Pirates to deal Gonzalez to Braves for LaRoche

Pirates to deal Gonzalez to Braves for LaRoche

I couldn't believe this when I read it! The Atlanta Braves take their blossoming premier slugger, 27-year old first baseman Adam LaRoche who finally had his breakout year in his third season, and trade him away for who? Mike Gonzalez, a closer for the Pirates who barely pitches 50 innings a season, and who despite a lucky 2.17 ERA has a 1.35 WHIP!

Look at these numbers:

149 games
492 AB's
32 HR's and 38 doubles
A .285-.354-.561 line, for a .915 OPS

What does that make LaRoche. The #10 (yes, top TEN) best OPS in the NL among qualifiers, and certainly the highest on Atlanta's own team (Chipper Jones and Brian McCann had higher, but didn't play enough to qualify). And this from a guy who was showing progressive growth even month-by-month in 2006, no less. Check out his pre- and post- all-star splits:

		G	AB	R	H	2B	3B	HR	RBI	BB	K	SB	CS	AVG	OBP	SLG	OPS
Pre All Star		83	263	40	66	21	0	13	42	30	66	0	1	.251	.325	.479	.805
Post All-Star		66	229	49	74	17	1	19	48	25	62	0	1	.323	.387	.655	1.042

Yes, the bullpen was bad, but that shouldn't delude any team into a disproportional trade accounting for only their needs and strengths.

Mike Gonzalez isn't even a good pitcher! The classic high-WHIP reliever getting by on pure luck - as a starter, having that 1.30+ WHIP will blow huge runs over the course of the game, and eventually over the season relievers will do the same. He can't even be judged on his previous year numbers - before 2006 as the Pirates' closer he was strictly a left-handed specialist - you can't project those numbers at all if you plan to actually use him as a full-time reliever.

Bad bad move. God I wish we had a baseball general management major here at Berkeley