Except Bonds also walked a lot and hit 30-ish homers every year. Even pre-roids, Barry Bonds was one of the best to ever play baseball. Throwing a Bonds comp on Nyjer Morgan is ridiculous.

was/is artificially high this season because of playing left field with the Pirates. He was being compared to other left fielders like Carlos Lee and Adam Dunn. Since, he was (and now is) a centerfielder, it would be expected that his UZR would be much higher than it should because he has a smaller “zone” to cover.

Basically, the zone UZR gives is based on the average defender in that position and left field is generally a place for bad defenders. So, a center fielder (which is typically a place for good defenders) should have a much higher UZR in that position than he would normally. That’s my understanding of UZR at least.

Taveras had high batting averages early in his career too, though. I’d be very surprised if Nyjer hit .238, but I wouldn’t be surprised if he hit, say, .270, in which case he’d be a major drain on his club’s offense.

Milledge is/was/will always be a head case.

Tangible examples, please? I’m sick of hearing this without hearing anything to back it up. When I say “Snell is a headcase,” I can give you at least 5 examples of things that happened while he played in Pittsburgh.

When hes hot he’s HOT. When he’s not, he brings the team down.

Well, yeah. The same can be said for anyone. “When Ted Williams hit .400, he was really valuable. When he hit .250, he wasn’t so good for his team.”

I watched him all last year. The things that stood out to me were the hot shot "me first" antics and the wasted athletic ability. Whether it was him fielding a short in field hit and walking it in so that the base runner could get extra bases

Wait. You know Lastings Milledge is an outfielder, right? So by definition, he never fields infield hits. If you have an issue with infield hits not being fielded properly, perhaps you should take it up with the second baseman or SS, since that is, believe it or not, their job. Not the center fielder’s job.

or it was him staring at his own highlights on the HD replay board.

I can’t say I’d do anything differently if I were a 23 year old kid in the Majors.

Every time he got on base he’d get caught stealing.

Alternately: He had 24 steals for the Nationals and 9 caught stealings. That’s a 72% success rate. Not good, but not as bad as, say…Nyjer Morgan. You know that the OF you’re defending actually leads the league in caught stealing, right?

He had a miserable batting average and got pretty hot hitting clean up at the end of the season.

WHAT?! A player in his first full season has a learning curve?! He didn’t get hot until the end of the season?! HERETIC! TEAM KILLER! ALL FIRST YEAR PLAYERS ARE LIKE DEREK JETER AND BAT .300!

They showed a lot of confidence in him at the beginning of the season, giving him the lead off spot. So he guns his mouth off to the press about how he’s not going to sacrifice his power just to get on base.

And if he has power, that’s reasonable.

What’s he do? Swings for the fences until he got injured and demoted. He made Austin Kearns look desirable.

I’ve seen none of this “swing for the fences every time” mentality since his arrival in Pittsburgh. Perhaps he changed that. Perhaps he never did it and you saw what you wanted to see.

Nyjer’s come in and not just given the fans excitement but he’s made the team raise it’s game a notch. the Nats are scoring more and staying in games better with a reliable guy on defense in center field and a reliable guy at the plate. It’s helped also that the bull pen’s come together as of late.

And as Charlie asked in his original post, how long do you expect that type of production to last from a 29 year old outfielder whose only tool is speed?

…in large part because he’s being strictly platooned.

His career line vs. LHP is .192/.297/.272 . So the rate stats are nice, but they don’t tell the whole story there, value-wise.

The presumption here is that people know how Milledge will turn out based on a few annoying things he did when he was 23. Lots of players who turn out to be stars don’t hit all that well in their first couple years in the majors, and Milledge’s minor league profile says he has a decent chance of becoming a star. Why a team in the Nats’ position would give up a wild card like Milledge for a 29-year-old who has close to a 0% chance of hitting for any power in his career is beyond me. And yes, I think Morgan is going to be a worthless stiff, or at best a fourth outfielder, by 2012, and comparing him to a well-rounded player like Albert Pujols is (as I’m sure you realize) kind of absurd. Not because I hate Morgan, but because he’s banging his head on his ceiling right now—he doesn’t hit for power or draw many walks, and those skills are highly unlikely to ever come along. So his value will always be dependent upon the batting average, and as soon as that starts to slip, he won’t be very helpful. Most otherwise similar players who age well (like Dave Roberts, for example) have at least some foundation in power or walks to sustain them.

I can see why Nyjer made sense for the Nats in the short term. What’s unclear to me is why the Nats would be willing to give up a player who had even a sliver of a chance of helping in the long term for him.

“A GM who looks only at current production and ignores potential is a bad GM, especially for a small market team. But the opposite is true also.”

Er, it is? What business do the Nats have sacrificing future value for short-term value right now?

Isn’t Pujols 29? Are you assuming he will be a worthless stiff by 2012?

Geez, first Burnett, now you’re comparing Nyjmo to Pujols?

Albert Pujols is probably the best all-around hitter in baseball. He hits for average, draws walks, hits for power, and has 10-12 SB speed.

Nyjer Morgan doesn’t walk, ever. He doesn’t hit for power. The only tool he has is speed. Guess which tool is usually the first that a player sees slip away? Ever hear the terms “young player skills” and “old player skills?” Pujols has the tools to be a successful player for 3-5 more years, maybe longer. Nyjer doesn’t.

A lot of other fanbases would say the same about us. I think it’s fair to assume that Nats fans probably know more about the future of the Nats than we do.

If 17 games is enough time to declare a player a bust, then almost every player in baseball has been a bust.

Though I was saying it both before and after the fact regarding the Bucs-Nats trade. I would have loved to see Rizzo pull a Neal Huntington and blow the team up. Most specifically, I think that Rizzo missed a window when he failed to deal Nick Johnson (dealt at the deadline for Aaron Thompson…. at least it was something) and Cristian Guzman (next year’s Austin Kearns, making $8 million to hit a streaky .290 or so with no power, no speed, and rapidly deteriorating defense…. still there) in late May/early June when their value was at its peak. Regarding Dunn and Willingham, I didn’t see the necessity as much. I thought that moving Johnson was much more pressing because of the obvious opening it would create for the Nats to move Willingham or Dunn to first base.

The current defensive alignment is far from perfect, but it’s a step in the right direction. Johnson had been a plus defender when (rarely) healthy for years, but was having a down year there this season. Dunn’s pretty brutal defensively no matter where you play him, but he does less damage at first base than he did in left field. Hammer was the better left fielder, though he’s far from perfect. What adding Morgan allowed the Nats to do more than anything was to shift Dukes (also miscast as a CF). Dukes plays a pretty miserable CF in his own right, but he’s average with the glove and has a big arm in RF.

Regarding Dunn and Willingham, there were several ways to look at both of them. Zimmerman’s ascent (as a hitter… he’s always had the glove) this season has a lot to do with the fact that Dunn’s hitting behind him. Dunn is signed to an expensive (yet affordable enough for a team in a new stadium in Washington, DC) $12 million next season. Simply put, while attendance has been down this season, I’ve gotten the feeling that it would be considerably worse if the virtual guarantee of Dunn’s 40 homers weren’t there. Beyond that, while I love the sell high element (for both of them, but Willingham will be the next paragraph), I don’t get the feeling that Dunn was going to fetch the price that the FO was hoping for. Feel free to argue, but Dunn has had his best season ever with the bat in DC:

Avg.: .285 (2009), .250 (career), .266 (career best)
OBP: .416 (2009), .385 (career), .400 (career best)
Slugging: .575 (2009), .524 (career), .578 (career best… though that was in his shortened rookie season…. his best full season is .569)

I say that screams that the Nats should consider selling him high (particularly to an AL team where his defense doesn’t nullify half of his offensive production), but if nobody’s willing to overpay to get him, there’s no point in selling him.

I view the Hammer differently. Again, he’s having a career year with the bat (.303/.410/.580… lifetime .272/.370/.491). He’s 30, which means he’s likely nearing the end of his peak seasons with the bat. That said, he’s another candidate who I’d have had to be blown away to deal if I were Rizzo. Why? He’s making just south of $3 million this season and he’s under club control for the next two years. Of course, we can expect that he’d get a hefty raise through arbitration/settlement prior to the 2010 season, but I can’t imagine that figure going much over the $5 million mark (on the high end) for next season. The Nats can’t spend with the likes of the Yankees, Mets, Red Sox, etc., but being in Washington would follow that they’re more of a lower mid-market (with the potential to bump the payroll more should they start putting a winning product on the field) team than a small-market team. They’re not the Marlins, and they’re not going to trade a good (not this good, but good) player simply because he’s going to be due a raise through arbitration. Like Dunn, I’d sell him if someone had blown me away (I’d sell him high), but if teams were coming at me with the previous season’s market value, I’d tell them to take a hike.

Would I have liked to see Rizzo move one of them before the deadline? Sure, depending upon the return. I loved what Huntington did for you guys. The Mariners’ treatment of Clement (staying in AAA while roster wastes like Rob Johnson, Kenji Johjhima [no…. Clement won’t make it at C… I know], Mike Sweeney, and Ken Griffey, Jr. were creating outs at record paces) this season made no sense to me, and set himself up to be a nice buy low option for the Bucs. Losing Jack Wilson hurts, but Cedeno has looked pretty flashy with the glove in his own right. Turning a couple of months of Freddy Sanchez into six years of Tim Alderson was pure genius. I even liked the McLouth deal, getting a solid upside arm (Locke), a big-league ready type of arm (Morton), and a future leadoff man (if/when McCutchen moves down in the order) in Gorkys Hernandez…. all while freeing up room for McCutchen. Huntington’s done a great job.

But what my entire response to anything posted here was supposed to be about had little to do with the Milledge/Hanrahan for Morgan/Burnett trade in the first place. It was basically because the story at the top used that one deal to question the Nats’ decision to remove the “Acting” from Mike Rizzo’s title and make him the GM of the Nats. Judging his work on the whole goes far beyond this simple trade. I realize this is a Pirates’ blog, but it seems like the view you’re taking is kind of narrow:

Obviously, the signing of Strasburg (which Kasten and the Lerners certainly had quite a bit to do with, I’m sure) is one of the biggest things that worked in his favor, but that’s not all there is… much like the trade that he made with the Pirates isn’t the only thing that he did which could backfire in the long-term:

- He was placed in an incredibly difficult position to begin the year. Basically, Rizzo was given a shot to run the club on a trial basis, but knew that he would still have to go through the interview process along with several other potentially deserving candidates. For those of you who are saying that the trade with the Bucs was a “win now” move, it was more likely that Rizzo was trying to save his job if “winning now” was his intent. Given most of the general junk he was left in the system by Jim Bowden, this is tougher than it sounds.

- After two years of watching his predecessor fail to lock up face of the franchise Ryan Zimmerman, Rizzo got it done a week into the season.

- He had the balls to get rid of the club’s longest tenured coach (and player, later in the year with Nick Johnson. Both had been with the club since they were in Montreal), Randy St. Claire, because he clearly wasn’t working well with the pitchers. The team was 30th in MLB in ERA under St. Claire… they’ve been 20th, 17th, and 17th since Steve McCatty has taken over.

- He ignored all of the critics and fired Manny Acta at the All-Star Break. I remember reading constantly in the month leading up to the firing from bloggers, columnists, and many of the faithful over at Federal Baseball how it was not Manny’s fault…. how Manny was a “good baseball man” with bad players…. All I’ve thought since the third week of April (and I watch nearly every game they play) is that Manny had lost the team. The effort just didn’t seem to be there, night in and night out. Manny Acta was fired with a 26-61 record. With the same roster, Jim Riggleman is currently 17-17…. and the difference in the effort seen on the field is immeasurable.

- On a much smaller scale, Rizzo achieved something that Jim Bowden failed to do in Alfonso Soriano’s walk year. He traded Nick Johnson. While one of the returns on the loss of Soriano was Jordan Zimmermann, the chances of that turning out as well with the sandwich pick Johnson (assuming he would even have reached Type B Free Agent Status, which remains in question) could have garnered just aren’t that great. Instead, they got a solid prospect in Thompson, who should reach the majors by 2011.

- Finally, he made that deal with the Pirates. The deal removed one player who seemed unwanted in the clubhouse (Milledge) and another who (while he has closer “stuff”) was detrimental to the bullpen. He replaced them with more known commodities. While the club got older in the Milledge/Morgan portion of the deal, it won’t affect how many years of club control they have on any of the players. Milledge has actually accrued more service time than Morgan, while Hanrahan and Burnett would appear to be on pace to hit free agency in the same season. Morgan doesn’t just help the Nats now because he’s more productive at this stage than Milledge is, but he helps to give the least experienced staff in the majors a bit of a safety net for their confidence. Confidence should only help them as they develop.

In Milledge and Hanrahan, the Pirates got the two players with the higher ceiling. They also got the players who are significantly bigger risks. The trade can’t truly be evaluated for another couple of years until we see what Milledge has become (Hanny is what he is…. a guy who can throw flat gas [with no movement] but likes to rely on his slider too much and has trouble finding the strike zone). He makes or breaks the deal for you. Truth be told, you didn’t give up a whole lot to get them, but Morgan was more valuable to the Nats this year (and for the next 3-4 as a great glove in CF) than some of you want to accept. The Nats dealt from excess (believe me… I’m much happier that we held on to the other questionable character guy over Milledge than you would think) to get a need.

Wow, that’s a bad article. Comparing players across eras with no adjustment for context, claiming players are similar when they’re not (Grissom vs. Morgan), not explaining what exactly the terms of comparison are, leaving out less well-regarded players who compare much better to Morgan than lots of players that are listed… and then dismissing folks who use fewer statistics than he does as “idiotic” and “stat-crabs.” That’s just terrible writing.