Doug Melvin Trade Analysis Part 4

This is part 4 of an analysis of the trades Doug Melvin made while he was Rangers GM. This week I will cover 1998. Each trade will be scored a win, loss, or tie. The score is based on how each player contributed to the Rangers at the major league level.

25. 3/14/98 The Texas Rangers traded Kevin Brown to the Toronto Blue Jays for Tim Crabtree.

Win – Tim Crabtree gave us two good relief year, with ERA’s of 3.59 and 3.46 in ’98 and ’99 before his awful years of ’00 and ’01. Kevin Brown (the catcher) only got to play in 85 career games.

Record: 8-7-10

26. 7/17/98 The Pittsburgh Pirates traded Esteban Loaiza to the Texas Rangers for Warren Morris and Todd Van Poppel.

Tie – None of the players did well, as Warren Morris never played very well, Esteban Loaiza never had an ERA below 5.00 as a Ranger, and Todd Van Poppel, in his only year with Pittsburgh, had an ERA of 5.36.

Record: 8-7-11

27. 7/31/98 The Florida Marlins traded Todd Zeile to the Texas Rangers for Daniel DeYoung (minors) and Jose Santo (minors).

Win – Todd Zeile really helped us make the playoffs in ’98 and then hit .293 in ’99. Neither DeYoung or Santo even made the majors.

Record: 9-7-11

28. 7/31/98 The St. Louis Cardinals traded Royce Clayton and Todd Stottlemyre to the Texas Rangers for a player to be named later, Darren Oliver, and Fernando Tatis. The Texas Rangers sent Mark Little (August 9, 1998) to the St. Louis Cardinals to complete the trade.

Win – Darren Oliver only played with the Cardinals for one and a half years, Tatis only started one year and hit .298 that year, and Mark Little only got 12 at-bats. Both Clayton, who hit .288 that year, and Stottlemyre, who had a 5-4 record that year, were huge in the Rangers’ pennant race. Also, Royce Clayton played for the Rangers for 2 and a half years.

Record: 10-7-11

I went to two baseball games this week. On Wednesday, my dad and I went to the Rangers/Royals game. It was Autograph Wednesday so I got a lot of autographs. They had Rusty Greer, Jim Norris, Frank Catalanotto, Ramon Vazquez, and David Murphy located around the park signing autographs and I got all of them. It was a great game, with the Rangers winning 3-2. Padilla pitched great and got the win and Benoit got the save. We had great seats, 11 rows behind home plate, so it was a lot of fun. On Thursday night, I went to the RoughRiders playoff game with my dad and my two-year-old little sister Kate. They lost, but we had a lot of fun and I got a lot of autographs for Kate. She really likes going to the games because she likes watching Deuce, the mascot. Eleanor Czajka from the Newberg Report and Jon Daniels were also there and I got to talk with them.

Last night, I was on the Rangers post game show on the radio (KRLD). Mike Ogulnick interviewed me about my blog. It was a lot of fun and I would like to thank Mike for having me on. I got to stay up until midnight to do the interview.

Results of last week’s poll:
Who do you think should be the NL MVP?
Prince Fielder – 38%
Matt Holliday – 25 %
Albert Pujols – 13%
Ryan Braun – 6%
Ken Griffey – 6%
Ryan Howard – 6%
Other – 6%
Miguel Cabrera – 0%
Adam Dunn – 0%

Come back next week for an analysis of the pennant races.