Let's go back to 2003

BY Jay Piques , September 15th, 2007 Lets go back to 2003. It was a pretty decent year to be alive I suppose. I mean lets put aside the start of the Iraq War, the outbreak of SARS, and Aaron F%#!ing Boone. More? 2003 also saw the emergence of a future stud pitcher in Josh Beckett, Rush Limbaugh admit he was addicted to pain-killers, my first year of college (maybe I should be setting that one aside), and perhaps the biggest trade buzz in the Boston area in December. The Red Sox were in talks with the Texas Rangers to swap the only $20 million players in baseball. Of course it never actually happened, but it sure is fun to imagine what could have happened. Baseball Prospectus agreed with me and in it's publication "Mind Game" devoted an entire chapter to what would have happened in the 2004 season had Manny for A-Rod actually gone through. I won't ruin the ending or the chapter, but there's been three seasons since then, so I figured it would be a great topic to revisit. Of course in the meantime we have to draw some safe assumptions to continue; 1.) Larry Lucchino shuts his mouth and John Henry forks over the $12m that held up the deal with the MLBPA 2.) Alex Rodriguez is sent to the Boston Red Sox in exchange for Manny Ramirez and Jon Lester [1] (The often forgotten part of the deal) 3.) Subsequently the Red Sox complete the trade rumor sending Nomar Garciaparra to the Chicago White Sox for LF Magglio Ordonez 4.) The Yankees never deal Alphonso Soriano for A-Rod because? well? he's now on the Red Sox. 5.) 'Tek never shoves his glove in A-Rod's face. 6.) The Yankees proceed with 2004 with their original plans of playing Enrique Wilson and Miguel Cairo at 3b. (Man that would have been funny) 7.) The 2004 season ends and the Yankees come to recognize that Enrique Wilson and Miguel Cairo are from a whole 'nother planet of suck and sign themselves the most expensive free agent third-basemen: Adrian Beltre. [2] 8.) Alright I'll let them have Troy Glaus instead, but think of how stupid Bill Bavasi must feel. 9.) Oh and the Yankees would no longer have a use for Robinson Cano, keeping Soriano at 2b, but lets keep this fair and keep his bat in the lineup. We'll assume Cashman recognizes his abilities as a hitter and plugs him in where he can add value at 1b. 10.) The Red Sox still complete the Beckett + Lowell for Ramirez + Sanchez + Delgado + Garcia deal. I only bring this up because the FO was thrilled that they kept Lester ? who has since been traded to the Rangers. 11.) The Red Sox walk away from Ordonez, but after looking at the sparse LF talent offer him a similar deal to what the Tigers eventually pay him. 12.) I overcome my intense loathing for A-Rod. 13.) Maybe not. 14.) The Red Sox short a man in their rotation for the 2007 season use Kason Gabbard as their starting lefty in the role that Jon Lester is currently filling. 15.) The Eric Gagne trade never happens because Gabbard adds too much value to the team as a 5th starter. Alright that should cover everything. I don't think a single one of those assumptions goes too far or depend solely on something that would be unlikely. I think that it' safe to say that either team has shown that they are willing to spend top dollar to fill any hole in their lineups. Now of course this leaves a whole bunch of stats to adjust for park effects. I'm not terribly interested in figuring out how the Blue Jays would have done had they held onto Miguel Batista and Orlando Hudson, or if the Rangers would have traded Manny to the Nationals. In the spirit of this weekend's series lets focus in on how the teams would look if this chain of events took place. First the obvious; A-Rod and Magglio are both having friggin monstrous years, but lets see how those numbers look in Fenway Park. What I've done is adjusted the home half of each players stats this year to park effects (These are easily accessible. I've used the Park Factors listed for 2004-2006 in the 2007 Bill James Handbook). (see article on RedSoxTicket.com for stat tables) So the Monster takes away a couple of homers from A-Rod but Magglio becomes a doubles machine. You'll notice something new on this report "RC" or Runs Created. What Runs Created refers to the number of runs that are created by each particular player. The formula I used is the one provided by baseball-reference.com and is the simplest version. (H+BB)*TB/AB+BB I'm not going to drone on about the stolen base adjusted RC formula because its not the one baseball-reference uses, and I'm shooting for consistency. Together, Magglio and A-Rod create 295 runs, whereas Manny and Lugo net you 145. But there are other things to factor in that we hypothesized earlier. 1st Jon Lester is no longer on the team, and Kason Gabbard is getting most of his starts. There was a brief period of time before the trade deadline where Gabbard and Lester were in the same rotation. As much as I like the guy, Gabbard would not have been able to pitch on 1 day's rest, so we adjust the number of batters Tavarez faces to account for two more spot starts. Also, because Gabbard has become the 5th starter on this team, we have to reallocate Eric Gagne's innings as well. In acquiring Gagne the Sox were hoping to lighten the burden on Okajima, so for our sake it makes the most sense to allocate his innings to Mike Timlin and Manny Delcarmen; two pitcher's who's roles became reduced on the Gagne acquisition (at least initially). Then there is of course the Yankees to consider with Glaus and Soriano, but without A-Rod and a reduced role of Johnny Damon. What's remarkable is that the MVP-less Yankees actually finish off with a Pythagorean record (RS^1.83/ RS^1.83+ RA^1.83) only 2 games behind their current record. The Red Sox however improve drastically ? (as to be expected by having the top two MVP candidates on your team. We'll see how drastic in a second, but here's the 2007 teams after the Red Sox pull the 2003 blockbuster deal in Runs Created, and Runs Created Against. (see article on RedSoxTicket.com for stat tables) So where does that put us? Well this weekend series would have had little fanfare because the Red Sox would have just clinched the AL East, and I wouldn't be sitting in my apartment not able to fall asleep after the Red Sox blew a 7-2 lead in the 8th. In terms of salaries, the Red Sox' would escalate roughly another $12m to $155m whereas the Yankees total salary would decrease everso slightly ($1.25m) to approximately $188m.And the standings would look something like this going into Friday's game. Red Sox: 103 Wins, 44 Losses. 0.703 Win Pct Yankees: 85 Wins, 61 Losses. 0.581 Win Pct