The Kansas City Royals have usually been bad for the past, oh, three, four decades for a litany of reasons, but one consistent contributing reason has been that they just don't know when to say goodbye to a player in service of the greater good. David DeJesus. Joakim Soria. Danny Duffy. Kelvin Herrera. Whit Merrifield. Scott Barlow. All those players were true premium trade pieces at one point, but the Royals didn't pull the trigger on leveraging any of them until after their value tanked. Add Kris Bubic and Cole Ragans to the list, while we're at it.
Why would teams want to trade their good players? It's pretty simple: good players have a lot of present value, and good prospects have a lot of future value. Depending on how talented your team is, you might want to exchange some of that future value for present value or vice versa. Trading big league players for prospects is a way for bad teams to make use of their talent in a way that works better for their timeline.
But just because it's simple doesn't mean it's easy. Have you ever had to go to your boss and explain that you and your team screwed up so badly that you're recommending your company lose money now with the hope that they make more in the future? That's what it's like for general managers to sell these decisions to ownership. Still, that's part of the job, and if you have players that could be interesting trade **** ets, it makes it easier.
Fortunately for the Royals, they have a few players who are could be trade **** ets. Chief among them are starting pitchers Michael Wacha and Seth Lugo. Wacha has arguably been the singular most reliable starting pitcher in the American League for the last three seasons, while Lugo has pitched decently and is two years removed from being the Cy Young runner up. Kansas City is also a very bad baseball team who sealed its fate months ago; it simply doesn't matter if they lose 90 or 120 games this year because they're not making the playoffs and they can't guarantee any spot in the draft thanks to the lottery system.
Are the Royals thinking about trading either? The answer is, predictably, no; get off their lawn.
Why would teams want to trade their good players? It's pretty simple: good players have a lot of present value, and good prospects have a lot of future value. Depending on how talented your team is, you might want to exchange some of that future value for present value or vice versa. Trading big league players for prospects is a way for bad teams to make use of their talent in a way that works better for their timeline.
But just because it's simple doesn't mean it's easy. Have you ever had to go to your boss and explain that you and your team screwed up so badly that you're recommending your company lose money now with the hope that they make more in the future? That's what it's like for general managers to sell these decisions to ownership. Still, that's part of the job, and if you have players that could be interesting trade **** ets, it makes it easier.
Fortunately for the Royals, they have a few players who are could be trade **** ets. Chief among them are starting pitchers Michael Wacha and Seth Lugo. Wacha has arguably been the singular most reliable starting pitcher in the American League for the last three seasons, while Lugo has pitched decently and is two years removed from being the Cy Young runner up. Kansas City is also a very bad baseball team who sealed its fate months ago; it simply doesn't matter if they lose 90 or 120 games this year because they're not making the playoffs and they can't guarantee any spot in the draft thanks to the lottery system.
Are the Royals thinking about trading either? The answer is, predictably, no; get off their lawn.
4 months ago
