Gabriel Moreno, Daulton Varsho Trade Evaluation, Part 1
The Diamondbacks and Toronto Blue Jays made a trade yesterday, exchanging Daulton Varsho for top rated catching prospect Gabriel Moreno and veteran right handed outfielder Lourdes Gurriel. It's time to begin the evaluation of this trade in the in the cold hard morning light of objectivity.
Trades should not be looked at in the vacuum of just the players involved in the deal itself. The entire roster and series of moves, and team surplus and deficits, must all be taken into account. Accordingly Part 1 of this evaluation deals strictly with the surplus trade values of the players involved. Part 2 will take a closer look at what this means in the context of the entire Diamondbacks roster in both the short and long term. These evaluations are being done from a Diamondbacks perspective. Our sister site Inside the Blue Jays has been writing this trade up from their perspective as well.
Part 1: Head to head player evaluations
Back on November 29th I published a Diamondbacks Outfielder Trade Value article. At that time I projected Varsho to have a starting point of 3.5 WAR in 2023 and a total trade value of approximately $77 million by the time he reaches free agency. Since then additional projections have become available that lower his valuations. Recently ZiPS projection system gave Varsho 2.8 WAR in 534 PA and Steamer projections gave him 3.1 WAR in 582 PA. If you average the two, and pro rate that to the same PA total he had last year (592) you arrive at 3.02 WAR.
Here is how the earlier and updated projections line up next to each other:
Original Projection
Updated Projection
Jack Sommers
It may surprise some to see Varsho projecting as a three WAR player by ZiPS and Steamer. After all he is coming off a 4.9 bWAR season. But almost 40% of his WAR value last year came from fielding metrics, which due to sample size and volatility are regressed heavily when projecting subsequent seasons. In any case, that's a wide range between $61M and $77M. I would personally look at the $61 million projection as a floor, and the $77 million as a 60 or 70th percentile projection. (ZiPS 80 the percentile projection is 3.9 WAR)
Now lets move on to Moreno. Based on Mike Hazen's comments last night about playing time I project Moreno to receive about 40% of the catching playing time in 2023. He will probably pinch hit, come in as defensive substitute, and perhaps even occasionally DH as well. In total I project 280 PA for 2023. Taking the average of ZiPS and Steamer and pro rating to 280 PA we arrive at 1.8 WAR. I increase his playing time to 350 PA for the next three years, and then decrease back down to 280 PA for the final two years. That simulates catcher increased vulnerability to injury. What I don't do however factor in any improvement in the player's rate of production over this time. The projection below is based on him being a finished product and not producing WAR at a higher rate than his 2023 projection for the entirety of his contract. His value calculation then comes out to 12.3 WAR and $70 million surplus value.
Conservative Projection, no rate improvement.
Of course projecting only 1890 PA and no improvement in the rate of production above his 2023 projection is extremely conservative. It feels like almost a downside projection. If I increase his rate of production for just the 2024-26 seasons by 0.5 WAR, but still don't move the playing time up and regress him back to the lower rate of production for the final two years we arrive at 13.8 WAR and $82 million surplus value.
Median projection with rate improvement from 2024-26
Jack Sommers
We can now see a reasonable range of outcomes presented above for these two players that are roughly in the same range. $61-77 million for Varsho compared to $70-82 million for Moreno. However there is a large gap in 2023, between $7-11 million surplus value.
This is where Lourdes Gurriel comes in. He is only under control for one season, 2023, and then becomes a free agent. He will earn $5.6 million next year. Neither projection system is especially bullish. The average of the two systems pro rated to 450 PA is 1 WAR. ZiPS is especially low due to a poor opinion of his defense. It's also hard to see Gurriel getting more than 450 PA with current roster construction. So the surplus value Gurriel provides is only about $2.4 million or approximately $5 to $8 million short of filling the 2023 value gap between Varsho and Moreno.
Part 1 Summary Opinion:
In the very near term in 2023, the straight up production and value comparisons between these players look like a net loss for the Diamondbacks. Don't forget Gurriel and Moreno will be taking up two roster spots and cost more money in total and still project to come up short of the projected WAR for Varsho.
In the longer term, focusing on 2024-2026, even the more conservative lower value projection for Moreno almost equals the higher projection for Varsho. ($49 vs 52$ for those three seqsons) If you compare the higher projection for Moreno for 2024-26 against the higher projection for Varsho over the same span the advantage flips to Moreno, $62 to $52. Anything Moreno gives them in 2027 and 2028 is bonus production in this scenario.
In addition, even if using the higher Moreno projection, that is still not reaching the all star levels that are projected for him by Baseball America, which ranks him the third best prospect in baseball. (Technically Moreno is no longer a prospect as he exceeded rookie limit in 2022)
If Moreno is just a solid 2.5-3 WAR catcher for just a few years, the Diamondbacks will have at least broke even or even be slightly better off than they would have been holding on to Varsho. There is always the chance that Moreno turns into a star. As with any young player, there is also the chance he could bust or have his career sidelined by injury.
In Part 2 we will take a look at what this means for the entire roster and how it affects the other player's projections. We will answer the question of whether the overall team projection be better or worse for 2023.
