Sisco for Gload

The Royals deal Andrew Sisco to the White Sox for Ross Gload. This is an interesting deal. My gut reaction is to say that it is a horrendous deal for the Royals. Sisco is a 23-year-old lefthander who could throw a feather through a brick wall, and those don’t grow on trees, especially for the pitching-starved Royals. He had a fine rookie campaign in 2005 followed by a terrible year, but 6’10” power lefties have something of a history of coming along slowly, and they are dealing him when his stock is down. I’m also not sure it’s a great deal for Sisco; while he gets into a much better organization for developing pitchers, he is probably more likely now to get pigeonholed as a situational lefty reliever, which is not the best role for a guy with his upside but also his control problems.
All of that said, though, the deal may yet be partly salvaged if Gload turns out a few good years as a regular. He is a pretty good hitter, probably better than, say, Jeff Liefer or Jeff Abbott or Greg Norton. While his upside is lower than Sisco’s, he’s a better bet to be productive in 2007. That may not be the profile you are seeking if you are KC and building for 2008-09, but it’s something.
UPDATE: Pinto says Sisco may have been dealt for eating tacos during a game in Mexico. Or something.

4 thoughts on “Sisco for Gload”

  1. This is a puzzling deal and I agree, it makes little sense. My only guess is that they didn’t think Cisco was going to make it back to his ’05 form. Remember, he was aquired in the Rule 5 draft from the Cubs A-ball team. There is a reason when a player is still in A-ball after 5 years.
    Gload will be a bat off the bench and not a regular. The Royals are loaded in the OF and there is no way he will beat out Sheely at 1B.

  2. Apparently, Sisco had some sort of problem in Winter ball and got kicked off his team. Maybe this was just a last straw kind of thing. There have been a number of players with lots of potential who wake up after getting canned. Maybe he’ll take his coaches seriously if he realizes his career is in danger. Maybe not.

  3. True!! He has an awesome arm, but in ’06 he had no command and when he did throw stikes it was hit hard.

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