December 7, 2016

Strong Up the Middle

The Nationals added Adam Eaton to and the White Sox gained another good pitching prospect as the teams complete a trade that makes Washington very strong up the middle.

The Nationals traded right-handers Lucaas Giolito, Reynaldo Lopez and Dane Dunning for Eaton, 28. Giolito, rated as the top right-handed pitching prospect in baseball at times last season, and Lopez, who cracked the playoff roster with high-90s stuff, showed they were close to major league ready last season. For Dunning, taken No. 29 overall out of the University of Florida, last year was his first of professional ball.

Eaton’s arrival all but ends the Nationals pursuit of McCutchen, whose price was believed to be even steeper than Eaton’s. It also pushes Trea Turner back to shortstop, his natural position.

With the earlier acquisition of Derek Norris, the Nationals are looking strong up the middle. For some reason, Norris’s offense fell apart with the Padres, but a better hitting team might take some pressure off Norris, and a group of selective hitters might influence him positively as well. He’ll play 2017 as a 28-year-old, so he’s still early in his prime.

So the Nationals have Norris catching, Turner at short, Daniel Murphy at second, and Eaton in center. Eaton brings a fine OBP to the team and should work well as a lead-off or number two hitter. I can see an Eaton, Turner, Murphy, Bryce Harper top of the order doing a lot of damage. Plus, with strength up the middle and a good hitter in Anthony Rendon at third, the Nats won’t need to spend much if they need to replace Jayson Werth or Ryan Zimmerman at the corners.

The White Sox are building a very nice, young pitching staff themselves. Giolito has excellent K numbers in the minors, although they did not translate to the majors in his age 21 season. Lopez showed excellent control in the minors which didn’t translate to his rookie season. Dunning was old for his minor league level, but at least he blew batters away. In two years they could be the middle of the White Sox rotation.

1 thought on “Strong Up the Middle

  1. art kyriazis

    I substantially agree with you dave. two points:

    1) the Nats search for a CF seems now to be eternal. They have now cycled thru Denard Span, Ben Revere and now Adam Eaton, all of whom are fairly similar players. But they could have gone out and gotten Andrew McCutcheon, who is a bona fide MVP, and put him alongside Bryce Harper for at least two years. Even though he hit “only .240” if you park and year adjust that, that’s actually a very good year–his MVP year park and year adjusts out to around .387 with 50 bombs if you project it to year 2000 in Fenway.

    2) “Strong up the middle” is relative–Trea Turner and Daniel Murphy are not the best glove guys around. They certainly can RAKE and can HIT–they can hit a ton–but defensively, they both are weak. They’re not going to remind anyone of Jimmy Rollins & Chase Utley, who could both field and hit in their prime. And Adam Eaton is not a terrific centerfielder–he’s given a minus Runs Total in CF by BR for his career, and has posted negative defensive WAR by BR two of his four regular seasons. So he’s not shining with the glove either, even if he was ok last year.

    And Wilson Ramos is gone at Catcher. So strong up the middle is a very relative term–I’m not fully sure that the Nats have fully kept pace with the Cubs here.

    The Cubs by contrast have picked up a key bullpen piece by trading an OF, Soler, who didn’t figure to play for the Cubs, and who was going to DH in the AL.

    Finally, the Nats are down a closer as well.

    The Mets and Braves are moving up, and the Phils farm talent continues to arrive in the majors at both the pitching and hitting levels.

    Once Bryce Harper is a free agent and hits the road for his monster contract with the Yankees, it would seem the Nats window will close.

    I want to conclude by noting the big role that Jayson Werth has played with the Nats. Year in and year out, even though he doesn’t seem to post the big numbers, if you adjust them for the park, they are still decent, and additionally, Werth plays hard and leads by example, especially in the playoffs.

    It always appears to me as if Werth is the only guy on the Nats that appears to bust a gut in the playoffs trying to win.

    The kind of guy the Nats really need in their clubhouse is a Chase Utley, a guy that might only play a bit, but whose demeanor and leadership would rub off on Bryce Harper and make him want to win it all. They should also try and trade for Chooch Ruiz from the Mariners as well.

    I simply think they need some winning veterans who know how to win.

    Art Kyriazis, Philly

    ReplyReply

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *