Pittsburgh Pirates: Potential trades for Starling Marte
The Pittsburgh Pirates and New York Mets have restarted trade talks on star outfielder Starling Marte. Marte is an underrated superstar and won’t come cheap, so what would it cost and should the Mets or your team pay it?
With new executive Ben Cherington looking to rebuild the Pittsburgh Pirates, just about anyone from the major league roster is going to be in play for other teams to acquire. Reports indicate the New York Mets are interested in acquiring Starling Marte and that the Arizona Diamondbacks were interested earlier in the offseason.
#Mets and #Pirates recently reopened Starling Marte trade talks, sources said. A deal is not believed to be close at this time. #DBacks were among teams interested earlier this offseason.
— Robert Murray (@ByRobertMurray) January 19, 2020
Starling Marte has been a borderline superstar during his time in Pittsburgh. He may be heading into his age 31 season, but he has continued to perform. This past season, Marte hit .295/.342/.503 good for a 119 wRC+ and posted 3.0 fWAR. Since 2014, Marte has been the 11th best outfielder in baseball racking up 19.6 WAR. There’s no reason to believe Marte’s production will be slowing down any time soon. Marte remains an elite runner (92nd percentile from Statcast) and his expected batting average, slugging, and wOBA metrics are in the top 20% of the league so there’s plenty to back up his stats.
Marte is also signed to a team friendly extension that has two years remaining. He will make $24M over those two years, $11.5M for the 2020 season and $12.5M for the 2021 season. Marte can fit comfortably into any payroll and would be an upgrade for almost any OF in baseball.
Moving forward, Steamer projects Marte to be a 3 win player again in 2020. As he has consistently been a 3-4 Win player, a sudden drop off seems unlikely, unless he suffers some sort of injury. It feels reasonable to project Marte for another 3 wins in 2021. In total, an acquiring team could expect Marte to produce 6 WAR over those two years and using an $8M valuation, would produce $48M in on field value. Marte would have $24M in surplus value to the acquiring team. Thanks to FanGraphs’ research, we can estimate the value of the prospects to see what a fair return would be in terms of prospects.
Now that we have established Marte’s value as we’ve done for other trade candidates, we can trade him all over the league. Each team will have their own internal valuation of Marte and the Pirates will value him the highest of anyone since he is a key piece that will kickstart their rebuild. Since the Mets are the most recently rumored team, we can start with them.
New York Mets
Marte makes perfect sense for a Mets team that hasn’t gotten much production in CF of late. Last season, the Mets ranked 27th in CF production at -0.4 WAR which is not ideal for a team that fancies itself as a contender. Marte would be an instant upgrade and slot at the top of a dangerous lineup featuring Pete Alonso, Jeff McNeil, and Michael Conforto and others. The Mets would have to give up some real value to the Pittsburgh Pirates in order to upgrade from nothing to Marte and it could look something like this:
Mets Get
- OF Starling Marte – $24M Surplus Value
Pirates Get
- SS Andrés Giménez – 50 FV – $28M Expected Value
OR
- 3B Brent Baty – 45+ FV – $8M Expected Value
- RHP Matthew Allan – 45+ FV – $6M Expected Value
- C Francisco Alvarez – 45+ FV – $8M Expected Value
- SS Shervyen Newton – 40 FV – $2M Expected Value
Pirates fans can dream of getting 55FV SS prospect Ronny Mauricio, but unless the Mets really like Marte, don’t value Mauricio, or a bidding war breaks out, it is unlikely they would be able to swing a deal. Giménez is coming off a down year but is still a top 100 prospect that could be an everyday SS with a lefty bat. Mets would be dealing from a position of strength with Amed Rosario and the already mentioned Mauricio ahead on the org chart. This would net the Pirates a SS of the future who will give them wins on the cheap.
The other deal the Pirates could pursue would be for quantity over quality. With the NL Central having four teams competing, the Pirates could opt for higher risk players that are further away. This trade would give them a slew of talent age 20 or less.
Baty is a 3B prospect with huge power, Alvarez brings rare power for a catcher and could be above average behind the plate, Allan has two above average pitches with a chance for a third, and Newton is a switch hitting SS. Brodie Van Wagenen would get his impact player and Cherington would get a crop of talent.
But could the Diamondbacks make a more enticing offer to the Pittsburgh Pirates?
Arizona Diamondbacks
This is another great fit for Marte as he could play CF and Ketel Marte could play 2B or Marte could slide to a corner slot. Mike Hazen has done an excellent job of staying competitive while still acquiring assets and Marte would cement the DBacks as a wild card contender. The question is would Hazen be willing to give up future value to only chase a wild card since they stand little chance of beating the Dodgers. Getting Starling Marte to Arizona would look something like this:
DBacks Get
- OF Starling Marte – $24M Surplus Value
Pirates Get
- CF Alek Thomas – 50 FV -$28M Expected Value OR SS Geraldo Perdomo – 50 FV -$28M Expected Value OR Liover Peguero – 50 FV -$28M Expected Value OR Corbin Carroll – 50 FV -$28M Expected Value
It would be more difficult for Arizona to put together a package of lower level guys because a lot of their minor league depth consists of older prospects that the Pittsburgh Pirates wouldn’t be interested in or players drafted in 2019 Arizona wouldn’t be keen on sending off already. Still, Pittsburgh could select a 50FV prospect from this strong list of players.
Related Story. Marte needs to go to restart rebuild. light
All of them are 20 years old or younger so their ascension would line up with the Pirates next contention period. Thomas profiles similarly to Brett Gardner, Perdomo will likely stick at SS and could grow into a monster, Peguero is Jean Segura with better defensive movements, and Carrol is a prototypical high school outfielder but was just drafted in 2019.
Marte would be an excellent fit for the Chicago Cubs but they haven’t made a single signing and probably couldn’t add anymore payroll. Even with the intradivision concerns, the Cubs could make a competitive offer but it would likely cost what’s left of the farm system. The Dodgers could have some interest in upgrading their OF but they will probably take half a season to assess what their needs are.
Starling Marte would be an instant upgrade for a number of contenders. If the Pittsburgh Pirates don’t find an offer to their liking or Ben Cherington needs more time to set up his player development system, they could wait until the trade deadline in July. There is a risk Marte could get injured or underperform but given his track record, that seems unlikely.
Next. Pirates top ten prospects. dark
There are a number of outfielders still on the market like Yasiel Puig, Nicholas Castellanos, or Marcela Ozuna but none of them are CF capable (unless you really squint at Puig). Whether it’s before spring training or in July, Starling Marte is going to be at the top of a lineup of a playoff team.