Dayton, tell me about Betancourt's upside again. Please?

Yuniesky Bentacourt. The name brings an undeniable and overwhelming feeling of nausea. Last year, after a slide in production and season-ending injury to Mike Aviles, Dayton Moore was able to pry Betancourt from the Seattle Mariner's "man-on-his-deathbed" grip. Seattle knew about Betancourt, baseball knew about Betancourt, hey Dayton, "Yeah. Did you get that memo?". I am still scratching my head on this one. Baseball is largely a game of numbers, and often these numbers are somewhat reliable in projecting the course of a player's career. Wins above replacement (WAR) might have been a good starting point for Moore when considering acquiring Betancourt.



(He doesn't look THAT bad from a distance)


I am not implying that numbers tell the whole story, but let's look at the top five shortstops in baseball (in order) according to the 2010 projected WAR:

-Hanley Ramirez

-Alex Rodriguez

-Troy Tulowitzki

-Ben Zobrist

-Jose Reyes

The list above is not necessarily the "who's who" of shortstops, but it is a respectable group nonetheless. I don't see Betancourt in the top 5...or the top 10...or even the top 50. No, to find Betancourt you have to look at the VERY BOTTOM of the list. He is the worst shortstop according to this assessment tool. His WAR is -1.0 compared to Hanley Ramirez (the top prediction) at 7.5.

Maybe WAR is just not a good way to look at this. I mean, Moore is a baseball man who came from a great baseball institution in the Atlanta Braves. Maybe Betancourt looks better in another category. That upside that he told fans about MUST exist in another form.

UZR measures the runs saved relative to the average fielder at a given position. Again, here are the top five shortstops projected for 2010 in that category...again, in order:

-Elvis Andrus

-Brendan Ryan

-Jack Wilson

-Paul Janis

-Ben Zobrist

A very respectable group defensively. When Moore acquired Betancourt, he was arguably in a pinch and understandibly felt the need to "get someone" to fill the shortstop void. I wouldn't expect him to be able to grab a top five...maybe middle of the road, or even a little worse. So where does Betancourt rank? 25th? 30? 45? Nope. DEAD LAST...AGAIN. Oh dear. It is often said that "the third time is the charm". Let's give Dayton Moore one last chance and maybe, just maybe, we will see this "upside" he was talking about.

Ever since coming to Kansas City, Moore has been faced with the challenge of improving an abysmal squad...offensively and defensively. Clearly, our above exercise shows that he wasn't looking for defense when he decided to bring aboard Betancourt. Maybe the upside is in his offense! This has to be it! Dayton was once regarded as one of the brightest young minds in baseball. He decided to take the GM position in Kansas City knowing that they were a small market club and would have to make VERY smart decisions given their limited payroll abilities. He must have seen something in the man's offensive numbers!

OPS is regarded as a fairly important tool is assessing a player's offensive ability/impact. It is, simply stated, a player's OBP plus slugging percentage. The top five? Well, they are a familiar group:

-Alex Rodriguez

-Hanley Ramirez

-Troy Tulowitzki

-Ben Zobrist

-Jose Reyes

BETAN-COURT!?!?!?!?!?! Where are you???????? Out of the three stats we are looking at, this is where he does the best. His OPS is projected at 0.642, putting him ahead of (only): John McDonald, Adam Everett, Cesar Izturis, and Paul Janish. Yup. He ranks 53rd.

Collectively and clearly, Dayton Moore traded for the WORST possible shortstop, if not player, in baseball. Worst of all, he added him to a team that needed the worst player in baseball as bad as they needed bats made of wet noodles.