Mets get LoDuca

[Guest Johnny Dickshot]

http://www.nydailynews.com/front/breaking_news/story/371588p-316146c.html

Mets acquire catcher Paul LoDuca from Marlins

By BILL MADDEN

Sunday, Dec. 4, 5:52 p.m.

Mets GM Omar Minaya has crossed catcher off his holiday shopping list, shunning the free agent market and turning once again to the Florida Marlins in a deal for Paul LoDuca, the Daily News has learned.

In exchange for the 33-year-old Brooklyn-born LoDuca, Minaya sacrificed one of the Mets' top pitching prospects, 21-year-old righthander Gaby Hernandez, a Miami high school product, and another minor leaguer pitcher to be named. But LoDuca, who hit .283 with six homers and 85 RBI last season, is regarded as one of the top offensive catchers in the game as well as a team leader and positive clubhouse presence.

When the offseason began, Minaya cited a closer, a middle-of-the-order first baseman and a catcher as his top three priorities and he has now satisfied all of them, having previously obtained Carlos Delgado in a trade with the Marlins and signed closer Billy Wagner as a free agent. It was not until a trade to send LoDuca to the Arizona Diamondbacks fell through last week that Minaya went back to his Florida counterpart, Larry Beinfest, to land a first-string catcher to replace Mike Piazza.

LoDuca essentially wound up replacing Piazza as the Dodgers' catcher five years ago and was a driving force in their winning of the National League West title in 2003. Then-Dodger manager Jim Tracy cited LoDuca as the Dodgers' team leader and was openly critical of the deal that sent the catcher to the Marlins at the trading deadline in '04.

Until the last few days, Minaya had been focusing on the free agent market, particularly Ramon Hernandez and Benji Molina, to fill his catching need. However, he grew impatient when the agents for both catchers kept holding out for three-year deals worth in excess of $7 million per. LoDuca will earn $6.25 million in each of the next two seasons.

Minaya also talked to the Devil Rays about their catcher, Toby Hall, but zeroed in on LoDuca when the Diamondbacks-Marlins deal for him was killed because of Arizona's insistence on Florida including substantial cash in it.

The trade of LoDuca comes two days after the Marlins sent second baseman Luis Castillo to the Twins for two other pitching prospects. In all, the Marlins have now dealt Delgado, Castillo, LoDuca, Josh Beckett and Mike Lowell in what they have termed a "market adjustment" representing a savings of nearly $70 million. In addition, they are expected to let shortstop Alex Gonzalez go and are actively shopping center fielder Juan Pierre, who will likely be the next to go in a deal at the winter meetings in Dallas this week.

[Guest Johnny Dickshot]

Heavy price to pay and not the best catcher available IMO.

I wonder if they will flip LoDuca in a trade for Vasquez?

[Guest GYC]

[Guest GYC]

Rotoworld analysis:
http://rotoworld.com/content/playerpages/p...ort=MLB&id=6032
http://www.nydailynews.com/front/breaking_...8p-316146c.html

]Paul Lo Duca - C - Marlins Paul Lo Duca has been traded to the Mets for right-hander Gaby Hernandez and a second minor league pitcher, the New York Daily News reports. Lastings Milledge wasn't an option, so the Marlins are doing pretty well to get Hernandez here. They must not have been too interested in either Anderson Hernandez or Jeff Keppinger as a potential second baseman. Since Lo Duca will earn $12.5 million over the next two years, he didn't have a lot of trade value. We wouldn't be completely stunned if this leads to Lo Duca going to the Diamondbacks in a Javier Vazquez deal, but it's more likely that Lo Duca will be the Mets' regular catcher. Dec. 4 - 6:16 pm et Source: New York Daily News

[Guest OlerudOwned]

I dont mind having LoDuca, but I didnt like him as much as Hernandez and didnt want them to give up a pitcher. Damn.

[Guest Edgy DC]

Seems the Mets are more willing to grip tightly to the prospects who they made a big commitment to --- big early draft choices and the like --- than to those who've successfully progressed and made an impact as minor leaguers.

For what it's worth, Hernandez was as hittable this season at St. Lucie as he was unhittable at Hagerstown.

I'll take Frayed Knot's line here:once again, it's the trade that wasn't burning up the rumor mill that goes down.

[Guest ABG]

How is LoDuca defensively?

[Guest Spacemans Bong]

Bleh. Not great.

[Elster88]

Why do this? There are two better catchers available who you can probably get for about the same money without giving up prospects.

What happened to those two offers on the table?

Isn't 33 the magic number where non-Piazza catchers start breaking down?

Someone start a poll and put me down for a no.

[Guest Edgy DC]

I don't know if this still goes on, but LoDuca used to have a tradition of writing his late mother's name in the dirt at the beginning of each game, as a tribute to her and her contributions for helping him get where he is.

[Valadius]

I have a feeling this is some kind of signal that Manny's on his way.

[Elster88]

I went with dislike. Love the CPF. Request a poll, go to eat some chicken, come back, and the poll is up.

[nymr83]

i dislike the trade. i dont care too much about losing Gaby Hernandez, its just that on top of that LOoDuca isn't worth his salary. LoDuca had ONE good year (in 2000 i think) and has been profiting off it ever since.

[Elster88]

Regardless of terming his years as good or bad, LoDuca is one of the better catchers out there. I don't really care so much about losing Hernandez except that we could've got a similar catcher without giving him up for the same money. Even with that I don't care too much except for the fact that I think that similar catcher would be [u:8751595f62]younger[/u:8751595f62]. 33 years old puts fear into me for a catcher, and he'll be 35 when the deal is up.

[nymr83]

he's being given 6 million each of the next 2 years AND we gave a up a decent prospect (i could live with one or the other but not both)....would anyone like to tell me that it wouldn't have been a better idea to offer slightly more than that (say 7 million per) to the similiarly-aged but better MIKE PIAZZA??

[Guest Johnny Dickshot]

The thing is, it's the $$ saved with Cameron gone, or if you like, Mike Cameron and Gaby Hernandez for Xavier Nady and Paul LoDuca. Nyeh.

[seawolf17]

LoDuca in 2005:

.283/.334/.380
6 HR in 445 AB (132 G)

Ugly. Better on the road (.798 vs .619 OPS), but still ugly.

Tenth out of 14 catchers in the majors with at least 450 PA in OPS in '05. (Better than Toby Hall, but not much.)

89 SB vs 29 CS, good for a little less than 25% CS. Better than some, but still in the bottom half of the majors.

One good season (2001), ugly since then.

[Frayed Knot]

- Jeez Omar are you going leave ANYONE in the farm system? That's #s 2, 3, & 4 gone from the BA list that's only 2 weeks old! I think our 2nd best prospect is now that 12 y/o (or maybe he's 16) kid we just signed in the DR. After that comes me.

- As I said in the other thread, I'm not too high on the guy. He'd be OK as a half-time catcher but is being paid like a full-timer, and a good one at that. He strikes me as better athletically than most catchers - ie; he can run a bit, bunt fairly well, plus play a few other positions if needed - but never hit as well as that first year and isn't all that great defensively.

- I remember the "clubhouse presence" card being played in just about every article following the big Marlin/Dodger trade involving Lo Duca a few years back (as Madden does in this piece) ... and I also remember at least as many pieces from 'Baseball Prospectus' making fun of that angle.

- I think the states of NY & Fla have worked out some sort of deal: we give them our retirees every January and our drunk college students every March, and in exchange every couple of years they send us a few of their overpriced ballplayers; Piazza, Leiter, Lo Duca, Delgado, Zeile

[Centerfield]

This is a stupid trade. I hate it. I hated it before it involved arguably the best pitcher left in our farm system. Right now Florida is ecstatic they weren't asked to pick up a portion of LoDuca's salary.

I can't believe we actually gave up prospects for an expensive, 33 year old catcher who had a .712 OPS and is only so-so defensively.

[Guest HappyRecap]

Man, this was a dumb trade.

Age 33 for a catcher is the supposed start of the slide and last year LoDuca hit 6 home runs which might be evidence that the slide started a while ago.

[Elster88]

Every post I've read makes me more pissed off at this trade.

Maybe Omar can now officially be called reckless. And I get to hear another interview tomorrow filled with "You know what I mean"s.

I'd like to trade my vote to hate, an ugly emotion.

[A Boy Named Seo]

We seem to keep hearing that Omar wants to strike and get something done before something else in the market drives up the price for whatever it is he's shopping for at the moment. He seemed to be right about Wagner (yes, I'm talking 'bout you, Mr. Tom Gordon), and maybe was right about Delgado, too (see the price tags on Thome and Konerko). The rags kept saying he was growing impatient with Benji and Hernandez, and maybe he got a strong impression from their agents or just from the waiting and silence that his 3-year/8-mils per deals to each wouldn't get the job done. That it might take 4 years (crazy for Benji anyway) or upwards of 9 or 10 mils or more for either of them (who would've thought Furcal would've got that much per year? Desperate teams in bidding wars to silly things).

So maybe he thought the "price" on LoDuca would go up if he tried to land him after one or both of Benji/Hernandez signed elsewhere. All that nonsense said, I still don't dig it especially. And Knot is dead-on about the LoDuca "heart" angle. After DePo traded him, everyone ripped him to shreads for tearing the heart and soul out of the Dodger organization. Heart and soul apparently doesn't help you throw out runners with a brilliant efficiency or hit for much power.

Welcome abordick, LoDuca.

[Guest Johnny Dickshot]

If you want a bright side, perhaps it's that money angle Seo discussed, and the fact that tho Hernandez, especially and Molina, somewhat, might be better, whoever catches wouldn't be a giant part of the O anywhoo, cost at least much in dollars, more in years, and could ultimately cost a draft pick. Hernandez is a 19-y.o. 3rd rounder, the FA pick you surrender is a 2nd rounder about the same age.

[Guest abogdan]

Like everyone else, I don't like picking up LoDuca, especially giving up anything of value for him. This pretty much means the Mets will have to make a move now to upgrade at 2B to avoid having a huge hole where the bottom third of the order should be.

[Guest Edgy DC]

"Honey, I'm replacing Piazza again."

[Valadius]

Are we going to be getting all of our catchers from the Marlins from now on?

[Elster88]

I'm curious as to why the people who voted "No opinion" voted as they did.

__________________________
This post had the designation 109) Timo Perez. This is a post that got off to a hot start and then felt cocky enough to jog around the forum assuming a home run had been hit.

[nymr83]

you know what else sucks? i'll bet that 2 weeks aho when we made the Delgado deal Omar could have said "oh yeah...and we'll take Loduca's Salary off your hands too" and the Marlins would have smiled and nodded WITHOUT the prospect.

[Elster88]

Huh. Excellent point. Hadn't even thought of that.

[Valadius]

I voted "no opinion" because I can't make any judgments yet.

Let's see how Lo Duca produces in a Mets uniform. He's supposed to be a great clubhouse guy and works very well with pitching staffs. He's one of the better catchers in baseball and could very well pan out. Let's wait and see on him.