The good, the bad, and the ugly of the Juan Pierre trade

Juan Pierre had 30 stolen bases last year but was caught 12 times. (Mark J. Terrill/AP)

Kenny Williams got his guy.

Again.

Earlier, it was Mark Teahen. Then, it was Omar Vizquel and Andruw Jones. Now, it's Juan Pierre. This move didn't come out of left field, though, as the Sox' interest in Pierre was reported eight days ago at the Winter Meetings.

At the time, though, it looked like the Sox weren't going to end up getting Pierre. The Dodgers wanted pitching in return and it was uncertain how much of Pierre's contract Los Angeles could pick up given the team's messy ownership situation.

But with Hideki Matsui off the market, the White Sox' left field options took a hit. Maybe the team never was interested in Matsui, maybe they were. The timing of the Pierre trade—one day after Matsui signed—is somewhat curious, though. Maybe Williams wanted to lock up a left fielder before all his favorite options went elsewhere.

Obviously, this trade will have a whole lot of implications for the rest of the offseason and into next season. A look at the good, the bad, and the ugly:

The good:

Scott Podsdenik no longer has a place on the White Sox. While I'll have more on Pierre's baseball ability in the next two "bad" and "ugly" sections, Pierre is more reliable than Podsednik. He's certainly more durable, and his ability to stay off the disabled list hopefully will allow the Sox to left Jordan Danks develop in the minors.

Unless the Sox turn to Podsednik to DH—which would be an awful and unlikely idea—he's not coming back to the White Sox in 2010. That's not saying Pierre is a marked improvement over Podsednik, but he'll be better than Podsednik next year, so that's a good thing.

Although it's not saying much.

Gordon Beckham won't lead off. My main worry with Beckham leading off wasn't that he wouldn't be a good leadoff hitter, instead, it was that leading off would stunt his power development. In reality, Beckham is a better leadoff hitter than Pierre, but for his long-term development I was somewhat about the effects of leading off.

That point is moot now, for better or for worse. Short term, it might be worse, but long term, it might be better.

The Dodgers are paying $10.5 of Pierre's remaining $18.5 million salary. The fact that the Sox will pay Pierre $3 million in 2010 and $5 million in 2011 makes the trade easier to swallow. It'll be tough for Pierre to not be worth that $8 million if he reverts back to his career averages.

The White Sox didn't pay a high price to land Pierre. Those are rumored to be John Ely and Jon Link, although Jayson Stark reports that the Dodgers will pick two major-league ready pitchers to complete the deal.

If the two players are Ely and Link, it would deplete the already-depleted pitching depth in the White Sox' farm system. But if the White Sox were forced to turn to Ely or Link at some point in the future, the team probably wouldn't be in good shape anyway.

Phil Rogers loves Ely, but I wouldn't put too much stock into that. Rogers once thought Lance Broadway, Kyle McCulloch, and Heath Phillips were the future of the White Sox' rotation. All three never panned out, and while Ely has had success in the minors, his stuff doesn't lend itself to him being a legitimate prospect.

While it wouldn't have hurt to have kept Ely in the system, losing him isn't anything to really get worked up about.

Pierre might play okay defense in left field. There isn't enough UZR data to make any sweeping conclusions about his defensive ability in left, but he has played around the league average or above the league average for the 178 career games he's played in left field. Playing in left would be the best spot for his weak arm, too.

At the least, he should be a good enough defensive upgrade over Podsednik.

The bad

Juan Pierre's offensive skills. Okay, so Pierre had a solid year at the plate in 2009. His OBP was .365 and his walk to strikeout ratio was 1:1 over 425 plate appearances. But don't let 2009 fool you: Pierre's best days are behind him.

From 2005-2008, Pierre's OBP went as follows: .326, .330, .331, .327. If that's not a trend, I don't know what is. Just because his OBP in 2009 was at a good level doesn't mean it'll be there in 2010.

It's the same argument I've been using in support of Alex Rios. Until proven otherwise, an outlier—like Pierre and Rios' 2009s—is just that, an outlier. It does not signify a trend.

The trend with Pierre has shown that his offensive skills are well below average. Weighted on-base average (wOBA, explained perfectly by Big League Stew), has rated Pierre well below average since 2005 with the exception of 2009.

If Pierre returns to his 2005-2008 wOBA average of .312, it likely would place him in the bottom fifth of qualified MLB players in that regard. The same goes for his OBP, if you like using that stat more.

The probability of Pierre being below average at the plate is pretty high going into 2010. That doesn't mean he can't buck the trend and have another decent year at the plate, but it's not something the White Sox should count on.

The ugly

Juan Pierre's baserunning. Pierre can steal bases. He also gets caught far too often to justify him trying to steal so many bases.

In 2009, Pierre stole 30 bases and was caught 12 times, a 71 percent success rate. In 2008, his stolen base success rate was 77 percent. You have to go all the way back to 2007 to find a year in which Pierre successfully stole a base on over 80 percent of his attempts.

The fact that Pierre gets thrown out so frequently just amplifies his poor on-base skills. If you subtract the 12 times he was caught stealing from his OBP, that stat falls to .336. Going back to 2008—which was about an average year for Pierre at this stage in his career—subtracting the 12 times he was caught stealing from his OBP drops it from .327 to .297.

I realize that's an incredibly simplistic view because it doesn't take into account the times Pierre was successful in a stolen base attempt. But if the goal of a leadoff hitter is to be on base as much as possible, Pierre doesn't succeed at meeting that.

Final thoughts

If the choice for the White Sox really was between Juan Pierre and Scott Podsednik, they made the right move in taking Pierre. He's a better fielder, is more durable, and has comparable offensive skills to Podsednik.

But just because Pierre is a better call than Podsednik doesn't make Pierre good. If he regresses in 2010, the Sox will be left with a leadoff hitter with a .320-.330 OBP who doesn't get many extra-base hits and gets thrown out way too much on the basepaths.

For Pierre to avoid a regression, he's going to have to keep his walk rate near 7 percent—where it was in 2009 and about where it was during his heyday in 2003 and 2004. A little patience would go a long way for Pierre, because if he gets on base and is a little more selective with his steals, he'd be a great asset for any team.

Problem is, Pierre will be 33 in August. At this point in his career, the chances are pretty low that he experiences any kind of career rebirth. But, nonetheless, the chance does exist.

I'm not going to write Pierre off as a failure this early. If comes out and takes a good number of walks early on in the season, my expectations for him will jump up to an above-average OBP.

They say patience is a virtue, but for Pierre, patience is necessary if he's going to be a successful part of the White Sox offense moving forward. If his walk rate falls into the 4 and 5 percent range, he'll go right back to being a below-average offensive player.

In the end, it's hard to dislike the trade itself—the Sox aren't paying a whole lot for Pierre and he didn't cost much in terms of prospects. But Pierre is far from the offensive answer the Sox are looking for in a leadoff hitter, so unless he finds a way to change the course of his history, he won't be doing much for the Sox at the plate in the next two years.

Trade reactions from around the internet:

• Larry at SouthSideSox says the Sox "get someone who isn't very good at major league baseball."
• Beyond the Box Score says Pierre projects to be a 0.7-win player.
• Rob Neyer makes fun of the White Sox outfield.
• Kevin Kaduk has some amusing nicknames for the Sox outfield at Big League Stew. My favorite: "The Ned Colletti Memorial Outfield."
• Jon Weisman of the Los Angeles Times comes to same conclusion I did—that Pierre's 2009 was a fluke.
• Jim at SoxMachine has now weighed in.