What to do with Brennan Boesch

I made this into a fanpost instead of a front page story- it seemed wrong to promote my own major league stuff to the front page when I'm the minor league editor. -Tokarz

I'm sure everyone's going to burn me at the stake if I keep running my mouth about trading Brennan Boesch. I still think trading him is a great way to capitalize on perceived value. Trading a player at his peak is a great way to maximize return. The only problem is that I'm not exactly sure we could get a major return for Boesch. We're certainly not getting a top prospect- not even KC's Dayton Moore is stupid enough to do that. We might get a reclamation project, somebody like Edwin Jackson that can contribute for a season or so. But after thinking carefully, I think there's a better solution.

It's called platooning .

The biggest knock against Brennan Boesch (other than the holey swing and lack of plate discipline) is that he's a platoon bat. Boesch's minor league record shows he hits right-handers a whole lot better than he hits left-handers. His 2009 splits at Erie prove this- Boesch shows a roughly 40 point difference in OBP and a 163(!!!) point difference in slugging when he's facing righties as compared to lefties. He is what he is-a big guy with power and some contact ability when facing righties. It would be wonderful if the Tigers had a guy that did the same thing, but with lefties. Luckily, we do. His name is Casper Wells.

It's unfair to call Casper Wells a purely platoon bat, though- Wells' splits aren't as bad as Boesch's. He hits for 40 more points of OBP (all made up of batting average) and only 100(!!!) more points of slugging when facing lefties, and his line of .250/.364/.466 against righties isn't shabby. But he's very similar to Boesch: holey swing with lots of power (though Wells has great plate discipline and could probably start against a few less talented right-handers). The great part is that they're both defensively decent- Boesch is average-to-above in an OF corner with a solid arm, while Wells handles center field very well and would be a plus right or left fielder.

Overall, what can we expect from Casper-Boesch? I could see them taking 750 plate appearances in left field. Lets say Boesch gets 500 and Wells gets 250 (he'd probably be a late-inning defensive replacement for Boesch occasionally since his defense is better). Using their 2009 numbers from Erie as well as scouting stuff as a baseline, let's play with statistics (note: math is probably complete trash- treat with a grain of salt). Fangraphs had Boesch hitting .280/.330/.440 in a platoon role. I think that line's a bit off- I'd go more around .270/.320/.500ish. Lets also go ahead and say that Wells hits about .280/.360/.500 in his plate appearances against lefties and late in ballgames. That comes out to about .273/.333/.500 as a final line for Casper-Boesch. How does that stack up against other players? Lets take a look at some free agents in 2011 and compare them to Casper-Boesch. I'll use 2009 lines for convenience (since that's the last full season of data we have).

Casper-Boesch: .273/.333/.500

Jayson Werth: .268/.373/.506

Carl Crawford: .305/.362/.452

Adam Dunn: .267/.398/.529

Look, I'm not going to pretend that Casper-Boesch is better than Werth/Crawford/Dunn, or even Manny Ramirez (also a FA this season). But if these guys perform only slightly better- say a couple more hits drop in and they hit .280/.340/.500, they're comparable in value to Jayson Werth. If I told you you could get a player slightly less valuable than Jayson Werth and it would only cost you two roster spots at the minimum, would you turn me down?

There's also plenty of room for roster flexibility. Lets assume 13 position players (a likely situation). That means 9 starters and a 4 man bench. I imagine the team would look something like this:

C: Avila, backup catcher TBNL

IF: Cabrera, Sizemore, Santiago, Guillen (who DH's), Worth, Raburn (our new 3B)

OF: Jackson, Ordonez, Boesch, Wells (who also plays defensive replacement and starts against weak righties to spell Jackson and Ordonez), Kelly

The last spot would really be between Thomas, Worth and Don Kelly (or free agents). Heck, you could sign a FA to man 3B or SS and still have utility on the roster by using Ryan Raburn as a supersub. Your lineup would then be this:

CF Jackson

DH Guillen

RF Ordonez

1B Cabrera

LF Casper-Boesch

3B Raburn

2B Sizemore

C Avila

SS Santiago

Ladies and gentlemen, that looks like a major league lineup. Play Worth and Kelly at 2B/3B when Porcello starts for defense if you want, but our 7-8-9 hole of suck gets plugged with tons of upside- and we don't spend a dollar more than we need to.

Look, I'm not going to pretend that the numbers I used were perfect. They're anything but. It's possible that Casper-Boesch slugs .550 (making this look so much better) or that one of them falls apart (turning this into a pile of suck). But if 2011 really is a retooling year (as it looks given the state of the free agent market), why shouldn't we try this? It saves money and provides a great defensive and offensive left fielder at minimum cost (an extra roster spot featuring a player good enough both offensively and defensively to serve as a great fourth outfielder). So what do you think? Better idea than trading Boesch?  Should I be banned from BYB for suggesting such an outrageous idea?