Why Matt Garza’s trade value is lower than I think

In Commentary And Analysis by dmick8935 Comments

Earlier today I wrote why Matt Garza's trade value may be higher than I think, or rather higher than the trade value numbers show. Since I wrote about why they may be higher it only makes sense to also spell out why they may be lower. I'm going to do the same thing for Ryan Dempster tomorrow, but some of that is written here already (why he's worth more). 

While Matt Garza threw 133 innings for the Twins in 2006 and 2007, he didn't have his first full season until he was traded to the Rays in 2008. Since then, his FIPs have been 4.14, 4.17, 4.42, 2.95, 4.16. These are  a lot alike with the exception of his first season in Chicago.

It's certainly more valuable than his best season was more recent, but one might look at these numbers and be tempted to throw out 2011. I would never encourage anyone to do this. The numbers happened and they matter. They tell us something, but it's easy to see how some team may look at the years 2008 through 2012 and see that he's been about a 4.2 FIP pitcher with the exception of one season (2011 when he was damn good). 

Fangraphs bases its WAR on FIP and his fWAR has been (since 2008) 2.9, 3.1, 1.6, 5.0, 1.2. He's essentially on pace for about a 2.5 fWAR season if he reaches his ZiPS projection the rest of the way. Not surprising since it's based on FIP, these numbers are all relatively similar with the exception of one season.

He has a 108 career ERA+. That's only 8% better than the league. His ERA+ since 2008 has been 119, 110, 100, 116, 99. Since 2008 his ERA+ is 109. For comparison, Ryan Dempster's is 118. Dempster has had 2 full seasons (2008 and 2009) in which his ERA+ was higher than Garza's best season. Dempster's this year is likely to be higher than any of Garza's best.

Garza has 13.8 fWAR since 2008. Dempster has 18.4. 

Baseball Reference uses runs allowed to calculate WAR. They factor in fielding by using the team defense and then assigning that to each pitcher based on his innings pitched. Garza's rWAR since 2008 has been 3.1, 3.3, 1.3, 2.5, and .5 this year. When you get away from the fielding independent stats, his WAR last season wasn't even the highest in his career. Looking at it this way makes two seasons stand out (2010 and 2012). The others have been close to the same while those two years have been quite a bit worse. 

He has 10.4 rWAR since 2008. Dempster has 15.8. 

Since 2008 Baseball Prospectus has Matt Garza being worth 7.6 WARP while Dempster has been worth 13.1 WARP. 

Ryan Dempster has been a better pitcher over the last 5 years. It's not really even that close and it doesn't matter which value stat you look at. Dempster has only a few months left on his contract and someone wouldn't be crazy to expect acquiring Dempster to be a better trade than one for Garza. Dempster could probably be had for a little less, but maybe not. 

If people believe Matt Garza is worth a whole lot, why do people think Ryan Dempster is going to be worth a lot less? Just because Garza has one year at approximately $12 million in salary left? I don't know. Garza isn't as good as a lot of people think and there's definitely reason to believe he may be worth less in a trade than the numbers show. 

I wouldn't bet on that. I also wouldn't bet on him being worth more.

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  1. Berselius

    Aisle424 wrote:

    For me, it’s always about who plays Catwoman

    Anne Hathaway has been great in everything I’ve seen, but I’m always prejudiced against her because she looks exactly like someone I fucking despised in high school (dying laughing)

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  2. Aisle424

    Anne Hathaway is on my Top 5, so I’m pretty fucking psyched about it. About the only person I’d be more interested in seeing play Catwoman would be Jennifer Aniston, and I think that would be miscasting in everything except how exceptional she would look in the outfit.

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  4. BubbaBiscuit

    @mb21
    He is on as executive producer on Man of Steel just to keep Zack Snyder from doing too much Zack Snyder shit.

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  6. Mish

    I enjoyed Batman Begins a ton, and can entertain it being the better of the two Nolan movies. Though ultimately, I side with the gravity of TDK as my favorite of the two.

    Through 29 reviews on RottenTomatoes (with 4 Top Critics in), TDKR is currently 96% fresh.

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  8. Rice Cube

    I think I like Batman Begins a lot better, in particular because of the origin story. TDK had the better villain (best Joker incarnation I’ve ever seen on the big screen, small sample size etc) but the whole love story angle was annoying. Still a great movie. I especially love how Batman interrogates bad guys in the movies.

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  9. jtsunami

    I wonder how long Christian Bale had to practice his deep Batman voice. I think I’d pick it up pretty well since that’s the voice I use to let my dog know he did something wrong.

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  10. SVB

    Hey MB, considering your generally rosy outlook on the Cubs, (dying laughing), this post seems to sum up what you think Garza’s actual value is, not why it is lower.

    Are there some intangibles I missed on why its lower here than in your trade value assessment from last month? (Like: last year’s numbers artificially good because of pitching in NL central–the opposite of the AL East + value argument; injury history that we don’t know about; make up a la Z; etc.)

    Otherwise maybe the title should be “Why Garza’s trade value is lower than everyone thinks: Recap”. (dying laughing) (dying laughing)

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  11. Rice Cube

    @ jtsunami:
    My feeling is that the animated series Batman voice actor did it est. Bale’s Batman voice was very inconsistent and was the one thing about his version of Batman that I hated most.

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  13. Mish

    @ jtsunami:
    FWIW (and I guess semi-spoiler-but-not-really alert) it appears Bale’s voice in TDKR is less grating than the last two. I, unlike just about everyone else I know, had no problem with Bale’s voice.

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  14. mb21

    @ SVB:
    I didn’t make my point well enough then. This was an argument for why it’s lower than the numbers. Throw last year out and he’s only an OK pitcher who has one year remaining at a pretty high cost. Compare him to Dempster who has been better and may even be better going forward. I didn’t do it very well though. (dying laughing)

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  16. EnricoPallazzo

    whoa, anne hathaway is in the batman movie? in that case, i will definitely be seeing it. that chick is my dream woman. she may be #1 on my all-time list although i would have to think about this.

    also, am i the only person here that thinks the new batman movies are (at best) overrated? i would go so far as to call the last one a piece of disjointed nonsense. and i really don’t get what the big deal is with ledger as the joker. i found his performance to be annoying as hell.

    the only batman movie that i really like is the original michael keaton one, which was fucking awesome. the rest ranged from “unwatchable” to “i guess i don’t have anything better to do for the next few hours.”

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  21. Rice Cube

    @ EnricoPallazzo:
    I think it depends on what your perception of Batman is. I felt the Tim Burton movies were half-campy while the Nolan movies took themselves a bit more seriously and was truer to the fear-inducing, almost superhuman Batman that the comics have portrayed since around the late-70s. That’s why I liked the Nolan Batman movies, though I very much enjoyed the first Michael Keaton movie as well for different reasons.

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  22. Rice Cube

    Q: James Shields might be on the trade block. Want? I doubt the Cubs have anything the Rays want (that the Cubs actually would want to part with that is) but just thought it might be fun to speculate.

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  26. josh

    I haven’t read hardly anything on the blog since last week. Then I come on here and see someone calling Batman overrated. For shame!

    Also, I don’t know why people insist on choosing between Tim Burton’s Batman and Christopher Nolan’s. They’re completely different ideas, each with their own strengths and weaknesses. I don’t see Nolan’s trilogy trying to compete with Burton’s trilogy any more than Start Trek TNG was trying to compete with the Original Series. Different takes on the same basic idea.

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  29. Aisle424

    @ Mish:

    She’s not perfect. She cut her hair. Not a good look for her. I know she only did it to play Fantine in Les Mis, but it can not grow back fast enough.

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  30. WaLi

    @ EnricoPallazzo:
    I enjoyed the first one. I couldn’t get into the second one as much. I also fell asleep a bit in the theaters while watching it (midnight showing and work the next day).

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