You can smell the stank of this trade all the way through the internet

OK, the Indians have started the off-season with a thud.   They managed to sign Chernoff to a contract extension and he rewarded them by making a stinker of a first trade this winter.

Normally in trades you are trying to do one or more of a number of things:

1. Trade your excess for another team's excess in areas your team is weak.   This is the best kind of trade as it usually a win-win, benefitting both teams' major league roster.  The key is that you get back in the trade about what you gave up.

2. Trade prospects to get a current major leaguer

3. Trade veterans for prospects

4. Do a salary dump

5. Take on salary in a salary dump to fill a need on your roster.

6. Clear space on your 40-man roster

The Indians traded Erik Gonzalez, Tanaj Thomas and Dante Mendoza to the Pirates for Jordan Luplow and Max Moroff.

This trade does not fit into any of the above categories

Moroff  is a utility infielder who is clearly inferior to Gonzalez.
Luplow is a right-handed hitting outfielder who bounced last year between AAA and the majors.

BOTH ARE PLAYERS WHOSE CAREER MAJOR LEAGUE AVERAGES ARE BELOW THE MENDOZA LINE.

Gonazlez, on the other hand, has performed at reasonable offensive and defensive levels to be a solid utility infielder for a number of years with the potential to be an everyday player in Pittsburgh.   How he will do when asked to play every day is up in the air but my guess is he will be a well-above-average defender and his bat will blossom now that he will be getting regular playing time. Plus he isn't even arbitration eligible so wouldn't have cost us much money next year.

Thomas and Mendoza are lottery tickets but they represent the kind of players acquired in trades where the other team is doing a salary dump.  That is, something that may net a big return in the future for the team dumping salary.  

Plus, this trade actually ADDS dead weight to the 40 man roster instead of removing it.

So, to summarize:

A. Unless Luplow and Moroff have sudden turnarounds in performance they will be no help next year to the major league roster and will just take up roster space.  They will both be in their 3rd year in the majors so it is not like they are about to explode on the scene.

B. We wasted a trade chip in Gonzalez and got nothing back that was useful.

C.  As if A. and B. were not bad enough, the Indians also threw in two lower level prospects, i.e., something for the future to salvage the trade if Gonzalez doesn't out.  Gonzalez should have netted us Luplow and Moroff WITHOUT throwing in Thomas and Mendoza.  It is even reasonable, looking at the major league performance of each of these three players, CLEVELAND should have gotten one or two prospects like Mendoza back instead of throwing him int.

Let me be clear.   This was a PATHETIC trade on paper.   Maybe the Indians know something about Luplow and Moroff that I don't know (and obviously that the mediocre Pirates don't know).  But, unless Luplow and Moroff far exceed their current level of ML production, this trade does nothing to help the Indians in the present or the future.  Time will tell but this trade appears to be nonsensical and made without any plan in place for the short term or long term future of the club.