Trade Targets: Marcell Ozuna

After this past season’s let down, the Indians will need to change the makeup of their lineup if they wish to compete for a playoff spot in 2016. The Indians are certainly not going to be major players in the free agent market, although players like Jason Heyward and Chris Davis would look great in a Tribe uniform. The most realistic option for the Indians to improve their current roster would be through a trade.

The Indians have a deep pitching staff and a deep farm system for the first time in a long while so there’s plenty to work with if the newly reshaped front office wants to explore a big trade. One of the names that has been floated around as a potential trade acquisition is Marlins outfielder, Marcell Ozuna. Going into 2015, most Indians fans would have been wholeheartedly on board with the Indians trading for a young, right-handed hitting slugger, regardless of the fact that the handedness of the hitter doesn’t actually matter. After this past season, the question now becomes, should the Indians attempt to trade for an average defender who is coming off of a tremendously unsuccessful season at the plate?

For those who may not be familiar with Marcell Ozuna, he’s one of the many young promising hitters in the Marlins’ organization. Ozuna made his MLB debut in 2013 at the age of 22 after just 10 games in AA, the highest level he had reached at that point in his career. In 70 games in the big leagues that season, Ozuna posted a slash line of .265/.303/.389 with 3 HRs, a 91 wRC+, and an fWAR of 1.7, largely due to positive defensive numbers. At the age of 22, those aren’t bad numbers, especially for someone who hadn’t even seen AAA pitching at that point in his career and only experienced a small cup of coffee in AA.

In 2014 Ozuna exploded onto the scene with a .269/.317/.455 slash and 23 HRs, for a 115 wRC+ and 3.7 fWAR. These are excellent numbers for a 23 year old who is getting his first full season of big league experience, understandably expectations were high for the Marlins and Ozuna going into 2015. This past season Ozuna faltered mightily, beginning the season with the big league club before being demoted to AAA for 33 games, and ending the year with Miami. In 123 games, Ozuna posted anemic numbers at the plate with a .259/.308/.383 slash line, with just 10 HRs, a 89 wRC+, and 1.1 fWAR.

Stephen Shumansky of Fangraphs wrote a piece about Ozuna’s 2015 struggles, in an attempt to analyze where the young slugger went wrong this past season. Because I agree with much of his analysis and do not wish to recreate it in an attempt to claim it as my own, I encourage you to read this piece. However, there a parts I wish the expand upon for while I generally agree, the numbers give an appearance that Ozuna will rebound, I feel there are other reasons for his struggles in 2015.

Particularly alarming, and perhaps very telling, for Ozuna is his lack of plate discipline.

Ozuna swung at more pitches this season than in the previous year. He also made more contact than he did last year and at first glance most would think that’s a good thing. After all he reduced his strikeout rate from 26% in 2014 to 22% in 2015. However, a closer look reveals what could have been a leading cause for his down year in 2015. Ozuna made contact with pitches outside the strike zone at a 9% higher rate than in 2014. Taking this into account, his batted ball profile begins to make more sense.

Ozone increased his line drive rate this past season, while his fly ball percentage declined and his infield fly ball percentage increased. Moreover, his HR/FB% dropped dramatically from last season and I suspect much of this has to do with the aforementioned plate discipline/lack thereof. The reason the strike zone exists is because those are the pitches that are most able to be hit. A player is not expected to hit a ball outside the strike zone, because for the most part, those are much harder to hit pitches. It makes sense then that if Ozuna is making more contact with pitches outside of the strike zone, the results of said contact will not be a positive as it would be if he were making more contact with pitches inside the strike zone. This is all a fairly intuitive concept, but deserves explaining when attempting to predict if Ozuna will rebound.

Ozuna is a very young player, he’ll turn 25 this month and he’s already played nearly 2.5 years in the big leagues. Younger players tend not to have as well-developed sense of the strike zone as older, more experienced hitters. While Ozuna has been in the major leagues for some time now, as mentioned earlier, he only played 10 games in AA before making the leap to Miami. He hasn’t exactly had the time to develop plate discipline and a sense of the strike zone that other players who take a more traditional route through the minor leagues have. With this taken into account, I believe Ozuna is a good candidate for a rebound year based on the experience he will continue to receive as he develops.

But the question still remains, should the Indians bank on this rebound and make the trade for him? If so, what should they offer?

Overall, I’d say the Indians should definitely consider trading for him. Ozuna is a promising young bat that could potentially expand the Indians’ window for contention as he’ll be under team control for another 4-5 years. But this comes with the always-present caveat of, it depends on what it would take to get him. Some early rumors had the Indians trading Danny Salazar for Ozuna and if that’s the case I couldn’t reject the deal soon enough. Salazar is an great young pitcher with unlimited potential, while Ozuna shows promise, but still has a long way to go to perfect his craft. The Marlins need young pitching to pair with Jose Fernandez and I believe they need it more than the Indians need the risk that accompanies Ozuna. If a deal is to be made that is centered around these 2, I would feel much more comfortable if the Marlins send over additional players in return. Only then would I consider the notion of a Salazar-Ozuna trade.