Watched: Oakland @ Toronto - 8/4/08

I wanted to check out Sean Gallagher, one of the main pieces Oakland received when they traded away Rich Harden. At the time of the trade, some analysts insisted that Gallagher would win more games in the next five years than Harden and some others went so far as to claim that Gallagher might even win more games in the rest of this season than Harden will (of course, predictions like those are easy to make - if you are wrong no one remembers, if you are right you can quote yourself in a later column to show that you are a genius). So far Harden and Gallagher are even at 1-1 since the trade. Of course, wins and losses don't tell the whole story. Gallagher has made five starts since the trade (including tonight) and has thrown 25.1 innings in those five starts, and while he has struck out twenty seven men, which is excellent, he has also walked nineteen batters and has an ERA of 4.26. Harden, on the other hand, has made four starts since the trade, lasting 24.1 innings in those starts. He has only walked eight, while striking out thirty nine batters and he has an ERA of 1.11.

Anyway, I wanted to see what Oakland got in Gallagher and the numbers above were indicative of his performance. He clearly has good stuff, but he needs to learn to reign it in a bit. His fastball seemed to top out at about 92 and he had a good sharp slider, which was his strikeout pitch. He was very inefficient with his pitch count and only lasted three innings on the night. During his brief appearnace he was able to accumulate four strikeouts and four walks. He also hit two batters.

Clearly, Gallagher did not pitch well enough to win, and with an average of about five innings per start, he's really not giving his team much of a chance to win when he's on the mound. But Gallagher is only 22 years old and he seems to have the talent to become a solid major league pitcher. There are innumerable stories of pitchers with great stuff that never learned to harness their abilities and burned out without ever making an impact in the major leagues. Gallagher could easily become one of those guys, or he could mature into his talent and make himself into a solid #2 or #3 starter.

Weekend Miscellany

It was an interesting weekend in baseball. First, the Rays have gone 2-8 over their last ten games, but found themselves back in first place in the AL East this morning because the Red Sox got swept over the weekend by the Anaheim Angels. Don't look now, but as both Boston and Tampa struggle, the Yankees are making headway in the division, having gone 7-3 in their last ten and pulling to 4.5 games out. This should make for an interesting stretch run.

There was also a trade over the weekend. The San Francisco Giants traded Ray Durham to Milwaukee for two prospects. The prospects weren't premium ones, but they might be useful down the road. One is pitcher Steve Hammond, who is left handed and strikes a good percentage of batters out, so that will probably earn him some play at some point. The other is outfielder Darren Ford, who profiles as a pinch runner/defensive replacement/fourth or fifth outfielder at the big league level. These guys aren't top prospects, but they are a bit more than organizational filler, too.

Durham could make a significant difference for the Brewers. For all of his tools and promise, Rickie Weeks has not performed as a major league second baseman. Durham is almost old enough to be Weeks' father, but he's putting up a line of .293/.385/.414 compared to Weeks' .216/.326/.365. The Brewers don't have too many weak spots in their lineup, but if they platoon Durham and Weeks (they are almost perfectly suited for this - Durham is significantly better against right handers and Weeks is much better against lefties) they will have filled the biggest weak spot admirably.

There is also a three team race in the NL East, with the Mets pulling into a tie with the Phillies and the Marlins hanging around a half game back. It should be fascinating to watch the Mets down the stretch because the media will mention their second half collapse last year at every turn.

Also, Oakland has gone 3-6 since trading Rich Harden and has now fallen nine games back of Anaheim in the AL West.

Trade: Harden to Cubs

The Cubs wasted little time in answering the Brewers' aquisition of CC Sabathia. Rich Harden isn't quite as much of a sure thing as Sabathia is, but if he can stay healthy he can provide similar results.

While I liked the Sabathia deal for both the Brewers and the Indians, I'm not as sure that I like this deal for Oakland. Perhaps they felt that they had to strike while the Cubs were still feeling the pressure of the Brewers deal or perhaps they wanted to make the move before Harden could hurt himself again, but the move seems a little premature to me. Joe Sheehan of Baseball Prospectus wrote that he believed that the Indians could have gotten more for Sabathia if they had waited until closer to the trade deadline, I can only imagine what he thinks of this move (actually, I'll probably read about it tomorrow). It seems to me that Oakland had even more incentive to wait to trade Harden: with Sabathia off the market, Harden became the best available starting pitcher on the trade market. Had Oakland waited and played all of the potential suitors off of one another, they could have driven the price up - potentially higher than what the Brewers paid for Sabathia.

There are several differences between this trade and the Sabathia trade. First, Harden will not be a free agent until after the 2009 season, so he is not merely a second half rental, as Sabathia is expected to be. Second, Oakland is also sending Chad Gaudin to the Cubs. Gaudin is a young (25 years old) right handed pitcher that has started some in his career and has also come out of the pen. He is the type of pitcher that will not be a difference maker, but can be a valuable pitcher to a contender. Third, none of the players that Oakland received back from the Cubs appear to have star potential like Matt LaPorta does in the Sabathia trade. Sean Gallagher is probably the best prospect in the deal; he is a twenty-two year old starting pitcher that has a pretty decent strikeout ratio. I've never seen him pitch, but he seems like he might have the potential to be a decent mid-rotation starter. Matt Murton has proven to be a valuable fourth outfielder for a major league team (he was probably being under-utilized by the Cubs, actually). Eric Patterson is an exciting slash and burn type of player that would be much more valuable if he could stay at second base, but the Cubs had decided that he would have to be an outfielder if he was to make it in the big leagues. Perhaps Oakland disagrees and will shift him back to the infield. The final piece is Josh Donaldson, who is a catcher that is still at low A Peoria, so it is difficult to know what they've got in him.

So, while LaPorta seems to be the type of player that can be used by the Indians as a foundation to their offense, Oakland hasn't really received anyone with quite as clear of a path. Gallagher represents one of the most valuable commodities in baseball: a cost-controlled starting pitcher, but those are also much more speculative than players of LaPorta's ilk (as Oakland knows - it worked for them with Danny Haren and did not with Dan Meyer).

I'm not trying to argue that Oakland should have received as much as Cleveland received for Sabathia, I am only wondering why they made the deal now, for a package that can hardly be described as 'bowling them over'. It is almost heresy in some circles to criticize Billy Beane's moves, but they don't always work out (as the Tim Hudson for Dan Meyer deal showed). Oakland almost certainly got some useful pieces in this deal, but I have to believe that they could have gotten more had they waited until July 31st to make a trade. They may get to test that theory if they decide to also trade Joe Blanton this month.

The questions we are left with are: Is AJ Burnett the next pitcher to get traded? Erik Bedard? Which team will feel the pressure to make a move next (St. Louis?)?