Chapter One Trades

I was not planning to make any deals prior to Opening Day, but when opportunity knocks, you have to answer the door. After signing Matz, we were still roughly 105 innings short in our starting rotation, and 117 innings short overall. This was not a devastating problem, obviously, because we felt we could either trade for those innings or plug the gap with some unsavory free agents.

Team Sylvester then came calling, offering both Trevor Bauer and Salvador Perez. Bauer (108 IP in MLB) would have perfectly fit those missing innings, and Perez would have filled a gaping hole behind the plate. Perez would also solve another problem that we can't help but notice about our lineup: it is extremely left-handed. Even against left-handed pitching, our lineup is far too left-handed. Perez, with his 50+ homer right-handed power, would have fit better than perhaps anyone else in the game. The problem was the Team Sylvester wanted Adley Rutschman in return. And that is a non-starter.

With Perez off the table, I inquired about Bauer and reliever Jonathan Loaisiga. In the end, a deal was struck: Bauer and a farm guy (who will be released) in exchange for Henry Davis and our last draft pick. Davis' Cowtippers career lasted about as long as I suspected it would when we acquired him. He served his purpose.

Although Bauer was a good fit, there was a better one. So, I reached out to Flagstaff's new owner, Greg Newgard, and gave him an offer he couldn't refuse. In exchange for Bauer and our top-rated prospect, Austin Martin, we received Lance Lynn and a draft pick in return. That pick was then used to select the only catcher currently on our 35-man roster, Austin Nola.

In the end, we traded Henry Davis and Austin Martin for Lynn -- which is the same trade offer we made to Billy Baseball when he owned the franchise.

We prefer Lynn to Bauer for a few reasons. Lynn is a better fit for our ballpark. We estimated that Bauer's slugging allowed would have been about 26 points higher in Salem. It isn't a deal-breaker, and we could have lived with it, but Lynn is simply a better fit. Lynn also has better-balanced splits than Bauer -- not that that would have been a deal-breaker, either. The biggest advantage to Lynn is that he is signed through 2023 at a reasonable salary, whereas Bauer is very unlikely to pitch in MLB this season.

Our entire pitching staff is now complete:

Starting rotation:

• Lance Lynn: 157-123-18-45-176, 677/553 splits
• Luis Garcia: 155-133-19-50-167, 827/548
• Steven Matz: 151-158-18-43-144, 720/727
• Jon Gray: 149-140-21-58-157, 730/753
• Framber Valdez: 135-110-12-58-125, 717/626
• Shohei Ohtani: 130-98-15-44-156, 733/536
• Ranger Suarez: 106-73-4-33-107, 311/600

Bullpen:

• Ryan Tepera: 61-35-4-19-74, 429/559
• David Bednar: 61-40-5-19-77, 531/611
• Joe Kelly: 44-28-3-15-50, 555/535
• Dominic Leone: 54-37-2-22-50, 501/580
• Jake McGee: 60-44-7-10-58, 496/593
• Gregory Soto: 64-46-7-40-76, 495/696
• Luis Garcia: 33-25-2-8-34, 864/367

Our rotation includes three lefties and four righties. Our bullpen includes five righties and two lefties. We can also use Suarez as a swing man -- which seems like the best way to use him. This is at least a division-winning pitching rotation. Of course, we thought the same a year ago, and look what happened.