Wednesday, December 13, 2006
Astros Acquire Jennings From Rockies
The Houston Astros announced Tuesday that they acquired starting pitcher Jason Jennings and reliever Miguel Ascencio from the Colorado Rockies.
In return, the Rockies will receive center fielder Willy Taveras and two young pitching prospects, Jason Hirsch and Taylor Buchholz.
The move appears to be the Astros' way of moving on from Andy Pettitte, who signed a 1 year, $16 million contract with the New York Yankees on Friday.
The move does shore up the Astros' rotation a bit. Jennings, who posted his career best ERA at 3.78 last season, does bring some experience to a rotation that will be reeling with the loss of Pettitte and with Roger Clemens playing his usual games. Ascencio should actually bolster the pen as well.
The big problem is that the Astros overpaid. Including Taveras in the deal is fine. Although he is a speedster and has great range in center field, he just never seemed to develop into the leadoff and base stealing threat that 'Stros fans thought he could be, although yours truly thinks that it wouldn't have hurt if someone taught him to dive back into first base headfirst.
The golden rule of GMs in baseball is that you never trade your top pitching prospect. That is exactly what the Astros did by throwing Hirsch into the deal. While Buchholz seemed expendible, Hirsch is the real deal. Although he has seen a small sample size in the bigs, he absolutely dominated the opposition at ever level he pitched at. Unfortunately, pitching in the thin air may never allow Hirsch to reach his full potential, even with humidifiers.
Speaking of the thin air, you never know what you are getting when you pick up a former Colorado pitcher. Jennings had an ERA of 3.78 last season, but it was his first season with an ERA under 4.50. He has never won more than 12 games in a season.
The thing that really bugs me about the deal though is that Jennings will be a free agent after this year. With the Astros typically not being the team to be the highest bidder on free agents (this season being the exception), if Jennings does have a breakout year the Astros will lose their chance of keeping him long term. Multiple sources have said that Jennings is a hothead, and that he had already turned down a long term contract paying $9 million/year from the Rockies. If he heads to the Juicebox and puts up career numbers, you can bet that Jennings will demand $12 million/year. If he stinks up the joint than you may not want to resign him anyway.
If either of those scenarios come true, and I could see them happening, then the Astros just traded at 24-year old center fielder with two years of Major League experience and 24- and 25-year old pitching prospects for a starting pitcher that noone is completely sure about. Even if Jennings has a decent year and the Astros can resign him, that is still quite a price to pay for an unproven commodity.
In return, the Rockies will receive center fielder Willy Taveras and two young pitching prospects, Jason Hirsch and Taylor Buchholz.
The move appears to be the Astros' way of moving on from Andy Pettitte, who signed a 1 year, $16 million contract with the New York Yankees on Friday.
The move does shore up the Astros' rotation a bit. Jennings, who posted his career best ERA at 3.78 last season, does bring some experience to a rotation that will be reeling with the loss of Pettitte and with Roger Clemens playing his usual games. Ascencio should actually bolster the pen as well.
The big problem is that the Astros overpaid. Including Taveras in the deal is fine. Although he is a speedster and has great range in center field, he just never seemed to develop into the leadoff and base stealing threat that 'Stros fans thought he could be, although yours truly thinks that it wouldn't have hurt if someone taught him to dive back into first base headfirst.
The golden rule of GMs in baseball is that you never trade your top pitching prospect. That is exactly what the Astros did by throwing Hirsch into the deal. While Buchholz seemed expendible, Hirsch is the real deal. Although he has seen a small sample size in the bigs, he absolutely dominated the opposition at ever level he pitched at. Unfortunately, pitching in the thin air may never allow Hirsch to reach his full potential, even with humidifiers.
Speaking of the thin air, you never know what you are getting when you pick up a former Colorado pitcher. Jennings had an ERA of 3.78 last season, but it was his first season with an ERA under 4.50. He has never won more than 12 games in a season.
The thing that really bugs me about the deal though is that Jennings will be a free agent after this year. With the Astros typically not being the team to be the highest bidder on free agents (this season being the exception), if Jennings does have a breakout year the Astros will lose their chance of keeping him long term. Multiple sources have said that Jennings is a hothead, and that he had already turned down a long term contract paying $9 million/year from the Rockies. If he heads to the Juicebox and puts up career numbers, you can bet that Jennings will demand $12 million/year. If he stinks up the joint than you may not want to resign him anyway.
If either of those scenarios come true, and I could see them happening, then the Astros just traded at 24-year old center fielder with two years of Major League experience and 24- and 25-year old pitching prospects for a starting pitcher that noone is completely sure about. Even if Jennings has a decent year and the Astros can resign him, that is still quite a price to pay for an unproven commodity.
# posted by Bevo @ 9:59 PM 
