FF Baseball League Trade 6/29/2009

KevinZuk acquires Jimmy Rollins and David Aardsma:  
KevinZuk's collection of 5 tool (or potential 5 tool) players continued this weekend when he traded hitting machine Ichiro Suzuki and the hot hitting Jason Bartlett for former NL MVP Jimmy Rollins and Mariners closer David Aardsma.  Ichiro, who was just acquired a little over a month ago, became expendable with the emergence of Andrew McCutchen and the return of Manny Ramirez.  He brings in a talented, yet slumping, SS Jimmy Rollins and a hard throwing closer that has looked very impressive this season, especially over the past month.  He now has a nice trio of closers with Heath Bell, Brian Wilson and now Aardsma.

Barry's Juice acquires Ichiro Suzuki and Jason Bartlett: 
Aside from Grady Sizemore, Barry's Juice has some question marks in his outfield.  He also has Cody Ross and Juan Rivera in the outfield.  Both are solid hitters at this point, but remains to be seen as to whether they can keep it up all season.  With uncertainty in the outfield, he picks up the most consistent hitter in baseball, Ichiro Suzuki.  In addition to Ichiro, he acquires Jason Bartlett who is having a career year in Tampa.

Trade Analysis:
Its a decent trade for both sides, but I'm giving the edge to KevinZuk.  Jimmy Rollins isn't this bad.  He's going to come out of it eventually and when he does, I think he makes for great trade bait as KevinZuk already owns Hanley Ramirez or just hang onto him and ride out his hot streak.  He also gets another quality closer in Aardsma who may just be the best closer in the AL this year.  Ichiro will give Barry's Juice more consistency in his outfield, but he's simply not a big point producer.  He gets on base, but doesn't have a great offense behind him to get him home.  Plus, he's not a big homerun hitter and doesn't pick up a lot of RBI so his value is really limited.  If he played on a different team, I might be singing a different song. 

Now I'll turn it over to the Fantasy Factor jury.  Who wins in this trade?

Posted Jun 29 2009, 09:05 AM by Nick Fruscello
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Comments

GuamBoonieDogs wrote re: FF Baseball League Trade 6/29/2009
on Mon, Jun 29 2009 12:30 PM

I'm gonna go with Barry's Juice. Rollins is in a season long slump with no signs of breaking out. He was even benched for two games. They have tried moving him in the order and everything you can think of. You also have quality closers on the waivers in Jenks, Franklin, Rodney, Hoffman and Sherrill. So why trade away two hit machines for a guy having a downright bad season and a closer that you could find on waivers?

Think we could trade away Jack WIlson and just have Sidney play shortstop? At this point, it couldn't hurt and it would probably sell more tickets.

Buc Fever wrote re: FF Baseball League Trade 6/29/2009
on Mon, Jun 29 2009 3:22 PM

Ehhh...I think it's a pretty good deal for both sides, which really hinges completely on how Rollins performs for the rest of the year. Bartlett is a machine this year, so unless Rollins turns it around, Barry's Juice *may* have acquired the best SS included in this deal. The inclusion of Aardsma is a head scratcher, but my guess is that he was a throw-in that probably won't last long.

It's a high-risk/high-reward type of deal for both managers. If Rollins turns it around in the second half...Zuk will be sitting pretty. If Bartlett continues his current pace, Barry's juice won't miss Rollins at all (even if he does turn it around) and also improved his outfield.

Tough call...so I call this one even.

KevinZuk wrote re: FF Baseball League Trade 6/29/2009
on Mon, Jun 29 2009 4:11 PM

Ah, I had a feeling no one would understand this from my perspective. Yes, I love Ichiro as a player in real life, but in our format of fantasy, where power is valued above all else, he's practically worthless, and as Nick pointed out earlier in the year when I acquired him, he plays more than half of his games in a pitcher's park, with a lousy offense.

But, the key to even OFFERING this trade was that Ichiro is addition by subtraction, for me. He was listed on the "Can't Cut" list. Rollins, for the time being, is not. If I COULD have cut Ichiro in favor of a better power hitter, I definitely would have done so long ago. As I said before, power is valued over all else in our format. Bartlett wasn't getting me a whole lot of power, but Rollins, when/if he breaks out of his slump will do that, or at least will have Ryan Howard and Chase Utley to bat him in and SCORE some runs.

The other thing that made this trade attractive to me was, in fact, Aardsma. I went through the season without knowing that there was a "cap" on the number of innings you could allow for pitchers in a season. I would pick up a new starting pitcher every day, so I'd consistently get points from them, but my projected IP was well over 50 more than the cap. So, I cut Cliff Lee because he devoured innings without getting many K's. And I decided to pick up an extra reliever or two to cut down on my IP for a few weeks. Aardsma's strikeout numbers are just as impressive as Bell's or Wilson's, if not better.

Finally, and this was a huge factor, too, Manny comes back from suspension this weekend. I had an extra outfield spot to burn. Manny>Ichiro in our version of fantasy, anyway.

Barry's Juice got better with the addition of Bartlett, I will get better when Manny comes back and give myself a chance to stock saves and strikeouts without padding my IPs. My offensive roster now FINALLY has the chance to explode (or it will when Manny returns next week). If pitching becomes a problem (and I expect it will soon) I'll deal with that later.

KevinZuk wrote re: FF Baseball League Trade 6/29/2009
on Mon, Jun 29 2009 4:12 PM

Also, if I feel like Rollins isn't working out (like I felt with Ichiro), I can always drop him, which wasn't an option with Ichiro. That option alone made this deal worth the risk for me.