Holiday Deal

The Diamondbacks and Mariners accomplished a significant five-player trade:

Mike Hazen aimed high in his first trade as Diamondbacks’ general manager, landing a starting pitcher with potentially sizable upside on Wednesday night when he acquired right-hander Taijuan Walker in a five-player deal that sent infielder Jean Segura to the Seattle Mariners.

“It’s not one of those guys that you’re able to acquire all the time with the state of the game now with pitching and the premium, especially on starting pitching,” Hazen said on a conference call to announce the deal. “We felt like this was an opportunity we needed to take at this moment in time.”

In addition to Walker, the Diamondbacks also acquired infielder Ketel Marte while sending outfielder Mitch Haniger and left-handed reliever Zac Curtis to the Mariners.

Walker does not live up to his name, with his strength as a pitcher his walk rate, 2.5 per nine innings pitched. He’ll play 2017 as a 24-year-old, so he has yet to reach his peak. His strikeout rate is fine but not spectacular, but he does allow home runs. Note that he allowed more power in Seattle, a park not known for it’s home runs. I would think that weakness would hurt him in Arizona.

Segura gives the Mariners a middle infielder who gets on base and usually plays good defense. Marte is only 23, and had a rough second year at the plate. He hurt his thumb, which can be a huge factor in a batter’s production. I suspect the Mariners wanted to win now, and they decided they could not wait to see if Marte’s bat recovered.

Haniger is an outfielder with a great minor league OBP, but he’s old, playing at seasonal age 26 in 2017. That means if he’s going to produce at the major league level, it’s now or never. Curtis is a high strikeout lefty who showed good control in the minors, but not so far in the majors.

I’m tempted to say the Mariners did a lot better in this deal, in that all three players they acquired should be able to help them win now. The Diamondbacks will come out of this well if the two players they acquired reach their upside potential.

from baseballmusings.com http://ift.tt/2fVpa2t