Ronald Acuna Jr (ESPN trade proposal)

[wibadgers23]

What would everyone think of this trade for Acuna Jr?  They also listed proposals for Tampa and Seattle.  Note that Acuna is signed for 3.5 more years.

SS Jesus Made (No. 5), SS Luis Pena, OF Sal Frelick, RHP Logan Henderson, RHP Abner Uribe

https://www.espn.com/mlb/story/_/id/45689613/mlb-2025-trade-deadline-proposal-offer-paul-skenes-ronald-acuna-jr-byron-buxton

[wiguy94]

No

[Lloyd330]

Braves would never trade him, but Frelick/Pena/Pratt/Quero/Henderson could be an idea for them

[tmwiese55]

No way I'd give up that much.  Really I can't believe it was even proposed based on how light most trade returns are these days.  That proposal is drastically way over the top, why not make MKE give up Chourio too. 

That said, due to his contract and control he actually is one that could make sense for MKE to target if they actually made him available. And we are a team with a strong enough farm that it could happen. Perhaps about half of what was proposed in that deal.  But really I don't see why ATL would trade him unless the minor manager rifts he's gotten into with them has become too much.

[adambr2]

6 minutes ago, tmwiese55 said:

No way I'd give up that much.  Really I can't believe it was even proposed based on how light most trade returns are these days.  That proposal is drastically way over the top, why not make MKE give up Chourio too. 

That said, due to his contract and control he actually is one that could make sense for MKE to target if they actually made him available. And we are a team with a strong enough farm that it could happen. Perhaps about half of what was proposed in that deal.  But really I don't see why ATL would trade him unless the minor manager rifts he's gotten into with them has become too much.

Who are the comparable trades to Acuna that are going for light returns? He’s the perfect combination of production, control, and reasonable contract. It would take a godfather offer, as it should.

The closest comparable would probably be when the Nats dealt Soto, and they did receive a package comparable to what is proposed here for Acuna.

[tmwiese55]

3 minutes ago, adambr2 said:

Who are the comparable trades to Acuna that are going for light returns? He’s the perfect combination of production, control, and reasonable contract. It would take a godfather offer, as it should.

The closest comparable would probably be when the Nats dealt Soto, and they did receive a package comparable to what is proposed here for Acuna.

Yea its rare situation basically for why you said, to make it make sense it has to be a godfather offer so few do it.  I meant in general all the guys traded with 1-2 years left every year get lacking returns to what we remember many years ago.  Take Burnes here, but really there's countless guys with 1-2 years left.   But Acuna with 3.5 left with two torn ACLs should go for that much more for just 1.5 more years. In addition, Soto was what 23 years old at the time whereas Acuna is 27 with two torn ACLs. And really that Soto deal is proving exactly why teams don't do it as SD look like fools on it, if anything it proves you shouldn't do it.  If I recall that deal also had Josh Bell in it going to SD.

But yea, that's why its so unlikely. Team like us would be dumb to godfather them and ATL would be dumb to do it without a godfather offer, unless their hand is forced by the player/agent.

[Brewer77]

There is no trade that makes sense for both teams. That trade would interest the Braves, but is going from Frelick to Acuna worth Uribe, Henderson, Made, and Pena? I can’t see the Brewers giving up both Made and Pena in any deal for a single player 

[liveforoctober]

This proposal actually upset me. 

[adambr2]

1 hour ago, Brewer77 said:

There is no trade that makes sense for both teams. That trade would interest the Braves, but is going from Frelick to Acuna worth Uribe, Henderson, Made, and Pena? I can’t see the Brewers giving up both Made and Pena in any deal for a single player 

I mean if the Dodgers are offering Made and Pena for Ohtani, I’m not saying no. He’s that good, and that valuable.

Of course, I’m not the one who has to cut him a check for $68 million every year for 10 years after he’s retired.

[nate82]

I think the Braves would want Chourio in return for Acuna.  I believe that is where the trade starts and ends with.  Neither team would do the trade.  Well the Braves may but I think they would want someone else along with Chourio.

[wallus]

Acuna is a great player but that is too much. 

[TURBO]

Injury history is of no concern here?

Nope, no thanks.

[endaround]

You can quibble around the edges but that is a fair return for Acuna given that he is signed for only $17m a year. He makes general sense for the Brewers as a target since his salary would fit within budget constraints.  I just don't think Atlanta believes that they need to to do a full teardown.  And a package built around an 18 year old means you don't think next year is your year either.  I think Atlanta will think this year was more due to bad luck than a lack of talent and run it back.

[Brewcrew82]

This is actually fair. Acuna is a generational hitter who is signed to a generationally team friendly contract over the next few years. 

Only concern is the ACL injuries but those were freak incidents and he's bounced back from this latest one way better than he did last time. 

[wiguy94]

7 minutes ago, Brewcrew82 said:

This is actually fair. Acuna is a generational hitter who is signed to a generationally team friendly contract over the next few years. 

Only concern is the ACL injuries but those were freak incidents and he's bounced back from this latest one way better than he did last time. 

I agree that it's a pretty fair deal. Just no chance the Brewers would do it.

[adambr2]

18 hours ago, tmwiese55 said:

Yea its rare situation basically for why you said, to make it make sense it has to be a godfather offer so few do it.  I meant in general all the guys traded with 1-2 years left every year get lacking returns to what we remember many years ago.  Take Burnes here, but really there's countless guys with 1-2 years left.   But Acuna with 3.5 left with two torn ACLs should go for that much more for just 1.5 more years. In addition, Soto was what 23 years old at the time whereas Acuna is 27 with two torn ACLs. And really that Soto deal is proving exactly why teams don't do it as SD look like fools on it, if anything it proves you shouldn't do it.  If I recall that deal also had Josh Bell in it going to SD.

But yea, that's why its so unlikely. Team like us would be dumb to godfather them and ATL would be dumb to do it without a godfather offer, unless their hand is forced by the player/agent.

Yeah, I would agree with most of this. Deals like this are of great reluctance to both sides, so to actually get one done just is so rare. A Soto type trade (from the Nats) probably comes along maybe every 5 years? It takes the perfect storm of circumstances and perfect match. And I just don’t even think the Braves are in such a hopeless position that they’d be looking at a full out rebuild which is what this deal would signify.

I can understand the temptation, because we just do not have anyone on this lineup on Acuna’s level who can just carry the load offensively. It’s more just a group of mostly competent but not spectacular.

But we also finally are in a really good spot in both our MLB roster and farm system and I’m sure we’d like to sustain that.

[Outlander]

No inside information, not even a rumor, just throwing stuff against the wall hoping for clicks at ESPN.

[adambr2]

34 minutes ago, Outlander said:

No inside information, not even a rumor, just throwing stuff against the wall hoping for clicks at ESPN.

It’s just that time of year. My money would be heavily on the side of Acuna still being a Brave in a month.

[Team Canada]

51 minutes ago, Outlander said:

No inside information, not even a rumor, just throwing stuff against the wall hoping for clicks at ESPN.

Yes, it's just a thought exercise more than anything, and the ESPN presented it as such.

[tmwiese55]

Another Braves option could be Albies.  He's fallen off a cliff the last year or so, so maybe they'd be looking to move on from him.  I think he just has two club option years left at 7 mil each.  Do to his falloff you could probably get for cheap, especially if ATL is thinking of letting him go and especially compared to any Acuna talk.   

Who knows though how confident anyone could be in getting him back to his prior norms though, he's been quite bad this year. So really don't think you should give up anything of substance considering how bad he's been.  And this would also need Turang going back to SS.  Then Ortiz/Durban/Albies all kind of being interchangeable around at the other spots.     

[wildcat2237]

Big hell no....

Made alone could end up being about as good as Acuna is now. This is just not the type of trade the 2025 Brewers front office would make. 

[JosephC]

Acuna has had one monster season, a 9.1 fWAR effort in 2023.  He's never hit 5 fWAR in any other season, although he was very close in 2019 (4.9 fWAR).  He has missed half-a-season-plus in 2020, 2021, 2024 and has appeared in less than half the games this year (40 games).  He would be on a near 8 WAR pace this year if he had played in 95% of the games, but missed games matter, and he now has a long history of missing games.

Pro-rate this year (90 games played by the Braves so far) to a full season, and Acuna's average bWAR/fWAR for 2025 would be 3.5.  In 2023 (the huge year) his average WAR was 8.75.  In 2024 it was just 0.5 WAR due to all the missed games.

I'd put a fair number at him moving forward of 4.25 WAR per season.  It's the average of what he has done from 2023-2025.  That number could be up around 8 if he was playing full seasons, but that is unlikely as he will only have achieved that once in the last five years.

That would put his WAR totals over the next 3 plus seasons at 1.9 (remainder of this year) + 4.25 + 4.25 + 4.25 = 14.65 WAR over the remainder of his contract.  14.65 * 8 million per WAR = 117.2 million in value.  Salaries are 7.55 (remainder of this year) + 17 + 17 + 17 = 58.55 million.  117.2 - 58.55 million = 58.65 million in surplus value.

Sal Frelick entered this season with 1 year and 72 days of service time.  Add in the time this year, and I would guess he is somewhere just short of 2 full seasons of service time.  Let's just say 2 years on the nose, it should be really close to that.  He's at 291 games played, divide that by 2 and it's 145.5 games which would be 90% of a full season...so I think using 2 years of service time is completely fair.  So far Frelick has totaled 5.3 bWAR and 5.1 fWAR.  So an average of 5.2 bWAR/fWAR / 2 seasons = 2.6 WAR per season.  He has 4 years of team control after this one and is only 25 years old, so there is no reason to predict any sort of decline.  So 1.15 WAR (remainder of this year) + 2.6 + 2.6 + 2.6 + 2.6 = 11.55 WAR * 8 million per WAR = 92.4 million in value.  Frelick won't be a super two guy as he only had the extra 72 days over one year of service time...so he's very cheap next year and then has 3 arbitration years after that.  He's not a big home run hitter, likely won't be perceived as a "big run producer," so his arbitration numbers should fall on the more reasonable end of the spectrum.  I'd guess salaries something like 345k (remainder of this year) + 1.0 million + 4.25 + 6.75 + 9.75 (complete guesses as I am not an arbitration expert) = 22.1 million dollars.  92.4 million - 22.1 million = 70.3 million.

So using a completely unbiased method based on what these guys have done in the majors recently...Acuna has an estimated surplus value of 58.65 million and Frelick's estimate is 70.3 million.

Personally, I believe that the number on Acuna is probably how the majority of MLB front offices view Acuna.  Maybe slightly higher, but with all the missed games, I think optimistic teams would probably put the number around 70 million and less optimistic teams would have the number around 55 million.  Frelick, probably much less despite all hard evidence showing what his true value is.  I'm guessing the majority of MLB front offices would put his number in the 30-35 million range.

However, not only would the raw numbers dissuade me from making ESPN's proposed trade, I would have a hard time dealing Frelick straight up for Acuna.  As the Dodgers GM, where money is not an issue, I'd make the trade and take the extra 1.5 WAR per season with the upside that Acuna stays healthy and returns an even higher number of WAR.  Pretty easy for the Dodgers/Mets/Yankees to make this trade.  But when you are the Brewers, and money is a huge issue, the cheaper player controlled for an extra year that is worth 2.6 WAR per season has real value.  And when it comes to the bottom line, a pretty unbiased surplus value calculation using Acuna's last 2+ seasons (which included his big year) and Frelick's 2 MLB seasons completely justifies the idea of not making a straight up Acuna for Frelick trade.

[harrydalton]

No no never never uh uh uh!

[JosephC]

So to redo the math to calculate just how much ESPN thinks Acuna is worth.

I've done the Frelick math above.  While the unbiased MLB WAR number indicates a surplus value of 70 million, it's probably much more likely the league would value him as a 35 million dollar WAR player.  That's about 10 million above what his projected surplus value was when he was a prospect in the minor leagues,

It's been awhile since the Point of Pittsburgh surplus value chart has been brought up, but historically it's been very good as predicting prospect value-

https://thepointofpittsburgh.com/mlb-prospect-surplus-values-2018-updated-edition/

Note that this is from 2018 and has 1 WAR = 8.5 million, but Fangraphs has gone back to 1 WAR = 8 million, so I've adjusted the estimates down based on that.  I've just used the rankings from the MLB pipeline.

Made = 65 million surplus value

Frelick = 35 million

Pena = 28.2 million

Henderson = 12.2 million

Uribe = let's just say 5 million

Total = 145.4 million

Frelick's 35 million in surplus value already has his salary end factored in, but then add Acuna's dollars in to what the Brewers would take on...so add 58.55 million.

That puts the investment in Acuna at 145.4 + 58.55 million = 203.95 million.

So to return that investment = 203.95 million / 8 million per WAR = 25.5 WAR.  Acuna would have to return the Brewers 25.5 WAR to make this an even deal.  Brewers would control him for 3.44 years, so 25.5/3.44 years = 7.4 WAR per season.  Acuna would have be a 7.4 WAR player per season to make this an "even" trade for the Brewers based on current values.

Acuna is basically at 7.5 years of MLB service time.  Over those 7.5 years, he's accumulated 30.3 fWAR and 27.5 bWAR.  If you like Fangraphs, he's been a 4 WAR per season player.  If you prefer Baseball Reference, he's been a 3.7 WAR per season player.  He's nowhere near the 7.4 WAR per season player that ESPN has valued him at.

[KCBrewerfan34]

The Brewers desperately need a middle of the order bat but there is no way in H Pena and Made go in any deal. Putting Frelick in this deal would dramatically lower the additional pieces involved.