Upton, meanwhile, just posted a 136 OPS+ as a 22-year-old, which is ridiculous. In the history of baseball, 48 players have been that productive at that age. Only 11 of those seasons have come in the last 30 years:

• Jack Clark, 1978, 152 OPS+
• Eddie Murray, 1978, 140
• Rickey Henderson, 1981, 150
• Cal Ripken, 1983, 144
• Ken Griffey Jr., 1992, 149
• Vladimir Guerrero, 1998, 150
• Alex Rodriguez, 1998, 136
• Albert Pujols, 2002, 151
• David Wright, 2005, 139
• Miguel Cabrera, 2005, 151
• B.J. Upton, 2007, 136

Basically Upton had A-Rod’s age-22 season. Works for me…

Post from: Knuckle Curve

This is going to take a while, so you may want to pull up a chair. Heck, go ahead and order a pizza.

Headed to Detroit

Cabrera is a stud. There’s no other way to put it. In any given year, he’s a legitimate MVP candidate. Better players in baseball? You can count the number on one hand, possibly two. Yeah, Cabrera’s a little heavy but he’s also a hitting machine who turns 25 in April. He’s a guy around which a team can build. Even that’s an understatement.

The Tigers now feature a sick, sick offense. Cabrera, Magglio Ordonez, Curtis Granderson, Gary Sheffield, Carlos Guillen? Sure, Ordonez will come back to earth somewhat, but who cares. This team will score 900 runs in 2008.

On the pitching front, Willis is coming off a poor season (5.17 ERA). He turns 26 in January, so this may have been a fluke. Then again, he’s been ridden pretty hard at a young age, like a certain Steve Avery I know, so maybe not.

Anyway, with a rotation headed by Justin Verlander and Jeremy Bonderman, and with that offense, it’s not like the Tigers need an ace. They just need a guy who can soak up innings, and Willis fits the bill. He could win 15 games without even getting out of bed next year.

Headed to Florida

Maybin and Miller are the prizes in this deal. Maybin is a stud in the making. Only by the grace of Granderson was he deemed expendable. As a 20-year-old in the pitching-friendly Florida State League, Maybin hit .304/.393/.486 before making late cameos in Double-A and the big leagues. Baseball America rated Maybin as the Tigers top prospect coming into 2007, comparing him to Mike Cameron and Torii Hunter.

Miller is a flamethrowing (love that phrase; how wicked would it be if a guy could actually do it?) left-hander who saw action at four levels (including 13 starts with the big club) in 2007. His command is spotty, but that should improve with experience. There is also some concern that his delivery could lead to injury down the line, but that’s always a risk with pitchers. If Miller stays healthy and develops as expected, he should be a front-line starter.

Rabelo is a 27-year-old catcher with a career .263/.327/.346 minor-league line. BA cited his defensive skills in ranking Rabelo as the Tigers’ 18th best prospect before last season.

De La Cruz is a right-hander who turns 24 in March. He made 11 starts in Double-A last season with decent results and then moved to the bullpen at Triple-A, where he was less successful. BA ranked De La Cruz #6 among Tigers prospects prior to the ‘07 season.

Trahern is a 22-year-old right-hander who spent most of 2007 at Double-A Erie. His career 3.38 ERA looks nice, but the 4.86 K/9 makes it unlikely he’ll have much of a career. Apparently he serves up a lot of groundballs. BA ranked Trahern at #8 last year, although he looks more like the second coming of Nate Cornejo to me.

Badenhop is, would you believe, another right-hander. BA had him at #22 in the Detroit system headed into 2007. He posted decent numbers (3.13 ERA) in the FSL but was old (24) for the league and struck out just 5.19 batters per 9 innings. I don’t see a lot of upside here.

Bottom Line

The Marlins get two tremendous prospects, plus a bunch of marginal guys. The Tigers get one of the best players in all of baseball, plus a solid option for the back end of their rotation. Theoretically this could help both clubs a la the Josh Beckett for Hanley Ramirez deal, but all of the risk is on Florida’s side.

The Tigers have upgraded an already potent offense and added starting pitching depth without losing anything that they’re likely to miss. This is a tremendous deal for them, and one that makes the Tigers, if not favorites to win the AL pennant in 2008, a truly elite team in baseball.

Other Voices

• Detroit Tiger Weblog
• Mack Avenue Tigers
• Tiger Tales
• Fish Stripes

Post from: Knuckle Curve

• Barry Bonds. His stories pretty much write themselves.
• Miguel Cabrera. Anyone who gets scolded by Ozzie Guillen for being too fat is okay in my book.
• Fausto Carmona. One of the biggest surprises of 2007.
• Daisuke Matsuzaka. Not as good as the hype, but still pretty good.
• Gil Meche. Irresponsible spending almost got the Royals out of last place.
• Jake Peavy. Bounced back from poor (by his standards) ‘06 season.
• Carlos Pena. Where did that come from?
• Alex Rodriguez. Takes abuse from everyone, but still great.
• C.C. Sabathia. Out-Santana’d Santana.
• Barry Zito. Hey, at least the Giants only have 6 years left on his deal.

Stay tuned for Jamie’s full list…

Post from: Knuckle Curve

Why would the Marlins, with the worst attendance in the game and desperately trying to land a stadium deal, unload their best player and one of the top hitters in baseball?

For one, Cabrera – who made $7.4 million last season – stands to make at least $10 million in arbitration this winter, a challenging price tag for a low-revenue team. Also, despite averaging 31 homers, 116 RBI and a .327 batting average the past three seasons, he has had several troublesome episodes.

Okay, I understand that $10 million is a lot to spend on one player when your entire team was paid $30.5 million in ‘07. What I’m not clear on is how this somehow makes, as the article seems to suggest, Alex Rodriguez affordable.

In case anyone has forgotten, Rodriguez just opted out of the final three years of a 10-year, $242 million contract. This means that he and Scott Boras think they can get more on the open market, not less. Or to put it more bluntly, Rodriguez won’t be coming to Miami for $10 million — you know, what Cabrera might make in arbitration.

I love this bit on Cabrera:

He has been benched a couple of times for arriving late for games, his weight is a concern and sources say the Marlins are frustrated with his overall attitude and approach.

What is the euphemism? “Socializing,” I think they call it. This is management and local media “socializing” Marlins fans (should that really be plural?) to the idea that Cabrera won’t be around much longer and that somehow this is a good thing.

Boy, I sure would be frustrated with Cabrera’s attitude and approach if I were the Marlins. It’s only produced MVP caliber results every year. Check out Cabrera’s list of similar players through age 24 at Baseball-Reference:

1. Hank Aaron
2. Ken Griffey
3. Frank Robinson
4. Orlando Cepeda
5. Hal Trosky
6. Joe Medwick
7. Al Kaline
8. Mickey Mantle
9. Andruw Jones
10. Vladimir Guerrero

That’s six guys who are in the Hall of Fame; three who will be; and Hal Trosky, a brilliant hitter from the ’30s and ’40s whose “demise as a player is solely attributable to migraine headaches that made his life a living hell” (The New Bill James Historical Abstract, p. 447). In other words, Cabrera is a special talent. Whatever other issues may surround him (and I don’t doubt there are some) would seem to pale in comparison to what he can offer a team.

Are the Marlins shopping Cabrera? Sure sounds like it, and maybe it’s not even a bad idea — jettisoning Josh Beckett worked out well for them. But just say that you’re cheap and don’t want to pay the guy. Don’t spew garbage about his “approach” or how the more expensive Rodriguez somehow makes sense as a potential replacement.

People aren’t stupid, you know…

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Post from: Knuckle Curve

Uh, whatever.

Quoth the “fan”:

I did something that anyone else would do.

Wow. Sometimes it really takes a special kind of stupid…

Post from: Knuckle Curve

Now Guillen is telling Cabrera to lose weight. Quoth the Chicago skipper:

When you’re getting older and you go down, they say you’re fat. Right now it’s, “Oh, he’s a little chubby. He likes to eat.” When you’re not hitting .340 with 40 home runs, they’re going to call you a fat boy from Venezuela. You’d better lose some weight.

This is sort of touching, but it’s also sort of weird. Like, it’s nice to see Guillen concerned about his fellow countryman, but the guy plays for the Marlins.

Guillen and Cabrera had their little chat over dinner Sunday night. No word on what they ate.

Post from: Knuckle Curve

The other interesting item here, and it’s really just a footnote, is how much pitching talent the Mets have given away over the past several months. In two separate trades this off-season, they sent Matt Lindstrom and Henry Owens to Florida for Adam Bostick and Jason Vargas, as well as Heath Bell and Royce Ring to San Diego for Jon Adkins and Ben Johnson.

Here’s how these guys are doing through games of May 1, 2007:

Bell: 16.2 IP, 6 H, 3 BB, 17 SO, 0.54 ERA
Lindstrom: 11.0 IP, 8 H, 7 BB, 10 SO, 2.45
Owens: 15.2 IP, 13 H, 7 BB, 10 SO, 2.30 ERA
Ring: 1.0 IP, 1 H, 0 BB, 2 SO, 0.00 ERA

Adkins: 12.0 IP, 16 H, 4 BB, 10 SO, 5.25 ERA (AAA)
Bostick: 23.0 IP, 24 H, 11 BB, 17 SO, 7.43 ERA (AAA)
Johnson: 21 AB, .238 BA, .385 OBP, .286 SLG (AAA)
Vargas: 27.2 IP, 29 H, 7 BB, 20 SO, 4.55 ERA (AAA)

I understand that the Mets’ bullpen is stacked and they could afford to move some arms, but shouldn’t they have been able to get a little more than this in return?

Post from: Knuckle Curve

Before I go any further, you should know my bias: I can’t stand Albert Pujols. He’s a brilliant player, and I’m willing to give him all the props in the world for that, but he often comes off as a pompous jerk who doesn’t mind showing up other players in his pursuit of greatness. Pujols actually reminds me a lot of Barry Bonds before Bonds gained notoriety for reasons other than being merely unpleasant.

So, that’s my bias. I respect the heck out of Pujols’ game but have no use for his attitude.

Did I purposely look to pick someone other than Pujols as MVP? Yeah, it’s possible. I also still like to bust out the contrarian card every now and then, although not as often as when I was younger.

More importantly, I think I’ve found a guy who legitimately could win the NL MVP this year. He plays third base for the Florida Marlins, and his name is Miguel Cabrera.

Cabrera hit .339/.430/.568 last year while playing half his games in a park that favors pitchers. He turns 24 the third week of the ‘07 season and has exhibited some very promising trends in recent years. Cabrera’s OPS+ and RC/27 have each improved every season he’s been in the big leagues, but one set of numbers in particular intrigues me:

 
Cabrera is tightening his strike zone in a big way. He’s seeing better pitches and doing more damage to them also. He was good to begin with, and he still hasn’t reached his peak years.

Folks, this is a scary talent. Of Cabrera’s 10 most similar players at Baseball-Reference.com, six are in the Hall of Fame, three (Andruw Jones, Ken Griffey Jr., Vladimir Guerrero) are still active, and Hal Trosky — well, he’s a story for another day.

Will Cabrera win the MVP in 2007? Considering that Pujols has finished no lower than fourth in the voting since he came into the league sixth years ago, he probably should be considered the favorite. But if you’re looking for a dark horse candidate, keep a close eye on Cabrera this year. He’s not quite in Pujols’ class yet, but the guy is a special player who still has room to grow.

Post from: Knuckle Curve