Oswalt Trade Analysis

I promised a more measured reaction the day following the big trade. I did this for a couple of reasons. For practical purposes, yesterday was a horrible trade to do anything. My internet is down at home, so I have to go to wi-fi hot spots to give you the news (Barnes and Noble this morning). Yesterday, my car battery died, so the hot spot happened to be the Apple Store in the mall. Naturally, that is not the best of places for in-depth analysis.

Even in ideal circumstances I don’t feel comfortable making snap judgments on any big deal. There is always a ton of emotion involved. There is sadness and relief. I didn’t want any of those to get in the way of smart analysis. Smart money seemed to be on the Phillies side simply because Ed Wade has a reputation for getting ripped off on these exchanges. He did when he traded Scott Rolen and Curt Schilling out of Philadelphia.

Let’s not forget two things. First, deals are always easy to grade five years after the fact. Hindsight is not only twenty/twenty but it often does not take into account what was going on at the time or how players would have played in their present situation. Roy O may go onto win 100 games in Philadelphia and get swept into Cooperstown in a Phillies cap. If that happens, it does not mean that is what would happen here. Similarly, J.A. Happ may go onto win 150 games on his own. Brett Wallace may go onto become a consistent .300/.400/.500 threat at the big league level. None of these things necessarily would have happened in Philadelphia or Toronto.

The second easy thing to forget is that in all three cases (Schilling, Rolen, and Oswalt) Wade was dealing from a position of weakness. Those three players wanted out and no matter what they may say, they asked to be traded. When you ask to be traded the price already goes down. So, I’m not going to crack on Wade too much if people start comparing packages to the one the Dbacks got for Haren or the Mariners got for Cliff Lee.

The headliner in the deal was J.A. Happ. Happ will be making tonight’s start, so it is easy to see him as the most important piece. In all likelihood he will have the least impact on whether this is a good deal. Happ has spent parts of four years in the big leagues. He has a career 14-5 record with a 3.11 ERA. He has thrown 217 big league innings. So far, it looks like a good trade even if he was the only one involved. This is where the Phillies know something we don’t.

That impressive record comes with a fairly pedestrian 6.59 K/9 rate and a fairly high walk rate (3.48 BB/9). The combination is a K/BB rate slightly below the 2/1 that we typically look for. I would normally feel squeamish about his 1.12 HR/9, but he is leaving a very good hitter’s park. So, all in all he has the look of a league average pitcher. In the minors he had a 29-30 record with a 3.52 ERA. We aren’t talking about an uberprospect here.

Brett Wallace is a hitting machine like Ed Wade described in his press conference yesterday. However, he has no position. This makes him a more heralded version of Koby Clemens. Still, Lance Berkman is on his way out and you can’t have too many competent replacements. Wallace is a better hitter than Clemens, but he has seen his walk rate dwindle in each of his minor league seasons. In 2008 he drew a respectable 8.1 walks per 100 plate appearances. In 2009 that dropped to 7.8. That isn’t that much of a drop, but now he is at 6.4. All we need is another free swinger. Still, he hits a steady .300 with power. In the big leagues, that will translate to somewhere between .260 and .280 with power.

Jonathan Villar will go to Lancaster. He gives the Astros another good shortstop prospect to go along with Jeovani Mier. In the 1980s, the Reds had two very good shortstop prospects in Kurt Stillwell and Barry Larkin. Some assumed Stillwell would make it. He served as a decent bench player for a few years, but it would be Larkin that would go onto a Hall of Fame career. You just never know and having more than one gives you a better chance of making it.

Villar has settled in so far with similar walk rates as Wallace. He consistently hits around .270 with impressive speed numbers. This season, he already has 38 stolen bases. Some will be concerned with 42 errors, but those numbers tend to improve with age. The biggest stat to be concerned with are his 103 strikeouts through four months of play. That number will have to improve for him to get anywhere.

If Villar or Wallace stick as regulars the Astros will have gotten decent return for Oswalt. If both stick then they have very good return. There are no guarantees in this business and there never will be. All you can do is stockpile as much talent as possible and hope for the best.