Sports

For Philadelphia Phillies and Fans: Happy (Roy) Halladays!

Yeah, yeah, every other publication has probably used the exact same theme - but it can’t be helped this time of year!

The much anticipated trade of Roy Halladay and Cliff Lee has finally been completed. The Philadelphia Phillies get Roy Halladay from the Toronto Blue Jays for minor leaguers, right-handed pitcher Kyle Drabek, outfielder Michael Taylor, and catcher Travis D’Arnaud. Then, the Phillies traded Cliff Lee to the Seattle Mariners for minor league right-handed pitchers, Phillipe Aumont and Juan Ramirez, and outfielder, Tyson Gillies. The Blue Jays then quickly flipped Taylor to the Oakland Athletics for third baseman Brett Wallace.

What does it all mean?

To this Phillies fan, it means that the Phillies got the best pitcher in baseball. That alone makes this trade worth it. I know there are those who think Lee was better, but that’s just not true. Lee was almost perfect in the 2009 postseason, but over their careers and in the last few years, Halladay has been the superior pitcher.

Halladay went 17-10 with a 2.79 ERA and 208 strikeouts last season. He led the AL with four shutouts and nine complete games. Combining his American League and National League stats from last season Lee was 14-13 with a 3.22 ERA and 181 strikeouts. Lee was considerable better in the NL, with a 7-4 record. Of course, he was nearly unhittable in the postseason, going 4-0 with a 1.56 ERA.  However, if you remember, Charlie Manuel didn’t want to use Lee on 3 days rest in the World Series, since he never done that before in his career. Halladay is 4-2, with a 2.79 ERA in six starts on short rest, averaging seven innings per outing. That could have meant no Pedro. Of course, Roy Halladay has never pitched in the postseason.

That right there is why this deal got done. Roy Halladay was willing to accept less money from the Phillies because he wants to be able to pitch in the postseason and have a chance to win a World Series. “I think the older you get, the longer you play in your career, the more important [winning a World Series] becomes”, Halladay said. “The more I play, the more I realize how important that is to me.” Due to that desire, the Phillies were able to sign Halladay to a three-year contract extension for the bargain basement price of $60 million. There is also a $20 million option that becomes guaranteed if he meets all three of the following: pitches 225 innings in 2013… pitches 415 innings combined in 2012 and 2013… and is not on the disabled list at the end of 2013.

While Lee was a relative bargain himself at only $9 million for the 2010 season, he is going to be a free agent after the season. At the Winter Meetings in Indianapolis last week, the Phillies met with Lee’s agent, Darek Brauneker, to try to work out an extension. There are rumors that he asked for CC Sabbathia money (7 years at $23.1 million per season), which is more years and more money than the Phillies were willing to pay a 31 year old pitcher, who really has only had two great seasons in his career. The agent denies this, but the fact that an extension wasn’t signed and these two trades happened would suggest that those rumors are true.

I’m not going to pretend I know much about any of the prospects in this deal, outside of Drabek, but I’ll tell you what I read from Baseball America.

The players acquired by Toronto:

Drabek, 22, was a combined 12-3 with a 3.19 ERA at single-A and double-A. His father is former Cy Young Award winner Doug Drabek. That and a nickel will get you a nickel. Oh, and he had Tommy John Surgery in 2007.

Taylor, 23, hit a combined .320 with 20 HRs and 84 RBI and 21 stolen bases at double-A and triple-A. The Blue Jays must not have thought much of him since they traded him for Wallace immediately. It is thought that the Blue Jays really wanted minor league outfielder, Domonic Brown, but the Phillies refused to part with him.

D-Arnaud, 20, hit .255 with 13 HRs and 71 RBI at Single-A. If you asked me who Travis D’Arnaud was before this trade I would have thought he was one of the Canadian Mounted Police investigating Tiger’s Woods’ doctor with Dudley Dooright. He’s a catcher and that’s all that matters.

The players acquired by Philadephia:

Aumont, 20, was converted from a starter to a closer this past spring. He went 2-6 with 16 saves and a 3.88 ERA in double-A. He also pitched for Canada in the World Baseball Classic. He throws a heavy sinker that will help him immensely pitching at Citizens Bank Park.

Ramirez, 21, was 8-10 with a 5.12 ERA in high single-A. Apparently his home stadium was brutal and he had a 3.09 ERA on the road. His stuff is “top shelf”, but he lacks consistency.

Gillies, 21, hit .341 led the California league with 44 stolen bases at high single-A. He scored 104 runs on 124 games and had a .430 on-base percentage. He’s strictly a slap hitter. For those of you who like completely useless bits of information, he wears hearing aids in both ears.

Keep in mind that the Phillies traded four minor league prospects to the Cleveland Indians for Cliff Lee at the trade deadline last season. Pitchers Carlos Carrasco and Jason Knapp, catcher Lou Marson and infielder Jason Donald are considered second-tier prospects.  Still, you need to at least consider that the Phillies had to give them up originally to end up with Halladay and the three prospects they just received.

In the end I’m happy with this trade. I received relentless crap from people when I said last season that I would have preferred Halladay to Lee. Obviously, Phillies GM Ruben Amaro, Jr agrees with me.

Halladay is a year older than Lee, but he has posted an ERA of under 3.75 in eight of the last nine seasons of his 11-year career. Lee has been one of the top pitchers in the game the last two years, including winning the Cy Young in 2008, but he’s not in Halladay’s class yet. Don’t forget that Lee was so bad in 2007, that he was sent to the minors and was left off of the Indians’ postseason roster. Also, Lee allowed six or more earned runs in six or fewer innings in 3 of his 12 starts with the Phillies. Halladay has had only one start like that in the last two seasons and only five of them in the last five seasons. The man is a stud and he is consistent.

Halladay is perfectly suited for the home run haven that is Citizens Bank Park with his power sinker. He also has a mid 90s four-seam fastball, excellent curve and change-up, and slider. He is 148-76 with a 3.43 ERA in his career. That entire career was in the AL East with the Yankees and Red Sox. He has led the AL in complete games four times and in every one of the last three seasons. He is simply the best pitcher in baseball in my opinion. The facts and statistics seem to back that up.

The only problem I have with this deal is that the Phillies didn’t really have to trade Lee. I understand that they don’t have an unlimited payroll like the Yankees, but their ballpark is a license to print money. The fans sell the place out every game and the team raised ticket prices in the off-season. What, making about $91 million is net profits instead of $100 million isn’t good enough for the owners of the Phillies? They could have kept Lee, with his $9 million salary for 2010, and had possibly the best rotation in the history of baseball. That’s assuming Cole Hamels returns to his 2008 form, but just Halladay and Lee could have been historic.

This feels like the Phillies being cheap, which was their reputation throughout the 1990s. They unsuccessfully tried to trade Joe Blanton, who is looking at about $7 million in arbitration. And they also are on the hook for $8 million to Jamie Moyer in 2010. However, even without being able to shed that money to keep at their target of a $140 million payroll, they should have kept Cliff Lee.

The Phillies also got $6 million from Toronto to offset Halladay’s $15.75 million salary next season, so they should have the money. Even if Lee were to leave in free agency after the 2010 season, they would receive two first round draft picks as compensation. How much worse could that turn out to be than the three prospects that they actually got in return for trading Lee? And watching Lee leave as a free agent would have been a lot easier to take after celebrating a second World Series Championship in three years. I have to wipe the drool from my mouth just imagining what a playoff rotation of Halladay, Lee and Hamels would have looked like.

If only could have had the chance to see it happen.

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