Comments on: Oakland Takes a Second Holliday

By: Ed Nelson

Ed Nelson — Sat, 15 Aug 2009 02:59:55 +0000

I’m getting the feeling he really didn’t want to be in Oakland (and really who can blame him), and that he really does want to be in St Louis. Hitting behind Albert doesn’t hurt either…

By: kris

kris — Sat, 15 Aug 2009 02:15:39 +0000

I’m really starting to think that the difference between a good hitter, and a great hitter is nothing more than the percentage of hittable pitches they get.

In St. Louis Holliday’s getting infinitely more hittable pitches. Crudely speaking, he’s getting about 5% more pitches inside of the zone.

By: Joe R

Joe R — Fri, 14 Aug 2009 23:52:34 +0000

So, um, I think Holliday is kind of beating expectations…

By: Paul Thomas

Paul Thomas — Wed, 29 Jul 2009 20:52:00 +0000

How much? A couple million bucks, at most?

In an inelastic market like Oakland’s, paying free agent wages for wins is a serious losing investment unless those wins take you to the playoffs.

Personally, I find this to have been a distinctly poor sequence of trades for Oakland (I’d much rather have Carlos Gonzalez in their system than Brett Wallace right now, and Street for Mortenson-Peterson is a rotten trade in its own right), and that’s even evaluating the good return they got for him from St. Louis– which just makes the point that the original trade was brain-numbingly silly.

By: Ed Nelson

Ed Nelson — Wed, 29 Jul 2009 02:45:24 +0000

Exactly. Four months of Holliday has (had) value.

By: mattymatty

mattymatty — Wed, 29 Jul 2009 00:56:26 +0000

Another important thing Oakland got in the deals was four months of Holliday in their lineup.

By: brian

brian — Tue, 28 Jul 2009 23:29:22 +0000

“What your omitting” is an apostrophe and an “e”

By: xacto

xacto — Tue, 28 Jul 2009 19:52:09 +0000

Another thing to consider is that Oakland was dealing from abundance when they traded Street. At the time of the trade, their bullpen was solid with Zeigler, Devine, and Casilla. Though Street’s a good player, his skills were redundant, duplicated by cheaper players. Street was, essentially, an expensive spare part. Thus, the A’s traded spare parts to get Holliday so that they could then acquire an infield hitting prospect in Wallace, an area of need for them. In these two trades Billy Beane has traded excess for need. Even if the talent levels are even, that’s a plus for the A’s.

By: Jacob Jackson

Jacob Jackson — Tue, 28 Jul 2009 19:24:40 +0000

That’s for sure. At this rate, Street is going to get a K-Rod deal in free agency.

By: Jacob Jackson

Jacob Jackson — Tue, 28 Jul 2009 19:23:13 +0000

The first Holliday deal could perhaps be considered “buying low” simply because players of Holliday’s caliber rarely even are available on the trade market.
The Rockies wanted to trim payroll, the economy was bad, Holliday was making $13.5 million in the upcoming year = opportunity for a team looking to acquire him. Without those circumstances, he wouldn’t have been available at that price.