You’ve heard the rumors. You’ve seen the BottomLine on ESPN. You know that Xavier Nady and Damaso Marte have been traded to the New York Yankees. The Pirates will receive pitchers Ross Ohlendorf, George Kontos, Phil Coke and outfielder Jose Tabata. I’m going to spare you the bull and tell you upfront that I love this trade, as a diehard Yankee fan. Brian Cashman netted two months and another full season of control over Nady, who will fill the left field vacancy right now and could take over for Abreu near the ‘Porch in 2009. Marte is not only a dominant power lefty reliever but has a club option for ’09, and of course, the Yanks could always deny the option, offer arbitration, and either keep him as a result or lose him to free agency and get Type-A compensation (His level of performance is essentially a forgone conclusion at this point).
Xavier Nady is currently sporting a line of .330/.383/.535. It’s significantly above his career averages and he is not going to keep that up in Yankee Stadium.
Broken bats usually don't work, X-Man.
However, I think it’s fair to expect something in the vein of .270/.330/.450, and I’ll take that any day. He’s really an average corner outfielder, as his career 108 OPS+ shows, but when he’s shoving a wet noodle like Brett Gardner out of the lineup, it doesn’t really matter how good he really is. He’s average or better, and right-handed, which the Bombers wanted first and foremost.
Looks like a 93-mph fastball from here.
Damaso Marte has pitched in the American League before, most recently as a member of the 2005 World Champion Chicago White Sox. I don’t like his ERA much (3.47), but he is striking out a guy an inning and holds a stingy WHIP of 1.157. That should translate well, and his role will be reduced from closer to middle/set-up reliever. Once again this seems like a good example of why ERA doesn’t mean that much, especially for relief pitchers. He doesn’t put guys on base. End of story. The Yankees have one of the game’s best ‘pens as it is, so I don’t feel Marte does anything worse than add depth, and at best, gives the Yanks a dependable veteran lefty who can handle hitters on both sides of the plate.
Ross Ohlendorf had been pitching as a starter once again at Triple-A Scranton, with great effectiveness to boot. It’s easy to why – the bullpen is stacked and the rotation is somewhat vulnerable but also full. He was trade bait as soon as he made his first start of the year. All in all, I didn’t see him helping much once he was sent down.
George Kontos and Phil Coke, both of Double-A Trenton, are solid starting pitchers. Kontos is a nasty righty with significant command and control issues. Coke is old for the league (26) and not a power guy but he’s a southpaw. These players were probably going to be in discussion as filler in just about any trade the Yankees made this summer. With so many pitchers ahead of them and younger ones on the way (such as Zach McAllister and Dellin Betances), they were expendable.
Jose Tabata is the most intriguing piece that Pittsburgh acquired.
The outfielder will turn 20 in August and was ranked number 37 on the Baseball America Top 100 Prosepcts list in February. However, he has been terrible at AA and almost certainly damaged his stock between his lousy play and attitude incidents, which include an instance when he walked out of a game earlier in the year (at New Britain, in the 7th inning, I believe). He may be young but a reality check is in order, and he’s still very, very far away from the big leagues. Fernando Martinez of the Mets is what the Pirates are hoping Tabata will turn into within the next year or so.
The only guy I care about in the long term is Tabata. Did we sell low? Perhaps. But there’s no way we would have gotten Nady and Marte for complete junk. They needed a good prospect and they got one. His makeup questionable and development stuttered by injury and a poor season, Brian Cashman figured it was worth a roll of the dice. Chances are good that Tabata never makes the bigs or at least doesn’t reach his projections as “The Next Manny” (Yeah, that does seem a bit extreme). Abreu and Marte could net the Yankees some great compensation this winter, and I would much rather have that on top of having a better chance this year. Who’s to say a championship isn’t in the works right now?
The Salary Dump 