Bay to the Sox is bad news for us, friends.

Meanwhile, go Pittsburgh! Sorry for our Dodger Thoughts friends.

It will never happen, because Kemp is too on fire right now, but if they wanted to, the Dodgers could play Manny in LF, Pierre in CF, and Andruw in RF. I'm sure that has the DT crowd frightened.

Nah, he'll still never beat us as many times as Manny did. I bet we win an extra game against the Sox every year now because of it.

Who's next? Is Papi unhappy at all? ;-)

The Sox probably didn't get any better, but they probably also didn't get any worse. Now, Manny and his "distraction" isn't their problem anymore and Craig Hansen and his general crapitude is out of their BP too. I think they get better just by virtue of that alone

Bay, meanwhile, is going to be boring and nearly as good as the aging Manny, if not better. And he's not leaving as a free agent this winter, either. (Then again, that means less competition for the Yankees in signing outfielders, which they'll need to do.)

Completely agree, Cliff. Bay may even be an improvement on Manny, all things considered, but something just went out of the rivalry.

Now I'm sold, Shaun. You were right.
Dammit.

Everyone reacts to trading Manny based on Manny Ramirez of the past, rather than going forward. I really see no reason why Bay can't mitigate the loss of Ramirez for the rest of the season.

Sox got more long-term value if Bay lives up to his career line. Hopefully he's closer to his interleague line.

8 I will miss being the quiet voice booing Manny from my seat in Fenway, while everyone around stands and screams their hearts out.

I wonder if the Dodgers pick up his option?

That's the second time he's been traded for a middle infielder, by the way- in 2006 the Dodgers traded him to the Nats for Marlon Anderson.

You should have, because then I could show you exactly how much you fail:

http://www.replacementlevel.com/index.php/RLYW/direct/replacing_manny_ramirez_with_jason_bay

Still, I think I'd rather have Bay, I-Rod, and two of Bruney/Britton/Melancon/Strickland/Cox.

But hey, think whatever you like.

If GMs were constructing teams based on "scariness," perhaps Manny would be more valuable. But players have value based on their performance on the field. And Bay and Manny are near equal in that regard. Unless you dispute the method, you can't discount the numbers.

Sure, Bay isn't as "scary" as Manny to us as fans, but he'll offer Ortiz plenty of protection in the lineup and he's cheap and under contract for another year (tho they will extend him another three or so I bet). And as I have said, the Sox can quite easily turn that $20M into CC

I'm not going to miss:
2008 - .417 .523 .778

There's no way Bay is replicating that disgusting line. Still hope the Yanks sign Manny though. Hopefully the Dodgers will audition him in RF for us.

Just speculating, but I'm guessing John Henry still wanted to keep Manny, but once the Rays started breathing heavily toward Bay, the Manny-must-go camp got bolstered.

Jason Bay
Interleague - .250 .312 .450 in 267 PA
Late/Close - .225 .350 .420 in 472 PA

And I would question how SG controlled for the quality of the pitchers each faced.

I'm going to miss the hell out of LaRoche but he just didn't seem to be in their plans for whatever reason and keep in mind they have DeWitt and could also re-sign Blake. Plus Boston eats the rest of Manny's salary this year plus the arbitration seems part of the deal so the Dodgers should get a Type A pick assuming they don't resign him (which is doubtful). Again, it could come back to haunt them down the road, but it also gives them a hell of a shot in the NL.

If Jones and Kemp or Kemp and Ether are the other two OFers with Manny, his defense shouldn't be as much of a liability, especially if he's remotivated.

And hey, if it's a total bust then Colletti will be fired and that doesn't make me that sad, either. It's win win!

How will you guys feel about not having to face him though?

Bay's a great player, Sox did score as far as personnel swapped if not in the money dept.

I think Bay is a very good player, but he's not getting better and he may be getting worse. Plus, from Canada, via Pittsburgh let's see how he handles the AL East.

G AB R H 2B 3B HR RBI BB K SB CS AVG OBP SLG OPS
Bases Empty 105 225 10 65 14 1 10 10 26 51 0 0 .289 .365 .493 .858
Runners On 100 168 62 46 9 1 12 54 33 35 7 0 .274 .386 .554 .940
RISP 86 88 45 19 3 0 2 29 18 15 4 0 .216 .333 .318 .652
RISP w/2 Outs 45 33 17 7 1 0 1 11 10 5 1 0 .212 .395 .333 .729
Bases Loaded 14 4 9 0 0 0 0 1 0 0 0 0 .000 .000 .000 .000

Ramirez:

G AB R H 2B 3B HR RBI BB K SB CS AVG OBP SLG OPS
Bases Empty 97 193 11 59 8 1 11 11 26 48 0 0 .306 .396 .529 .925
Runners On 95 172 55 50 14 0 9 57 26 38 1 0 .291 .399 .529 .928
RISP 80 97 46 30 10 0 4 44 19 22 0 0 .309 .432 .536 .968
RISP w/2 Outs 55 46 19 12 5 0 1 17 12 13 0 0 .261 .424 .435 .859
Bases Loaded 20 11 12 2 0 0 0 5 1 4 0 0 .182 .250 .182 .432

And against much better pitching.

13. Posted at 2:11:54 am on Thursday, July 31, 2008 by SG

"Did I miss an AL/NL correction factor? It's probably non-negligible, even this year."

There's about a 4% difference between the leagues, so we'd expect Bay to be about 4% less valuable in the AL, but it's not readily apparent because Bay would be moving from PNC park which plays as a pitchers' park (batter park factor of 96 this year, 98 the past three years), to Fenway which plays as a hitter's park (batter park factor of 111 this year, 106 the last three years). Manny's projection is in Fenway, if I move him to Florida his line goes down slightly because the difference in parks is about 10%, cut in half is 5%, which means the league adjustment gets negated by the park factor and then some.

Manny isn't going to be happy with his home runs dieing in Chavez Ravine. Tee hee.

No way Bay is going to be as good as Manny. And I doubt David Ortiz sees a good pitch the rest of the season.

And when was the last time Manny had an OPS+ of 93? Bay did it last year.

This deal, minor as it is, perfectly illustrates the difference between the things I praise Cashman for and the things I criticize him for.

Value for value, it's probably a pretty darn good trade. AG has a good glove but can't hit for beans, isn't even really a major-league utility player. In exchange, they got a righty with a little bit of upside as a reliever. Cashman gets good value, as always.

The problem is that their system is so ridiculously thin that trading AG actually leaves a hole. Betemit is the only backup on the 40-man for three infield positions. They do have Nick Green and Chris Basak in S-WB, and they're probably even worse than AG (and require a roster move).

So, bad as AG is, they actually needed him more than they needed their 17th righty reliever with a little upside. That's not a pretty thought.

Nobody is really saying Bay will be better than Manny this year, what we are saying is that he will probably be near as good and that drop off isn't going to hurt the Sox very much at all. Plus, going forward, it is much more likely that Bay outproduces Manny.

.250 .357 .417 in 14 PA @ Fenway

Look, I would have preferred Bay to Nady/Marte. But I'm not giving him anything based on projections. He has to earn it. And still, I'm not convinced he can perform in pressure packed games. Let's see him earn that too.

"Serenity Now!!"

41 I know when I try to value players, I'd use the #s from 267 or 476 specially selected PAs instead of the 3000 PAs that fully encompass their careers.

49 You look at the players who've switched leagues over the last four years and compare what they did to what they should have been expected to do. So if a player's was worth 100 runs in the NL, in the AL it'd be worth 96 runs, and vice versa.

Hypothetical:

There's 2 outs in the 6th. The Yankees are ahead 3-2 and the bases are loaded. Moose is on the mound. Is there anyone on the Banter who would PREFER to see Manny Ramirez step to the plate over Jason Bay?

Manny's got a .321 .411 .618 1.029 line against the Yanks lifetime. I am GLAD to have him gone.

Okay, so he would have hit one less HR than projected.

pt2 - Alert! Snark Alert! Alert!

pt3 - Okay, that's a start. Still, I'd worry about the size of the sample and the players involved. When you include that variance with the 4% you could be looking at three standard deviations equaling a 10-15% difference between leagues. That's the difference between a .900 OPS guy and a .800 OPS guy.

http://tinyurl.com/58sya6

Yes, he brought fear and a weird glamor to Yanks/Bosox, but the Sox are better tonight than they were last night and will be even better next spring.

Doesn't mean they'll beat us, or Tampa, but this was nimble GM work.

1) How many players get included? Plate appearance minimum before and after the switch?

2) What's the standard deviation across the set of players?

3) Does pitching show the same 4% difference?

My worry is that we've seen too many players come from the NL and struggle for it to be that small and the total dominance of the NL is glaring. Bay will be another nice test case though.

Though I wonder if you guys are undervaluing the level of pitching in the NL? There are some incredible pitchers in the NL, as well as what I think are more pitcher-friendly parks, no? I mean I still think the AL is the superior league right now as far as overall talent, but I wouldn't penalize Bay for hitting in a weaker league that is still full of strong pitching. (Though, granted, I don't think the pitching in the NL Central is as strong as it is in say, the NL West.) So keeping all that in mind it will be interesting to see how Manny fares in that division, in those parks. Hopefully will still mash.

YAAAAAYYYYYYYY!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

HA AH AHA HAH AH AH AH H !!!!!!!

YAAAAAAYYYYYYYYYY!!!!!!!!!!!!

Good luck, Joe!

I can't believe these two days.

Good God, this is the best trade season I can recall in a long while!

So long, Manny!

Fare thee well!

Yaaayyyy!!!!

On Bay switching leagues:
I think the biggest issue is how he'll do this season against a lot of pitchers he's never (or rarely) seen. A secondary issue is whether he'll pull a Renteria and shrivel in the spotlight -- but I do think that's a minor consideration.

Craig Hanson, I agree, has not done anything in MLB, and losing him doesn't much hurt the Sox for this year. Much -- don't forget, they have a thin bullpen. But he still had potential, and he had real trade value. Similarly for Moss: he was not expected to be good enough to be an everyday player for Boston, but he could well be an everyday player for someone else, and now they've lost him as a trading chip. (They could definitely have traded him for bullpen help.)

I think if Manny doesn't act up this year, this trade doesn't get made, and ignoring the pain-in-the-butt factor it makes the Sox worse. But given the situation, I think Theo made out reasonably well.

That sucks.

:)

1) Bay will wilt in Boston, disproving many of the extremely flawed statistical analyses which project everything from league transition to ballpark factors.

2) Manny will mash from here on out as he plays for a contract. Importantly, these will not be (remotely) comparable to the #'s he would have put up if he'd stayed in Boston.

3) The media will be all over Theo..."How the F could you deal Manny, who is mashing, for this Bay guy?!?" Answer: see #2.

Many is one of the one guys I've ever seen play about whom it could be said with great confidence that he could get a hit any time he wanted to as long as he cared to, in the moment. Lately, he hasn't cared. Now, he will.

That's another reason I don't buy Manny's "drop off" and/or projected drop off. For whatever reason, I'm quite sure that if he hadn't felt "disrespected" and had the "peace of mind" he clearly requires, we'd be seeing a Manny much closer to the guy we feared so deeply a few years ago (and admit it - the guy we still fear today if he cares enough to come to play).

Bay? I have enough friends in Pittsburgh to have a sense of what kind of player he is, what kind of clubhouse presence he is, and what kind of impact he'll have in Boston.

I'm not afraid.

74 Sure, except great hitters usually do worse against a team that's won 4 championships and 6 pennants during their career. Frank Thomas, the second best right-handed hitter of the same generation, drops 100 points in OPS against the Yanks in his career (629 PA). That Manny has held his own, at the true peak of a HOF hitter's abilities, says everything.

Again I don't see the same from Bay. Not even close.

And if anyone has great issue with what I said in 78 then take pleasure in knowing that I was the guy predicting Mussina's downfall after every solid start for the first 3 months of the season...

Sure, if everything goes right (Bay at his best) he could match would Manny would have put up at his worst. Projections aside, we all have all seen Manny's upside and Bay has never reached that level. Even at age-36, Manny has been a better hitter than Bay (higher OPS+ in a much better division of a better league). Then, you factor in things like adjustment, moving to a bigger stage, dealing with pressure, etc., and there are a lot of variables in the equation.

Also, Bay is not as cheap as you think. The Red Sox are paying all $7mn, so that's part of his cost. Either you can think of it as coming from this year's payroll, which means Boston could have afforded to spend $7mn extra next season, or you can allocate it to next year, which makes Bay a $14.5mn man.

Finally, the Red Sox are getting Bay for one more season (let's say at that $14.5mn), but I would still rather have a happy Manny in 2009 for $20mn.

vs. Moose: .277 .342 .624 with 16 XBH in 111 PA
vs. AndyP: .416 .465 .675 with 12 XBH in 86 PA

by contrast, I'll bet Bay does slightly better against Doc, Manny was

vs. Halladay: .266 .314 .443 in 86 PA

More fun with Manny versus pitchers:
vs. Roger: .180 .317 .380 in 60 PA
vs. Wells: .288 .344 .458 in 64 PA

vs. Ponson: .420 .491 .560 in 57 PA
vs. Sturtze: .311 .392 .867 in 51 PA

vs. Kazmir: .159 .260 .273 in 50 PA

vs. Gordon: .194 .341 .444 in 44 PA
vs. Rivera: .211 .279 .289 in 43 PA

Also, we have to remember that OPS+ is relative to each league. It means a lot more to have a 142 in the AL than a 135 in the NL if the differences in the league is as real as it seems.

I can't be happier about the Manny trade. Make any argument you want, but Manny killed us. Bay is younger, a good hitter, and a good player for the Sox. But he is just not Manny Ramirez, just like Mike Lowell or JD Drew is not Manny Ramirez.

I am very happy about the way things worked out this week. I firmly believe that the Yankees got a bit better and the Red Sox a bit worse. In this division, and tied in the loss column, trades that give the Yankes plus one or two games, and trades that give the Sox minus one or two games can mean the difference between September and October baseball.