of the diamond, he might be able to fit in as a utility infielder.  I'm not sure if his fielding is quite good enough for that role, however, given his low power potential.

Conclusions

So, it's not an overwhelming collection of talent...but I still like this deal better than the Todd Frazier trade.  With Frazier, you were dealing two years of a 3-4 WAR player, and the headlining prospect was pretty underwhelming (high contact, low-OBP, high speed, no power, just ok fielding).  In this case, the two headlining players coming over might not be top-tier prospects, but there's a path by which each could become important an contributer to the Reds over the next few years.  Given that the Reds were dealing just a single year of Chapman, and that year one potentially rocked by domestic violence allegations and suspensions, I think they did a lot better in this trade.  If you accept that the Reds absolutely had to trade Chapman at that moment (can his value get any lower?), I give the trade a solid B, while I'd give the Frazier deal a D.

It's been a discouraging offseason.  I still think the Reds got a better haul in the Alfredo Simon trade last winter than they did in either of their big deals this offseason, which is unreal.  Still, there's nothing for it but to look ahead to next season.  I'm hoping that, with the payroll the Reds have discarded, they can make some late free agent signings this offseason that can be dealt away in July.  They only have $71.7 million committed to next season, so there should be room to add a few short-term deals to both make the first half more sufferable, and allow for more talent acquisition this summer.  That's what I'd be doing, anyway.  Reds fans don't have a whole lot else to look forward to.

My 2015 National League All Star Teams

It's time to talk All Star voting once again, and so here are my annual picks for the midsummer classic exhibition extravaganza.  As in prior years, I'm basing my recommendations for the All Star game on past calendar year performance; I don't like the fact that we don't pay attention to second-half statistics when choosing our All Stars.  Fortunately, FanGraphs makes this super-easy to do, thanks to their past-calendar year split.

Below, bold-faced players did not appear on my 2014 teams.

Catcher

Buster Posey

Starter: Buster Posey (SFG; 6.6 WAR)
Reserve: Devin Mesoraco (CIN; 3.0 WAR; injured)
Alternate: Francisco Cervelli (PIT; 3.0 WAR)

Buster Posey has been magnificent over the past year, and has been worth approximately twice the value of any other catcher according to FanGraphs calculations.  Not only that, but he also tops Baseball Prospectus's rankings for Framing Runs added this year at 10 runs above average, so he's good at that as well.  He walks almost as much as he strikes out (and he has incredibly low strikeout rates), he hits for good power, and has played 147 games in the past year by manning first base.  There's talk that he might eventually have to move out from behind the plate, but that has to be a difficult proposition given how amazing he is back there.

Francisco Cervelli shocked me, but all of his PA's have happened in the past calendar year.  The last time he had even 300 PA's in a season was 2012 with the Yankees AAA affiliate.  But now that he's both healthy and being given a chance, he's showing himself to be a pretty nice hitter.  Sure, the .400 BABIP will come down, but a solid hitter and a top-tier framer?  The Pirates are looking pretty darn smart.

First Base

Anthony Rizzo (CHC; 5.7 WAR)
Paul Goldschmidt (ARI; 5.3 WAR)

Rizzo is the newcomer (he "merely" earned a pat on the head last year as the Cubs representative), but as the Reds just witnessed first-hand, he has really come into his own in Chicago and might just be the best first baseman in baseball.  He's at the top of the leaderboard, if nothing else.  Rizzo's calling card is his power, but he gets on base thanks to decent walk rates and excellent contact rates.

Second Base

Joe Panik (SFG; 4.0 WAR)
Howie Kendrick (LAD; 4.0 WAR)

Although their overall value pegs out as identical over the past year, Panik gets the nod here over Kendrick because he has done so in fewer PA's, because he's having the better 2015 season, and it's fun to vote for young guys.  I don't remember Panik being much of a prospect as far as ballyhoos go, but he's having himself a terrific start to his career with the Giants.  The 24-year old is hitting for good power this season (mostly doubles), has outstanding contact skills, and holds his own in the infield.

Third Base

Todd Frazier

Todd Frazier (CIN; 5.6 WAR)
Anthony Rendon (WAS; 4.4 WAR)

For the second-straight year, Frazier is my starter in the National League at the hot corner.  I really enjoy watching Frazier in the field; he has good hands, but for me what seems to set him apart is his ability to make such good, strong, accurate throws from almost any position.  Offensively, while he is an aggressive hitter and often seems to lunge at balls low and away, he somehow gets enough barrel on balls to hit them with power when he does so.  Or, at least, he can hit them in the air over the infielders heads.  2015 is, so far, easily the best year of his career.  Two causes: one, a lower strikeout rate, and two, a major drop in his ground ball rate.  Almost everything he hits goes into the air, and he has enough power to do serious damage.

There's a bit of a snub with the reserve here, where I took Anthony Rendon over Josh Harrison.  Harrison actually had slightly more WAR (4.5), but Rendon got his total despite missing time with injury.  And, frankly, he's a guy I really like.  And I picked him last year.  Still, with Harrison being a Princeton High grad, I feel a little bad about.  I ended up taking him as an outfielder below...kind of a stretch, but he has played there.

Shortstop

Jhonny Peralta

Jhonny Peralta (STL: 5.5 WAR)
Brandon Crawford (SFG; 3.5 WAR)

This is a pretty thin position.  Peralta, though, continues to be one of the most interesting players I've seen.  When with the Indians, he was moved off of shortstop due to significant concerns about his ability to field the position.  The Tigers signed him and plugged him back at shortstop, but just about everyone thought this was a foolish move; would he hit enough to make up for his defense?  Not only did he do that, but he actually has become one of the best fielders at his position.  The how is still a bit unclear to me, but a) he very rarely makes mistakes, and b) he seems to be incredibly good at both positioning and reading the ball off the bat (or, maybe, reading the bat before it even hits the ball?). Regardless, he's easily been the best shortstop in baseball over the past year.

Outfield

Starters: LF: Giancarlo Stanton (MIA: 5.2 WAR); CF: Andrew McCutchen (PIT: 5.0 WAR), RF: Bryce Harper (WAS: 5.7 WAR)
Reserves: Josh Harrison (PIT: 4.5 WAR), Starling Marte (4.2 WAR), Denard Span (4.0 WAR)

Of Harper's 5.7 WAR over the past 365 days, 4.6 of them have come this season.  He has nearly a full win lead over the next-best player (Josh Donaldson: 3.8 WAR), has an OBP we haven't really seen since Barry Bonds (.479), a 20% walk rate, an equal strikeout rate, and has shown a huge drop in his ground ball rate to help his other-worldly power play up.  I still think Mike Trout is a better ballplayer, but Harper's actually making me question that.  How fun; those two players have always been tied to one another, and now we're seeing both of them making good on their promise.

Starting Pitchers

Clayton Kershaw

Clayton Kershaw (LAD: 8.2 WAR)
Max Scherzer (WAS: 6.5 WAR)
Cole Hamels (PHI: 5.6 WAR)
Jacob deGrom (NYM: 5.5 WAR)
Jake Arrieta (CHC: 5.2 WAR)

Here I'm using an average of RA9-WAR (based purely on runs allowed per nine) and normal fWAR (based on FIP) in an effort to recognize that FIP doesn't catch everything that is within a pitcher's skillset.  Clayton Kershaw once again leads the way, and rightly so.  Jake Arrieta and Jacob deGrom were the two surprises for me.  Reigning rookie of the year deGrom has long been throwing well, but I guess I didn't realize how well.  And while I knew that Arietta had a great season last year, I overlooked him this year...likely because the Reds missed him when they faced the Cubs last week.

Relievers

Aroldis Chapman (CIN: 2.4 WAR)
Drew Storen (WAS: 2.3 WAR)
Ken Giles (PHI: 2.2 WAR)
Kenley Jansen (LAD: 2.1 WAR)
Jonathan Papelbon (PHI: 2.1 WAR)

Aroldis Chapman has seemed mortal in recent weeks, but over the past calendar year he has arguably been the best reliever in the league.  It's curious that one team recently rumored to be interested in him is the Washington Nationals, who control the second name on this list.  A Storen-Chapman combination, played to maximize platoon advantage, would be brutal in late innings.  I didn't expect the Phillies' bullpen to rank out so well.  Ken Giles, in particular, is a revelation.  He has been walking a few more this season, but the 24-year old has a 1.49 ERA (and a 2.27 SIERA) in 72 innings between this and last year.  I completely overlooked him in my recent Phillies preview.

Pats on the Head

(players selected as team representatives despite not making the cut above)

Freddie Freeman

Atlanta: Freddie Freeman, 1B (4.7 WAR)
Colorado: Nolan Arenado, 3B (3.7 WAR)
Milwaukee: Carlos Gomez, CF (3.0 WAR)
San Diego: Tyson Ross, SP (3.3 WAR)

Team Totals

ARI - 1
ATL - 0
CHC - 2
CIN - 3
COL - 0
LAD - 3
MIA - 1
MIL - 0
NYM - 1
PHI - 3
PIT - 4
SDP - 0
SFG - 3
STL - 1
WAS - 5
(not including pat-on-head selections)

After placing second in the "Star Counts," the Nationals take the lead this year.  They've had a fairly disappointing season thus far, but I still like them to take their division when it's all said and done.  They're only 1.5 games behind the Mets.

Chapman abandons change (mostly)

So, less than two weeks ago, I wrote about how Aroldis Chapman's improvement this year can arguably be traced to the debut of his change-up.  Well, as Jeff Sullivan noted, almost coinciding with when I wrote that, Chapman now seems to be moving away from using his change-up.  In fact, he's thrown the pitch in only 1 of the last 5 games, and 2 of the last 8:

The reason appears to be that he has a hard time throwing the change-up for strikes.

The good news was that while he was not throwing it for strikes, he was usually missing down (assuming he was even trying to get it in the zone).  Nevertheless, it does look like the pitch has fallen out of favor.  So much for my last piece on him! :)

I personally hope that he can continue to work it in, even as a show-me pitch.  Hitters can catch up to his fastball if they know that it is coming.  The slider is a fantastic pitch, and I'm sure he can be quite successful as a fastball/slider reliever.  But a third pitch against right-handers, at least, would be one additional thing that hitters need to keep in their minds as they step in to face him.

The New Aroldis Chapman

The Reds' worst-kept secret is how amazing Aroldis Chapman has been this year, and the story of what he is doing differently to become so dominant.  Chapman is arguably in the midst of the best season of his career:

(sorry about the size of that one--click to make it bigger).

I know he had the 1.51 ERA is 2012.  But his strikeouts are at to 2 k/inning (18 k/9) on the season, his walks are stable, and he's allowed just one home run on the year.  He's been ridiculous***.

***This calls for a graph dump!

So how has he done it?  Well, part of it is that his velocity is up about two mph this year after averaging "just" 98 or so the prior three years.  Here's Brooks' Baseball's graph of that:

Aroldis has had months in which he has averaged over 100 mph.  But he's never had three consecutive months like this before in terms of sheer power.

The other thing that appears on this graph, of course, is that Aroldis is throwing his change-up again for the first time since 2010.  Here's a look at all of his games on the year in my favorite plot for identifying pitches:

It's pretty straightforward.  Chapman throws crazy-hard, with a fastball that breaks back away from a right-handed hitter while traveling at roughly the speed of sound.  And on top of that, he has a change-up that breaks almost 10 inches away from a righty, and then a slider that breaks in toward the right-handed batter's back foot.  The change-up and slider break opposite directions and travel roughly the same velocity.

Chapman is throwing both of his secondary offerings much more often this year:

After living almost exclusively with this fastball at times from 2011-2013, he's dropped his usage of that pitch into the high 60% range.  Instead, he's now throwing a quarter of his pitches as sliders, and is working in change-ups at a consistent, low rate.

The change-up has been very effective for him:

When he first started throwing it in May after coming back from the DL, batters had no idea what to do with it, and were swinging and missing 50% of the time he threw it.  They've since learned to lay off it (because they can't hit it: the pitch has a 95% whiff rate when they do swing on the season!!), and so we're seeing that whiff rate decline.  But, concurrently, we're seeing a spike in his fastball whiff rate.  So far in July, his fastball has induced the highest percentage of strikeouts of any month in his career.  It's correlational, but it sure looks like the use of his change-up has strengthened the impact of his fastball.  'Cause the fastball wasn't already an amazing pitch....

One last thing: on a recent Redleg Nation Radio, Bill Lack asked whether Aroldis gets beat more often when pitching down in the zone than when pitching up in the zone.  Here is are opposing batters' slugging percentages against Chapman in different parts of the zone.

First, left-handed batters:

(also known as "good luck, fella").  Lefties have gotten good wood on the ball when throws in the strike zone down and away, but otherwise are basically hopeless against him.

Now, right-handed batters:

Bill's perceptions hold true here.  When Chapman is throwing in the bottom half of the zone against righties, he's actually been hit pretty well during his career.  When he elevates the ball, however, it's been pretty much lights out.  And this isn't the pattern you always see either.  Here's a link to Cueto's graph; he gets it up in the top part of the zone as well.


Chapman seems to have noticed.  This year, he's throwing up in the zone more than in prior years, especially with his fastball:

All of Chapman's success this year is made all the more amazing by the fact that he suffered a serious head injury in spring training.  He's been one of the bright spots on the team thus far.  I don't know if he'll still be on the team by the end of the year, as he would seem to be a nice trade chip if Jocketty decides the Reds need to sell off some parts.  I think someone would overpay for him.  But it's fun to enjoy him while he's still a member of the Reds.

All graphs courtesy of the amazing Brooks Baseball.

My two cents of pitcher head protection

Like all Cincinnati Reds fans, I'm still reeling from the news of Aroldis Champan's injury last night.  The star closer was hit by a line drive in the face, resulting in facial fractures.  If nothing else, the bones in the area where he was hit (near where his eyebrow and nose meet) are directly in front of his left frontal cranial sinus, so that may have collapsed.  He is getting a metal plate installed in a surgery that began at 5pm Arizona time, which will be reinforcing those areas.  The big concern from all of this, of course, was the possibility of damage to the brain, and the eye.  Early reports are very good, however.  Hopefully, those reports will continue.  Word is that he can be expected to be pitching as early as May, assuming he recovers well and is able to conquer the psychological challenge of getting in front of live hitters again.

Therefore, for the moment, I'm breathing a little easier now than I was this morning.  That reprieve allows one to start thinking about how the Reds will readjust their bullpen (Broxton?  Hoover?  Marshall?), but that can come later.

My other reaction is to immediately advocate measures that would fix this problem.  As Craig Calcaterra noted, it's hard to know how to what to recommend here.  I do think that we're very slowly starting on a trajectory toward requiring some kind of protection for pitchers.  Pitching at the major league level is so difficult, however.  It must require almost perfect balance and coordination to get the ball within a 3' by 1' box sixty feet away.  Therefore, anything that has the potential to disrupt or interfere with that balance seems destined to be rejected.

The IsoBlox padded hat.  Ugly, uncomfortable,
but at least a bit safer?

Still, solutions are already in the works.  This spring, in response to Brandon McCarthy's injury in 2012, MLB approved a new padded cap as an option for pitchers.  It weighs about a half-pound more, but provides a modicum of additional protection against line drives to the head.  Unfortunately, at least thus far, even McCarthy himself has been slow to embrace the cap.  I'd be interested to know if any players in baseball are using it right now; I haven't seen reports of any.  And, given that the ball hit Chapman in the face, it wouldn't have mattered in his case anyway.  There's another level or protection to consider as well: the pitching facemasks used in softball and even some little leagues.  The two in combination would offer a lot of protection.  But would pitchers still be able to throw the baseball with precision while wearing that gear on their heads?

My guess is that it would take some practice, and the transition would sometimes be frustrating to watch.  But yes, eventually pitchers would adapt.  The problem is, as long as protection is entirely optional, I think we're very unlikely to see pitchers adopt the protection on their own.  Some might give it a try.  But my guess is that the moment they start to struggle, someone is going to suggest they go without it.  And then, because Regression, they'll probably start throwing better once they take the gear off, and decide that it's just not for them.

So a league-wide policy, then?  It worked for third base coaches.  Yes, it has a chance to have a meaningful impact on player performance, and thus their livelihood.  And yes, some pitchers--maybe max-effort throwers?--might be impacted more severely than others.  But I see this as a workplace safety issue.  Just as wearing a hard hat on a construction site is a requirement for worker safety, requiring some kind of head protection should probably be something that MLB strongly considers.

Will it happen?  I'm under no illusions that it will happen soon.  A first step would be to improve the hat (or find another) that at least a decent number of pitchers can sign off on, and yet still provides meaningful protection.  But once that's done, I think MLB will need to mandate it if it is going to be used.