by Daniel Gettinger

Last week the Padres traded pitcher Chad Gaudin to the New York Yankees.  The Padres will receive either a “player to be named later,” or cash.

When the Padres signed Gaudin, I praised the move, declaring Gaudin the Padres third best starting pitcher (behind only Peavy and Young).  A few weeks later, I announced I was so bullish on Chad that I had picked him up in a NL/AL fantasy league.  In June, I urged the Friar Faithful not to give up on Chad, arguing that his batting average on balls in play and his strand rate suggested his high ERA was a function of bad luck. As recently as July 27, I favorably compared Gaudin to Wandy Rodriguez who has a 2.63 ERA this season.

I think it is pretty clear that I am a fan of Chad.  I continue to believe he is a league average starting pitcher (or at worst, slightly below league average, but certainly better than replacement level).  Gaudin’s stats support my hypothesis.  Since 2007, his xFIP’s (FIP with a normalized HR rate) have read: 4.58, 4.43, 4.00, 4.23.  Nothing wrong with those numbers.  Consistently league average.  As we all know, Chad strikes out a lot of players (a strikeout per inning this season), but also walks a lot of guys (4.78 BB/9).  Gaudin is not a good pitcher, but he has value.

From a baseball perspective, I don’t love this trade, but don’t hate it either.  The Padres were due to control Chad for another 2 arbitration cycles.  This year he made $2M (note: the Cubs are on the hook for all but $0.4M of his salary this season), and given his high ERA, I cannot imagine him receiving a huge arbitration reward next season-maybe $3M at most.  Given Gaudin has been worth somewhere between $5M and $7M already this season, and was worth $3.8M in only 90 2008 innings, I feel Gaudin is a good bet to provide value in excess of his salary next season.

The problem with Gaudin is that the Padres have actually acquired a lot of pitchers who will provide the same amount of value.  Kevin Correia, Clayton Richard, and Sean Gallagher are all guys who should put up a FIP between 4.0 and 4.5 next season.  Tim Stauffer may be able to post similar numbers.  Mat Latos will be projected to be league average next year, but could certainly pitch better than that.  Correia has the same amount of service time as Gaudin, but the rest of these “league average” pitchers are not even arbitration eligible.  They will be paid the minimum.  (And be less frustrating to watch).  Plus there’s also Chris Young-another guy who will probably be projected to be league average, but may exceed his projections next year.

Furthermore, because Petco Park is notorious for being so kind on pitchers, I believe the Padres have a leg up on signing league average free agents looking to parlay a Petco influenced ERA into a larger contract in the future.  Replacing Chad should not be a problem for the Padres.

And that’s why, as much as I took a liking to Chad’s volatile approach to getting outs, I don’t mind trading him…even for cash.  The Padres are full of cheap, average pitchers, and won’t have a problem signing more of them if needed.  Chad was expendable.  I would however like to thank him for his four months of service to the Padres organization.  He provided me with an incredible abundance of post material, and I will always remember being at the game where he walked the opposing pitcher with the bases loaded.  Classic.

by Daniel Gettinger

Yes, this is a blog primarily about the San Diego Padres.  Recently though, a friend of mine from Houston asked me to “write a blog post about the surging Astros.”  To be perfectly honest, I had not even noticed the Astros had been winning ball games, but I’ll oblige and touch on the Astros.  Unfortunately for my friend, I don’t have anything promising to report.

As of this moment, the Astros are 50-48.  Only two games behind both the Cubs and Cardinals.  They trail the wildcard leading Rockies by 3.5 games.  Compared to  preseason expectations (PECOTA had the Astros pegged for 66.6 wins), this has been a surprisingly good season for Astros fans.  They have certainly had more fun than Padres fans have had.  That said, the Astros are not a legitimate 50 win team.  They have been outscored by 28 runs, and have an expected win/loss record of 46-52.

The Astros biggest problem is they have very little talent on the roster.  Berkman and Pence are good. Carlos Lee can hit.  And Tejada had had a surprisingly solid season.  But other than those players, the Astros have very little in the way of position players.

Geoff Blum, Kaz Matsui, and Jeff Keppinger have all received more than 200 plate appearances.  The team’s bench is nearly non-existent.  The Astros have little lineup depth, and quite frankly, one of their “stars” is incredibly overrated.  Carlos Lee has essentially given back all the runs he has generated with his bat by playing terrible (-7.8 runs below average) defense at a corner outfield spot.

The starting pitching is not fantastic either.  Roy Oswalt leads the staff, and is still a good pitcher. Just not great.  He has a 3.80 FIP, exactly the same mark he posted in 2008.  Wandy Rodriguez has been a nice surprise, posting a 2.72 ERA.  But his peripherals, while good, are not 2.72 ERA good.  Lets play the player A/player B game…

Player A: 8.38 K/9, 3.01 BB/9, 0.93 HR/9, 3.61 FIP

Player B: 8.97 K/9, 4.66 BB/9, 0.63 HR/9, 3.67 FIP

Player A has better control than player B, but strikes out less batters (albeit barely), and gives up more homeruns.  Player A is Wandy Rodriguez.  Player B is Chad Gaudin.  Yup, Wandy Rodriguez is essentially Chad Gaudin.  Wandy has gotten lucky this year.  Chad has been somewhat unlukcy.

Mike Hampton, Brian Moehler, and Russ Ortiz round out the rotation.  Um, yeah.  Can’t say I have a lot of faith in any of those guys.  At best Hampton is a league average pitcher.  Moehler and Ortiz are not even that.  The Astro’s starting pitching mirrors the team’s bats.  The top 40% is solid.  The bottom 60% is pretty bad.

The bullpen has been good.  Jose Valverde has returned from an injury, and has done a capable job in the closer’s role. Letroy Hawkins and Chris Sampson are both enjoying good seasons as well.  Even lesser known players such as Tim Byrdak and Alberto Arias have done a nice job when called upon.

The bullpen may be the Astro’s strength, but a good bullpen is not going to make up for the rest of the team’s flaws.  The Astros lack depth in both their lineup and their starting rotation.  The Astros are overachieving, and will not make the playoffs this season.  As George Zimmer says: “I guarantee it”…