Balta1701

So you want Avisail Garcia but you are simply going to demand he strike out less, it's totally confusing to you why someone would point out that contradiction, and even though you're going to snap your fingers and make him strike out less I'm the one who became a god.

You literally gave a reason to get rid of Avi Garcia in 1 post - that you want guys who put the ball in play more often, got snippy when I pointed out that Avi didn't do a good job of putting the ball in play, and then in the next post you said "I don't see much of a reason for getting rid of a talented player". Which is it, is there no good reason to get rid of him or do you want to see guys who put the ball in play more often?

Ergo you want to get rid of Avisail Garcia since last year he couldn't put the ball in play enough right?

Do the Dodgers have anything left to make it worth doing for the Tribe? I count 2 Dodgers in the MLB.com top 100, Verdugo and Ruiz, both in the 30-50 range, that seems like a low price for those guys to me.

Put the ball in play more often? Last year Garcia struck out 101 times in 385 PAs. That was the worst rate of his career and a pace for 150 Ks in a full season if he could ever play one.

If you count the $25 million/year they spent on Robert's bonus and penalties...they have to spend $45 million for 2019 just to keep the payroll from substantially dropping.

I agree Rodon absolutely could do this. He has the stuff to do it. I'm skeptical about him particularly because to my eyes he has shown absolutely no growth in his ability to pitch during his 4 years in the big leagues - he doesn't seem to have new ways to attack hitters, and the same things I wrote about him in 2015 are the things I was writing in September 2018 - when everything is working he's unhittable, but if he doesn't have his best control on both pitches he gets beaten around a little bit. If you watched him in 2015 and 2018, the only difference would be the slightly diminished velocity. It's weird, usually when guys are in the league for as long as Rodon they learn new ways to attack hitters, we saw that with all the other guys we developed, but I haven't seen that with Rodon. He reminds me a lot of Edwin Jackson - great stuff when everything is on, but only has 2 pitches and since no pitcher will ever have all his pitches working perfectly all the time, when Rodon doesn't have his best stuff for a few games he gives up 4 or 5 runs and labors through outings. He's a serviceable pitcher at the back of an average rotation, but that's not going to make this a competitive roster and people keep insisting it could be. Right now he's another guy that if we're saying "We are going to be competitive next year", he needs to break out as an entirely different pitcher than what he has been for 4 years of his career, and that's not even counting the injury stuff.

Spending money on a starting pitcher only to push them into the bullpen because Kopech and Cease need their roles and they are more important is a bad use of money, not a good one.

They absolutely need to add 2 starting pitchers no matter what happens because right now they only have 3 and all 3 of them have major question marks. Frankly, they could add 2 and a guy like Santiago last year who can pitch out of the bullpen and fill in gaps too. At the very least we need some guys who can throw innings...but one of the tricks is that Kopech and Cease are coming in 2020 and we need open spots for them, so whenever anyone in this thread says something about how we "shouldn't block guys", signing starting pitchers to deals >1 year does exactly that.

Oh ok it's 5 years? That's the problem with my numbers.

Rodon has done that every single year. He throws up a 5 game stretch where he's unhittable with both pitches working, and then he throws up a stretch of 5+ starts where his control isn't there and he's totally hittable. The end result is that he's a pitcher who puts up an ERA in the high 3's. His FIP was worse this year, but that's probably some velocity loss from the injury - I think he's still a pitcher who would put up an ERA in the high 3's or low 4s over a full season...which happens to be exactly what he's done every year. If that's your best pitcher...you are a pretty weak pitching staff.

Moustakas I'm a little conflicted about, IMO, because at this point after what happened to the hamburgler last year there's no sign of any 3b help coming any time in the future, but we could go hard after Arenado next offseason...and I would kinda rather go hard after Arenado if we miss the guys this year. Brantley is more annoying because I think he'll cost more and because there's a shot we might have some OFs coming up in the 2nd year of that deal, and I kinda would rather have that money to spend elsewhere. But here's the key point - we still need to sign 2 other pitchers. Signing a James Shields and a Lance Lynn, combined with a Moustakas and a Brantley - now your payroll is >$100 million and your roster is still a 70 win candidate for 4th place in the division.

He's got $120 million remaining over 4 years, if the Ms picked up 40% that's $48 million, leaving $72 million remaining - over 4 years, $72 million is $18 million AAV, not $14. (Writing this out as I double checked my math)

They would have eventually because McCullers got hurt...but there's a lesson here. On a good team right now, Carlos Rodon is a 4th or 5th starter with serious injury worries. For Carlos Rodon to be a key part of a good team...he has to have a major breakout season, and so far I haven't seen any sign that he's gotten any better over his 4 years in the big leagues. Right now he's a major disappointment compared to what we wanted out of that pick. That doesn't mean he can't break out this year, but he's another guy who needs to break out!

In another thread a guy asked whether I could make this team competitive with the Indians with a $150 million payroll. I got to about $160 and put together a roster that I thought had a shot, but I had to trade away Basabe, Rutherford, Walker, and a couple other guys to do it, and even then if Cleveland's bullpen didn't implode like it did in 2018 I thought they had a far better pitching staff.

He literally said "Top 40". I did not use that phrase, he could have said "Top 50" and it would have been accurate, but he said "Top 40" which means I'm missing someone because saying "top 40" specifically excludes Anderson. Interestingly it does include Fulmer, who I don't expect to be on the big league roster next year, but hey that's 6!

They will not be competitive next season even if they land them...unless every single guy from the list of "top 40 prospects" has a breakout year. If they sign Harper or Machado, they will now be sitting there with a $90 million payroll and gaping holes in 2 of their rotation spots. At that point, they're still going to have to sign pitchers just to play the games, at which point if you want to sign Cruz and one other guy, you're talking about a $140 million payroll for a team that still looks sad compared to the indians. If this team signs Harper and then they're competitive next year, then Cooper, Renteria, and Steverson will truly deserve their jobs for life because that will be the greatest batch of coaching ever.

When his FIP was 4.63 and xFIP that full season was 5.22, yeah. He's the most likely candidate from that list to break out next year and actually be a decent big leaguer, but literally the only guy from that list who would have even played for a good team like the Astros last year before injuries would have been Eloy. Out of that list, a couple of those pitchers might have been good enough to be the Indians 5th starter and the infielders would have been backups, and we're counting on these guys to beat the Indians?

Anderson was never a top 40 prospect to anyone other than Baseball Prospectus. Choosing top 40 seems specifically designed to exclude him.

Lopez, Giolito, Rodon, Moncada, Eloy. Who am I missing? Are you counting Abreu? Second point - out of that list, 4 of the guys I counted would register as "disappointments" to me, the only one who hasn't disappointed is the one who hasn't made the big leagues yet. This is a pretty rotten batch of impact talent so far.

If Seattle picked up 40% of his contract, they could potentially send him to a team that has need of a 2nd baseman and some interest in competing next year for 0 return. While he put up 3 fWAR each of the last 2 seasons, that's still $72 million over 4 years you're asking a team to take on for a guy who is in his late 30s and has a recent steroid suspension. I guess there's a chance you could get the Phillies in on that if they miss out on Machado. Cesar Hernandez was their 2b last year, he's an ok player but he's arb-3 and putting up Yolmerish numbers, so that's a potential upgrade for them.

Because he's a crappy defender who belongs at DH and we've just taken on a 37 year old to fill that role?

Cano has 0 value to the White Sox. We're already talking about whether we need to move Moncada to make room for our next 2b, now we're going to acquire Cano? We're going to DH him and get rid of Palka, when Cano over the past 2 years put up a 122 OPS+ while Palka put up a 111 OPS+ and is far younger?

We have this brilliant idea about doing this every year - taking on a bad contract to get huge talents, but it NEVER HAPPENS. Teams will give you small guys to clear $10 million or so, but they just don't pay the price to move a big guy. Moving a guy with $120 million left on his deal - that's the equivalent of sending over 2 Luis Robert's to a team. It just doesn't happen.

No. No one would.