Appel becomes a Phillie as Ken Giles trade becomes official... (updated)

A bit of a shock today as the Ken Giles trades becomes official.  What the Phillies have announced is the following players are shifting organisations:

Ken Giles and Jonathan Arauz to Houston

Vince Velasquez, Brett Oberholtzer, Thomas Eshelman, Mark Appel and Harold Arauz to Philadelphia.

Astros County has already published a couple of post-trade articles on this particular topic, so I urge the interested (and undoubtedly handsome) reader to refer back to those articles.  In this one, I posted immediate news of the trade, and the Constable chimed in with his analysis of Ken Giles, and in this one, I have a quick look at the outgoing prospects, and talked a little about how I saw bullpens having evolved over the last 15-or-so years.

I must say that I was confused when news broke of the change to the trade.  Firstly, I wondered whether Appel and Fisher were included in the trade, because the MLB Trade Rumors article essentially listed a whole bunch of names at initial glance.  If you look, it seems like the trade could have been for Velasquez, Oberholtzer, Eshelman, Appel, Arauz and Fisher, but after a second-or-two of shock, I realised that Fisher's name was part of the next sentence.  So Fisher remains an Astro, which undoubtedly would please some, but in his place, Mark Appel and Harold Arauz depart.

Appel's departure - much like Fisher's reported departure - is probably going to result in divided opinions amongst Astros fans.  Appel, famously, was a candidate to go first in the 2012 draft, but the Astros passed him over for Carlos Correa, later drafting Lance McCullers and Rio Ruiz.  The latter two became affordable because the below-slot deal that Correa agreed two meant the Astros could afford to go over-slot with their later picks, and McCullers and Ruiz were the beneficiaries of that.  Appel dropped to the eighth overall pick, where he was selected by the Pirates.  After he turned down their bonus offer, he re-entered the 2013 draft, and was taken first by the Astros.

I pulled up a Wikipedia list of the 2013 draftees - and please support the current Wikipedia appeal if you are able to - expecting to be able to list a bunch of players who I would have preferred the Astros to have taken instead of Mark Appel.  Well, there aren't that many, but the one player the Astros missed taking is a biggie.  Kris Bryant will be forever burnt into the memories of Astros fans as the One Who Got Away.  2013 wasn't that long ago, and there is a lot of water still to go under the bridge in terms of that draft, but Bryant is the guy who has made the biggest impact on baseball to this point.

Like the 2013 first round, the Astros' 2013 draft seems similarly underwhelming too.  Appel has been a disappointment, as was Andrew Thurman, who is now a Brave.  Also traded away from the Astros is Jacob Nottingham, who when to Oakland as part of the exchange for Scott Kazmir.  Tony Kemp seems to have a thing going, but he is blocked in his most natural position.  No one else really sticks out, except for perhaps Kyle Westwood and/or Tyler Brunnemann, who seem to have had a few solid seasons in the mid-minors each.  The irony is that the biggest contributor from the 2013 draft for the Astros looks set to be Colin Moran, who the Astros considered (and passed on) for the first pick, but later acquired from Miami in the Cosart trade.

Mark Appel has a long history with Astros County.  For a start, the Constable interviewed him pre-draft in 2012.  Then we watched as he was drafted 1-1 in 2013, later celebrating his professional debut.  Then 2014 happened, and Appel's results were lacklustre despite positive scouting comments, leading to an infamous bullpen session at MMP that got everyone excited for no reason.  The bullpen session occurred en route to Corpus, after Appel was promoted from Lancaster, immediately after a solid start in Stockton.  2014 was the kind of year for Appel where the two earned runs in six frames against Stockton was considered a success, but he had been the victim of appendicitis, so perhaps lingering core muscle problems were to blame.

Appel finished 2014 at Corpus, then he progressed to the Arizona Fall League, where he showed some more prospect potential.  When the AFL season concluded, I had a quick look at Appel's game logs, noting that he was sometimes solid, and sometimes totally dominant.  Hopes for further progression were high entering 2015, which Appel started by returning to the Hooks.

However, 2015 was another unimpressive year for Appel.  He split the year evenly between Corpus and Fresno, posting near-identical stats in each.  His overall year involved 131-and-two-thirds innings pitched, for a combined 4.37 ERA.  His WHIP was a middling 1.413, and he struck out 7.5 per nine innings, against a rate of 3.5 walks per nine.  Appel allowed roughly a home run per nine innings over both levels.  Perhaps significantly, nine unearned runs did not contribute to his 4.37 ERA - ncluding them increases his runs-against-per-nine average to 4.99.

To me, and given that Appel will play 2016 as his age-24 season, those aren't the numbers normally associated with a top prospect.  The one caveat that I would mention is that sometimes minor-league pitchers are working on something at AA and AAA - perhaps a breaking pitch or something - and that makes them predictable to opposing hitters and their performance prone to fluctuation.  But it has always seemed that Appel has only really been working on being effective in the minor-leagues, and combined with concerns about his stuff dating back pre-draft, along with his rough start as a pro, it is possible that the Astros see him as simply not making enough progress to justify his place in the organisation.

Appel continues to get some prospect-love, however.  He was rated number 2 of the Astros' MLB.com prospect list prior to the trade, and the same organisation ranks Appel number 43 in the most recent top-100 prospect rankings.  However, top draftees are often the beneficiaries of some positive propaganda in various media organisations associated with major-league clubs, and it is possible that Appel's place in those rankings remain inflated by virtue of his drafting position at 1-1, back in 2013.

So 2016 was poised to be a big year for Mark Appel, and he won't see it out in the Astros organisation.  Here ends an interesting relationship between Appel and the Astros, who always seemed every supportive of their asset, despite middling overall results.

Appel's inclusion does change the trade analysis somewhat.  My quick take is that this is an exchange of high-risk high-ceiling prospects - Appel has some risk involved, but so too does Fisher.  However, Appel's floor is likely to be higher than Fisher's, and Appel always has the significant advantage of trialling himself as a reliever if he flames out as a starter.  Fisher potentially has a role as a bench-bat, but relievers are more valuable than pinch hitters, which is why the Astros are making this trade in the first place.

The change in personnel associated with this trade also raises some questions that call into question Fisher's overall value.  Jonathan Arauz (included in the trade to the Astros) isn't a nothing, as a 17-year-old toolsey middle infielder, but it is a long way from knowing exactly what he happens to be.  The question as to why the trade pieces were changed also arises - was Fisher excluded because of a medical reason, or was the trade mis-reported from the beginning??  I would think it likely that there is something in Fisher's medical records that the Phillies didn't like, both teams settled on Appel instead, and the including of one Arauz minor-leaguer going each way balanced out the difference in value between Appel and Fisher.

I like this trade more for the Phillies now.  They get another high-risk pitching prospect instead of a high-risk outfielder.  Risk should matter less to the Phillies in four-for-one or five-for-two exchanges.  The risk is partly mitigated by the sheer number of players headed in the Phillies' direction.  If one of them hits, then the trade has been worthwhile, and because they aren't expected to contend any time soon, they can take their sweet time finding out what Velasquez, Oberholtzer and Appel are capable of.  For the Astros, the fact they have two guys coming their way spreads their risk a little, but it is is easy to imagine this trade being viewed as a bust for the Astros in a few years time, because the value for the Astros is - at this point in time - nearly entirely dependant on Giles' performance and health.

The inclusion of another starting pitcher also means that the Astros (i) are more likely to sign a free-agent starter and (ii) again double-down on their top prospects, which for now consist of Michael Feliz, Francis Martes and Joe Musgrove.  Earlier in the offseason, many Astros fans were wondering how they were going to deal with their prospect depth in the starting pitching ranks, and I guess now we are finding out.

Thanks for reading, and please add to the comments below.

Update and Opinion on the Ken Giles Trade

So the Astros eventually get their closer of the future - a cost controlled guy who cannot become a free agent until after 2020, who has done stuff in the major-leagues already that not many guys have done.  He possesses a triple-digit arm, and more importantly, he knows how to use it to generate strikeouts.  It is not hard to see him further improving over the next few years.  Ken Giles may just have become the best reliever in the AL West, especially with the recent departure of Carson Smith (who headed to the Red Sox in what many pundits consider a lopsided trade).

The Constable has done a brilliant job of quickly profiling Mr Giles, so I am not going to try to add to that at all.  I will, however, provide an update, a quick profile of those lost to the organisation, and an opinion.  The trade looks like (at the time of writing):

Ken Giles to Houston in exchange for pitchers Vince Velasquez, Brett Oberholtzer and Thomas Eshelman and outfielder Derek Fisher.

Firstly, this drops the number on the 40-man roster by one, to 36.  This may be significant, partly because Brad Peacock and Scotty Feldman will be looking to be activated off the 60-day DL prior to the start of the season, partly because free agents may be in play, and partly because of the upcoming Rule 5 draft.  The Astros need a lefty-reliever - Kevin Chapman may the the only guy still on the 40-man who fits that profile - so perhaps they have a plan to nab someone as a LOOGY in the Rule 5 (Cesar Vargas or Luis Lugo, anyone?).  If that is the case, then the Astros have enough room to take a Rule 5 pick, add Peacock and Feldman, and promote Reed, and still not exceed 40 players.

This isn't to say that the 'stros will not get gouged in the Rule 5 again - it is too late to add protect players now - but the 40-man squeeze as the season starts will certainly become less of a factor, thanks partly to trade activity, and partly to the recent DFA's.

Vincent Velasquez is the main piece of this trade - if he ain't in, this trade doesn't get done.  He is a 23 year old right-handed starter taken in the second round of the 2010 draft.  He has a big arm, with nice offspeed stuff.  He has fought a variety of injuries - resulting in TJS amongst other procedures - managing only 365 innings in a six-year professional career.  He threw just under 300 innings in the minors, with an ERA of 3.28. a WHIP of 1.134 and a 10.8 K/9 versus a 3.1 BB/9.  In the majors (all in 2015), he threw 55-and-two-thirds, with an ERA of 4.37, a FIP of 3.46, a WHIP of 1.275, and near identical strikeout (9.4/9) and walk (3.4/9) rates.  He looks like a lock the be a mid-rotation starter this year of the Phillies want to push him, but there is a significant chance he continues his development at AAA.

But - and there is always a but - Velasquez has struggled with injuries.  He threw only 88 innings last year.  Astros County is a sabermetically-leaning site, and the number-nerds tell us that pitcher injuries increase by some-significant-percent-number-thingy if you throw significantly more than 40 frames more than the year before.  I doubt that applies properly in Velasquez's case for his artificially-low 2015 number, but it does seem fair to say that he is 2 years away from being a 200-inning per year pitcher.  As the Constable recently pointed out, if the Astros want to contend now, they don't have the luxury of slowly bringing Velasquez along.

Brett Oberholtzer will be familiar to most Astros fans.  He was acquired in the Michael Bourn trade, and has thrown parts of 3 major-league seasons for the Astros.  Obie's best year was in 2013, when he threw to an ERA+ of 147 over 71-and-two-thirds frames.  But his ERA+'s in 2014 and 2015 have been below average - 88 and 91 respectively.  An important feature when discussing Obie's bio is when he officially Lost His Mind and managed to make the most hated player in baseball look like a sympathetic figure for a day or so.  Anyhow, Obie was a battler in 2013, but he has strangely struggled in 2014 and 2015, so this trade was always on the cards for him.  Unless he turns into Dallas Keuchel 2.0 - and there aren't many signs of that - this loss should not hurt.

Derek Fisher is a lefty hitting outfielder / DH who the Astros drafted with a first-round supplementary pick in 2014.  He is 22, and in his short pro career, has sliced through the short-season leagues.  He ended 2015 in Hi-A, so his big step is still ahead of him.  A Hi-A line of .262/.354/.471 at the friendly confines of Lancaster wasn't stunning, but he was 18 months young for the league.  But at this point, he is mostly projection, and if his power doesn't come around, he offers little extra value in the form of baserunning and defence.  He might be someone, and he might not.

The last of the four players is Thomas Eshelman, who was the Astros' second round draftee this year.  One handsome and intelligent AC reader compared him to Kirk Saarloos - solid pitchability but limited stuff - while another thought he was like Kent Emanuel.  He was drafted out of Cal State, and he finished the season with six-and-one-third innings at Quad Cities.  He isn't nothing, but he is a long way away, and not the worst throw in for either party.

Many Astros fans will be breathing a sigh of relief that it is Eshelman heading to Philly, rather than Michael Feliz or Akeem Bostick.

Time for the opinion part of the article.  I have read a lot about baseball for the last 15-plus years, and it has been interesting how opinions have evolved over that time.  Relievers have historically been discussed in the sabermetric community with some distain - their year-to-year variability was always cited as reasons why large commitments to relievers were a bad idea, and there was the thought that you could build a solid bullpen with some drafting, some luck, and some savvy waiver-wire pickups.

Throughout the latter part of the steroid era, I am sure that this belief was well-founded.  Steroids have the ability to help middle-relief guys at least as much as position players.  Because steroids are mostly about recovery from muscle fatigue (along with assisting with strength and training), middle relievers who were effective at a steroid-assisted 96-mph and who could pitch most days would have benefitted hugely.  Steroids also extended the careers of a lot of players, too, so the number of guys pitching effectively into their late 30's was much higher when I had my Baseball Prospectus subscriptions prior to 2007.  Because of the laws of supply and demand, middle relievers were an easily available commodity.  Some of those middle relievers successfully transitioned into late-inning relievers, adding to the options there, too.  For this reason, the sabermetric community probably undervalued them.

Over the last five or so years, significant alterations in how bullpens are put together have occurred.  The better control of performance enhancers has probably resulted in lesser talent falling by the wayside, allowing for the elite guys to shine again.  Enhancements in training and biomechanics along with improved pitching philosophies have probably helped.  Offence - in general - has declined as well, for a number of reasons that aren't well understood.

So bullpens have changed, and the elite talent has again been concentrated.  Ken Giles - at least for the last couple of years - has shown himself to be one of those elite talents.  His numbers match up with a number of dominant relievers - Dellin Betances is his leading similarity score of all time, and Bruce Sutter is his leading similarity score through the age of 24.  If he continues along this trajectory, then the hope is that he continues to perform at a similar level until his free-agency pay day.

Astros fans who remember 2003 and 2004 should recall what a dominant bullpen looked like.  If you don't remember those days, ask a Royals fan what life has been like over the last two years.  The Royals 'pen has been so good that they have been able to under-spend on the starting pitching market, cobbling together a good-enough rotation in combination with a freaky, contact-driven offence.  Bullpens matter, and all-encompassing statistics like WAR tend to underestimate them.

This trade also continues the concentration of talent that the Astros have been engaging in for the last year or two.  The Astros need elite talent at a number of positions to consistently win.  The existing elite talent has been mostly the product of good scouting and development (Jose Altuve and George Springer), high draft picks (Carlos Correa, Lance McCullers) and trades (Carlos Gómez).  Ken Giles is potentially an elite talent who pitches in a role the Astros have elected to prioritise this offseason.  He has the goods to be a top-10 reliever in baseball for the remainder of this decade.

The price was steep, but not staggeringly so.  With the caveat that it is often not a great idea to trade for ANY reliever, giving up a young, injury-prone starter, another starter who has experienced moderate and infrequent success in the major leagues, a boom-or-bust bat, and a middling arm who is a long way from contributing in exchange for five years of control seems like a reasonable price to pay for me.  Add in the benefits in terms of the 40-man, with the potential to consider players in the Rule 5 or free-agency, and overall, I think this is a solid trade for the Astros.

And if you are doubting, Astros fans, remember the Hunter Pence trade.  For years, Astros fans sat smugly and recalled the time when Ed Wade fleeced his ex-employer for four players in exchange for the terminally-restless gamer, Hunter Pence.  Well, the Phillies went on to make the postseason (but not advance past the division series), and the players that the Astros got back are either scuffling in the minor leagues (Jon Singleton), are scuffling in Miami (Jarred Cosart), became waiver-bait (Josh Zeid) or were cashed in as trade chips for other high-value talent (Domingo Santana).  If you think the Ken Giles trade is lopsided for the Phillies, look what the Pence heist has turned in to (although I still think that trade was a clear win for the Astros).

Overall, I like this trade, and I think the Constable does too.  This continues the trend of concentrating talent, which I think is a necessary and exciting step.  I like how the Astros are set up for 2016 - this trade deepens the bullpen significantly, while not really detracting from the starting-pitcher ranks at all.  Quality prospects are exciting the Astros system, but none seem to be irreplaceable.

Now, all Ken Giles needs to do is stay healthy and effective, and we got ourselves a solid trade.

Friday Morning Hot Links

On April 9 the Astros' chances of winning the AL West were 3.5%. This morning, with a 5-game lead after 81 games, their chances of winning the World Series are 7.2%. This season has been weird.

But we still gotta go get Edinson Volquez.

*Despite backtracking on his no-trade list, a Jon Heyman source says that Cole Hamels is unlikely to approve a trade to the Astros. "He's just trying to say the right thing," A Person said.

*The Cardinals fired their Scouting Director, Chris Correa, yesterday in the wake of the hacking/cheating scandal. Within that story we are told that Correa was not the one who leaked the Astros' information to Deadspin, which means that someone else did. The FBI has apparently narrowed the culprits down to "four to five" individuals within the Cardinals' organization.

*The St. Louis Post-Dispatch's Bernie Miklasz has an interesting response to the Cardinals. To cherry-pick a quote:
Fairly or unfairly, there's a deep stain on the Cardinals organization. And with the investigations continuing there could be new findings that increase the taint. DeWitt and Mozeliak need to perform a vigorous scrubbing to make sure the baseball side is clean and replenished.

*Be sure you read Not Hank Aaron's - who is a lawyer - response to this tomfoolery/douchebaggery.

*The Houston Press's John Royal - also a lawyer - has a take.

*Carlos Correa is your AL Rookie of the Month.

*The Astros signed 16-year old Dominican outfielder Gilberto Celestino to a $2.5m signing bonus. Celestino is ranked #7 on MLB.com's international prospect list.

*2nd Round pick Thomas Eshelman signed for $1.1m, $225,700 under the slot value for that pick.

Friday Morning Hot Links

The Wife and I will be at the Astros game tonight to watch Oberholtzer pitch Correa's home debut. If you see me, holla at me.

*On that note, the Astros are hoping Correa's arrival will mean a boost in ticket sales.

*The Astros and Rockets are suing Comcast over how they handled CSN Houston. Here are more details from Houston Press.

*Lots of signings, or reports of signings, and one number trickling in to our 2015 Draft page.

*The Astros and 37th overall pick Daz Cameron are seemingly close to a $4m deal - which would be about $2.3m over the slot value for 1-37, meaning the Astros need to save that money somewhere else in the first ten rounds. In that link you also find that Heyman is reporting Mark Appel may need "a change of scenery."

*Luhnow said "it's too early to tell" if the Astros messed up by taking Appel over Kris Bryant.

*Quad Cities' Jacob Nottingham just might be the Astros' top catching prospect

*Astros picks Riley Ferrell and Thomas Eshelman are projected to be the 2nd- and 3rd-most valuable college pitchers in the draft, respectively.

*Awww, Erik Bedard retired.