The Idaho Taters were facing a few question marks in their starting rotation and went the trade route Wednesday night in a substantial deal with the Spokane Fightin' Fish. The Taters will receive right-handers Shane Bieber (2/$58) and Charlie Morton (3/$12) in exchange for 1st Round (14th Overall) and 3rd Round (35th Overall) Picks.
Bieber recovered nicely from the injury-shortened 2021 season to make all of his starts and return to the 200 innings level combining the volume of 2019 and top shelf stats from his Cy Young campaign. If you removed his name from his StatCast profile page, you may not be as interested in the player as he does give up hard contact, does not throw hard and his breaking stuff isn't particularly spinny, yet he has held the league to a sub .230 batting aveage in each of the past four seasons and his strikeout rate has been at least 25% in each of those four seasons. The sum is better than the individual parts here and he is one of just eight starting pitchers with a K-BB% greater than 20% from 2019-2022. He lacks the special fastball of the rest of that octet, but you simply cannot argue with the results and just how great he is pitching with his non-fastball offerings.
This could be Morton's ride into the baseball sunset as he enters his age-39 season. Atlanta holds a team option for 2024 at $20 million. After helping the club get to and win a championship in 2021, Morton returned from the fractured fibula he suffered in the World Series to go 9-6 with a 4.34 ERA across 172 innings spanning 31 starts last season. For the second consecutive year, Morton was knocked out of the postseason by a comebacker, this time to the elbow although this one didn't do nearly as much damage. He can still drop his excellent curveball in for strikeouts -- he finished 10th in baseball with 205 punchouts last season -- but everything else in his repertoire is rather hittable at this stage. The walks ticked up last year (8.7 BB%) as he nibbled more. Morton has a great defensive outfield behind him and a lot of offense to support him so while there is some age-related decline showing, he can still do a lot of good for a RDBL rotation.
The Taters had been projected to have one of the league's top cap space numbers but that will significantly change with the $70 investment in Bieber and Morton.
The Fish had dealt away both of their 1st Round Picks in their acquisition of Aaron Judge and Justin Verlander, but were able to jump back into the top round by dealing away Bieber and Morton who were unlikely to make their Keeper Roster. GM Michael Tirabassi looks all but finished on his 2023 Keeper Roster with a group that will need just two hitters and nine players overall for $177. giving the Fish the highest cap space per opening in the RDBL at $19.67.
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