No More Nomah!

[Clay Dreslough]

In a 4-team deal with the Twins, Cubs and Expos, the Red Sox get Orlando Cabrera and Doug Mientkiewicz, but lose NOMAH!

I see it this way as a Sox fan:

1) Sox are better long term, since we weren't going to re-sign Nomar.

2) Sox are a little weaker offensively short-term, but significantly stronger defensively.

3) Cubs are better for the stretch run -- one more dangerous bat in the lineup, in exchange for mostly prospects.

[K_Dub420]

i voted better now and better in the future... as a red sox fan i would have liked to see nomar still in boston but i feel the redsox are better off making this deal... the only thing i see that could be a problem is juggling ortiz, millair and doug m. in the lineup. i also love the move aquiring dave roberts from LA... i much rather have his speed on the basepath than the player he'll likely replace, gabe kapler who just got nailed by a mile stealing 2nd in the top of the ninth a second ago on a side note, it's pretty crazy to see a player get traded to the team that his former team is playing, and suiting up for his new squad on the same day....

[cartman00000001]

There was a player in the 70's I think who played for 1 team in a game and played later on that night for another team in another city. I think that was Joel Youngblood. There might have been someone else who played in game 1 for his team, got traded to the other team and played for them too. Getting to the Nomar thing, as far as resignalbility, both team should come out good. I think Cabrera is a free agent also, but Boston should be able to get him to sign. I don't think there will be anybody else, Renteria is going to stay in St. Louis, and anyway, Cabrera is a better hitter I think. It just going to be weird around here without Nomar. WEEI Sports radio, is going to be nuts on Monday!! Lastly, wasn't the last SS before Nomar from Montreal too? Wil Cordero, right? Or was it Luis Rivera? Not sure.

[egswanso]

the sox are better off for the future, since they weren't resigning nomar, so at least they got something for him.

but there worse off now. in a good year. cabrera would be a slight offensive downgrade & defensive upgrade, but he's having a terrible year and is rumored to be as bad of a 'cancer' that nomar was.

mienky is also having a terrible year, moreover, while he's an excellent defensive 1st baseman, he doesnt have the power a championship-caliber team should have at a corner.

and dont forget, red sox also gave up a top prospect, and DIDNT get matt clement from the cubs... so they'r pitching after the big two (Pedro/Schilling) and the innings-eater three (Wakefield) is as big as a question as ever.

at this point, unless the yankees collapse (which, given their age, awful pitching & injury problems, is not inconceivable), i dont expect the red sox will make the post-season, which is pathetic from a team most (including me) ranked as the best in the A.L. going into the season.

big winners in the trade: cubbies and twins.

[Clay Dreslough]

I read the same article. It was pretty contrarian considering that the folks on Baseball Tonight including Gammons had thought

One problem is there are many criteria for evaluating trades. At the least, the Dodgers are in better shape financially and probably no worse off in terms of the pennant race. But if LoDuca or Mota have great 2nd halves while their replacements don’t, folks will say it was a bad trade, even though I buy BPs argument that it wasn’t.

As for Nomar, I thought it was weird that the BP argument was willing to be “not rational” when discussing Contreras – essentially he said he’s not going to bother analyzing the numbers because Contreras is no-good against good teams, and thus has no place on the Yankees who only care about winning in the post-season.

But when it came to Nomar, he jumped straight to the “wins above replacement” numbers without talking about the big picture. If Nomar was in shut-down mode, I’d get him off the team.

I feel sorta bad for the whole Nomar thing – as much as you can for a multi-millionaire athlete married to the U.S.’s best all-time soccer goal scorer. He tops 1.000 in OPS for 2 straight years, then gets beaned in the wrist and seems like he’s never been the same guy since. In his own head, he still thinks he’s the A-Rod-type offensive guy that can turn down $16 million per year.
But on paper he just isn’t.

Clay

Interesting stuff, this trade. Baseball Prospectus had a feature on how one young GM had a great weekend, distinguishing himself among the young GM fraternity, while another had a terrible weekend ... and of course the punchline is that Paul DePodesta is the guy who did well and Theo is the guy who screwed up.

I'm willing to buy their defense of DePo. Basically, they say that Mota and LoDuca had both passed their peaks and were at the point where their perceived value was a lot higher than their actual value; meanwhile, Brad Penny's a good starter, and Hee Seop Choi is a very good firstbaseman. Choi, of course, has been almost completely ignored in the mainstream coverage of the trade.

Meanwhile, there's the Sox. Basically, they say that Cabrera's no where near the shortstop that Nomar is (I'll buy that), that Minky isn't all that useful (good glove, no hit firstbasemen rarely are), and that the Sox gave up too much for what they got.

Of course, there may be more to it than that. Tellingly, they compared Theo's announcement of the trade to Billy Beane's announcement of the Jeremy Giambi trade two years ago, though they didn't bother to follow through on what that might imply. BP says you should never make a bad baseball move for emotional reasons, but did it hurt the A's?

It's also sounding, now, like Nomar might have been in Operation Shutdown. They're saying that he told the Red Sox he needed more rest and might need to go on the DL, while his agent has assured the Cubs that he can play nearly every day. So is 100% of Orlando Cabrera better than 50% of Nomar?

Anyway, I don't like it, but c'est la vie. BP suggests that Theo is too much a slave to the stupid, emotional Boston fandom. Meh.