Arizona Diamondbacks' surplus talent creates options
General Manager Dave Stewart has made no secret of the fact that he is not eager to deal from the Diamondbacks’ core of young position players, saying last week he would do so only if he got “exactly what we want” in a trade (think: young, controllable starting pitching).
This is a perfectly reasonable and justifiable stance, one likely welcomed by Diamondbacks fans who have watched good prospects thrive elsewhere more times than they’d care to remember. It’s also a course of action typically advocated for in this space.
But, like every move or non-move in baseball, there is a flip side to the argument. Sometimes, a team’s best chance at extracting maximum value from a player is to deal him – whether the club believes in his future or not.
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“Some guys,” a high-ranking talent evaluator with an American League club said, “end up dying on the vine.”
As it stands, the Diamondbacks have too many talented players for too few positions. With A.J. Pollock, David Peralta and Ender Inciarte finishing this season as the club’s everyday outfielders, Yasmany Tomas and Socrates Brito – a pair of intriguing, albeit less proven players – are without a place to get everyday at-bats.
Their infield is nearly as crowded, with Nick Ahmed, Chris Owings, Jake Lamb and Brandon Drury giving them four potential everyday players for the three spots alongside Paul Goldschmidt.
If the Diamondbacks choose to keep them all, they would be relegating players to the minors or to bench roles. In some respects, perhaps, this would be fine; they would maintain depth, a valuable and generally underrated commodity that would be useful in the event of injury or poor performance.
But it’s also possible some of their players might never be worth more than they are right now, and by allowing them to languish in the minors or get inconsistent at-bats in the majors, they might be torpedoing future value at the cost of maintaining depth they might never need.
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“There is a chance of holding on too long, and that’s why you have to constantly re-evaluate what you have and where you are,” another high-ranking scout with an AL club said. “Every year that you go and a player makes more money and has less control left, he has less value on the trade market.”
There are examples everywhere, perhaps none better than former Los Angeles Angels prospect Brandon Wood. A 2003 first-round pick, Wood averaged 25 homers a year in his first four seasons in the minors, and he was twice ranked among Baseball America’s Top 10 prospects.
At one time, the Angels could have dealt him for almost anything. They didn’t, and after Wood struggled in multiple short stints in the majors, his flaws became apparent. By then, it was too late. He never hit big-league pitching, and the Angels never benefited from his once-astronomical value.
“When guys are sitting in Triple-A after a period of time, a lot of them lose some motivation, and with that there’s maybe a downturn in some production and you lose value there,” the first evaluator said. “Along those lines, too, once you start that clock and put them on the roster, and they run out of control or become out-of-options players, they’re harder to carry or give the commitment to. Timing is always really important.”
Domonic Brown is another case in point. The outfielder’s value was once so high the Philadelphia Phillies refused to trade him for ace Roy Halladay (whom they eventually acquired anyway). But Brown never hit enough, and last month the Phillies outrighted him off their roster after giving him 1,748 plate appearances and getting mostly subpar production.
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“Two years ago,” an executive with an NL team said, “it’s unbelievable to think what the Rangers could have traded Jurickson Profar for. The guy can still hit, but you don’t know how the shoulder is really going to come back and you don’t know how the long-term health is really going to be.”
Such examples are so common it’s enough to wonder if the Diamondbacks wouldn’t be better served deciding sooner than later on the players they want as a part of their future. Will it be Lamb or Drury at third? What two of Ahmed, Owings and Drury will be up the middle?
The outfield presents more complicated scenarios, although with Brito it might be simple: If the Diamondbacks believe he might not crack an everyday role anytime soon, parting with him wouldn’t be too difficult. But things get tricky beyond that, thanks, in large part, to what’s left of the $68.5 million deal Tomas received last off-season.
The Diamondbacks probably wouldn’t get much back for him in a deal, certainly not without paying down a large chunk of his contract. But if the club still believes he’ll develop into a middle-of-the-order bat, it might make sense to deal Inciarte, whose value might be best served playing center field for another team.
These are questions the Diamondbacks likely are considering. In fact, sources with rival clubs say the Diamondbacks have discussed a variety of scenarios. Multiple sources say the Diamondbacks’ asking price is high for Inciarte. Another executive said Tomas is the player they are trying to move, while a source with an AL club believes the Diamondbacks will deal one of Owings, Drury or Lamb.
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And, for as much as a club might not want to part with its own – for as easy as it can be to have an affinity for the homegrown guy – there are times when a trade might be the wisest course of action, particularly for a team that believes it might have a chance to contend as soon as next season.
“It’s a good point and it’s stuff that we talk about and wrestle with quite a bit,” the NL executive said. “For me, this is all about windows. Baseball is all about windows and managing the windows. They open and they close, especially when we’re dealing with prospects.”
Reach Piecoro at (602) 444-8680 or nick.piecoro@arizonarepublic.com. Follow him on Twitter @nickpiecoro.
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