Revisiting the Giles trade

Oliver Perez, Jason Bay, and the work-in-progress PTBNL Cory Stewart for Brian Giles.

A lot of writers said Littlefield made a "horrible blunder" there because he couldn't get San Diego to take Jason Kendall. One website asked, "This makes us wonder, what was the point on the Pirates side of dealing Giles, if they can't also get rid of Kendall's contract?" The transactions expert for another prominent website wrote that "Stunt Chimp" could have made a better trade. After some false graciousness on the impossibility of Littlefield's situation, the conclusion was this: "That said, clearly, on the surface, Dave Littlefield blew it, not getting an awful lot" for Giles.

As usual, the people who were most wrong (and negative) about the current Pirates franchise were national-audience writers who pay little attention to the Pirates. Take Sports Illustrated's Tom Verducci, for example, who wrote that the trade demonstrated "misguided thinking" and that Littlefield acquired "a whole lot of mediocrity" that "won't bring this franchise back to respectibility." (If you read that link, notice that Verducci leads with a letter from a San Diego fan who writes to gloat confirm his notion that the Padres made out well with the deal.)

Pirate fans live with such nonsense twice. First, we have to endure it as it happens. Then, we have to listen to it as it is recycled by people who know even less of the subject than the "expert" who fed them that line in the first place. Since a majority of all baseball fans are flattered when a guy like Tom Verducci goes negative on any one losing franchise, it's no surprise that such ideas spread and endure. Unless you are a Pirate fan, such essays provide another reason to feel good about your attachment to your team. (I.e., "at least I'm not rooting for that team.")

The thing is, despite the negativity of a lot of writers, most of the fans liked the deal well enough when it went through. Certainly the majority of Pirate fans were willing to wait and see, I think.

It's not wise or possible to evaluate fully any trade until three or four years have gone by. In the meantime, however, the trade is looking OK for the Pirates, and it's pretty safe to say that many analysts rushed to judgment.