Murray Chass: The Gagne Deal

You'd think maybe he'd write a piece on what he thought the trade meant for Boston and New York as it pertained to the division, or the teams' respective playoff chances. Or since he claims to be an insider, maybe he could have talked about New York's reaction to the deal. But no, apparently this trade simply signifies Boston's transformation into the Old Yankees, and the Old Yankees' change into Brian Cashman's New Yankees. I guess the Red Sox are MIA. This isn't exactly as deep, meaningful, and informative as I'd have liked my first post to be, but it'll have to do. It's a little hard to follow because Chass sort of jumps around from graph-to-graph. I'll try and paraphrase for Murray a bit:

- The Red Sox foolishly mortgaged their future to add superfluously to an area of strength. Just like the old Yankees.

- The Red Sox looked into trading for Jermaine Dye because JD Drew has been a disappointment. I'm not going to mention the fact that the deal reportedly fell apart because Boston was unwilling to give up its best prospects, since that would go against my "Boston as the Yankees" theme.

- Boston added Eric Gagne to cover the failings of J.C. Romero and Joel Pineiro, which must have left something of a hole in the pen. I have no idea who Manny Delcarmen, Mike Timlin, or Brendan Donnelly are.

- Boston didn't need Gagne. Their bullpen is already fantastic, tops in the AL. They must not have wanted him going to New York.

- Boston dealt Kason Gabbard, who had four wins this season for Boston. FOUR WINS! Who's Curt Schilling?

- I've also never heard of Justin Masterson, Jon Lester, Clay Buchholz, or Michael Bowden. Or Baseball America.

I guess I wasn't aware that the Yanks had the monopoly on deadline deals. Or that adding a postseason weapon without giving up even a single top-15 prospect constituted a sacrifice of the future. Maybe the problem lay with the fact that Boston was already in first? Is it rude for first-place teams to try and improve? Unnecessary? Yankeeish?

Maybe this wasn't even worth a post. Chass' latest wasn't particularly outlandish, insulting, or irresponsible, just poorly written and incredibly pointless. He could have asked a scout about Boston's farm. He could have taken thirty seconds to read reviews of the trade, or had his editor make sure he wasn't contradicting himself in consecutive paragraphs.  But Murray don't roll that way.

Comments

[Kazz]

The Gagne conversation should begin and end with the Sox '07 playoff results (this is assuming that if the Sox collapse so tremendously that they miss the playoffs, Gagne alone can't possibly be responsible). That's what we got him for, after all.

So let's pick this conversation back up in October.

[Hudson]

The only thing anyone needs to know about Chass are the last three letters of his name.

[Hudson]

(Yeah, I make some version of that joke every time he's cited here. He truly is the worst sportswriter currently working for a major U.S. newspaper.)

[SF]

This article is just phenomenally bad. From a Hall of Famer, to boot.

There is no logical consistency to the piece, as Josh points out. Worse, the article illustrates that Chass doesn't really get what the Yankees and Sox are doing now, which is building a deep farm system to allow for deadline deals that don't tie the organizations' hands for years to come. Chass doesn't even get that Gagne was NOT salary-dumped by the Rangers - he was a smart signing traded at peak value, sure to leave as a free agent. He was owed less than $3M (plus whatever bonuses he was guaranteed by the Sox), and he brings at least one, if not two, sandwich picks in return next year to the Sox. So effectively the Sox have traded three prospects for Gagne + 2 prospects, perhaps better prospects than they gave up, even. Last year's Abreu deal was similar for the Yankees, even if more expensive (and more of dump for their trade partner). They exploited their organizational depth to acquire a player for the short term and not at a ridiculous cost considering the market and quality of the player.

Clearly Chass has no idea what Gagne is being paid, he has no idea what the Sox' farm system has, he knew nothing about the players involved in the deal (all he saw was "three young guys for a veteran" and jumped to conclusions), and he just doesn't understand what the Yankees and Sox are now doing, using their vast resources to stock a deep farm system and trade pieces for cost-effective, short-term, non-binding help. It's literally a stupid article.

[YF]

SF: I'm not sure how many picks Gagne will draw--where did you read that?--but otherwise i agree. Also, could we point out that the Sox were the team dumping salary: they drop 2 deals in exchange for the couple months of Gagne. It's more of a wash than anything.

[TJ]

The Sox are going to call up Brandon Moss, no details on why or what move will be made to make room.

[SF]

Gagne brings at least one sandwich pick, and two if he's re-classified as a Type A free agent. Not sure when they make the determination, or the complicated formula. If he's not a Type A, it's one pick, if he's a Type A it's two. Either way, the pick can't be ignored as a component of the deal (which I know you aren't doing).

[Brad]

Hinske will be taking the next series, and maybe the one after that off. I heard on EEI that he has a real serious family issue to take care of. Moss is getting the callup to replace him.

[Paul SF]

Yeah, Hinske's wifehas had a difficult pregnancy and is due to deliver, and his grandmother just died. Rough time for him.

[Brad]

Wait, I just heard that the Pale Sox (as Yankee fans have so aptly named them) claimed Tejada off of waivers? When did this happen? Is this true? Anybody?

[Brad]

Ep. Nevermind. I found the story. How is it even possible that Angelos puts Tejada on waivers, then can't work out a trade for him? You have to think that Tejada is NOT happy about this at ALL. What a terrible front office there.

[DAW]

After the trade deadline, teams usually put as many players on waivers as possible- many of which they have no interest in moving. It's a way of disguising their true trade intentions.