MINOR DEFICIT

The Angels recently traded second baseman Randy Velarde and pitcher Omar Olivares for three minor league prospects. What are the chances that at least one of those three will live up to his potential?

Not good if the deals of both local teams in the last decade are indications. A check of Dodger and Angel trades involving veterans and minor leaguers from 1989-98 showed 32 prospects coming to the two organizations. Of those, only one, J.T. Snow, ever became anything close to a star.

What happened? A closer look:

*

Consider yourself a baseball expert? See how many of the following questions you can answer:

1. Which major Angel trade brought them Fausto Macey?

2. Which major Dodger trade brought them Arnold Gooch?

3. Who is Terry Welk?

4. In trades for players to be named, how many of those players can you name?

If you don’t know the answers, don’t feel bad. Only a few managers, general managers and scouts do, and some of them don’t even like to admit it.

More than any other sport, baseball, despite the advent of free agency, remains conducive to trades. And you don’t have to be an expert to remember the blockbusters. Everybody who cares knows that the Dodgers traded Mike Piazza and Todd Zeile to the Florida Marlins last year for Gary Sheffield, Bobby Bonilla and several others.

But you have to be pretty knowledgeable to remember that one of the players thrown in by the Marlins was Manuel Barrios, who has pitched one inning for the Dodgers.

Or that Macey, a pitcher, was included in the 1996 deal that also brought pitcher Allen Watson to the Angels from the San Francisco Giants for Snow.

Or that Gooch, a pitcher, was part of last year’s trade with the New York Mets, which also brought catcher Todd Hundley to the Dodgers.

Or that Welk, also a pitcher, was traded to the Dodgers in 1990 by the Houston Astros for first baseman Franklin Stubbs.

Minor leaguers often have been included in major league deals, but now, in this age of budget-busting salaries, they are more attractive than ever. If your roster is weighed down with high-priced veterans who are leading the club into oblivion--or bankruptcy--the quick fix is to dump those veterans and rebuild cheaply with enthusiastic, talented, lower-paid kids.

Last month the Angels, having long since dropped out of the division race, took what they hope is a shortcut to the future in a five-player deal with the Oakland Athletics.

Sent to Oakland were Velarde, who was batting .306, and Olivares, who was 8-9 but had been one of the Angels’ most consistent pitchers over the last two seasons. The Angels received Class-A outfielder Nathan Haynes, double-A outfielder Jeff DaVanon and double-A pitcher Elvin Nina.

Haynes came in for special praise from Angel General Manager Bill Bavasi, who said, “He can really run, and he has really shown he can adapt to the leadoff role for a young guy.”

But then, has there ever been a minor leaguer traded who didn’t receive praise from the club taking him?

Certainly none of those obtained by the Angels and Dodgers over the last decade. Ruling out trades involving strictly minor leaguers, The Times focused on the 28 deals in which at least one of the players qualified as a veteran and one as a rookie by major league standards, meaning a pitcher with no more than 50 innings of major league work in one season, or a position player with no more than 130 at-bats.

Of the 32 players in that category, 17 never even made it to the Dodgers or Angels. Of the remaining 15--10 Angels and five Dodgers--catcher Ron Tingley spent the most time with the big league team, playing five seasons with the Angels. But he batted only .198 with four home runs and 33 runs batted in.

The only player to emerge as a star was Snow, who came over from the New York Yankees along with pitchers Russ Springer and Jerry Nielsen in a 1992 trade for pitcher Jim Abbott. In four years in Anaheim, Snow hit 65 home runs and drove in 256 runs, batting .258, then was traded to the Giants.

One regular in 10 years of trading--now playing elsewhere. That’s not much of a success rate.

Minor leaguers traded by the two local teams show a somewhat higher record of accomplishment. In 41 trades involving major and minor leaguers from 1989-98, 27 minor leaguers have left the Angel organization and 26 were traded by the Dodgers.

Of that group, four former Dodgers can be considered successful:

* Pitcher Rudy Seanez, sent to the Colorado Rockies for infielder Jody Reed in 1992, is 10-2 with the Atlanta Braves over the last season and a half with an earned-run average of 3.05.

* Pitcher Omar Daal, traded to the Montreal Expos for pitcher Rick Clelland in 1995, is 13-6 for the Arizona Diamondbacks this season with a 3.45 ERA.

* First baseman Ron Coomer, dealt to the Minnesota Twins along with pitchers Greg Hansell and Jose Parra in 1995 for pitchers Mark Guthrie and Kevin Tapani, has batted .284 in four-plus seasons with Minnesota, hitting 58 home runs and driving in 266.

* Outfielder Mike Devereaux, traded to the Baltimore Orioles in 1989 for pitcher Mike Morgan, went on to play six seasons with the Orioles, his best year being 1992 when he batted .276 with 24 homers and 107 RBIs in 156 games.

Only two former Angel minor leaguers are worth mentioning:

* Pitcher John Snyder, sent to the Chicago White Sox along with pitchers Andrew Lorraine and Bill Simas and outfielder McKay Christensen for Abbott and fellow pitcher Tim Fortugno in 1995, is 16-8 with a 5.18 ERA in the last season and a half for Chicago.

* Pitcher Rich Monteleone, included with outfielder Claudell Washington in the 1990 deal with the Yankees that brought outfielder Luis Polonia to Anaheim, had a 17-9 record for New York with a 4.51 ERA in four seasons.

In the Angels’ recent deal, the 19-year-old Haynes didn’t anticipate being traded so soon. Thrilled to have been drafted 32nd in June 1997 by the Athletics, especially since he is an Oakland native, Haynes figured he would be playing in front of his friends and neighbors.

“At first, I was a little surprised to be traded,” said Haynes, now with the Lake Elsinore Storm, a Class-A affiliate of the Angels. “I expected to make it with Oakland. But I’m going to make the best of it. It’s good to know somebody wanted me. Now that I have gotten over the initial shock of being traded, this has given me a little incentive to play harder.

“I am just going to . . . work on my skills and be myself. I am not going to try to do too much. I am not going to press and try to do things I would not normally do. That’s when you have problems. I want as smooth a transition as possible.”

If Haynes, who had stolen 78 bases in 199 minor league games before the trade, sounds mature for his age, perhaps it’s because he already has had a peek into the big leagues. One of his best friends when he was growing up was a nephew of St. Louis Cardinal veteran Willie McGee. McGee often played catch with Haynes.

“He checks up on me all the time,” Haynes said. “I’m like a son to him.”

Added Haynes, “He told me not to take failure hard because baseball is a game of failure. The quicker I learn that, the quicker I will learn to deal with what’s ahead and I’ll be better off.”

Although the Angels are high on Haynes and the other players obtained in that recent deal, they have no illusions.

Said Bob Fontaine, Angel director of scouting and player personnel, “The thing about scouting that is so tough is that you are trying to evaluate something that you think will happen four or five years from now and be right about it. If you can be right 20% of the time, you’re a success.

“You never know what’s going on in a kid’s life. It could be anything from personal problems to the kid is sick. What you have to do is stay with the basics of scouting and go by the player’s natural athletic ability. Unless you are with a player for a long time, like you are with your own players, it’s tough to know everything about someone.”

Former Dodger general manager Fred Claire says the key to many of these trades is to look at the date they were consummated. Is the deal being made at the trading deadline to a team in contention or in the spring?

“If you are trading an established player to a team in a pennant race for a player in the minor leagues, you have a right to expect a player of pretty good caliber in return,” he said. “If you trade an established, productive player and get back players the fans haven’t heard of, those unknown players better be top-line prospects. A certain amount of talent has to bring back a certain amount of talent.”

In 1992, the Dodgers traded an established player, outfielder Kal Daniels, to the Chicago Cubs for pitcher Mike Sodders, who never made it.

“Kal didn’t fit into our plans,” Claire said. “If we did not trade him, we were going to have to release him and pay his full salary. At that point, we would have taken anything. When you trade Kal Daniels at that stage, you can’t expect to get much.”

Claire is proud of what he got in an earlier trade, though. On Aug. 29, 1987, he sent veteran left-hander Rick Honeycutt to Oakland for right-hander Tim Belcher, who had never thrown a pitch in the majors. He made it to the Dodgers that season and, 12 seasons later, is still in the big leagues, now pitching for the Angels.

“We always tried to be incredibly thorough,” Claire said. “Our scouts followed Belcher closely. We had a scout who had seen him pitch in high school and college in Ohio. We knew about his makeup, his competitiveness, his character. There was some difference of opinion in our organization about whether we should go after him. But ultimately, we felt he had enough of the qualities we were looking for.

“Belcher didn’t look that good at first, but he kept getting better and better and he really blossomed the next year. That’s as good as it gets, to get a young starter for a veteran. With Honeycutt, we expected to get something, but when we got Belcher, we felt like we had fallen into heaven.”

Ultimately, it comes down to scouting.

“I always said, if I had only two scouts, I would never have them watch a major league game,” Claire said. “I want them to watch single A, double A and triple A. We’ll see the major leagues ourselves. If you are looking at a Barry Bonds or a Greg Maddux, you don’t have to spend a lot of time talking about it. The guy on the bar stool can tell you about them. What I want to know about is the right fielder in A ball.”

Hank Aaron, baseball’s home run king, believes the best time to gauge a player is when he reaches double-A ball.

“Single A may be too soon,” Aaron said. “By the time they reach triple A, they are in there with some players who might be there because they are not good enough to make it to the majors, players who are grumbling and unhappy. I think you can tell more from double A.”

Regardless of the level, it’s never easy.

“You put your reputation on the line every time you select a player in the draft,” Fontaine said. “But you have to give Billy [Bavasi] what he wants or needs. One thing you can’t worry about is making mistakes. If you do, you can become gun-shy. You’ve got to go with your instincts.”

And sometimes, a good one gets away. That’s not a new story. In 1954, the Dodgers left a 20-year-old outfielder unprotected. The Pittsburgh Pirates drafted him.

The Pirate scouts had done a pretty good job. That outfielder was Roberto Clemente.

(BEGIN TEXT OF INFOBOX / INFOGRAPHIC)

Minor Leaguer Deals

Trades from 1989-1998 in which at least one of the players qualified as a rookie (fewer than 50 innings pitched or 130 at-bats) and at least one of the players was a veteran. Minor leaguers traded to Dodgers or Angels are in bold. Statistics compiled by those players only while with Dodgers or Angels are in parentheses:

DODGERS

1998

1. Dec. 1--New York (NL)--Catcher Charles Johnson and outfielder Roger Cedeno for catcher Todd Hundley and pitcher Arnold Gooch.

2. July 31--Montreal--Infielders Wilton Guerrero and Jonathan Tucker, pitcher Ted Lilly and outfielder Peter Bergeron for infielder Mark Grudzielanek, pitcher Carlos Perez and infielder Hiram Bocachica.

3. July 23--San Diego--Pitcher Jim Bruske for pitcher Widd Workman.

4. May 15--Florida--Catcher Mike Piazza and third baseman Todd Zeile for infielder Bobby Bonilla, catcher Charles Johnson, outfielders Gary Sheffield and Jim Eisenreich and pitcher Manuel Barrios (1998: 0-0, 0.00 ERA, 1 inning, 1 game).

1997

5. Aug. 9--Pittsburgh--Infielder Eddie Williams for pitcher Hal Garrett.

1995

6. Dec. 15--Montreal--Pitcher Omar Daal for pitcher Rick Clelland.

7. May 23--Montreal--Outfielder Henry Rodriguez and infielder Jeff Treadway for outfielder Roberto Kelly and pitcher Joey Eischen (1995, 1996: 0-1, 4.24 ERA, 63 2/3 innings, 45 games).

1993

8. Sept. 7--Detroit--Outfielder Eric Davis for pitcher John DeSilva (0-0, 6.75 ERA, 5 1/3 innings, 3 games).

1992

9. July 2--Philadelphia--Outfielder Stan Javier for pitcher Steve Searcy and outfielder Julio Peguero.

10. June 27--Chicago (NL)--Outfielder Kal Daniels for pitcher Mike Sodders.

1991

11. Dec. 11--Cleveland--Pitcher Dennis Cook and Mike Christopher for pitcher Rudy Seanez (1994, 1995: 2-4, 5.09, 58 1/3 innings, 54 games).

1990

12. Dec. 15--New York (NL)--Outfielder Hubie Brooks for pitchers Bob Ojeda and Greg Hansell (1995: 0-1, 7.45 ERA, 19 1/3 innings, 20 games).

13. April 1--Houston--First baseman Franklin Stubbs for pitcher Terry Welk.

ANGELS

1997

1. Aug. 13--San Diego--Pitcher Ryan Hancock and infielder Jorge Arias for outfielder Rickey Henderson and pitcher Stevenson Agosto.

1996

2. Nov. 27--San Francisco--First baseman J.T. Snow for pitchers Allen Watson and Fausto Macey.

3. Oct. 28--Kansas City--Designated hitter Chili Davis for pitcher Mark Gubicza and pitcher Mike Bovee. (1997: 0-0, 5.40 ERA, 3 1/3 innings, 3 games).

4. Aug. 31--Chicago (AL)--Catcher Don Slaught for catcher Scott Vollmer.

5. July 27--Chicago (AL)--Catcher Pat Borders for pitcher Robert Ellis. (1996: 0-0, 0.00 ERA, 5 innings, 3 games).

6. Feb. 15--Cleveland--Pitcher Brian Anderson for pitcher Jason Grimsley and Pep Harris. (1996, 1997, 1998: 10-5, 3.92 ERA, 172 innings, 121 games, including 3 starts).

1995

7. July 27--Chicago (AL)--Pitchers Andrew Lorraine, Bill Simas and John Snyder and outfielder McKay Christensen for pitcher Jim Abbott and pitcher Tim Fortugno.

1993

8. Jan. 15--Montreal--Infielder Lee Stevens for pitchers Jeff Tuss and Keith Morrison.

1992

9. Dec. 6--New York (AL)--Pitcher Jim Abbott for first baseman J.T. Snow (1993, 1994, 1995, 1996: 488 games, .258, 65 home runs, 256 RBIs) pitcher Russ Springer (1993, 1994, 1995: 4-10, 6.35 ERA, 157 1/3 innings, 51 games, including 20 starts) and Jerry Nielsen (1993: 0-0, 8.03 ERA, 12 1/3 innings, 10 games).

10. July 30--Toronto--Pitcher Mark Eichhorn for catcher Greg Myers and outfielder Rob Ducey (1992: 31 games, .237, 0 home runs, 2 RBIs).

11. April 12--New York (NL)--Infielder Dick Schofield for pitchers Julio Valera (1992, 1993: 11-17, 4.37 ERA, 241 innings, 49 games, including 33 starts) and Julian Vasquez.

1991

12. Dec. 10--Milwaukee--Pitchers Mike Fetters and Marcus Moore for pitcher Chuck Crim and catcher Ken Rivers.

1990

13. Dec. 4--Baltimore--Pitcher David Martinez for outfielder Dave Gallagher and pitcher Mike Hook.

14. Dec. 2--Toronto--Outfielder Devon White and pitcher Willie Fraser for outfielder Junior Felix and infielder Luis Sojo (1991, 1992: 219 games, .265, 10 HR, 63 RBIs).

1989

15. Sept. 6--Cleveland--Infielder Mark McLemore for catcher Ron Tingley (1989, 1990, 1991, 1992, 1993: 183 games, .198, 4 HRs 33 RBIs).