[ayaghmour2]

In a move that sent shock waves through the FABL, two Continental Association rivals agreed to a four player shock that could change the landscape of the league. The defending champion Philadelphia Sailors sent Tom Taylor, who used to look like the brightest young star in the FABL, to the Chicago Cougars for Mack Deal, Jim Stevens, and George Jordan.

"The Canadian Club" will turn 26 in March and will be playing in his fourth FABL season. The 4th Overall Pick out of Houston HS in 1923 is quite possibly the most intriguing and puzzling player in the FABL. The switch hitter burst onto the scene in 1928 as a Rookie, hitting .342/.422/.689 (16 OPS+) with 44 homers, 126 RBI's, and 26 steals. He had an insane +20.4 ZR out in right and was worth 10.7 wins above replacement. Taylor was named MVP of the CA that year, a rare feet for a rookie. His 1929 season was almost identical, hitting .351/.441/.651 (191 OPS+) with 38 homers, 138 RBI's, and 27 steals with an even better +24.5 ZR out in right. Again, Taylor was worth over 10 WAR (10.5) and won his second MVP in as many years.

So what happened? Why would Philadelphia, who won the World Series, be willing to trade him?

1930 was not Taylor's year. At the plate, everything as different. He hit just .261/.322/.421 (90 OPS+) with 15 homers, 81 RBI's, and 17 steals. All his numbers dropped from the year before. His doubles fell by 16, triples by 9, homers by 23, RBI's by 57, walks by 53, steals by 10, OPS+ by 101, and WAR by 8.7. The only thing that didn't fall, was strikeouts, which jumped by 10. He also played almost 30 less games as elbow issues caused him problems throughout this season.

His defense didn't take a hit, as the +21.2 ZR was better then his rookie year and his 1.132 efficiency rating was the best of his career, so worst case he's still the absolute best defensive corner outfielder.

Is there hope for Taylor rebounding offensively? I decided to dig into the advanced numbers. Here's where the biggest changes were: Taylor went from being walked inentionally 13 and 15 times his first two seasons before just 5 free passes this season. As a whole, hit walk rates fell from 12.2 and 13.9 (led the league with 99 walks in 1929) to 8.5. On the flip side, his strikeout rate sat at 10.2 and 9.8 before jumping to 14.8 this season. Another big change for Taylor is he just stopped getting balls to land. His BABIP fell from .320 and .347 all the way down to .281 while extra base hits fell from a league best 79 and 89 all the way down to 41. Not only was Taylor making less contact, he was hitting the ball much less hard. A lot of this could be attributed to him playing through his sore right elbow. His worst month was June, where he hit .208/.279/.396, one of the month he played injured in.

Does this mean Taylor will return to superstar levels in Chicago? Looking at park factors, Sailors Memorial park is a crazy pitcher friendly park with average factors of .902, .914 (LHB), and .895 (RHB) with extremely low home run factors of .797, .828 (LHB), and .780 (RHB). North Side Grounds, on the other hand, is much more hitter friendly with average factors of 1.088, 1.089 (LHPB), and 1.088 (RHB). And you wouldn't know it because we don't know how to hit homers, but balls fly out of North End Grounds with a 1.231 factor (the only stadium with a higher factor ironically is the Chiefs). The stadium change should bode well for Taylor and he'll have a lot of protection in the lineup. We had arguably the best offense in the league last year and Taylor will join a lineup filled with .300 hitters (lowest .321) at all seven other starting spots.

Looking at the package we gave up, the headliner was Mack Deal. If I didn't acquire another outfielder, Deal would have been given the chance to start out in left field. An infielder by trade, Deal was taken 6th Overall in the 1924 draft and has spent the past two seasons (and a cup of coffee in 1928) in Chicago. He's hit .308/.368/.400 (92 OPS+) with 9 homers, 132 RBI's, and 44 steals in just over 1,000 trips to the plate. At one point, Deal ranked as the 26th best prospect in the league and he is filled with talent. At just 24, he has a lot of time to grow, but there was no obvious position for him. He's played a lot of second, third, and short, but he's not much of a defender yet at any of the three positions. And with Simmons, Kincaid, and Combs at those positions, there's no easy spot for Deal. In Philly, however, they have a big hole at third and they'll be able to give him a full season's worth of playing time. It's going to be hard to let Deal go, but when you have the chance to add someone who's done what Taylor has, you jump at the chance to take it.

The other two pieces also have big league experience, catcher Jim Stevens and outfielder George Jordan. Stevens, 25, was originally acquired from the Foresters and he made his big league debut this season with us. He picked up just 11 plate appearances, but he would have competed with Jim Kyle (former Sailor) for the backup catcher role behind Fred Barrell. Both have the talent to start, as Stevens has 20+ home run power and should be a decent defender behind the plate. Jordan, also 25, was originally acquired from the Kings and he completed his first full big league season in a platoon role with Bob McCarty. It didn't go great, as he hit just .281/.339/.410 (80 OPS+) with 7 homers, 12 steals, and 54 RBI's. He's also generally been a plus defender, but he put up a -3.3 ZR out in center and just a .970 defensive efficiency. He was once a high ranked prospect, up to 24th in 1925, but a lot of the prospect shine has gone away. He lost his starting job with the addition of Cy Bryant, but he had a good shot to earn the 4th outfielder role.

This was a major trade that will be really interesting to look at a few seasons from now and it should create an interesting story line for this year. This offseason has been crazy, with multiple star players moving teams. We picked up Steve Castellani from the Gothams who moved star LF Carlos Cano to the Saints while adding a better LF in Joe Perett. Not only that, they already picked up superstar 1B Max Morris from the Pioneers. Now with us getting Taylor, it's the fifth big name player to change teams this offseason. Spring is around the corner and we're almost back to real baseball. Cougars fans are ecstatic as they feel this could be the year they return to the postseason.