FanPost

Dan Haren or Cliff Lee?

While Cliff Lee seems almost a sure thing to be traded this year and the Twins are almost surely to be in the mix, Dan Haren's name has been tossed out on more than one occasion as possibly becoming available. The question really comes down to who would you want more and what would it take to get them?

(Much more must-read discussion under the jump.)

In the short term the obvious answer is Lee he's been absolutely dominant for 2 years and now looks even better this season. If it came down to a 3 month rental for the same trade package then you obviously take Lee. Not only because of how he's looked the past 3 years (the bulk of that in the AL) but also because of how dominant he was in the playoffs. He's a rental player and any team acquiring him would get two draft picks somewhere between 16th pick in the 1st round and 15th pick in the 2nd round. He'll take at least one top prospect and more to acquire but could be the type of player to push the Twins over the top. Wilson Ramos is almost a given in any package for Lee along with probably 2 more prospects in the 10-25 range.

Then you have Haren, who is under contract at 12.75 million per year for 2011 and 2012 along with a 15.5 million option (3.5 buyout) in 2013 that does not appear to be vesting. Based on traditional statistics like ERA(4.65) and win-loss record(7-6), Haren is having a bit of a down year so there could be some concern that he is on the decline. However, all of his peripherals show that he's probably unlucky such as a .341 BABIP compared to a career rate of .303. There really is no explanation for the higher BABIP as his line drive rate has actually declined by 3% overall. The only major change in batted ball statistics is that his FB% rate has climbed 5% along with his HR/FB rate at a career high of 14.1% compared to an 11% career average. So the main culprit appears to be that he's giving up more home runs than normal which could very easily just be a small sample size aberration. His K/9 and BB/9 are all in line with his career norms so I believe there is very little to worry about. His xFIP is at 3.46 (career 3.62) and FIP is at 4.04 (career 3.69) so everything seems to be hunky dory just a bit of bad luck on flyballs leaving the park I assume.

So, I guess by this last paragraph it becomes pretty obvious I'm in favor of a trade for Haren even though it would require more in return. Because of his mediocre ERA and contract he may be a buy low candidate to some extent. However after looking at his other numbers it becomes apparent he's not really having that down of a year. The nice thing about Haren is that because he's under contract for a number of years the Twins could afford to package a top prospect with a current starter to get a deal done. Part of me doesn't want to put together a package but some names that would likely be considered would be Ramos, Angel Morales, Ben Revere, Joe Benson, Bromberg, etc. The only guys I don't see the Twins considering would be Hicks, Gibson, and Sano. I also believe a package could include a current starter such as Baker or Slowey. Slowey may be the more attractive option as he's cheaper but Baker has a better track record and would offer the Twins a bit in salary relief to make room for Haren's contract. It would likely take two of our top 10-15 prospects and possibly a currrent starter. Ramos, Baker, and say Bromberg? Would that be enough, maybe put Slama in there too? It's not going to be cheap but a starting lineup of Haren, Lirano, Pavano would look really nice this year and any rotation headlined by Liriano and Haren over the next 2-3 years sounds great to me. So what do you think?