Houston Astros: Healthy Madison Bumgarner is an intriguing trade target
The Houston Astros have the best record in the major leagues and are having a phenomenal season leading to World Series aspirations. The San Francisco Giants on the other hand, are having the opposite type of year with the worst record in baseball.
The Houston Astros and San Francisco Giants make for perfect trade partners on paper. They’re in opposite leagues, with one clearly on their way to the post season solidly in the buyers market and the other solidly in the sellers market with no shot at the post season.
If the Astros trade with the Giants, they won’t have to face any of the players they deal away or worry about the Giants rising up and supplanting them in the American League with the farm talent they sold to San Fran.
The Giants are in an interesting situation as there are three teams in their division that are looking to be in great shape for now AND the future, two of which are a real shock. The Arizona Diamondbacks are having an amazing rebound year after that horrible 2016 season that had as much hype as a team could have with the Zack Greinke signing and the Shelby Miller trade. And the Colorado Rockies are just, well they’re just good all of a sudden with a powerful offense leading the way.
They Giants are currently in the cellar but are only a year removed from playing a hard fought series against the eventual World Series Champion Chicago Cubs where they definitely held their own. However rough years from their starting rotation and an injury to their ace have them looking up at the other 29 teams in the major league standings.
They are at a crossroads as they’ve had such great success with three World Series championships in the last seven years, but they’re also under some monster contracts that are looking like mistakes at the moment. Per baseball-reference.com for these contract numbers, Johnny Cueto is signed through 2022 for $21 million dollars a year and Jeff Samardzija is signed through 2020 at $18 million dollars a year. Which would be great if they both were pitching up to those contracts.
The Houston Astros and San Francisco Giants make for perfect trade partners on paper.
Jeff Samadzija, while striking out 117 over 105 innings pitched, also has a 3-9 record with a 4.63 ERA. And Cueto isn’t much better with a 5-7 record and a 4.20 ERA. Toss in the fact that they owe Buster Posey $22 million dollars a year through 2022, $17 million dollars a year to Brandon Belt through 2021, and $15 million dollars a year to Brandon Crawford through 2021, and that’s $93 million dollars for five players over the next three years and $75 million for four players over four years. On what is currently a last place in all of baseball team.
This limited payroll flexibility and poor place in the standings may convince the Giants to try and infuse some young talent that can turn the team around quickly and a trade of 2014 World Series hero Madison Bumgarner would, no pun intended, garner that talent. This is all contingent on Bumgarner’s health, but every other aspect of Bumgarner screams trade target.
He’s a left handed starter with a great track record in both the regular season and the post season. He’s under team control for a very inexpensive $12 million a year over the next two seasons before hitting free agency in 2020. And with the load of so many expensive contracts, even with Samardzija’s contract leaving that same year, Bumgarner may be out of the Giants’ price range. And if that is the case, might as well get something for him rather than losing him for nothing in free agency.
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Of the options available, whether it’s a struggling Gerrit Cole who has fallen off in the month of June seeing his ERA rise to 4.11 or Jose Quintana who has turned it on in the month of June lowering his ERA by a full run to 4.37 since June 1st, Madison Bumgarner is by far and away the most solid trade target as his only question mark is how he will return from injury.
He’s supposed to come back right around the all-star break and according to MLB.com he threw three no-hit innings in his first rehab start for the Giants Rookie Level Arizona League affiliate and will make another rehab start for the Giants Triple-A affiliate today (as of this writing on June 30th.) But who knows how long it will take for him to get his full rhythm and if his health will maintain after his ill-advised dirt bike ride that caused him to miss so much of the season.
Bleacher Report says that Madison Bumgarner is one of three untouchable players (the other two being Buster Posey and Brandon Crawford) in trade talks with San Francisco. But if the package is sweet enough and includes some major league ready talent, they could change their minds.
The Astros can wait and see how the market shakes out and if Bumgarner has two or three solid starts it’ll be perfect timing around the trade deadline for the Astros to make a move. The trade market for starting pitching is in a strange place as targets like Chris Archer are no longer available and the struggles of Quintana and Cole this season make them not seem as appealing.
Next: Charlie Morton extremely close to a return
Bumgarner could be the talk of the trade town if he returns healthy and the Giants perk up their ears. He would be the perfect piece for the Astros to make their rotation dominant and setting them up for a deep playoff run. Here’s hoping for that.