Masahiro Tanaka: Start One

Masahiro Tanaka made his much anticipated debut for the New York Yankees on April 4th, pitching seven innings with three runs allowed, striking out eight and walking none against the Toronto Blue Jays in Toronto. Tanaka got twelve groundballs versus six flyballs, but famously gave up a home run to the first batter he faced, Melky Cabrera, a switch hitter (so in this case, batting left handed). I thought I should start the post by looking at that at-bat.

The pitches are labelled by the MLBAM tags and by the pitch number in the at-bat. Tanaka obviously attempting to keep the ball away from him at all costs, and kept the first two pitches low in the strike zone, with the slider staying far enough arm side that it was a ball. Tanaka then hung the splitter in the strike zone, and even though it was away, it turned into a home run. However, I thought it was interesting what Tanaka did to Cabrera the next time he faced him, when he struck him out.

This time, Tanaka stayed high in the zone on the first four pitches, even with a curve and a slider, which were both balls, and both probably mistakes. However, he went inside with a fastball and got a foul, and then went away with a fastball and got another foul. Tanaka finished the at-bat with his patented splitter, keeping it arm side (away from Cabrera) and low in the zone. 
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Before taking a closer look at his stuff, let's take a look at his release points:

So his release point seems to be a little lower and more out than I had thought in my original scouting report. The original scouting report gives us an idea of his stuff, but here is his speed and spin chart from his first Pitch F/X start:

 We see five real clusters here, suggesting about five pitches. The curve is the pitches on the far left and bottom, the slider in the middle and low, the splitter around the 88 MPH mark and high, with two clusters of fastballs, suggesting a four seamer and a cutter or moving fastball (the MLBAM tags have a little of both, and he threw both in Japan). I don't want to focus too much on velocity in these posts, because that is something someone can easily find elsewhere, but I thought it would be interesting to compare his velocity in Japan according to the data in my original scouting report and his velocity according to the general MLBAM release point (for these posts, I will be using the modified Brooks Baseball data, but this part will be the general pitch velocities you can get on FanGraphs and other places). So here is the difference, with the plus or minus compared to what his pitch velocity numbers were in Japan.

FF: + .8
SL: + 2.1
FT: + 2.1
Splitter: + 1.7
CU: 3.54

So as I predicted, thanks to better pitch tags, and a cold gun in Japan (and perhaps some adrenaline since it was his first start), he is throwing harder in the Majors.

When it comes to pitch movement, it is hard to see clear classifications, so speed and spin is probably better to classify pitches for him, or at least easier:

 But what about location? We saw that it was important when it came to the at-bats against Cabrera, so how did he generally locate his pitches? This first graph is all of his pitches, labelled by whether they were strikes (s), balls (b), or put in play (x).

 The biggest cluster seems to be mid strike zone in height and on the arm side, with a couple of other major clusters, such as low in the zone and arm side, and mid zone and glove side.

Breaking down the average locations by pitch type (with the average release point for reference) looks like this (using MLBAM tags, I combined the non four seam fastballs into one pitch):

I think his slider location left something to be desired, as it stayed up more than his other pitches and didn't get glove side. His splitter stayed low, as did his moving fastballs, and his curve was a glove side curve (though it stayed high as well). When you look at his average locations by pitch result, it looks something like that:

Strangely, his foul balls were the highest pitches on average, but not surprisingly, his whiffs were the lowest. Notice how everything is arm side. There also isn't much difference between his called strikes and his pitches that resulted in contact. Here are all 19 pitches that were put in play by Blue Jays hitters:

Most are really arm side, and the home run was the furthest up, but he got a lot of grounders on pitches low and arm side (though he got two groundouts just slightly lower than the home run).

I plan to have a post like this after each of Tanaka's starts, and if you have any ideas at what I should look at each start, then let me know in the comments or on twitter.

AFL Pitch F/X Data: Battting Results

Moving along from just looking at a pitching perspective when it comes to Pitch F/X data in the Arizona Fall League, I wanted to take a basic look at the batting results in the Pitch F/X game from a hitter's perspective. In the next post, I plan to take a look at the results from a more individualist standpoint, but for now, I'll look at results as a whole. The simplest way to start this seems to be by looking at all the swinging strikes in the AFL Pitch F/X games, labelled by MLBAM pitch type:

There isn't a lot of surprising things here, fastballs are more likely to be swung and missed at high, curves and changeups low, and sliders low and side to side. 2-seam fastballs (FT) are usually low or in the middle of the zone when they are swung at. There are some exceptions of course, as I see a couple of high sliders, a high cutter, and a high changeup on both sides.

When looking at home runs, the pitches are high in the zone, with really only one "low pitch" hit for a home run.

Obviously there is a lot of fastballs, but there is a hanging high curve, some sliders that didn't get real low, and a hanging changeup. Below is the same graph, but labelled with the names of the hitters instead of the pitch types:

Peter O'Brien, a Yankees C/3B prospect in the lower minors, managed to hit a homer that wasn't even a strike, while Ohlman had the low home run. The highly paid Cubs' prospect Jorge Soler had the home run on the highest pitch, while Mexican Leaguer turned Astro Japhet Amador had an honorable mention (as did Peter O'Brien).

Infield fly balls is something that I think has been getting too much attention in the sabermetric community in the last couple of years, but it is something that is interesting since they are almost always turned into outs. GameDay labels them "popups", and here are the locations and the pitch types of each one measured by Pitch F/X in the AFL in 2013.

 Most of them are on fastballs thrown up and in to right-handed batters, which I don't think is surprising. There appear to be some breaking balls thrown away from right-handers that turned into popups, most likely pitches that the batter tried to pull (you wouldn't think a left-hander would pop up a low and inside breaking ball).

Groundballs are much easier to measure, and usually more predictable as a repeatable skill, but the problem is that there are more of them. This makes the graph a little messier, but here are the groundballs turned into outs in the AFL by Pitch F/X data:

There aren't many high pitches, but the concentration of pitches is mostly in the middle of the plate. Not surprisingly, a lot of cutters and 2-seam fastballs show up here, without the concentration of breaking balls that we saw in the swinging strike graph.

Here are the average locations of the 4 main GameDay results:

On average, there is no real average difference in location between outs, no outs, or run scoring plays. This suggest that most of the actual results off the bat were BABIP or randomness driven. Swinging strikes on the other hand, were thrown lower in the zone and a little further away from right-handed hitters.

Does Joba Chamberlain Still Have Value?

Recent reports have the Yankees trying to trade Joba Chamberlain, a one time top prospect that has had problems with both health and ineffectiveness. The Phillies were rumored to be interested, but have since reported that they are not interested. So far this season, Joba is still missing some bats (but has seen a drop), but is walking too many hitters and is having some home run problems. Not the kind of relief pitcher that is going to be extremely valuable.

I think it will be helpful to look at three different seasons for Joba. First, 2009, the only year he was used as a starter in exclusivity (he did have 1 relief appearance, but 31 starts). Then,.2010, when he first moved to the bullpen full time, and because of injuries, really the only year he has been in the bullpen for a full year. As a starter, he was okay, below average, but a quality back of the rotation piece. In 2010, he had a very mediocre year in the bullpen by ERA, but had a good year by defensive independent metrics. The third year in this post that I'll look at is so far in 2013, as we want to determine whether or not he still has present value, by comparing this year to the two previous years, where he did have value.

I'll also break it down by platoon splits, as for his career, Joba has been about equally effective against both lefties and righties, and he was in 2009 and 2010 as well. Obviously 2013 is too small of a sample size to look at splits, but breaking up the graphs by splits gives us a better idea of how he is actually pitching on the whole. First, let's look at how he has pitched lefties since 2008 (including the years we aren't looking at individually)

One thing you notice is that he doesn't change the slider location horizontally by platoon, which can be a problem. However, he does move it vertically, much more than the average pitcher based on platoon splits. He makes sure he throws it lower to lefties on average, as you can see by looking at how he is pitched right-handed batters for his career

As I mentioned before, Joba has not had big platoon splits in his career. The slider is no different, actually better against lefties on a whole (19.6 % swinging strikes against righties, 25.6 % swinging strikes against lefties). The vertical difference would seem to play a big reason for this. Here is how Joba attacked lefties in 2009, as a starter

Obviously the velocity is a tick down, which you would expect as a starter, but it isn't drastically down. He still had pretty good stuff as a starter. The locations are basically the same (the slider might be a little higher), but there is at least some kind of bias, as 2009 has the most pitches. He kept the ball extremely glove side other than the slider. Here are how Joba's results broke down against lefties in 2009

This graph shows how effective the slider was against lefties. His problems came when he threw up in the zone and slightly more glove side (inside to lefties). The velocity drop on the home runs is a little curious. Here are how his average result locations looked like against lefties in 2010:

As a reliever, he clearly threw harder on average, lower and more glove side as well. His home runs came when he went up and in, but the contact came low in the zone like the average pitches, but slower as well. The whiffs came more arm side than they were in 2009, and they were also harder. Joba seems to be the rare pitcher that is more likely to get swinging strikes the harder he throws. Joba has never been a heavy changeup user, but he has just thrown 2 so far in 2013. He threw just 1 to left-handed batters in 2010 (so basically, since he has moved to the bullpen he has ditched the pitch, which makes sense considering his slider is effective regardless of the platoon). Because in 2010 he actually located his slider out of the strike zone on average, this graph is the one where the entire graph is not the strike zone (as the strike zone itself shows) 

The fastball is located both high and low about equally in 2010, showing how he was pitching lower that season. The curve was kept either further away from lefties that season as well. Fast forward to how he is pitching lefties so far this year:

 He is locating even lower with all his pitches on average now, with some reduced overall stuff. However, his fastball has actually seen an uptick. This is why I thought Joba was so interesting. At times I have seen him pitch this year, his fastball still looks great, especially velocity wise. The curve and the slider have dropped in velocity, and he is throwing more glove side with the curve against lefties. As a whole, the curve has been his worst pitch so far this year (by wRC + according to FanGraphs). Here are what his results look like against lefties so far this season

The whiffs are still coming low in the zone and glove side, the general area of the slider. The one home run came on a good fastball, a little higher and arm side than his average pitch, the same location as his average contact given up. The average contact is actually coming on harder pitches, showing that for some reason, his fastball is less effective. I think it does have something to do with the fact that he is throwing it lower on average, even if the contact is higher than the average pitch thrown. His fastball, one of a four seam variety (with an occasional FT tag, that I converted into FF for ease), is meant to be thrown high in the zone. This is what he did when he was a starter, but he isn't doing it anymore. How about against righties? The following three graphs in a row is how he has pitched by average locations and velocity in the three selected years:

Obviously the easiest part of the distinguish the difference is the lack of changeup in 2013, which is probably the least consequential, as he never threw it much anyway. The curve also provides a big difference, as he is throwing it harder (though he is throwing the slider softer, suggesting some tag confusion) and throwing it to the complete glove side, further away than he ever has before. Horizontal curve location, as long as it isn't inside to hitters, doesn't appear to matter much, but whiffs on curves usually come away from hitters, so it would appear, even though the pitch has been awful this year, that he is locating it in a good spot. While he is throwing the fastball more glove side than ever, he is also throwing it higher and harder. He is keeping it up, away, and throwing with premium velocity (the velocity increase from lefties to righties suggest that there probably should be FT tags for Joba, he probably is throwing a moving fastball). It should be more effective than it is.

Joba is getting the whiffs in slider and curveball locations and they are on pitches that he is taking velocity off of on average. The home runs are coming when he isn't getting the ball glove side, and his contact allowed is coming on pitches that are a little higher and more glove side than his average pitch. Compared to 2009-2010, his whiffs are coming on much lower pitches on average this year, but his home runs allowed are lower, and his contact is about the same:

 

Maybe there is a sequencing problem or maybe he is doing some kind of pitch tipping or has a release point that is easy to see. Because of the current numbers, and the injury concerns, Joba doesn't have much real value when it comes to the trade market, but I think he could be an interesting buy low guy. His command doesn't look broken, at least by average locations (he can still locate both arm side and glove side depending on platoon), and his stuff is still really good. Preferably, he gets the fastball up higher on average, but he has the tools to succeed, especially if he gets away from Yankee Stadium where he has struggled.

A Look at Preston Claiborne

Preston Claiborne has now thrown 97 pitches out of the Yankees bullpen this year since being promoted from AAA, what you might conservatively call a start.

First, lets look at his stuff:

So here is how I break down and classify his pitches, along with the closest comparisons for right-handed relievers in the Pitch F/X era.

63 Fastballs: 94.14 MPH, Jason Frasor

19 Sliders: 84.96 MPH, Derrick Turnbow

15 Changeups: 87.67 MPH, Kyle Farnsworth

Picked out of the 17th round out of Tulane by the Yankees in 2010, Claiborne has never been a rated prospect. He has purely been a bullpen pitcher in his professional career, so that is one reason why, but the fastball is clearly a MLB fastball. To go a little further on the Frasor comparison, Frasor doesn't throw a changeup, and his slider isn't as hard as Claiborne's.

Claiborne's average release point so far is 6.14 vertically, and -.86 horizontally. His closest comparison is probably Greg Holland, who has a dominating 58 FIP - in his career with somewhat reverse splits.

Holland doesn't throw a change and his fastball and slider are both a couple MPH harder than Claiborne's, so obviously Claiborne won't be as dominating. However, the release point does seem to show that Claiborne shouldn't have to be in a specialist role, as he should be able to get out lefties as well (throwing a changeup helps as well). Last year, he had large platoon splits when it came to OPS last year in the minors.

While the sample size is obviously small, we can get some idea of how Claiborne is trying to attack batters by looking at his average locations (pitches are my classifications, as above):

He locates the change arm side and the slider glove side, not surprisingly. His average pitch is located about average for a right-hander, and his fastball is a little high. Clearly, Claiborne is going for the strikeout and whiffs with the fastball, and not the groundball. Strikeouts are needed out of the bullpen obviously, but if a lefty can pull that fastball (it helps that he locates it slightly arm side like most righties), they can put it in the seats in the short porch at Yankee Stadium (it is tougher for righties to pull homers in that park, so going in on them with good fastballs is probably a good thing). This will make Claiborne's change very important. For him not being any kind of real prospect, I like Claiborne, and while he won't be any kind of elite reliever, if he can go one or two innings at a time and have the minimal platoon splits the release point suggests he should have, he can pitch in the big leagues for a long time.

Minor League Pitchers Notes

Here are some short notes on just a few random minor league pitchers I have watched recently:

Brooks Brown in the Tigers AAA is a former 1st round pick. The righty has a 90 MPH fastball with a little bit of movement and a curveball. He throws too many pitches in the middle of the plate, but can get a lot of grounders if he can get it down. When I saw him, there wasn't much evidence he can. Brown has some real control issues, which is not a good combo with his mediocre stuff.

Helpi Reyes for the Jamestown Jammers can throw a curveball for a strike and get swings and misses on it when it is in the dirt. He throws pretty hard with a good fastball that he can locate low. Reyes also has a slider, but has less control over it. When I saw him, he got in trouble with walks.

Cody Wheeler of the Yakima Bears is a short lefty with a curveball, change (pretty good late movement, got whiffs), and fastball. Wheeler has a slow arm action and works pretty low with his fastball (you can probably can call it a sinker).

Victor Capellan is a drop down sidearmer from the Dominican Republic pitching for the Yakima Bears. He has good numbers even though he has no real idea where the ball is going. The pitches have good movement, both downward and sideways, and righties don't really stand a chance. It obviously doesn't look like he will be able out lefties.

Erik Jokisch for the Cubs AA is a lefty with a solid swing and miss changeup. He keeps the ball low, throws a ton of breaking pitches(looks like a curveball)/off speed. The fastball seems good enough, especially when he throws it high after starting low with off speed (pitching backwards).

Chris Manno of the Reds AA (came over in Johnny Gomes trade from Nationals) is a lefty reliever with a quirky delivery, in which he hides the ball behind his back and then throws sidearmed. It makes fastball look faster but I'm not sure how he will be able to get righties out (he did get one to fly-out on a fastball down the middle). The fastball stays high and I would like to see a breaking ball. He wasn't missing bats or getting many grounders.

Brady Wager in the Orioles New York Penn League affiliate is a righty at 91-93 MPH. He has no real secondary pitch though. Nathaniel Stolz of Beyond the BoxScore noted that he landed on a stiff leg and tended to rush his delivery.

Ben Snyder of the Rangers AAA was originally a 4th round pick in 2006. He is a little old to be considered a prospect and has a AAA lefty delivery (3/4 type with a LOOGY type release point). He  doesn't throw hard, with a lot of breaking balls (one of them being a slow curve). When he threw his change in the dirt (especially to lefties) it was a pretty good pitch, but he was getting hit pretty hard.

Bryan Mitchell of the Charleston Riverdogs (Yankees affiliate) is a skinny right-hander with a good looking straight fastball and a big curve. He can miss some bats with it. Mitchell will also throw a rare changeup. It is pretty good stuff for a 16th rounder but the fastball command is why he isn't getting good results.

Chad Pierce of the Brewers class A can throw a soft slider type pitch for a strike. The fastball is not all that impressive for the righty but he got swings and misses on the curve in dirt. It is a pretty slow pitch and Pierce can also throw it for strikes. Pierce has a moving fastball that he can throw to both sides of the plate, although it usually doesn't get down. This could be dangerous, especially if it moves into lefties with power . The straight fastball also got him in trouble, he needs to keep that pitch high above the zone.

Chris Lamb is a big lefty with a good looking changeup that can get him whiffs from righties. He also has a moving fastball/sinker with a curve. The curve is his swing and miss pitch and he can throw it for strikes (and has confidence throwing it with 3 balls). Along with the straight fastball, it is a pretty deep array of pitches.

Drew Granier pitches for the Burlington Bees (A's class A) with Lamb. He has a big curve ball with 2 plane break (meaning it moves both horizontally and vertically). It is the right-hander's feature and favorite pitch. He likes to throw it in the dirt, but can also throw it for a strike. Granier can locate his fastball on the corners and really appears to have swing and miss stuff. His moving fastball can both tail in and tail away to hitters from both sides.

Su-Min Jung was on Rehab (that was his official roster status, he has pitched as high as class A Peoria) in Boise, a shortseason affiliate for the Cubs. He has a low 90s fastball, a big curveball and a moving fastball. Can throw the curve for strikes but doesn't hang it. It is certainly his best pitch. It has some nice late bite, especially when he throws it low. Jung was basically pitching backwards when I saw him. The moving fastball was more of a sinker type pitch in movement. He didn't have much control of it.

Low Level Minor League Notes

Some assorted prospect notes:

Alex Meyer of the Hagerstown Suns has a 95-97 MPH (touched 98 MPH in the Futures game as I watched his start before the Futures game and the Futures game) fastball. It has iffy command and he mixes it with a pretty good looking slider at 87 MPH

Cutter Dysktra on the Suns (the Nationals A affiliate) is listed as a 3rd baseman, but played 2nd when I saw him. He made a very good play defensively. Offensively, his long stint in A + last year was horrible, but he has been better (at least as far as K/BB is concerned) in the lower level. Matt Skole leads the league in walks and homers. He has an uppercut type swing, and a fly-ball hitter type swing.

The Tri-City Dust Devils (Colorado Rockies A-) closer Seth Willoughby is a skinny right hander with some swing and miss stuff. He has a good looking straight fastball, along with a moving fastball, and a curveball he can throw for strikes. At this point, he has thrown just 9 innings so it is hard to draw any conclusions, but it has been going well for him. 

Drew Bowlin of the San Jose Giants is a little too old for the level and has just a 90 MPH fastball as a righty reliever. He has struggled so far this year, with a lot of strikeouts, but too many walks and a high ERA. 

Richard Castillo of the AA Springfield Cardinals has a weird arm angle as a right-handed starter. He is pretty short and it doesn't look like he throws very hard. He has a soft moving fastball that tails low and in to righties. This is definitely his feature pitch and he was getting quite a bit of grounders.

Staten Island Yankees:
Saxton Butler is a big first baseman, so it is hard to get excited about him, but he has some really good pull power. He has a good looking swing and can go the other way with authority too.
Fu-Lin Kuo has a good approach and good long at-bats. He has a really good looking contact tool but nothing to suggest he will hit for much power.

Santos Rodriguez is a tall (6-5) lanky (180 pounds) left handed reliever for the Birmingham Barons (the AA of the White Sox). He hits 94-96 MPH on the gun, but even with his frame, at 24 he probably won't gain anymore velocity. He has been a fly-ball pitcher for a lot of his career with some pretty good K ratios (with perhaps too many walks).


Ryan Acosta of the Dodgers system (Rancho Cucamonga Quakes) has a curveball that he can throw for strikes. Despite an inconsistent delivery, he can throw 91-94 MPH as a right handed reliever. Acosta also has a changeup that he throws a lot. It has some break, but he can't really throw it for strikes. This didn't stop him from having confidence in it. This probably didn't help his control problems. He has sort of a starter's repertoire if he can gain command. It looks like he can miss bats.


Peter Hissey of the Portland Sea Dogs (Red Sox organization) is a lefty with a weak uppercut swing. His line drive rate is above league average, but his ISO is well below league average. He is an efficient base stealer but doesn't walk a ton.

Michael Foltynewicz is a former 1st round pick by the Astros currently playing for the Lexington Legends. He has a 94-97 MPH fastball, with pretty good control/command. He doesn't really have a great breaking pitch but has a decent curve that he can throw for strikes. The fastball is his best pitch, as he can locate it low or high. That pitch is why he was a first round pick. He gets some whiffs but doesn't appear to be a real strikeout pitcher (which matches with his numbers). 
Mike Kvasnicka switch hitting catcher with a huge swing. He whiffs a lot and couldn't catch up to a plus fastball. Over the last two years, a 197 game period at Lexington, he is slugging just .368.

Scouting Report on Gerrit Cole

Gerrit Cole made his first start in AA on Wednesday June 20th 2012. Cole was picked by the Yankees in the 1st round of the 2008 draft, and then (after attending UCLA) was picked in the first round again in the 2011 draft by the Pirates. He was ranked as the Pirates 12th best prospect coming into the year by Baseball America and received similar rankings from other publications. So far, in what is still a pretty small sample size at 14 starts, Cole has been as advertized with a 3.02 FIP and 3.09 SIERA. Over a quarter of his at-bats end with strikeouts for a really nice 3.57 K/BB ratio. The Baseball Cube rates his strikeout ability as his best attribute at 91 out of 100. 

The first thing you notice about Cole is his velocity. He hit 95 MPH to the first batter on a tailing pitch out of zone. It looks like he has a straight 4 seamer and a moving fastball to go along with it. He sits 97-98 MPH on his straight 4 seamer. He has a very easy looking delivery, seemingly using very little effort. He has a slight hesitation but not it's not a crazy pause. You could count 5 different pitches, the fastballs, a slider, a slurve looking pitch, and a changeup. A nasty pitch with late break got a looking strikeout, and then he got a whiff on the next batter at 96 MPH. He was throwing strikes, and getting ahead of hitters very well. He really showed no breaking stuff in the first. Cole isn't afraid to just throw it down the middle, which is both a positive and a negative thing. He was getting a lot of weak fly-balls, and the 2nd was mainly fastballs as well. However, he threw a lot of moving fastballs until he showed off a nasty slider in a 1-2 count for a strikeout. The slider has very good late break at 86 mph. It can basically be his feature pitch when he wants it to be. He then started mixing in the slurve looking pitch. Occasionally, he throws a 94 MPH moving fastball down in the zone that is really good . It looks almost like a sinker, or at least functions like one. Defensively, he appears to field his position well and looks like a good athlete. It did appear like he was having control problems with his change. Cole sometimes throws it nowhere near the plate and sometimes right down the middle, but it's a good pitch with good break and good speed differential (and yet another potential strikeout pitch). I don't think he is going to be a ground-ball pitcher. Strikeouts and weak fly-balls will be what he gets when he is on, despite the low moving fastball (he got a lot of ground-balls in A+, so he may be able to be a ground-ball pitcher, it just didn't really look like it considering his stuff). The 4 seamer is a pitch he likes to throws high. He can throw the slurve for strikes but hangs it at times. This may not matter when all of his pitches are working. Other than occasional lapses in control, Cole looked very advanced. If one was looking for flaws, one could point out that he threw too many flat fastballs down the middle. The Baseball Cube rates his control at 58, but from what I saw, it seems better than that.

Cole pitched in the Arizona Fall League in 2011 and threw 15 solid innings. This is only notable because we actually have Pitch F/X data from one of those outings. The pitch classifications are a little weird as it had him as a Fastball/Sinker/Cutter/Slider/Changeup pitcher, a little different then what I had him (the big thing is that I didn't see the cutter). It was only a 29 pitch outing, so he was able to run the velocity up a little bit more, but he was averaging 99.36 MPH on his fastball with a change around 88 MPH. He also had pretty good movement on his pitches, as you can see here:

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