Breaking Down the Edwin Jackson/Colby Rasmus/Jason Frasor Trade Madness

Well, we’re still over half a week away from the trade deadline, but the madness of late July is officially upon us.

That’s right, today we have what is essentially a three-way deal between the White Sox, Blue Jays, and Cardinals. Here’s who each team gets:

White Sox: RHP Jason Frasor, RHP Zach Stewart (both from Toronto), LHP Trever Miller (from St. Louis)
Blue Jays: 3B Mark Teahen (from Chicago), OF Colby Rasmus, RHP P.J. Walters, LHP Brian Tallet (all from St. Louis)
St. Louis: RHP Edwin Jackson (from Chicago), RHP Octavio Dotel, LHP Marc Rzepczynski, OF Corey Patterson (all from Toronto)

Is your head spinning yet? Well, let’s break this thing down.

The White Sox have the smallest part in this trade, so let’s start with that. They traded Jackson, a veteran enjoying a career season, and spare part Teahen in exchange for dependable veteran relievers Frasor and Miller and prospect Stewart.

There have been rumors Chicago may “blow up” their roster in the next few days, and this seems to be the possible beginning of such a process.

Jackson’s contract expires after the season, so if Chicago is indeed cleaning house, then his imminent free agency would definitely be an impetus to trade the righthander. He projects as a Type B free agent, so they lose the potential draft pick if he signs elsewhere, but get it back with the acquisition of potential Type B free agent Frasor.

Frasor himself has little use to a team that doesn’t intend to contend (assuming that’s what Chicago is doing), and Miller makes even less sense. Frasor is having his usual workmanlike solid year in the bullpen, but Miller has been a disaster, walking more batters than he’s struck out. In the AL, Miller’s situational value also plummets–not that that matters for a 37-year-old reliever on a rebuilding team.

Trading Jackson does allow the White Sox to delve into their pool of solid upper-minors pitchers–perhaps we’ll learn if Dylan Axelrod or Joe Bisenius can cut it in the big-league rotation.

The only player with any post-2011 value (and thus, value to the White Sox) acquired by Chicago is Stewart, who ranked 44th on Keith Law’s top 100 prospects before the year.

He comes with lots of acclaim, but we’re at the point where it’s time to turn the expectations down on Stewart. He’s nearing his 25th birthday and has spent 1 1/2 years pitching solidly but unspectacularly in Double-A. He’s a fastball/slider pitcher who made three starts in the majors this year and performed decently but didn’t show overwhelming stuff. Stewart’s fastball averaged just 90.6 mph in his big league stint, and he used it 73.5% of the time–it’s tough to see such an approach holding up in a big league rotation. He’s ultimately a back-of-the-rotation starter, but could become an impact reliever.

And that’s not much of a return for a 27-year-old pitcher with a 3.21 FIP this season. That said, you can see why Chicago made the deal. The acquisition of Frasor covers the draft pick loss, Miller and Teahen are both spare parts, and the White Sox think six years of Stewart is more valuable than two months of Jackson–for this team, that’s certainly true.

Which means that for Chicago, this is pretty much a case of “If this is the best they could do, then that’s fine.” And we’ll always be left wondering what else was out there, but if this was it, then you can’t fault Kenny Williams for pulling the trigger.

Okay. (takes deep breath)

Since I’ve already discussed Jackson, let’s move on to the team that’s getting him–St. Louis.

The Cardinals are sort of the centerpiece of the deal, as they gave up one of the two key players in Rasmus and received the other in Jackson.

Rasmus holds more long-term value that Jackson, of course, given that he’s a league-average center fielder who won’t hit free agency for 3 1/2 years. But, of course, the Cardinals are playing for the present too, given that they’re half a game up in the NL Central as of this writing.

And let’s not forget, the Cardinals really want to make the playoffs. Not just because it’s great to get there and all, but because the extra revenue a playoff berth would generate could allow the team to give Albert Pujols a better contract offer in the offseason.

And things just weren’t working out for Rasmus in St. Louis. He’s had a bunch of problems with manager Tony La Russa, he’s performed worse in 2011 than 2010, and has hit poorly in July. Perhaps that’s selling low, but the Cardinals don’t really need to worry about that–their outfield has the highest wOBA in baseball right now, so trading Rasmus just means that Jon Jay (who’s outplayed Rasmus this year) will start in center field with the newly-acquiRed Patterson as the backup.

Bringing the veteran Dotel in makes sense too. He’s no longer the devastating setup man of 2001-03, but he struck out over a batter per inning this year, and his flyball tendencies will play better in St. Louis than Toronto. Given that the Cardinals’ bullpen has been below replacement level as a unit, adding Dotel can’t hurt. They won’t miss Miller, Tallet, or Walters very much.

The player who really makes this deal make sense for St. Louis is Rzepczynski. While trading the promising Rasmus for two months of Jackson and two spare parts like Dotel and Patterson makes sense only as a go-for-broke, must-keep-Pujols move, Rzepczynski adds some long-term value. And hey, we know how La Russa loves lefties and Dave Duncan loves sinkerballers, so a lefty with a 65.7% grounder rate couldn’t find a better home. Rzepczynski was having a great year in relief and pitched solidly in the rotation in 2009-10, so he has value in either role and is under team control for four seasons. He may not be as valuable as Rasmus in that period, but he still could be a very valuable member of the team.

And given Rasmus’ situation with La Russa, the team’s outfield depth, and the chance to also have Jackson and Dotel for the big 2011 run, this deal makes plenty of sense for St. Louis.

The early pundits are praising the Blue Jays in the deal, and it’s not hard to see why. Dotel, Patterson, and Frasor don’t have any value to a team 13 games out of first, while Rasmus will team with Eric Thames to form two thirds of a suddenly solid young outfield. Rzepczynski has good value, but the Jays didn’t need him–he was already pushed to the bullpen because of their glut of young starters. It was smart to trade Stewart for two reasons: a) because his value is still fairly high and b) the aforementioned pitching depth that made him expendable.

Still, Toronto is betting a lot that Rasmus’ problems can be pinned on La Russa. Yes, he’s an immensely talented player, but he’s also a guy who’s rated below average defensively in center field, isn’t a huge factor on the bases, and has a career wOBA of .337 (just .332 this season). A solid player, to be sure, and one with the talent to star, but not by any means a slam dunk to do so merely because of a change of scenery.

Let’s not overstate Rasmus’ value just because he’s perceived as being a player with untapped potential that will soon come out. It certainly could, but many players spend their whole careers one or two adjustments away from greatness–adjustments they could never quite figure out. A change of scenery may stimulate growth, but it far from guarantees it.

And if Rasmus doesn’t grow, then he may just wind up an average starting outfielder.

Even then, though, when you consider that every player Toronto gave up wasn’t integral to their future plans, it’s hard to not see it as a win for Toronto.

And that’s pretty much the theme of this deal. There are lots of questions about each team’s approach, but if you look deep enough into the situations of each, you can find satisfying answers. Each team looks to have accomplished its goals with this trade.