The state of the Red Sox as we stand is this:
- Mike Lowell is likely to be traded to Texas for catcher Max Ramirez, who is likely to open the season in Triple-A. Assuming he opens the season in the majors, that would lead us to assume Victor Martinez is moved to first and Kevin Youkilis put at third. At that point, this article becomes moot. We will proceed under the assumption this will not happen, because it would catch many by surprise.
- The vacant spot at third base will be filled by either Kevin Youkilis or Adrian Beltre. If filled by Youkilis, first base is to be filled by either Casey Kotchman or Nick Johnson. The outcome will rely on market valuation. Since Scott Boras is asking for an eight-figure annual salary for Beltre which Boston will not pay, we must proceed with the assumption that Beltre is out and Youkilis slides to third. If the price comes down later in the season, great. Let’s talk then.
- We then are faced with two choices. Slide Youkilis over to third and commit to Nick Johnson as first-baseman… or leave the window open for Beltre with the expectation that Kotchman ends up at first.
The question is then:
Is Nick Johnson appreciably better than Casey Kotchman based on actual value?
To me, it’s a rather simple answer: No. Casey Kotchman is the better option than Nick Johnson.
Johnson, entering his age-31 year, is coming off a .291/.426/.405 season, split between the Washington Nationals and Florida Marlins. He missed a big chunk of time after being traded to Florida, only furthering the notion that Johnson is injury prone. His career high in games played was 147 back in 2006. That was followed by a missed year, then 38 and 133 games respectively. Looking over his career, 100 games is about all you can expect from this guy.
Johnson’s value is in his plate discipline. His walks per plate appearance in 2009 (1.72) was third behind Adrian Gonzalez and Adam Dunn. Unlike Gonzalez and Dunn, Johnson’s power has all but disappeared. His fractured leg that wiped him out from 2008 returned him to one without power. 10 home runs is his ceiling in Fenway Park (although he would get a nice bump in doubles).
Defensively, a consensus on Johnson is that he’s average to below-average.
Switching to Casey Kotchman, he has gold glove defense and potential on offense. In full-time duty for Atlanta before the trade to Boston, he was at .282/.354/.409. Not bad, right?
In his time in Atlanta, Kotchman’s power mysteriously vanished. When he was with the Angels, he had enough thump to be a good first-baseman. Prior to the trade for Mark Teixeira in 2008, Kotchman was hitting .287/.327/.448. After the trade, it was .237/.331/.316, followed by the .409 SLG this year.
Kotchman is entering his age 27 year with the Monster looming in front of him. Simply looking at previous production, age, and park, I can’t imagine Kotchman wouldn’t be good for a slugging percentage around .425. This is done completely based on assumptions and eye-balling, and is not based in any statistical valuation. Bill James’ 2010 projection seems to agree, predicting Kotchman for a .419 slugging percentage. Assuming James is spot on with Kotchman at .272/.342/.417, is he better than what Johnson can put up?
Johnson has a projected .289/.414/.434 line coming up via Bill James, but as we all know, offense is just one part of the game. Johnson ranked at -6.6 UZR/150 at first in 2009, with Kotchman at 11.1.
What have we learned so far? Kotchman is an elite defender at first, especially more so than Nick Johnson. Offensively, Johnson provides the clear advantage in on base percentage, but is the advantage enough to nullify his defensive impact, the additional salary Johnson would require (he certainly won’t get this, but FanGraphs valued his 2009 season at $10.9 million, which would have been a market value of $15 million) and the loss of upside in Kotchman tapping back into his potential he flashed in 2004?
If the decision was strictly Johnson and Kotchman to be our first-baseman next year, I’d say that it’s a wash at best. Boston has already tendered Kotchman a contract, and it will probably come in at around $3.5 million. If we bring in Johnson for a value of, say, $6-7 million, we’ve closed off any chance of signing Adrian Beltre should his price come down, at the expense of Kotchman producing at a WAR/VORP/wOBA/wRC+/WSYCTM (Whatever Statistic You Choose To Measure) appreciably similar to Johnson.
Sure, you run the risk of Kotchman falling flat on his face like he did in Atlanta. You assume the same risk with Johnson and his injury history.
I would much rather take the risk of a younger, gold-glove first-baseman re-establishing his offensive value than Johnson, especially when Adrian Beltre could fall in our laps if (when?) his price comes down. If we have to look for a replacement mid-season, Adrian Gonzalez figures to be more available midseason than he is now, at least according to the most recent reports at the time of this writing. And okay, let’s get off the Adrian Gonzalez bandwagon for a sec: even if he’s not available, the odds are we will be able to get a slugging first-baseman rather easily.
There are a lot more factors in favor of Kotchman than Johnson. If Beltre becomes available at a market valuation that is worth his addition, you’ll see me dancing in the streets. I can’t say the same about Johnson.
UPDATE: Well, so much for that. Looks like Johnson’s becoming the Yankees’ DH for $5.5 million over one year. Point still stands.
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Sorry, I don't see Kotchman as the starting 1st baseman for this team next year. My feeling is that Adrian Gonzalez will be playing in Fenway come April and here's why.
It's pretty clear in my mind that Ellsbury is done in Boston. Mike Cameron is much more valuable as a CF and Jacoby just doesn't have the bat to play LF. I don't think that the Sox would be opposed to starting Hermida in LF next year as (unlike Kotchman) he's demonstrated some power in the past. In any case, it doesn't make sense to platoon Cameron and Hermida when Cameron is the better player and as a RHB would see less at bats in the platoon. Platooning Ellsbury and Hermida makes no sense since they;re both LHB and Ellsbury doesn't hit enough to play left. With Cameron signed to a two-year deal that could bridge the gap to any number of CFs in the system including Reddick, Kalish, Lin, and Westmoreland, all of whom are potentially superior to Ellsbury, Jacoby seems like the logical odd man out.
At the same time, the Lackey signing makes Buchholz trade bait for obvious reasons. Both Buchholz and Elsbury would play well in Petco park where there is no need to worry about hitting for power and a speedster like Ellsbury and a pitcher who has been homer-prone in the past like Clay could thrive. At the same time Hoyer would ask for at least one if not two major-league ready prospects in any Gonzalez trade.
Would this package be enough for San Diego? Ellsbury, Buchholz, Bowden, Kalish or Reddick, and Doubront. That's an excellent 5 for 1 for both teams and the sox protect Kelly and Westmoreland (the real CF of the future). Kotchman wouldn't be terrible for half a season but he wouldn't be good either, he would be the #9 hitter in the Sox lineup. You don't want your 1B hitting ninth if you have aspirations for a pennant.
I'm sorry, but that is a bad trade. On my estimates in prospect value and a concervative projection for Ellsbury and Buchholz you just gave up $70.6 million in value for a potential return of $25.75. Even if Gonzalez becomes Albert Pujols you only would be looking at $60.15 million in added value. Buchholz seems to be the best match with Gonzalez as he has $38.9 million in value with his 5 years left of team control.
If they want multiple players you are looking at Ellsbury, Bowden and Kalish or Reddick being a fair trade. Over the next few weeks I'll be explaining how I arrive at these values.
Oh and if your more positive on Ellsbury like I think the Red Sox are he has almost enough value to go in a trade straight up with maybe 1 or 2 Grade C prospects.
Thanks for the evaluation. I think it takes both Buchholz and Ellsbury to get it done, I don't think the Pads would be terribly interested in Bowden, and I think I'm a bit lower on Ellsbury. What about Buch, Ellsbury, and Kalish or Reddick. In my mind the sox could afford ot give that up and the Pads would have to consider it pretty hard.
Why would the Padres want Ellsbury? Arbitration is around the corner and with Scott Boras as his agent, it wouldn't surprise me if Ellsbury's salary in his second year — if not first — dwarfed A-Gon's salary in 2010.
awesome point
San Diego needs to sell tickets. There is no way that the Sox are going to be able to pry Gonzalez away from them before the beginning of the season. I get the feeling that Theo and Jed already have some sort of a tentative deal worked out to send Gonzalez to Boston in the middle of the season.
I liked the Laroche/Kotchman deal at the time, but Kotchman looked completelt overmatched in 85 percent of his ABs in BOS. Laroche’s oppo power ripping the Monster looks pretty good compared to what we got out of Kotchman.
Evan, I agree with your assessment. Kotchman would be a much better option than Johnson. With Kotchman at 1B you at least nullify any loss of defense created by moving Youk to 3b with the potential of putting up decent numbers. Will the by 1b worthy? Most likely not, but what about compared to at 3rd baseman? If Youk is giving you 1b production, while playing 3b, and Kotchman is giving you 3b production while playing 1b, yet both are giving plus defense, then you're not really losing are you?
I agree with you and Evan re: Kotchman. Thank you for writing this, as I have a strong sense that his offense is under valued. Few top prospects/"can't miss" young players have found themselves on such a labyrinthian career path since he hit "the show" which, for Casey, began at the young age of age 21. His career has been a maze, and he gets high marks for his ability to navigate. IMO, had he remained with the Angels through 2008 or, when traded for Teixeira, had he remained with the Braves through 2009, his game would have stabilized and the production #'s on which projections are based would be considerably better. But his career has been one of constant adjustment, and to his credit he keeps adjusting, which could benefit the Sos in 2010. Here's what I mean.
2004: Age 21. Cup of coffee. 128AB. .224/ .289/ .276/ .565, 0/15/7, 7BB/4K. NOT GOOD
2005: Age 22. Cup of coffee. 143AB. .278/ .352/ .484/ .836, 7/22/16,15BB/18K. good/illness!
2006. Age 23. Missed entire year, home with mono. 29G. Awful stats. NOT GOOD
2007. Age 24. Gimme the ball. 508AB. .296/ .372/ .467/ .840, 11/68/64, 53BB/43K. Finally!
2008. Age 25. Angels. Stable. 398AB. .287/ .327/ .448/ .774, 12/54/47, 18BB/23K good/traded
2008. Age 25. Braves/unstable. 175AB .237/.331/ .316/ .647, 2/20/18, 18/BB/16K. NOT GOOD
2009. Age 26. Braves. Stable. 336AB. .282/ .354/ .409/ .764, 6/41/28, 32BB/28K. good/traded
2009. Age 26. R.Sox/unstable. 95AB. .218/.284/ .287/ .572, 1/7/9, 7BB/14k. NOT GOOD.
2010. Age 27. R.Sox/ Stable. This could be a very good year, better his averages project.
Would it be possible for him, at Fenway, at age 27, finally stable, in a powerful lineup, to re-establish his career as an elite 1b with high BA/OBP, 15-25HR, and more BB than K, while playing heads up ball and GG caliber D? Casey Kotchman should never been a backup or a journeyman player. From his days as a prospect he was expected to be well above average and, when stable, he has been. If no AGon, give his shot at $3.5M, keep Ells, Buch, Westy, Kelly, etc. and let it play out.
Kotchman could very well have a good season at 1st and I've talked myself into this a little bit. But the power number give me a lot of pause. To this point he really hasn't demonstrated the type of pwer that you want at 1st.
Why are you even talking about this when the Yanks signed Johnson?
Maybe because it was published this morning before they had? And maybe if you read the article, you'd notice I added an update about the Yanks signing Johnson.
Adam Laroche is FA
Yes, but he won't start hitting until June/July, and his defense isn't up to Casey's, and everyone will be yelling at Theo to dump him. At which point he will be traded and proceed to light it up for some other team, and we may even be paying part of his salary. He's not on circadian rythm.
Casey will deliver offense in April, play better D, allow Victor to platoon at 1b, and might get a chance to build his trade value back to 2007 levels if AGon or MCab comes at the deadlline. Good for him and Theo. If not, and he succeeds, we would have stability going into 1b in 2011, until Lars or Agon or whomever is ready. I, too, am a little concerned about his pop, but he hit 14HR in 2008, 12 of them in spacious Anaheim before he was traded to Atlanta; and 11 in 2007 in Anaheim, in 508AB at age 24. At age 26/27, that latent power may well be there to hit 15-20 in Fenway. He's a smart hitter who could pull it to Williamsburg or aim for the Monster. Remember his first hit for the Sox was a grand slam against Joba.
I guess the article's moot at this point, but I'm still wondering about the walks per PA stat in paragraph 3, after the subheader in bold. I think the decimal point should be one spot further to the left.