The Nick Swisher Trade

Before the 2008 season, Mr. Moneyball himself sent Nick Swisher to the Chicago White Sox for Ryan Sweeney, Gio Gonzalez, and Fautino De Los Santos. Swisher spent a grand total of 1 year with the White Sox (he currently plays for the Yankees) and had just a .332 OBP with 24 bombs and 69 rbis, with a WAR of -.8 (he made 3.6 million that year). After the season, he was dealt to the Yankees (along with Kanekoa Texeira) for Wilson Betemit, Jeff Marquez, and Jhonny Nunez. Texeira never pitched in the big leagues for the Yankees (although he has appeared in games for the Mariners and Royals) so we will throw him out. Betemit had just 1 terrible year with the Sox, with a WAR of -.4 with a salary of 1.3 million. In Nunez and Marquez's short time with the Sox (neither are in the organization anymore) they each registered a -.1 WAR (because neither of their salaries were disclosed, we will assume it was the minimum $400,000, and we will do this again later on Santos). The four players drew $5,700,000 from the White Sox and posted a combined -1.4 WAR, giving them a combined 19380 WAR and Salary Per. The Athletics story looks much happier. Fautino De La Santos made his major league debut this year and has pitched pretty well with a 3.54 ERA and a .2 WAR (his salary is not released so we will assume $400,000). Since joining the A's in 08, Sweeney has posted a WAR of 6.7 (further salt in the wound, his WAR was negative as a member of the White Sox) and has received $2,625,000 in salary in that time. Gio Gonzalez has racked up a 6 WAR while collecting $1,635,000 from the Athletics. This gives the 3 a total of 12.9 WAR (meaning that those 3 guys alone have won 13 games for the Athletics, while the White Sox players lost games for the team). Adding their salary together and dividing it by their WAR gives them an incredible 361 WASP (they have a value similar to MVP candidate Jacoby Ellsbury). Both in overall performance and value, this was an extremely lopsided trade towards the A's. I guess there is a reason they wrote a book and made a movie about Billy Beane