Needs mo’ Ranch.

For some reason, I’ve been getting Alfredo Simon and Henry Simon confused for a while now. Why is this? I have no idea. There is not any logical basis to this confusion.

There are quite a few players that we got in those trades that I didn’t need to see as Giants.

The AJ and Hillenbrand trades were the worst, but they kind of made some sense at the time.

5) and 9) were OK, 4) was a salary dump.

6) (I for one will now always refer to this trade as “6” to avoid mentioning any actual names) was of course horrific in hindsight, but was rated a “meh” at the time.

The rest of them are mostly crap for crap, except Bill Mueller, who commited the cardinal sin of getting on base.

Thank you for responding to my lengthy, wordy treatise, zen. Here’s something even wordier…

I think it makes a lot more sense to evaluate trades based on how they worked out after the fact, rather than simply passing judgment on trades (and FA signings) based on whether or not they adhered to generally accepted criteria for making good trades and signings.

There’s some similarity here to the way the general sports media likes to give grades to NFL teams each year, just a day or two after the draft has been completed. For sure, there’s criteria and history available, enough to allow some good forecasting of whether or not a draftee will be a successful pick or a bust in the NFL. But mostly these draft grades are merely a grading of how well each given team followed the conventional wisdom and generally accepted criteria for good drafts. All well and good, I suppose, but not nearly as useful as taking a look back 3-5 years from now and giving the grades based on how the draft picks actually performed. But the people want analysis now, and there are newspapers and magazines that need to be sold, and ESPN ratings to be considered.

There are several problems with evaluating trades right after they’ve occurred, primarily with the info at hand, or by using our criteria for what we consider to be the basis for a good trade:

1. Incomplete information; A good GM is able to evaluate a given player using statistics, scouting, inside information (maybe a player being considered has personal habits or character issues that could be a problem down the road), and even his own hunches and intuition. You and I pretty much only have our statistics and maybe a little scouting if we’re able to watch a good number of games. And of course we have our own intuition.
   A good GM should be able to outperform any of us in making trades, using the extra information he has available, along with the extra time and resources he has to devote to the task. It is, after all, his full-time job. He gets paid well to do this job, and he has a sizable number of (hopefully) expert people at his disposal to help with that job. When you and I evaluate trades, based on the limited information we have available, we are at a distinct disadvantage, with information that is incomplete, and analysis that is often flawed.
   The fact that our analysis as fans in many cases seems to outperform that of Sabean underscores how little and how poorly he uses statistics—the most important of the evaluation criteria. I also think that Sabean has had people around him who have the same basic perspective in evaluating players as he has. This has shown slight signs of change (on a very limited basis), with the hiring of John Barr and the reassigning of Jack Hiatt and Matt Nerland. But nothing seems to have changed in the acquisition of major league players department.
2. Sample size is tiny (as I noted), but we don’t have the luxury with a GM of compiling sufficient sample size before we can pass judgment. I think we can study Sabean’s body of work right now and see that his ability to evaluate players and make productive trades is badly lacking, particularly over the past 6-7 years.
3. Different people have different criteria. When trades are made, there’s no shortage of opinions, many of them divergent—even among the well-informed. What happens when we don’t agree on whether a good trade has been made? What is the deciding factor? We wait and see how the trade turns out and decide if it was a good trade based on that.
4. Results are a more efficient criteria; If a hitter looks great at the plate, seems to have a great approach, and keeps getting good swings, but simply is failing to produce anything, a team eventually has to replace him. If our GM kept making deals that we all hailed and admired, but the players acquired (and the team) continually failed, eventually the GM would have to go. Of course it’s a lot easier to size up Sabean because he doesn’t have a good approach, and the fact that his system for evaluating players (particularly hitters, as you noted) is badly flawed is painfully obvious to even casual observers.
5. What you call “chance” might be undiscovered or unacknowledged criteria. This isn’t to deny that chance and/or “luck” exist—just as they do in hitting (which is why we pay attention to things like BABIP). Then again, I think there’s something to the saying, “I’d rather be lucky than good”. To put it another way, I don’t believe we know all there is to know about evaluating baseball talent. If there is someone out there who has ideas that go completely against the grain of what we think we know, but is also able to get proven results, I’ll take that guy every time over the guy who follows our preferred sabremetric criteria, but whose players still do not succeed.
6. Good information and good analysis do not equal flawless forecasting; We’ve all been surprised by seemingly bad trades that turned out great, and by seemingly good trades that turned out to be disastrous. I think it makes a great deal more sense to evaluate a GM based on his actual results, rather than whether or not he follows the proper doctrinaire. Don’t get me wrong—good evaluating criteria is important. It’s what made me start suspecting that Sabean really didn’t know what he was doing. But, as they say, “the proof is in the pudding”. Six years of bad Giant pudding, as shown in jctGamer’s spreadsheet, are what really nail home the conclusion that Sabean has utterly failed.
7. Wins and losses, and Championships are the ultimate measure of a GM’s success. In the end it doesn’t really matter whether or not you and I approve of Sabean’s moves. It matters that Sabean puts productive players on the roster and productive teams on the field.

I don’t think any of us will ever stop evaluating trades as they occur, or attempting to establish and improve on the criteria we use to effectively forecast whether trades are likely to be helpful or not. But I do think it’s important to strive to evaluate results in as objective a manner as possible.

By the way, I agree 100% with what you said about Sabean’s evaluation of offense. I guess I’ll save those thoughts for a fan post or something.