This weekend, the New York Yankees will travel to the West Coast to visit the San Diego Padres. The three-game series begins Friday and both teams spent much of the season in second place in their respective divisions.
The subtext of the matchup is Juan Soto, the superstar on-base machine who was traded from the Padres to the Yankees this offseason.
Let’s take a look at how it’s integrated in New York and how the pieces the Padres got have also been integrated in San Diego after a quick reflection on what exactly the deal was and who it included.
Statistics updated through the games on Wednesday, May 22.
At the MLB Winter Meetings in late 2023, the likelihood of Soto being traded was an open secret. Even more notable was that figures in the Yankees organization, such as general manager Brian Cashman and manager Aaron Boone, talked about Soto as if it were a foregone conclusion that he would end up wearing pinstripes in 2024, even before the deal closed. deal.
Padres general manager AJ Preller had this to say, per AJ Cassavell of MLB.com:
“We listen to anything in terms of what we need to do to make our team better,” Preller said. “There’s no real update. There’s nothing really new today on the (de Soto) front. We’re still going down a lot of different paths and a lot of different ways we can move forward with this as we try to build a roster and improve to next year. “.
Aaron Boone was coy and said he wanted to give the baseball world “something to talk about,” but he also spoke highly of Soto in the weeks leading up to the trade.
“He’s with another team, (but) it speaks volumes about what a great player he is, what a great start to his career he’s had,” Yankees manager Aaron Boone said on the YES Network. H/T MLB.com. “But he’s a great dad right now, so we’ll see what happens as the week goes on. But the only thing I can say is that he is a very special player.”
Cashman addressed Soto directly several times in December before the February trade and admitted that conversations with the Padres during the 2023 trade deadline intensified discussions over the winter.
What the Yankees got
The Yankees got the big piece, Juan Soto, but also got outfielder Trent Grisham as part of the trade.
What the Fathers got
The Padres got a bounty for Soto.
Perhaps most importantly, one of the key goals of moving Soto was to secure financial relief from his contract, giving San Diego more flexibility to build its team in the future. They made it in 2024, but they also cashed in on some of Soto’s assets before he had a chance to leave for free in free agency. Soto’s contract expires after the 2024 season.
The Padres sit around .500 as it stands and have by no means shaken the world. But that was, to some extent, what was expected after giving up an All-Star talent like Soto. The Padres’ decision was a little more about building smarter and for the future.
San Diego acquired Soto in a trade in August 2022 and sent him back in less than two years. The franchise attempted to create a power core of sorts with him, Manny Machado, some bewildered looks in San Francisco. Diego. The Fathers repeatedly refuted those suggestions.
For comparison’s sake, it may be worth looking at the wins above replacement (WAR) for the pieces traded in the deal. Here’s how that plays out for the Padres:
Player | WAR |
---|---|
Michael King, P. | 0.2 |
Jhony Brito, P. | -0.1 |
Randy Vasquez, P. | -0.4 |
Kyle Higashioka, C. | -0.3 |
TOTAL | -0.6 |
miguel king He has started nine games with a 4.28 ERA. He has allowed a league-leading 12 home runs and has a 1.31 WHIP.
Jhony Brito, who is only 26 years old and generated excitement for the future in the Bronx in 2023, improved his ERA from 4.28 last year, lowering it to 3.96 this year. But Brito went from starting with the Yankees to being a reliever in 2024 after New York traded him last year. His strikeout-to-walk ratio has improved to 2.60 this year, but his strikeouts per nine innings have decreased. His WHIP sits at 1.320, a little higher than you’d like to see.
Randy Vasquez He has started five games and has had a poor performance. He has a 5.82 ERA and a 1.754 WHIP. He has struggled to complete four full innings in three of his five starts so far.
Kyle Higashioka He is the team’s backup catcher and, to put it bluntly, can’t be played offensively. He’s hitting .150/.150/.275 for an OPS of .425 (OPS+ of a paltry 22). Higashioka is a better catcher than Padres starter Luis Campusano (and about the same defensively), but it’s becoming increasingly difficult to justify playing him with his poor hitting.
Drew Thorpe was traded to the Chicago White Sox as part of a deal that landed the Padres Dylan Cease, who has been phenomenal. Thorpe is rolling the dice in the minors with a sub-1.00 WHIP and a 6-1 record, but he’s only in AA and there’s no telling what his timeline to the majors will be as he tries to rise through the ranks of the system. of the White Sox. . Meanwhile, Cease is posting a sub-1.00 WHIP in the majors this season. It’s worth it.
It’s worth noting that Juan Soto will earn $31 million this season. If you trade Cease in for the traded Thorpe, the five players the Padres added will make approximately $14.8 million combined.
This trade has paid off in every way the Yankees expected. Let’s start with Trent Grisham, who was more or less the balancing piece of the transaction.
Grisham’s OPS+ is 8, which suggests 92 percent of the league is hitting better than him. He has acquired just five total bases in 36 at-bats. He has had two hits and seven walks in 45 plate appearances. To be fair, the Yankees have a loaded outfield that makes it difficult for Grisham to get regular playing time.
That’s the bad thing. The good guy is Soto, as the Yankees expected.
First, Soto has been available, leading the league in plate appearances. His OPS is .979, fifth in baseball. He is hitting .313/.409/.569 and already has 13 home runs, driving in 40 runs as of Thursday morning.
There have been some stalemates for Soto. In back-to-back series against the Rays and Twins in May, he walked just two and three hits in 28 plate appearances, with six strikeouts in that span (culminating with a .339 OPS). However, in the next six games, he walked three and nine hits (including a four-hit showing), yet struck out six (1.418 OPS).
Even at its lowest level in the Bronx so far, it is well worth the cost.
Here’s how he lands in WAR:
PLAYER | WAR |
---|---|
juan soto | 2.5 |
Trent Grisham | -0.6 |
TOTAL | 1.9 |
Considering that the two franchises’ motivations for this trade were very different (New York wanted immediate results, San Diego wanted salary relief and player control): That puts the Yankees’ WAR after the trade at 2.6 higher than the parental. Not included in the calculations is Cease, whose WAR for the Padres is 1.2, which would bring the balance much closer.
For the Padres, the biggest questions revolve around the prospect they acquired from the Yankees. Will Randy Vásquez be able to progress as a major league player and are the Padres looking to move him back to the minors for further development?
For New York, the big question to ask is about Soto. Can New York rehire him? Hal Steinbrenner has already poured cold water on the finances the Yankees will have to do to achieve this, but fans will be frustrated to hear that from one of the richest teams in baseball. There has been a lot of speculation that Soto will find his way back to the Bronx in 2025 and beyond with a new deal, but it is the biggest unknown at this point.
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