Brandon Allen

[Kenny Hates Prospects]

Great post, and pretty much captures my thoughts as well.

Thank you.

 

Here's a new thread I made: http://www.soxtalk.com/forums/index.php?showtopic=74096

[almagest]

When that trade was made there were reports of AZ scouts absolutely loving this guy. I forget who it was, but FutureSox had an interview with I think one of the BA guys and something similar was said where Allen is a guy some scouts love and see as an above-average starting MLB first baseman, others see him as a AAAA player, and yet others see him as a MLB bench or platoon player. The AZ people have seen this guy since we've had him because, with the exception of this year's ST, we've shared complexes with the Diamondbacks as long as Allen has been in our system.

 

The strikeout rate statement lacks knowledge of his numbers. He has cut down on his K's drastically from where it was prior to the last two seasons while increasing levels and facing tougher competition. Obviously his numbers will look bad for periods while he adjusts, and obviously the PCL had inflated his AAA AZ numbers, but the numbers with AZ are a lot more indicative of his ability than his stint in Charlotte was. The improved K rate was one of the main reasons he shot up our charts as a prospect, and if you think Allen's K numbers the last two seasons are high, just check out the numbers for pretty much every other legit power hitting prospect in the game. Most all of them are going to be at least as high, probably a lot higher. It is pretty rare to find a guy who makes better contact than Allen has these last couple seasons and still hits for power.

 

Thirdly, the main reason I loved him as a prospect is *because* of his ability to make adjustments at the plate. It is that plus the lowered K rate, plus the age, plus the improvement he's made over the last two seasons, plus the increased walk rate as he's improved, plus the athletic ability and the improvement he's made at 1B that makes him more than your average 1B prospect. Allen hasn't gotten the attention nationally, and if you look at top-100 prospect lists from long ago, it is very common to see guys in the 80's and 90's that ended up being far better players than other guys much higher on the lists. Just because a guy doesn't get lauded in the big publications doesn't mean he isn't as good or better than some of those guys that are. Allen IMO is a much better prospect than Poreda and yet we heard lots of national prospect evaluators glowing over him with very little about Allen. Casey Rogowski probably got more pub coming up the ranks than Allen got the last two years.

 

Allen might be considered a "late bloomer" as a prospect because he had to repeat levels, but even considering him that would be inaccurate as he signed out of high school and at the age of 23 has become Arizona's starting 1B. So I don't think anyone is overrating or overvaluing Allen because no one is making outlandish statements like he's going to win batting titles, or have top-5 finishes in MVP races, or be a perennial All-Star, etc. It's just that he's a very nice prospect and some people, including myself, feel he was worth more than Tony Pena. I would have had no problem dealing him provided we got a better return - and I'm not talking Pujols or anything, I'm talking about a better-than-average starter or position player whom we would be able to control for the next couple of seasons.

I don't see how you can assume we should have gotten more for Allen than Pena, since Arizona had absolutely no production from the first-base position this year. It's not like they dealt from a position of strength. I also think you undervalue Tony Pena, as he's been a good reliever since 2007, makes league minimum, and is under our control for a couple years. He's also a likely replacement for the 5.5 million dollar Octavio Dotel.

 

You also seem to overvalue Arizona's talent evaluation, while undervaluing ours. We weren't wrong on Chris Young, it seems, and I doubt Arizona would trade Quentin again, even with his injury this year.

 

Allen seems to have improved his strikeout/walk ratio, which is a good sign, but I still find it hard to get excited about a first baseman who had a full-season OPS over .900 once in his 6 year minor league career.

Edited August 25, 2009 by almagest

[Kenny Hates Prospects]

I don't see how you can assume we should have gotten more for Allen than Pena, since Arizona had absolutely no production from the first-base position this year. It's not like they dealt from a position of strength. I also think you undervalue Tony Pena, as he's been a good reliever since 2007, makes league minimum, and is under our control for a couple years. He's also a likely replacement for the 5.5 million dollar Octavio Dotel.

 

You also seem to overvalue Arizona's talent evaluation, while undervaluing ours. We weren't wrong on Chris Young, it seems, and I doubt Arizona would trade Quentin again, even with his injury this year.

 

Allen seems to have improved his strikeout/walk ratio, which is a good sign, but I still find it hard to get excited about a first baseman who had a full-season OPS over .900 once in his 6 year minor league career.

We should have gotten more for Allen than Pena because Allen's ceiling is a lot higher than Pena's and Allen is ready now.

 

Pena is a decent reliever who has been an underachiever and has a chance to be a very nice setup man. Speaking of dealing from a position of strength, unless we want to permanently move Flowers or Viciedo, by dealing Allen we dealt from a position of weakness. OTOH, the strongest part of the upper portion of our farm is the amount of quality right-handed relief prospects.

 

Your comment about AZ not dealing from a position of strength doesn't make sense. They dealt a reliever who had basically been a righty specialist during a horrible season to fill a glaring need.

 

If Pena can replace what Dotel has done, well, that will be a huge addition. Not many relievers out there can put up the kinds of numbers Dotel has put up here, and not many of those guys can come in and get huge strikeouts with RISP. I would definitely not bet on Pena being as good as Dotel has been, although he could end up as our primary righty setup man.

 

No, I'm not overvaluing or undervaluing anyone's view on anybody. AZ reportedly loves him and he was a target of theirs. KW OTOH had a hard-on for Tony Pena and had been rumored to be after him before. Just because Kenny traded Allen for Pena doesn't mean people in Kenny's ear weren't telling him not to make that deal. Kenny happened to think Allen was expendable enough, and he wanted Pena bad enough, and so he made that deal. It doesn't sound at all like Kenny really shopped Allen, and if he did, I think he could have gotten more.

 

As for the Chris Young and CQ deals, Chris Young was a guy a lot of teams would have loved to acquire. Teams love high-level defensive CFers with 30-30 potential who handle large jumps like that from low-A to AA with great success. It's not like Kenny "fooled" anyone by trading Chris Young. Kenny and all his people know the odds of a prospect panning out, and some are better than others, and some are worth trading when you're coming off a WS Championship. It's not like we had some major scouting advantage there. And CQ only became available because of the bogus Eric Byrnes extension combined with CQ's injury history and the emergence of Chris Young and Justin Upton. It's not like Kenny saw something great in CQ that nobody else saw. Everyone knew the type of player Quentin was capable of becoming. The reason we got CQ in the first place was because the DBacks were talking with the A's about Haren and Beane wanted Chris Carter. It's not like we were the only team in on him. The Indians offered Cliff Lee straight up and the DBacks passed. When those deals were made, each team took a chance talented players and so far it has worked out better for the Sox.

[ThunderBolt]

Which has nothing to do with his play in the OF. The point was that just because someone is athletic (Allen) and plays a corner IF spot doesn't mean they can play a corner OF spot as was suggested earlier in the thread.

Brandon Allen is a fundamentally different player then Josh Fields. It’s a flawed comparison. And i promise you that Fields could have played LF, were we to have sent him out their more then a handful of times. It's not a difficult place to play.

[ChiSox_Sonix]

Brandon Allen is a fundamentally different player then Josh Fields. It’s a flawed comparison. And i promise you that Fields could have played LF, were we to have sent him out their more then a handful of times. It's not a difficult place to play.

 

No.

 

The only thing that was flawed was the original reference to Brandon Allen having the chance to have possibly been a starter for us next year at one of the corner OF spots.

[ThunderBolt]

No.

 

The only thing that was flawed was the original reference to Brandon Allen having the chance to have possibly been a starter for us next year at one of the corner OF spots.

That was pretty awesome how you just made a large g while generalization while failing to back up your point. Is argument for Brandon Allen not being able to play the OF, really that Josh Fields couldn’t do it? As I said, it’s a false premise Brandon Allen is not Josh Fields nor am I ChiSox or you Thunderbolt.

[ChiSox_Sonix]

That was pretty awesome how you just made a large g while generalization while failing to back up your point. Is argument for Brandon Allen not being able to play the OF, really that Josh Fields couldn’t do it? As I said, it’s a false premise Brandon Allen is not Josh Fields nor am I ChiSox or you Thunderbolt.

 

What you're failing to get is what the initial statement was. It was that since Brandon Allen is an athletic person, he could potentially be a starter for us next year at a corner OF spot. Since he has a total of 8 career games in the OF (all in rookie ball 6 years ago) I asked based on what. The response was his athleticism. I brought up Gordon Beckham and someone else brought up Josh Fields as reasons why that is bad logic. It was a flawed argument. It was just someone trying even harder to justify their pissed-off-ness (i relaize that's not a word) over the trade.

[almagest]

We should have gotten more for Allen than Pena because Allen's ceiling is a lot higher than Pena's and Allen is ready now.

 

Pena is a decent reliever who has been an underachiever and has a chance to be a very nice setup man. Speaking of dealing from a position of strength, unless we want to permanently move Flowers or Viciedo, by dealing Allen we dealt from a position of weakness. OTOH, the strongest part of the upper portion of our farm is the amount of quality right-handed relief prospects.

 

Your comment about AZ not dealing from a position of strength doesn't make sense. They dealt a reliever who had basically been a righty specialist during a horrible season to fill a glaring need.

 

If Pena can replace what Dotel has done, well, that will be a huge addition. Not many relievers out there can put up the kinds of numbers Dotel has put up here, and not many of those guys can come in and get huge strikeouts with RISP. I would definitely not bet on Pena being as good as Dotel has been, although he could end up as our primary righty setup man.

 

No, I'm not overvaluing or undervaluing anyone's view on anybody. AZ reportedly loves him and he was a target of theirs. KW OTOH had a hard-on for Tony Pena and had been rumored to be after him before. Just because Kenny traded Allen for Pena doesn't mean people in Kenny's ear weren't telling him not to make that deal. Kenny happened to think Allen was expendable enough, and he wanted Pena bad enough, and so he made that deal. It doesn't sound at all like Kenny really shopped Allen, and if he did, I think he could have gotten more.

 

As for the Chris Young and CQ deals, Chris Young was a guy a lot of teams would have loved to acquire. Teams love high-level defensive CFers with 30-30 potential who handle large jumps like that from low-A to AA with great success. It's not like Kenny "fooled" anyone by trading Chris Young. Kenny and all his people know the odds of a prospect panning out, and some are better than others, and some are worth trading when you're coming off a WS Championship. It's not like we had some major scouting advantage there. And CQ only became available because of the bogus Eric Byrnes extension combined with CQ's injury history and the emergence of Chris Young and Justin Upton. It's not like Kenny saw something great in CQ that nobody else saw. Everyone knew the type of player Quentin was capable of becoming. The reason we got CQ in the first place was because the DBacks were talking with the A's about Haren and Beane wanted Chris Carter. It's not like we were the only team in on him. The Indians offered Cliff Lee straight up and the DBacks passed. When those deals were made, each team took a chance talented players and so far it has worked out better for the Sox.

If you have a glaring hole you need to fill, and other teams know this, you are not dealing from a position of strength.

 

I'm also not entirely sure why Arizona is so smart for targeting Allen, yet the Sox made a poor decision in obtaining Pena. It's not like Az has been raping the Sox in trades, their major league team isn't anything special, and quite a few of their big-time prospects have done nothing or have seriously regressed since 2007. ...Besides your biased opinion that Allen is better, of course.

 

Cliff Lee? Really? The same Cliff Lee who was mediocre in 2006, then awful and injured in 2007? I probably wouldn't want him after 2007 if I were Arizona, either. They probably regret that now, though, as Haren/Webb (when healthy)/Lee/Scherzer would be disgusting.

[witesoxfan]

That was pretty awesome how you just made a large g while generalization while failing to back up your point. Is argument for Brandon Allen not being able to play the OF, really that Josh Fields couldn’t do it? As I said, it’s a false premise Brandon Allen is not Josh Fields nor am I ChiSox or you Thunderbolt.

 

You're right, and Josh Fields couldn't play the outfield because he couldn't play QB in the Big 12.

 

Some guys just cannot play the outfield. There is a much different natural reaction to seeing a ball coming at you on the ground than there is in the air, and some guys never figure it out. Some guys do and can move around the diamond. Josh Fields was not given a long look in the outfield because the Sox brass felt that he could not handle the OF after even just a small time out there. If they felt that Brandon Allen could have played in the outfield, I guarantee you they would have given him more than 8 games in rookie ball 5 years ago (or whenever it was). The fact of the matter is that, from what the Sox brass has seen, and what the Arizona brass has seen, Brandon Allen cannot play the outfield. He's a big kid already, and he's not going to get smaller as he gets older. He's a 1Bman.

 

On to Brandon Allen's value...compare Allen's numbers in AA and AAA to those of Casey Kotchman, Paul Konerko,

Aubrey Huff, and Adam LaRoche. All 4 have been relatively average 1Bman, though good to great at times. If that is Brandon Allen's ceiling, then the value is about perfect; Adam LaRoche, after proving himself at the MLB level, was traded for a dominant left handed reliever. Brandon Allen, having not proven himself, was traded for an average MLB reliever who is young and has been solid in the past.

 

 

 

[JPN366]

Even though his nickname is Big BA, Allen wasn't exactly huge. He is 6'2" and is 235. He's about the size of a linebacker. But, he is a lean 235. He actually looked like he lost some weight from last season. I think he's definitely capable of winning a gold glove at 1B. He could play LF in a pinch, but probably not everyday. He has the speed and range to cover the ground in a corner outfield spot.

[almagest]

You're right, and Josh Fields couldn't play the outfield because he couldn't play QB in the Big 12.

 

Some guys just cannot play the outfield. There is a much different natural reaction to seeing a ball coming at you on the ground than there is in the air, and some guys never figure it out. Some guys do and can move around the diamond. Josh Fields was not given a long look in the outfield because the Sox brass felt that he could not handle the OF after even just a small time out there. If they felt that Brandon Allen could have played in the outfield, I guarantee you they would have given him more than 8 games in rookie ball 5 years ago (or whenever it was). The fact of the matter is that, from what the Sox brass has seen, and what the Arizona brass has seen, Brandon Allen cannot play the outfield. He's a big kid already, and he's not going to get smaller as he gets older. He's a 1Bman.

 

On to Brandon Allen's value...compare Allen's numbers in AA and AAA to those of Casey Kotchman, Paul Konerko,

Aubrey Huff, and Adam LaRoche. All 4 have been relatively average 1Bman, though good to great at times. If that is Brandon Allen's ceiling, then the value is about perfect; Adam LaRoche, after proving himself at the MLB level, was traded for a dominant left handed reliever. Brandon Allen, having not proven himself, was traded for an average MLB reliever who is young and has been solid in the past.

Sounds about right to me. I was going to say LaRoche isn't in the same class as those other players, but his career numbers are better than I thought. Edited August 25, 2009 by almagest

[oldsox]

While I criticize KW from time to time (mostly because there are so many people who think he can do no wrong) picking out 2 trades in 9 years is a bit ridiculous. Everyone screws up. I still think in the long run the Swisher trade isn't as bad as you think. He's not a CF and didn't have a place to play on the White Sox. They got out of his contract. We'll see how he does the next several years. Rios probably isn't a White Sox if Swisher is around, and he's a better player, and they did use the money they saved this year to sign Viciedo. The Foulke trade was bad at the time, the Sox may have won the WS in 2003 or 2004 if they kept him, but Cotts did help them win in 2005 even if Koch was done when they acquired him. May vs. did, I'll take the did anytime.

 

So many bad trades wind up decently. When Hawk was GM, he was criticized for trading Bobby Bonilla for Jose DeLeon. DeLeon was a decent pitcher who eventually turned into Lance Johnson. A guy that helped the Sox win a lot of games. Hawk supposedly ruined the White Sox, a team not good enough to win previously when they had Britt Burns (who never pitched again) and Tom Seaver (who didn't wan't to play in the midwest anymore) and Bob James (who fell apart) leading their pitching staff in 1985. He also acquired Ivan Calderon for almost nothing, and Calderon help the Sox have a great season in 1990, before he was turned into Tim Raines. He was also criticized for turning over the scouting dept., the department that drafted Kurt Brown over Barry Bonds.

 

I'm using Hawk as an example of grading the Swisher trade. Its waaaaaaaaaaaayyyyy to early to grade it. Granted Betemit and Marquez aren't long for getting paid to play baseball, but what if Viciedo becomes a star? What if Nunez becomes dominant? Perhaps those are longshots, but what if Rios outplays Swisher for years? That's almost a guarantee.

Good post, Dick. We can probably have a separate thread on Kenny's deals. He does make it interesting, but the Foulke trade was bad, Neil Cotts' 2005 contribution notwithstanding. He should have known better than to acquire Koch, then give him $12 MM. Then the Swisher trade -- I wish Kenny would not even talk to Beane. I never understood giving up on Sweeney, especially since he can play CF. Gio, too. All of the Carl Everett and Alomar deals were so-so. Kenny has a habit of getting over the hill players like them; also, Darrin Erstad, who was an embarrassment. He throws worse than Pods. Same with Betemit. I thought he gave up way too much for Thome, given that we did the Phillies a huge favor by taking Thome, since all they had was Ryan Howard ready to go. There were others, some of which I forgot. Although it doesn't sound like it, I like Kenny.

[danman31]

I thought he gave up way too much for Thome, given that we did the Phillies a huge favor by taking Thome, since all they had was Ryan Howard ready to go.

Wow. That's an out there belief. I certainly believe Thome is worth more than Rowand and Gio. Rowand was a free agent a year later and Gio has been awful in the Majors.