By Gabriel Lundeen

Cappo, League 10

When analyzing a trade, the first thing I look for is motive. Why make a deal without a specific goal in mind … no matter how small? Today, we have a bit of a ‘head-scratcher’ out of League 5. Let’s take a look and see if we can make sense of this odd transaction.

THE TRADE

Team A gets Miguel Tejada

Team B gets Takashi Saito and Francisco Cordero

Let’s look at the players involved.

Team A acquires –

Miguel Tejada: Mr. Mitchell Report, himself, has fallen on hard times in both real and fantasy baseball, with problem after problem plaguing him in what will go down as one of the epically terrible off-seasons in Major League history.

Between his older brother dying in a motorcycle accident, Congressional investigations, and possible deportation, steroid use seems like small potatoes. It seems like SO long since he won his AL MVP award. His power has, since, dropped off precipitously. Regardless, perhaps the move to Houston (and out of Baltimore) will rejuvenate his still-quick bat, and a stat line of .300 with 25 HR and 100 RBI isn’t out of the question. He remains a top-10 shortstop but appears past his prime and is not a keeper in the 12-team Mafia format.

Team B acquires –

Takashi Saito: The 38 year old Saito, in his second year in the Big Leagues, thoroughly dominated hitters, holding them to a .151 batting average and racking up 39 saves. His only concerns are his age and fireballing set-up man Jonathan Broxton breathing down his neck.

On stats alone, few relievers have done a better job than Saito over the last two seasons, and depending on how many closers are being kept in your league, he’s a possible keeper. Just make sure you draft Broxton, who has value in his own right, as an insurance policy.

Francisco Cordero: Cordero had an amazing first half of 2007 before coming back to earth a bit, but he still saved 44 games and posted excellent strikeout numbers.

A move to the Great American Smallpark hurts his value a bit, and remember that it wasn’t so long ago that he lost his closing job in Texas to Akinori Otsuka. Cordero is an excellent mid-level closer option but a notch below the ‘elites’. You could do a lot worse in the last single-digit rounds of your draft, though I don’t think he’s a keeper.

THE FINAL BREAKDOWN

In order to properly evaluate this trade, let’s look at the two teams’ keeper lists as they stood before the trade. Team A was keeping Albert Pujols, Manny Ramirez, Lance Berkman, Travis Hafner and Chipper Jones. Not a bad collection of hitters but room for upgrades remains.

Team B was keeping A-Rod, Hanley Ramirez, Brandon Webb, Jake Peavy and Joe Mauer, an excellent collection of talent but also with room to upgrade if the right trade came along.

It’s pretty easy to see Team A’s motivations - they got two closers, including the best player in the deal in Saito, who could become his fifth keeper if he elects not to keep Jones. Cordero seems like an unnecessary throw-in to the deal and will likely end up back in the draft. Saito is a marginal keeper at best, and his keeper value really depends on the climate of your league. If I had to guess, though, I’d say that Team A’s real motivation was to dump Tejada by any means necessary.

So here’s the question: what was Team B thinking? Saito and Cordero likely don’t crack his keeper list, but why deal them away for a player like Tejada, who certainly doesn’t crack the list and doesn’t even sniff the Holy Trinity of shortstops (Hanley, Reyes and Rollins) … one of which is already on his roster?

Depth has its own value, and surely there was a better deal out there. The deal didn’t do much real damage to his team, but Team B essentially gave away two very trade-able commodities for one that few fantasy players would touch on a keeper list … even his own. Was this a mercy deal? Did Team A e-mail him into submission? Unless there’s a subsequent deal on its way that’s part of a larger plan, I just don’t get it.

Team A wins in a landslide. As a keeper deal, though, I’m still scratching my head trying to figure out what happened here.