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Blue Jays Discussion: Saunders > Bruce; Tulo and Bautista trade DL spots

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Longshot

Longshot

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Jul 2, 2008
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Can somebody refresh my memory, what was the word on Devon Travis when the Jays acquired him? The more I see him play, the more I think he has the potential to be a big star and, barring that, a very productive/above average player.

How did the Jays get him for Gose?

In hindsight, the deal looks like complete steal for the Jays. I'm curious if there was something about Travis at the time that was a red flag.
 
The Nemesis

The Nemesis

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Apr 11, 2005
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Longshot said:
Can somebody refresh my memory, what was the word on Devon Travis when the Jays acquired him? The more I see him play, the more I think he has the potential to be a big star and, barring that, a very productive/above average player.

How did the Jays get him for Gose?

In hindsight, the deal looks like complete steal for the Jays. I'm curious if there was something about Travis at the time that was a red flag.
Click to expand...

I think he was viewed as a guy who would be a decent everyday guy, but not a top tier player at his position. His biggest skill was a contact bat. He wasn't supposed to have a ton of power and he was supposed to be passable with the glove.

Even if he just topped out as an OK everyday player he was still a good acquisition vs Gose just because Gose's biggest problem was (and is) contact hitting to the extent of keeping him out of the lineup. Travis' negatives were never enough to hold him back nearly that much.
 
Kurtz

Kurtz

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Longshot said:
Can somebody refresh my memory, what was the word on Devon Travis when the Jays acquired him? The more I see him play, the more I think he has the potential to be a big star and, barring that, a very productive/above average player.

How did the Jays get him for Gose?

In hindsight, the deal looks like complete steal for the Jays. I'm curious if there was something about Travis at the time that was a red flag.
Click to expand...

I believe the biggest knock on him was his defense.


...damn. On father's day too....
 
Longshot

Longshot

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The Nemesis said:
I think he was viewed as a guy who would be a decent everyday guy, but not a top tier player at his position. His biggest skill was a contact bat. He wasn't supposed to have a ton of power and he was supposed to be passable with the glove.

Even if he just topped out as an OK everyday player he was still a good acquisition vs Gose just because Gose's biggest problem was (and is) contact hitting to the extent of keeping him out of the lineup. Travis' negatives were never enough to hold him back nearly that much.
Click to expand...

I seem to remember hearing he was a good hit/poor fielder kind of guy. Which appears to have been nonsense.

My memory might be bad, but I seem to recall by that time Gose had pretty much burned out as a top tier prospect and was viewed as a 4th OF kind of a guy. I also remember the feeling in Detroit was they had Kinsler and didn't need Travis. A dumb way to look at things in my view. It would be like the Jays saying a couple years ago: "We have Reyes, so no need for Goins."
 
TootooTrain

TootooTrain

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Kinsler was acquired which instantly made him available aswell if they could upgrade another area of need. Mainly outfield/defense. They were thinking about transitioning Travis to the outfield but I don't think they were too keen on it.
 

habamillions

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TootooTrain said:
Kinsler was acquired which instantly made him available aswell if they could upgrade another area of need. Mainly outfield/defense. They were thinking about transitioning Travis to the outfield but I don't think they were too keen on it.
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Interesting about kinsler too is that the jays had a trade in place for him but Ian didnt want to come to toronto
 
Scrub*

Scrub*

Team Canada
Dec 28, 2008
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Travis was being tried as an outfielder with Detroit in the minors because they got Kinsler. Then we offered Gose for him straight up and moved him back to 2nd base.

Gose was an incredible talent but he can't hit and every opportunity he has to show off his arm he does it, but thats not always the right play.
 
Canada4Gold

Canada4Gold

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Dec 22, 2010
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Morgs said:
He's worth of the all-star game for sure, I just don't think he's been the best offensive outfielder in baseball... (Other than the past week or so).
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Statistically he's been the best outfielder in baseball. Offensively anyway, which is what all star nominations tend to be more based off of.

For all players he's 3rd in wRC+(the best all encompassing offensive stat), and 3rd in OPS. For only outfielders he's 1st in both, along with 8th in HR's, 3rd in average, 2nd in offensive portion of WAR, 13th in WAR.

Among only AL outfielders he's 1st in average, 2nd in offensive portion of WAR, 5th in HR's, and 7th in WAR, along with those other 1st's from above as well.

The defense drags it down a little bit(Pillar has a better fWAR for example), but like I said before the all star game is based moreso on offensive stats. He won't get voted in obviously, but if he's not named as a reserve I'll be absolutely shocked

He's was really solid before last week, and last week has certainly bumped him into that conversation. Luckily for him last weeks stats count just like any other week.
 
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Canada4Gold

Canada4Gold

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Canada4Gold said:
Statistically he's been the best outfielder in baseball. Offensively anyway, which is what all star nominations tend to be more based off of.

For all players he's 3rd in wRC+(the best all encompassing offensive stat), and 3rd in OPS. For only outfielders he's 1st in both, along with 8th in HR's, 3rd in average, 2nd in offensive portion of WAR, 13th in WAR.

Among only AL outfielders he's 1st in average, 2nd in offensive portion of WAR, 5th in HR's, and 7th in WAR, along with those other 1st's from above as well.

The defense drags it down a little bit(Pillar has a better fWAR for example), but like I said before the all star game is based moreso on offensive stats. He won't get voted in obviously, but if he's not named as a reserve I'll be absolutely shocked

He's was really solid before last week, and last week has certainly bumped him into that conversation. Luckily for him last weeks stats count just like any other week.
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Gonna add to this, in no way do I believe that Saunders is the best offensive outfielder in baseball. Just in the first 2.5 months of the season it can easily be argued that he has been. 2.5 months isn't a large enough sample to expect the best offensive outfielder in the league out of Saunders moving forward.
 

Discoverer

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Canada4Gold said:
Gonna add to this, in no way do I believe that Saunders is the best offensive outfielder in baseball. Just in the first 2.5 months of the season it can easily be argued that he has been. 2.5 months isn't a large enough sample to expect the best offensive outfielder in the league out of Saunders moving forward.
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Yeah, this is basically what I was saying with my initial post: not that he IS the best offensive player, not that he will be going forward, just that he has been so far. By wRC+, the best catch-all offensive stat we have, he has been.
 
metafour

metafour

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Longshot said:
Can somebody refresh my memory, what was the word on Devon Travis when the Jays acquired him? The more I see him play, the more I think he has the potential to be a big star and, barring that, a very productive/above average player.

How did the Jays get him for Gose?

In hindsight, the deal looks like complete steal for the Jays. I'm curious if there was something about Travis at the time that was a red flag.
Click to expand...

Travis was seen as a diminutive player with a good feel for hitting and average-ish tools across the board. This led to a label for him as a guy with a "low ceiling" and bottom-tier starting upside. What ended up happening is that several of his tools have seemingly played up a lot better than most people expected, notably his defense (which was projected as average at best) and his power his has surprised a lot of people. He's simply a guy who was undervalued as a prospect by most, likely due to the fact that he was an infielder who wasn't very big on top of not being "fast"/average athletically. It should be noted that there were writers who were legitimately high on him due to his advanced hitting pedigree, in retrospect to idiots like Keith Law who simply wrote him off immediately.
 
Eyedea

Eyedea

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4 of the next 5 pitchers the Jays face are lefties, the only righty being Miguel Gonzalez. Mind you they get Sale on the final game of the Chi Sox series.
 
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