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September 04, 2006
John Hart, Destroyer of Worlds: The Giles and Hafner Trades
In which instance did John Hart cause more harm to his team: trading Brian Giles or Travis Hafner?
On November 18, 1998, Cleveland GM John Hart shipped 27-year-old outfielder Brian Giles to Pittsburgh for 28-year-old lefty reliever Ricardo Rincon. Cleveland’s bullpen had performed admirably in a six-game ALCS loss against the Yankees (seven runs in 28 innings), but the Tribe had only one lefty of note, 38-year-old Paul Assenmacher. With an abundance of fine OF/DH-types (Manny Ramirez, Kenny Lofton, David Justice, Richie Sexson), Hart decided he could tolerate Giles’s absence. Giles had started only four of the six ALCS games and had begun the season in a platoon with Geromino Berroa.
Rincon pitched reasonably well for Cleveland, allowing just under four runs per nine innings in relief. On the other hand, injuries limited him to only 154 innings in three-plus years. At the 2002 trading deadline, the Indians traded him to Oakland for future Ranger Marshall McDougall, who did nothing from them.
Giles, on the other hand, became an elite player the moment he left Ohio, batting .315/.418/.614 and belting 39 homers in his inaugural Pirate campaign. Giles received modest consideration for the MVP award in four consecutive years, and he certainly would have earned more votes had the Pirates not been so exquisitely awful during his tenure.
Fast forward to December 2002, when Texas GM John Hart sent 1B/DH Travis Hafner and struggling pitching prospect Aaron Myette to his former employer for catcher Einar Diaz and similarly struggling pitcher Ryan Drese. Texas badly needed a catcher after management decided not to break the bank for Ivan Rodriguez, still an elite catcher but on the wrong side of 30 and seemingly injury-prone after missing significant portions of three consecutive seasons. Internal solutions consisted of Todd Greene, various organizational fodder, prospects who weren’t quite ready (Gerald Laird) and prospects who never would be (Scott Heard). Again, presumably dealing from a position of strength, Hart relinquished the promising but largely untested Hafner for what appeared to be a solid Major League catcher (to Hart, if not his observers). The pitchers involved were little more than throw-ins.
From 1999-2001, Diaz was a superior defensive catcher, and while by no means a good hitter, he could hit for a decent average and smack the occasional double. Injuries wrecked his 2002 (.206/.258/.284), and though may have fully healed by the time he joined Texas, he never recovered on the field. Diaz hit .257, walked a dismal 2.5% of his plate appearances, and provided only average defense. By season’s end, Greene and Laird had usurped most of his playing time. As for the throw-in pitcher, Ryan Drese suffered through another desultory season, then pitched remarkably well for the surprising ’04 club. Success proved fleeting, and only two months into 2005 Texas stunningly waived him. The Senators generously claimed him and his glistening-new two-year contract.
Just before Opening Day 2004, Texas dumped Diaz for yet another struggling pitching prospect, Chris Young. The deal also involved two minor-league pitchers of no consequence. After throwing 36 promising innings as a rookie, Texas signed him to a three-year contract rather than risk his departure to the NBA’s Sacramento Kings. Young pitched 165 above-average innings in 2005, but a late-summer slump raised questions about his endurance and long-term potential. Hart’s replacement, Jon Daniels, traded him, Adrian Gonzalez and Terrmel Sledge to San Diego last winter for pitchers Adam Eaton and Akinori Otsuka and a minor-league catcher.
Unlike Giles, Hafner didn’t immediately explode into brilliance after the trade, instead slowly developing into arguably the best hitter in the American League. Hafner presently leads the AL in both walks and slugging percentage and ranks second in homers and on-base percentage.
Back to the question at hand: Which trade caused more damage, Giles or Hafner?
Methods of comparing the value difference of the players in each trade include measuring by Win Shares and by Wins Above Replacement Player (the uninitiated can click the links for a description). For a uniform comparison, I’ll only used the first four years after the trade (actually three years and five months for the Hafner trade.).
Giles vs Rincon
| WIN SHARES | 1999 | 2000 | 2001 | 2002 | TOTAL |
| Giles | 27 | 27 | 29 | 32 | 115 |
| Rincon | 3 | 3 | 6 | 2 | 14 |
| DIFFERENCE | 101 | ||||
Deficit in Win Shares: 101
| WARP | 1999 | 2000 | 2001 | 2002 | TOTAL |
| Giles | 10.2 |
10.7 |
9.0 |
11.3 |
41.2 |
| Rincon | 1.8 |
1.0 |
2.2 |
1.1 |
6.1 |
| DIFFERENCE | 35.1 | ||||
Deficit in Wins Above Replacement Player: 35.1
A Win Share equals one-third of a win, so the deficit in wins equals approximately 34, nearly the same as the WARP deficit. The trade cost the Indians about 8.5 wins annually during the next four years. An epochal disaster.
Hafner vs. Diaz
Analyzing this trade requires more work. Texas traded Diaz and a fringy prospect for Chris Young and another weak prospect before 2004 and then traded Young with Gonzalez and Sledge for Eaton, Otsuka and Killian two years later. It’s safe to argue that prospects in the first Young deal contributed negligible value, but in the second trade Young was but one of three valuable players. For this analysis, I’m assuming Young comprised 45% of the value acquired by San Diego, with Gonzalez receiving 45% and Sledge 10%. From this estimates, I’ll use only 45% of the value of Eaton, Otsuka and Killian as part of the analysis. Perhaps you disagree with those estimates, but changing them doesn’t affect the results much, so don’t sweat it.
| WIN SHARES | 2003 | 2004 | 2005 | 2006 | TOTAL |
| Hafner | 7 | 21 | 27 | 23 | 78 |
| Myette | 0 | - | - | - | 0 |
| CLE TOTAL | 78 | ||||
| Diaz | 5 | - | - | - | 5 |
| Drese | 0 | 17 | 1 | - | 18 |
| Young | - | 2 | 11 | - |
13 |
| Eaton | - |
- |
- |
1 | 1 |
| Otsuka | - |
- |
- |
5 | 5 |
| TEX TOTAL | 42 | ||||
| DIFFERENCE | 36 | ||||
Deficit in Win Shares: 36
| WARP | 2003 | 2004 | 2005 | 2006 | TOTAL |
| Hafner | 1.9 |
7.3 |
8.0 |
10.0 |
27.2 |
| Myette | (0.2) |
- |
- |
- |
-0.2 |
| CLE TOTAL | 27.0 |
||||
| Diaz | 1.9 |
- |
- |
- |
1.9 |
| Drese | (0.1) |
6.5 |
0.3 |
- |
6.7 |
| Young | - |
1.1 |
4.8 |
- |
5.9 |
| Eaton | - |
- |
- |
0.5 |
0.5 |
| Otsuka | - |
- |
- |
2.8 |
2.8 |
| TEX TOTAL | 17.8 | ||||
| DIFFERENCE | 9.2 | ||||
Deficit in Wins Above Replacement Player: 9.2
So far, the Hafner trade has cost the Rangers between two and three wins per season. Certainly those three wins would have come in handy in 2004, but the trade doesn’t rate as badly as I’d expect. Yes, Hart lucked into Drese’s 2004, and his belated implication that he traded Hafner for Drese was an obvious and embarrassing lie. Still, however improbably, Drese nearly equaled Hafner in value in 2004, a fact that can’t be ignored. Hart (or at least he and his staff) also consummated the Diaz-for-Young trade that has paid off wonderfully (even though I hated the second Young trade). Thanks to both serendipity and skill, the Hafner trade only rates as a severe fleecing, not a catastrophe.
Did either trade have any mitigating factors?
Notwithstanding the minimal return, trading Brian Giles actually made sense. Cleveland already had several powerful outfielders and designated hitters and received good-to-excellent production for them for the first three years after the trade. Not until 2002, when Russell Branyan, Milton Bradley and Matt Lawson all batted poorly, did Cleveland field an inadequate outfield. Again, trading Giles in and of itself wasn’t the problem. Settling on a situational lefty reliever for him resulted in a miserably lopsided trade.
Texas had a similar situation, if not so clear-cut. Texas had Rafael Palmeiro and Juan Gonzalez signed for 2003; certainly their aged bodies would spend significant time at DH. Mark Teixeira had stormed through the minor leagues and was a strong candidate to break camp with the Rangers the next spring. With Hank Blalock likely playing third most of the time, Teixeira would crowd the field of 1B/DH/COFs of which Hafner was part. As with Giles, trading Hafner was understandable. The return was decidedly not.
Unlike Cleveland’s outfield minus Giles, Texas’s DH production suffered greatly. David Dellucci performed well in 2005, but the other DH “solutions” – Brad Fullmer and Phil Nevin – were replacement-level flops.
How did Giles and Hafner compare?
Giles would turn 28 before playing for Pittsburgh and had just over 1,000 MLB plate appearances when traded. Though rarely a regular and considered slightly dubious against lefties, he had established himself as a very good, if not elite, hitter with excellent on-base skills.
As a 25-year-old, Hafner had only 70 late-season appearances in 2002 to his credit when shipped to Cleveland. The results were uninspiring. However, he had dominated AA and AAA during 2001-2002 and was still considered an excellent prospect.
| Player | Brian Giles, MLB |
Travis Hafner, MLB |
Travis Hafner, AA-AAA |
| Position | Mostly LF |
Mostly DH |
Mostly 1B |
| Age | 27.8 | 25.4 | 24-25 |
| PAs | 1,033 |
70 |
877 |
| AVG | .284 | .242 | .315 |
| AVG+ | 103 | 87 | -- |
| OBP | .391 | .329 | .431 |
| OBP+ | 113 | 95 | -- |
| SLG | .485 | .387 | .552 |
| SLG+ | 111 | 87 | -- |
| OPS | .876 | .716 | .983 |
| OPS+ | 124 | 82 | -- |
| HR Rate | 3.7% | 1.7% | 4.7% |
| BB Rate | 15.0% | 8.7% | 15.7% |
Posted by Lucas at September 4, 2006 10:36 PM