By Gabriel Lundeen

Cappo, League 10

It’s mid-June, and your team is either flying high, gun-shy, or ready to cry.  Wherever you are in the standings, it’s time to think about deals to win now, deals to win later, or deals to shake up your stagnant roster.  Let’s take a look at this trade from the Fantasy Baseball Mafia Writer’s League, which went down a few weeks ago, and see which team came out ahead.

THE TRADE

Outlaws United BC acquire James Shields - Jersey Hitmen acquire Hideki Matsui

Let’s take a look at the players involved …

James Shields: Shields’ breakout 2007 season was no fluke, as he’s put up stellar numbers thus far in 2008. He complements his excellent changeup with a strong fastball and has learned to mix his pitches better with experience. For a “soft ace” on your fantasy roster, you could do a lot worse, and I look for him to only improve.

Now might be your last chance to buy relatively low before he ascends to the next level. The emergence of the Rays as a legitimate contender also helps his value, as he’s bound to get more run support and perhaps a few extra wins.

Hideki Matsui: Matsui has been a model of consistency since arriving in New York. Though he hasn’t quite lived up to his “Godzilla” numbers in Japan, due differences in the American game, he’s a virtual lock for 20+ HR and 100+ RBI per year. There have been precious few players who have modeled his sort of consistency, even though he was derailed a bit by a wrist injury in 2006.

Matsui has been the subject of trade rumors since the early off-season, so his value could take a bit of a hit if he ends up in, say, San Francisco. For now, he’s a Yankee, he’s hitting well over .300 and is on pace for another 20/100. The guy does it in his sleep, it would seem.

THE FINAL BREAKDOWN

Oakland GM Billy Beane once said, “If both sides don’t feel pain, it isn’t a fair trade.” Both Outlaws and Jersey Hitmen gave up value to get value, so they’re both likely to feel the pain a little. This trade is extremely fair based on value, average draft position, and performance.

These kinds of trades can be the most difficult to evaluate, because both teams traded to address different needs, so we’re looking at apples and oranges. How do you pick a winner?  For now, I’m going to declare Outlaws United BC the winner by a nose.

Shields will provide strong value all year long pitching alongside Scott Kazmir, the Rays should compete all year long, and he’s young and improving. He may not strike out a batter an inning, but he’ll get close, and his ratios should help the Outlaws’ pitching staff.

Matsui can sustain his strong batting average (.321 as of this writing), and he should benefit from the Yankees getting heathly and firing on all cylinders, but the possibility of a deal and potential injury due to age could hurt his value.

This is an extremely narrow victory, one in which I’m taking the relatively rare stance of going with the arm over the bat.