The trade market can be funny sometimes. The Reds are a few games under .500, and everyone's waiting on them to blow it up. The Mariners have an even worse record, but they fancy themselves contenders. Ditto for the Red Sox, and there isn't much chatter about them selling off bits and pieces. The Padres aren't ready to give up, and so on and so forth.
And in fairness, the Reds haven't surrendered. That's why they haven't made trades yet. They've really wanted 2015 to be a special year, and getting hot and into the hunt isn't wildly unrealistic. But it is tremendously unlikely, and in their case there are other factors at play -- like, say, Mike Leake's pending free agency. Or more importantly, Johnny Cueto's pending free agency. The Reds are in line to get compensation for losing Cueto as a free agent, but they'd be in line to get more in the event of a trade. Which is why the market is waiting on Cueto to become available. It feels like an inevitability.
So our purpose here: Identify the most fitting places for Cueto to go. It wouldn't be possible to get it exactly right, but we can try something. Now, I understand that Cole Hamels is even more available than Cueto is, and Hamels is his own kind of ace. For sure, Hamels ought to get dealt, and there are some teams for which he'd be a better fit than others. But the Hamels negotiations are complicated, given his contract terms and given his no-trade clause. Cueto's available to anybody. His potential market is simpler to explore.
Maybe the best thing we could do in theory is compare current team playoff odds to what those playoff odds would be if the team were to trade for Cueto and add him to the rotation. That'd be great! But we can't do it. Not easily. So to get around that, I'm instead going to compare current projected team WAR to what that projected WAR would be if a team were to trade for Cueto and add him to the rotation. An extra win doesn't mean the same to the Blue Jays as it would to, say, the Brewers, but we'll address that after the following table.
A quick explanation: Cueto seems healthy, after a bit of an arm scare. There's risk involved, but there's risk with everyone. Cueto's projected to finish out the season, throwing another 108 innings. And while we have him projected for 2.1 WAR the rest of the way, Cueto has a history of out-pitching those numbers somewhat, so let's bump that up to 2.5. So, to every projected team rotation, we're adding 108 innings, and 2.5 WAR.
And then it's just a matter of taking innings away from whomever would stand to lose innings in the event of a Cueto trade. This is, of course, an inexact science, basically nothing more than educated guessing, but then projections are also just educated guesses, and the most important thing is just getting the numbers in the right ballpark. For every team, you could argue a couple tenths of a point. But I did the best I could, not knowing for sure how things would actually go.
This all brings us to the table. By the method above, here are all the teams that aren't the Reds, and how much they might stand to gain, in WAR, by adding Cueto sometime soon:
| Team | WAR Gain |
|---|---|
| Tigers | 2.5 |
| Rangers | 2.4 |
| Phillies | 2.3 |
| Royals | 2.3 |
| Rockies | 2.3 |
| White Sox | 2.2 |
| Indians | 2.1 |
| Braves | 2.1 |
| Brewers | 2.0 |
| Diamondbacks | 2.0 |
| Giants | 1.9 |
| Red Sox | 1.9 |
| Blue Jays | 1.9 |
| Mariners | 1.8 |
| Dodgers | 1.7 |
| Athletics | 1.7 |
| Rays | 1.7 |
| Cubs | 1.6 |
| Astros | 1.6 |
| Marlins | 1.6 |
| Twins | 1.6 |
| Orioles | 1.6 |
| Yankees | 1.5 |
| Nationals | 1.3 |
| Mets | 1.3 |
| Padres | 1.3 |
| Pirates | 1.3 |
| Angels | 1.2 |
| Cardinals | 1.1 |
The first thing you might notice is that the range between either end is fairly limited. This shouldn't be too surprising -- every single team in baseball would be better with Cueto, and no one is projected to give a bunch of innings to pitchers who are worse than replacement level. Maybe this would count as your main takeaway: Practically every contender is a Cueto trade candidate. If you can get better by adding an ace, why not?
But different teams would be differently motivated. The Tigers, for example, wouldn't be thinking the same thing as the Cardinals. Even without Adam Wainwright, the Cardinals have a good amount of starting pitching. If they were to get Cueto, it would be proactive, protecting against further injury or pitchers wearing down. The Tigers, meanwhile, are hovering around .500, and they have absolutely nothing toward the back end of the starting staff. It's not that they don't have an ace, because they already have David Price, but they're by no means assured of a playoff spot.
Then you have the Rangers, who are in an interesting position. Texas is being talked about as a potential candidate for Hamels, but Hamels might well cost more, given his extended contract. Yet this year the Rangers have overachieved, and it's probably worth trying to capitalize on that. Cueto would be available to them for less than Hamels, and while this is a team that the projections don't love (and that doesn't have Yu Darvish), Martin Perez is coming back from injury. Same with Matt Harrison. And of course there's Derek Holland. There's plenty of uncertainty with Texas, but even if you don't buy that team right now, you'd have to buy into it if it added Cueto. It's not a crazy idea.
The Phillies would be hilarious, but nonsensical. Same with the Rockies. So you identify the Royals in there, who are a pretty clear match. The Royals have a pretty bad rotation, and Kris Medlen can do only so much when he comes back. Now, you can make the argument that, because of their deep bullpen, the Royals don't need to trade for a starter. But then they could badly use a No. 1 because Yordano Ventura isn't that guy, and Cueto could give the bullpen a breather. You can't use those guys every day, at least not until the playoffs begin.
Moving on down, you see the Indians, but they have so many upper-level starters they'd probably settle for someone cheap and decent at No. 5. And then you get into the middle tier of contenders on this list, spanning from the Giants to the Yankees. All these teams could use Cueto. All of them could use him almost as much as the teams previously mentioned. Predictably, the Blue Jays and Red Sox rank high, although Boston probably isn't in a position right now to add a front-line rental. The Jays are, and the idea I keep coming back to is a blockbuster package deal for both Cueto and Aroldis Chapman. It fills two needs, and it might make the Jays the best team in the league -- and if I keep thinking about this without it actually happening I'm going to drive myself insane. The Jays should try it! Live a little. I'll stop.
This is but one single way of trying to figure out the best Cueto trade destinations. It's possible there's another way you like better. It's also possible you just don't like this way. But it's something, a starting point if nothing else. And maybe the main point really is that practically every contender in baseball would be better off with Cueto in the rotation. Not every team would be identically better off, but if and when the Reds decide to sell, they're going to want to sound like salesmen.
