Greetings, fellow Mafia members!
With most trade deadlines gone and forgotten, An Offer They Couldn’t Refuse will change things up a bit. For the balance of the season, evaluations will be presented from a keeper-value perspective. After all, probably two-thirds of the teams in each league are thinking keepers at this point … aren’t they?
Over to League 13 where, some time ago, they blew the doors off with Team One sending Justin Morneau, Vladimir Guerrero, and Ian Snell to Team Two for Lance Berkman, Grady Sizemore, and Jason Isringhausen. Can anyone say BLOCKBUSTER keeper trade?
The four obvious potential keepers in this deal are Morneau, Vlad, Berkman and Sizemore. Each team walks away from the deal with two of these guys, so how do they stack up after the swap?
Going into this season, Morneau ended up getting drafted somewhere in the 3rd round range. Even though he came into the season as the reigning AL MVP, the fact that 2006 was his first big year of production pushed his value down a little bit. Now that he’s backed up last year’s performance with a very solid 2007, however, you can expect him to jump up into the 2nd round, at the very least, in 2008.
On the other hand, you can bet that one guy who will fall out of the 2nd round next year will be Lance Berkman. Sure, he’s been fighting a series of bumps and bruises most of the year, but let’s face it … between these two, who will you pick first next year? Morneau and his 30 - 35 HRs or Berkman coming off a sub-par season? Don’t get me wrong. I’m not saying that we should write Lance off as being absent of any value. I’m just saying that Team Two gains the advantage on this part of the trade.
Back in March, not a lot of space separated Vlad and Grady in the pecking order of most drafts. In fact, in League 13, they were taken back-to-back at the top of the 2nd round.
General consensus has Sizemore moving up into the 1st round in 2008, while Guerrero’s somewhat hot and cold 2007 performance has his draft status in question for next year. That being said, Vladdy is still Vladdy. We have to give him the benefit of the doubt … for now. He might slip a bit, but I still see him, at the least, as a high 2nd rounder next year. That is, if he doesn’t pull up the end of the 1st round.
Overall, although Team One grabs Sizemore and nets, what has to be considered, the best player in the deal, I think Team Two comes out on top. In Morneau and Guerrero, they’ve nailed down the best package of keepers