Trade Reactions, Part Two

Happ and Wallace should provide a lot of value, and it was nice to see them get at least one high-upside guy in Villar.

I don’t really understand why Toronto traded Wallace to Houston for Gose, though. Clearly Toronto believes that Gose is a better prospect, and that just kind of surprised me given how much refinement Gose needs as a baseball player.

I am in love with Wallace’s swing. The ball pops off his bat. Very strong wrists, very loose, a quick swing which keeps the barrel in the zone a long time. Color commentator/former Astros pitcher Jim Deshaies raves about his swing every at bat; normally you wouldn’t put much stock in the announcers (or just enough negative stock to press mute immediately), but JD is an exception. He’s a very, very smart dude, and might be the best color guy in the sport.

Wallace has three singles, an IBB (thanks TLR), and a pair of strikeouts in 11 ABs, but aside from his first game when he looked nervous, he had a lot of very good at-bats in there. He looks for his pitch to hit, laying off balls outside the zone, and flicks balls away like it’s nothing to stay alive. All three hits were smoked.

The biggest criticism is that he doesn’t use his legs enough in his swing, and doesn’t put enough loft in the ball. That’s fair, but I wonder whether they can work with him on both of those things over time. I don’t really buy that a 23-year old hitter in his second full season is a finished product. And his wrists are so strong I can see him hitting for above average power even without tweaking anything.

I also find his low walk rate a little strange. As I mentioned, he tends to get good patient at bats. He might be one of those guys who sees a patient AB as an opportunity to get a good pitch to hit, and prefers to swing when he gets into a hitter’s count, instead of trying to work a walk. It may just be who he is, and he may never draw a whole lot of walks, but I certainly wouldn’t characterize him as a free swinger based on what I’ve seen so far.

I still haven’t seen enough on defense to say a whole lot about him on that end of the ball, but he’s made some nice stretches and scoops and seems to have good hands. He hasn’t had many difficult chances with which to flash his range. He moves okay on the basepaths for a guy his size though. His third baseman’s arm already came in handy as he threw out Jon Jay trying to advance to third base on a grounder (it was a close play but Wallace’s strong arm nailed him). Other than that, I don’t know. I think the Astros might not mind him being slow since all four (count ’em) of their best second base prospects have plus range.