A quick look at the players coming to Chicago in the Nick Swisher trade

November 14, 9:04 AMChicago White Sox ExaminerJJ Stankevitz

Previous Next

4 comments Print Email RSS Subscribe

Subscribe

Get alerts when there is a new article from the Chicago White Sox Examiner. Read Examiner.com's terms of use.

Email Address   Include other special offers from Examiner.com Terms of Use

Wilson Betemit has hit .260 over his five-year MLB career. 

I've been on the record twice against the White Sox trading Nick Swisher away from Chicago. The Sox did just that today, sending Swisher and Kanekoa Texeira to the New York Yankees for Wilson Betemit, Jeff Marquez, and Jhonny Nunez.

I'm not going to go back and delve into why I think Swisher will improve next year, but I'm going to go back to the trade that initially brought Swisher to Chicago. In the end, the White Sox ended up cutting their losses with Swisher, amounting to Gio Gonzalez, Fautino de los Santos, and Ryan Sweeney being traded for Betemit, Marquez, and Nunez.

Yikes. That doesn't look good.

Betemit is the one player out of the three picked up from the Yankees that has some decent upside, despite the fact that he's played in the major leagues for most of the last five seasons. In 2002, Betemit was rated as the No. 8 prospect in baseball by Baseball America, but he found himself stuck behind Chipper Jones in the Braves organization.

Atlanta moved him to Los Angeles in 2006, which flipped him to the Yankees in 2007. Betemit was stuck behind Alex Rodriguez at third base, but saw some decent playing time at first base while with the Yankees. Overall, though, Betemit has found himself stuck behind some pretty good players over the course of his career, and he may have a chance to be a full-time starter at third base with the White Sox.

Betemit has had offensive potential in his career--but the question at this point is, at age 27, has the ship sailed on that potential? There's really no way to tell until Betemit shows up for spring training next year. If he does fulfill that potential, then this deal may be saved. However, if he flops, the White Sox will have a poor defensive utilityman (NYYFans.com's Phil Allard, who graciously quoted me in his article, described Betemit as having "horrible range" and an "anvil of a glove") without a decent bat on their hands in Betemit. And there's not much chance that Marquez or Nunez could salvage the deal for the White Sox.

Marquez was the 41st overall pick in the 2004 draft and was ranked as the No. 7 prospect in the Yankees' organization in 2008--although, given the state of the Yankees' farm system, that's not a whole lot to write home about. He's not much of a strikeout pitcher, and overall, his numbers give me the gut feeling that he's a slightly better version of Kyle McCulloch. Marquez might compete for a job in the bullpen next year, but he's been a lifelong mediocre starter. His only saving grace is that he does get a lot of ground balls, but regardless, he's still not much of a prospect.

Nunez originally came up as a starter, but he moved to the bullpen last year and saw some decent success in limited time at Double-A. His K/9 was well over 9.00 for 2008, so hopefully that indicates that he has good stuff (I'm sure I'm not alone when I say that I haven't seen video of Jhonny Nunez). He might be a decent middle relief prospect, but projecting minor league relievers is a difficult task unless you have a Francisco Rodriguez on your hands.

Overall, it doesn't look like the White Sox got much of a haul in this trade. Granted, it's still far too early to declare a winner in this one, but right now, I'd be leaning toward the Yankees on this one.