White Sox Acquire RP Tony Pena from ARI for Brandon Allen

[caulfield12]

Seems we've done pretty well in our last few trades with the D-Backs (yes, the Chris Young trade has tipped, despite the Phil Rogers campaign to keep bringing it up when Young was playing so well for 1 1/2 seasons), no reason to think we'll end up getting hosed on this one, as our scouts know their system inside and out.

[caulfield12]

A bit yes, but not a precipitous plummet for either player. Shelby’s falloff being more significant then Allen’s.

 

 

At the same time, Viciedo's "disappointing" start in AA (depending on your perspective....looking at all factors, age, defensive progression, offensive adjustments, etc.) probably deems him to be slipping less than Brandon.

 

Obviously, Hudson is the one that is being lauded and praised as jumping, but we have to see a lot more from him at AA to begin projecting him as a 3 starter.

 

I keep hearing Shirek's name as well...but continue to be "bullish" on Santeliz and Omogrosso having more of an impact that Shirek.

[Jordan4life_2007]

Brandon Allen was #99 0n Baseball Prospectus' Top 100.

http://www.baseballprospectus.com/article.php?articleid=8506

John Sickels had him in his top 100 picture, he also had him ranked 4th amongst our prospects

 

http://www.minorleagueball.com/2008/12/22/...te-sox-top-20-p

 

http://www.minorleagueball.com/2008/9/17/6...rospect-brandon

 

Prospect Rankings*

2009 - #4 ranked for CHW

http://www.baseballamerica.com/today/prosp...009/267205.html

 

 

*According to Baseball America

 

Brandon Allen was more then relevant to any prospect buff. Be more constructive with your feedback, please.

 

I admit I goofed when skimming through Baseball Prospectus' list. I obviously skimmed too fast because I didn't see his name in their list. And did you read the whole post? I know Brandon was viewed as a top WHITE SOX prospect by many minor league sites. Again, there's a big difference in being a team's top prospect and a top overall prospect. Lance Broadway was one of our top 3 prospects three years ago. He wouldn't have made any other team's top 20 outside of maybe the Astros.

Edited July 8, 2009 by Jordan4life

[caulfield12]

Russell, McCulloch, Silverio, Andy Gonzalez, Adam Russell, etc.

[Chicago White Sox]

Brandon Allen was #99 0n Baseball Prospectus' Top 100.

http://www.baseballprospectus.com/article.php?articleid=8506

John Sickels had him in his top 100 picture, he also had him ranked 4th amongst our prospects

 

http://www.minorleagueball.com/2008/12/22/...te-sox-top-20-p

 

http://www.minorleagueball.com/2008/9/17/6...rospect-brandon

 

Prospect Rankings*

2009 - #4 ranked for CHW

http://www.baseballamerica.com/today/prosp...009/267205.html

 

 

*According to Baseball America

 

Brandon Allen was more then relevant to any prospect buff. Be more constructive with your feedback, please.

 

Thank you for pointing these rankings out. It's clear that he’s a respected prospect in the minor league baseball community (and not just Soxtalk). The guy is a young, left-handed hitter with outstanding physical tools. Last season his power increased, even though he played in a notorious pitchers park, and his plate discipline greatly improved. The kid looked like he might have taken a huge step forward. He appeared to have the ceiling of a slightly, above average first baseman. There is a ton of value in a player of that caliber.

 

Yes, he has been somewhat of a disappointment this year (from a power perspective), but he is still only 23 years old. His plate discipline at AA was actually better this season and shouldn’t be ignored. He may never put it all together, but it’s still way too early to write him off. And to be honest, I don't recall anyone on this board saying Brandon Allen was the next Ryan Howard. I like some people really liked his long-term potential and improvement at the plate last season. Perhaps he’s slightly overrated, but not to the degree this website is claiming.

 

As for the trade, I have no problem acquiring Pena and don’t hate using Allen to get him. I don’t like losing a potential left-handed power bat, but I trust that Kenny has another plan in mind to eventually replace Thome’s bat. One thing I don’t agree with is that we have a glut of first basemen waiting in the wings. We need Flowers to stay at catcher for obvious reasons. I love Dayan’s raw talent, but it’s way too early to pencil him in anywhere, especially first base. Phegley was just drafted, but for some reason everyone here has him on their three year board. Hell, the guy might never make out of A ball, let’s wait a while longer before judging him. Last, Fields is NOT a solution at first base. The guy couldn’t stick at third, why would we count on him at an even more offensive-minded position. If Paulie can keep this up, then this whole point is moot. I’ll be happy to keep him around for another couple of seasons. I still think the Sox should target a slugger (left-handed preferably) in the early rounds of next year’s draft.

 

[Jordan4life_2007]

Thank you for pointing these rankings out. It's clear that he’s a respected prospect in the minor league baseball community (and not just Soxtalk). The guy is a young, left-handed hitter with outstanding physical tools. Last season his power increased, even though he played in a notorious pitchers park, and his plate discipline greatly improved. The kid looked like he might have taken a huge step forward. He appeared to have the ceiling of a slightly, above average first baseman. There is a ton of value in a player of that caliber.

 

Yes, he has been somewhat of a disappointment this year (from a power perspective), but he is still only 23 years old. His plate discipline at AA was actually better this season and shouldn’t be ignored. He may never put it all together, but it’s still way too early to write him off. And to be honest, I don't recall anyone on this board saying Brandon Allen was the next Ryan Howard. I like some people really liked his long-term potential and improvement at the plate last season. Perhaps he’s slightly overrated, but not to the degree this website is claiming.

 

As for the trade, I have no problem acquiring Pena and don’t hate using Allen to get him. I don’t like losing a potential left-handed power bat, but I trust that Kenny has another plan in mind to eventually replace Thome’s bat. One thing I don’t agree with is that we have a glut of first basemen waiting in the wings. We need Flowers to stay at catcher for obvious reasons. I love Dayan’s raw talent, but it’s way too early to pencil him in anywhere, especially first base. Phegley was just drafted, but for some reason everyone here has him on their three year board. Hell, the guy might never make out of A ball, let’s wait a while longer before judging him. Last, Fields is NOT a solution at first base. The guy couldn’t stick at third, why would we count on him at an even more offensive-minded position. If Paulie can keep this up, then this whole point is moot. I’ll be happy to keep him around for another couple of seasons. I still think the Sox should target a slugger (left-handed preferably) in the early rounds of next year’s draft.

 

A constructive, well thought-out post! Doomsday must be near. This is what I'm talking about. I'm not saying you're an idiot if you're not crazy about this trade. You don't even have to like it. There's just a certain way of expressing yourself without coming off like an irrational, arrogant, know-it-all.

[Vance Law]

Frankly, that's exactly what this sounds like. Except we gave up more than Joe Borchard.

 

 

Minor league stats

 

Allen 569 games .787 OPS as a 1st baseman

 

Borchard 712 games .823 OPS mostly as a CF/RF

 

 

 

Is there anything that suggests that Allen would be a better hitter than Josh Fields, who can be a low-cost first baseman if that is what we need?

[VAfan]

I didn't learn about this trade until late last night. And the first thing that popped into my head was that I'm 100% certain that all of Soxtalk is going absolutely apes*** right about now. And after reading through this thread, you guys certainly didn't disappoint.

 

First of all, who the hell is anybody from this god damn message board to say with absolute certainty (or even 50% certainty) that the Sox "could've gotten more" for Brandon f***in' Allen? Unless you can find a direct quote from any one of the 28 other general managers in baseball clearly stating they would've traded the Sox a lot more than Tony Pena for Brandon Allen then please, with all due respect, STFU! Because all you do is make yourself look and sound incredibly stupid. I like this board overall. But the ignorance/arrogance around here at times is simply incomprehensible. Unless your JPN or Scenario or BHAMBARONS and you happen to live close by one of our minor league affiliates or you're a subscriber to MILB.com, most of you have never seen a single f***ing live Brandon Allen at-bat. And that includes me. s***, I love to track prospects. But I have no first-hand knowledge about any of these guys. All I can do is go by stats, scouting reports, ect. Yet we've got message board "experts" around here on their f***ing high horses acting like they know more than guys that get PAID FOR A LIVING to scout and break these guys down? Get the f*** outta here. Brandon Allen for the most part appears to be a solid prospect. He could be really good, bad or somewhere inbetween. Who knows? And we won't know for a while. So let's stop acting like we traded away the next Ryan Howard.

 

[greg775]

I didn't learn about this trade until late last night. And the first thing that popped into my head was that I'm 100% certain that all of Soxtalk is going absolutely apes*** right about now. And after reading through this thread, you guys certainly didn't disappoint.

 

First of all, who the hell is anybody from this god damn message board to say with absolute certainty (or even 50% certainty) that the Sox "could've gotten more" for Brandon f***in' Allen? Unless you can find a direct quote from any one of the 28 other general managers in baseball clearly stating they would've traded the Sox a lot more than Tony Pena for Brandon Allen then please, with all due respect, STFU! Because all you do is make yourself look and sound incredibly stupid. I like this board overall. But the ignorance/arrogance around here at times is simply incomprehensible. Unless your JPN or Scenario or BHAMBARONS and you happen to live close by one of our minor league affiliates or you're a subscriber to MILB.com, most of you have never seen a single f***ing live Brandon Allen at-bat. And that includes me. s***, I love to track prospects. But I have no first-hand knowledge about any of these guys. All I can do is go by stats, scouting reports, ect. Yet we've got message board "experts" around here on their f***ing high horses acting like they know more than guys that get PAID FOR A LIVING to scout and break these guys down? Get the f*** outta here. Brandon Allen for the most part appears to be a solid prospect. He could be really good, bad or somewhere inbetween. Who knows? And we won't know for a while. So let's stop acting like we traded away the next Ryan Howard.

 

Vafan is worked up. Wow.

Some of us don't like the idea of losing a player we've heard a lot about for a reliever.

Some of us think it'd be better to package a guy like that in a big deal in the offseason or before the trade deadline.

Somebody in this thread said it best. No need to fall in love with any prospects because most will never make it/and or get dealt.

[JPN366]

I just want to point out that people were calling for Allen to come up to Chicago if Konerko had been injured.

[qwerty]

I just want to point out that people were calling for Allen to come up to Chicago if Konerko had been injured.

 

Those people were fools.

[witesoxfan]

We got a #2 starter for Reed. For Allen, we got a guy who looks to be the 6th or 7th best thing in our bullpen.

 

That's as of right now, because the Sox have a pretty damn good bullpen. As of this moment, I'd rank Jenks, Thornton, Dotel, and Linebrink above him. I'd say he falls into the 6th inning short reliever role and a guy who can fill in for Linebrink and Dotel when they are tired; a guy like Carrasco is a 6th inning long reliever role, where he can go 2 innings or more if need be and you really don't want to count on him for much else unless you are forced into it. The Sox bullpen right now is very versatile and has very capable arms. It's similar to the 2007 philosophy of finding guys who can throw the ball hard, but now the Sox have guys who can locate and have decent to good breaking stuff too, and the results have been much improved.

 

I could also very easily see Pena working into a setup role a couple years down the road too.

 

It isn't exactly what I would have looked for if I were to trade Brandon Allen, but I'm sitting in a computer chair. Ken Williams and company felt that this was a great value for Allen, and I'm not going to disagree with them because there is some merits behind the trade.

[iamshack]

That's as of right now, because the Sox have a pretty damn good bullpen. As of this moment, I'd rank Jenks, Thornton, Dotel, and Linebrink above him. I'd say he falls into the 6th inning short reliever role and a guy who can fill in for Linebrink and Dotel when they are tired; a guy like Carrasco is a 6th inning long reliever role, where he can go 2 innings or more if need be and you really don't want to count on him for much else unless you are forced into it. The Sox bullpen right now is very versatile and has very capable arms. It's similar to the 2007 philosophy of finding guys who can throw the ball hard, but now the Sox have guys who can locate and have decent to good breaking stuff too, and the results have been much improved.

 

I could also very easily see Pena working into a setup role a couple years down the road too.

 

It isn't exactly what I would have looked for if I were to trade Brandon Allen, but I'm sitting in a computer chair. Ken Williams and company felt that this was a great value for Allen, and I'm not going to disagree with them because there is some merits behind the trade.

 

As much as I hate to repeat it, I think the guy has earned our trust. They have time and time again scouted their own system incredibly well (much like the Braves), and brought quality pieces back. As Wite stated, all of us are sitting in computer chairs. There is not one among us who has seen Pena as much as our front office has. Nor is their one among us who has seen Allen as much, with JPN probably being the closest. From the very limited knowledge most of us have, we've just got to take their word for it for the time being.

 

Do NOT take this as saying we cannot all express our opinions. But it is with the utmost certainty that I can say they are not as learned as our front office's.

[Heads22]

Bullpen trust level:

 

Jenks

Thornton

Linebrink

Dotel

Pena

Carrasco

Poreda

 

I love that Tony Peña is our fifth f***ing option.

[SoxAce]

I'll say this after all of the stuff said in here... Jimmy Gobble being DFA'd is probably the greatest thing that's ever happened to the organization and the fans who had to watch him.

[Buehrle>Wood]

I'll say this after all of the stuff said in here... Jimmy Gobble being DFA'd is probably the greatest thing that's ever happened to the organization and the fans who had to watch him.

 

[SoxAce]

 

Ha. Good call, but at least he was young and new with a babyface... not an old Royal's reject.

[BobDylan]

There is something about players with the initials 'BA' that gets this board riled up.

[iamshack]

There is something about players with the initials 'BA' that gets this board riled up.

Damn you and your hypnotic signature.

Who is that girl?

[Buehrle>Wood]

I didn't learn about this trade until late last night. And the first thing that popped into my head was that I'm 100% certain that all of Soxtalk is going absolutely apes*** right about now. And after reading through this thread, you guys certainly didn't disappoint.

 

First of all, who the hell is anybody from this god damn message board to say with absolute certainty (or even 50% certainty) that the Sox "could've gotten more" for Brandon f***in' Allen? Unless you can find a direct quote from any one of the 28 other general managers in baseball clearly stating they would've traded the Sox a lot more than Tony Pena for Brandon Allen then please, with all due respect, STFU! Because all you do is make yourself look and sound incredibly stupid. I like this board overall. But the ignorance/arrogance around here at times is simply incomprehensible. Unless your JPN or Scenario or BHAMBARONS and you happen to live close by one of our minor league affiliates or you're a subscriber to MILB.com, most of you have never seen a single f***ing live Brandon Allen at-bat. And that includes me. s***, I love to track prospects. But I have no first-hand knowledge about any of these guys. All I can do is go by stats, scouting reports, ect. Yet we've got message board "experts" around here on their f***ing high horses acting like they know more than guys that get PAID FOR A LIVING to scout and break these guys down? Get the f*** outta here. Brandon Allen for the most part appears to be a solid prospect. He could be really good, bad or somewhere inbetween. Who knows? And we won't know for a while. So let's stop acting like we traded away the next Ryan Howard.

First off, settle down.

 

Second off, relax.

 

Third off, I apologize in advance for sharing my opinion.

 

Fourth off, you have missed the point entirely like so many in this thread.

 

You are right. I haven't seen Allen play and probably not the guy we traded for either. But who I have seen pitch is Aaron Poreda, Matt Thorton, Scott Linebrink, Octavio Dotel, DJ Carrasco, and Bobby Jenks. Here's the scouting report on them: they're all f***ing good.

 

It comes down to why make this deal to begin with. To say we have the best 5th best guy in a bullpen in MLB? Even then, it will be hard for him to pass up what Poreda and Carrasco have been doing for us. And still, to me, not a legitimate reason to make a trade, and I would think so for most. Did I mention everyone in out pen except for Dotel is signed at least until 2011?

 

Is it to replace Dotel? So we bring in a guy to be our 3rd righty out of the pen at best a year in advance and give up a guy who is by everyone's account a top 5-6 guy (in the very least) in our system? Sorry, hard for me to get excited personally.

[Heads22]

First off, settle down.

 

Second off, relax.

 

Third off, I apologize in advance for sharing my opinion.

 

Fourth off, you have missed the point entirely like so many in this thread.

 

You are right. I haven't seen Allen play and probably not the guy we traded for either. But who I have seen pitch is Aaron Poreda, Matt Thorton, Scott Linebrink, Octavio Dotel, DJ Carrasco, and Bobby Jenks. Here's the scouting report on them: they're all f***ing good.

 

It comes down to why make this deal to begin with. To say we have the best 5th best guy in a bullpen in MLB? Even then, it will be hard for him to pass up what Poreda and Carrasco have been doing for us. And still, to me, not a legitimate reason to make a trade, and I would think so for most. Did I mention everyone in out pen except for Dotel is signed at least until 2011?

 

Is it to replace Dotel? So we bring in a guy to be our 3rd righty out of the pen at best a year in advance and give up a guy who is by everyone's account a top 5-6 guy (in the very least) in our system? Sorry, hard for me to get excited personally.

 

He gives us some certainty going forward in the pen. Thornton is about the only guy you'd figure that's a good bet to stick around in two years. Will we ante up to keep Jenks? Dotel will likely be gone after this year. Hell, who knows with Linebrink? Carrasco has a rubber arm but we can't count on him for pivotal innings. Poreda may not be here by August. Peña has been regarded as Arizona's future closer, and we have an abundance of 1B types. Excuse me if I'm not mourning the loss of a guy with an 824 OPS in his second year in AA. He's a top 6 prospect in our system, yes, but he's not shown himself to be anything potentially special, like a Flowers or a Danks.

 

[DBAHO]

First off, settle down.

 

Second off, relax.

 

Third off, I apologize in advance for sharing my opinion.

 

Fourth off, you have missed the point entirely like so many in this thread.

 

You are right. I haven't seen Allen play and probably not the guy we traded for either. But who I have seen pitch is Aaron Poreda, Matt Thorton, Scott Linebrink, Octavio Dotel, DJ Carrasco, and Bobby Jenks. Here's the scouting report on them: they're all f***ing good.

 

It comes down to why make this deal to begin with. To say we have the best 5th best guy in a bullpen in MLB? Even then, it will be hard for him to pass up what Poreda and Carrasco have been doing for us. And still, to me, not a legitimate reason to make a trade, and I would think so for most. Did I mention everyone in out pen except for Dotel is signed at least until 2011?

 

Is it to replace Dotel? So we bring in a guy to be our 3rd righty out of the pen at best a year in advance and give up a guy who is by everyone's account a top 5-6 guy (in the very least) in our system? Sorry, hard for me to get excited personally.

Well there's no guarantee that Carrasco and Poreda are going to keep doing what they're doing in the 2nd half of the season.

 

Pena I think switching leagues etc. can do quite an effective / underrated job for us as we chase a playoff spot.

 

Good bullpens win ballgames. We've all seen that in the past when we've had bad bullpens and how many games that has cost us. I don't mind KW trying to turn a strength into an even bigger strength going forward.

[Rowand44]

Took me a few days to respond cause I'm just not sure how I feel about this deal. First off, hopefully there was something in his mechanics that Cooper saw that he can fix ala Thornton. As for Allen, I'm not high on him at all but I really think he could have at least been a piece to a bigger deal(not the center piece). Oh well, hopefully we get a new and improved Tony Pena.

[scenario]

IMO, the Sox probably felt Allen had higher trade value now than he would at the end of the year...

 

That memories of his outstanding performance in 2008 were still pretty recent and gave them a window to 'sell higher' than memories of his so-so performance in 2009 would...

 

Which is probably true given the way things were going for him in Charlotte. Unless things turned around for him in a big way during the 2nd half in Charlotte, his trade value would likely have fallen off the proverbial cliff.

 

So... I was initially surprised by his being dealt, but the more I think about it... the more logical it seems.

 

I wish we had gotten more for him, but... KW has a pretty respectable track record with deals involving our prospects, so I'll give him the benefit of the doubt.

 

 

[Kenny Hates Prospects]

Minor league stats

 

Allen 569 games .787 OPS as a 1st baseman

 

Borchard 712 games .823 OPS mostly as a CF/RF

 

 

 

Is there anything that suggests that Allen would be a better hitter than Josh Fields, who can be a low-cost first baseman if that is what we need?

Jesus, could you come up with a worse comparison than that? Both started out out very raw, with Borchard being an elite prospect worth a ton of money and coming out of college, and Allen being completely off the radar out of high school and signing for a much, much smaller amount. Both players reached AAA at 23, with Allen so far struggling in 61 AB and Borchard putting up good power numbers but with a freakishly high K total in 438 AB. We'll see where Allen stands at the end of the year there.

 

Along their journeys, Allen progressively got better and became a smarter hitter, cutting down on his K's and increasing his BB total while abandoning the swing-for-the-fences mentality and learning how to take what a pitcher gave him and go oppo or serve a little single out into short RCF. Borchard OTOH put up power numbers but did nothing beyond that. His career took a nose dive in 2003 at AAA as a 24-year-old and he still wasn't ready by the time he got some regular playing time in 2004. The book has not in any way closed on Allen despite his struggles early in Charlotte. I've seen him and from hearing an interview with the Barons guy he seemed to echo my first thoughts on Allen as well, which was that Allen was getting smarter as a hitter and learning how to approach the game with the type of attitude that leads to success against tougher competition. He can and will make his adjustments and is not greedy and stubborn at the plate. Those qualities to me are much more valuable than some guy who just does not learn and refuses to shorten up his swing with 2 strikes.

 

BTW Allen's career MiLB numbers don't mean s***. You're taking them out of context entirely. Who cares if he had s***ty seasons while he learned? I don't give a s*** what his numbers early on look like as long as he has learned and improved along the way.

 

I had and still have no problems dealing any of our prospects in the right deals because they haven't gone on to show they can produce at the MLB level yet. But I don't like Pena as much as some others do and I don't like this deal. I still feel we should have shopped Allen if he wasn't in our plans, and maybe we could have gotten something better. We have Link, DRod, Omogrosso, Santeliz, Jones, and Nunez all pretty close and if we wanted another reliever to replace Gobble we could have called one of them up first. Pena has better stuff than most of those guys, but I don't feel his presence makes us a much better team than we were before. IMO we traded a top prospect for a luxury who also happens to be a bit of a project who currently can't get out lefties. This isn't the Thornton deal redux because Borchard wasn't worth s*** at the time of that deal, he'd already been a miserable failure. Allen was worth a lot more.