Balta1701

If Cease is as bad in '24 as he was in '23, then the White Sox will be sitting there with a mid-rotation pitcher, likely to still eat innings, available at the trade deadline, with a low price and 1.5 years of control. That should theoretically be more valuable than either Lynn or Giolito were at the deadline last year. So - not a big drop in trade value if no one is coming close to Getz's price right now. The only downside is if he does get hurt, which - he's leading MLB in starts over the last 3 years so he's a decent bet to stay healthy for 3 months, and if he's only getting a limited offer return right now, then it's not a huge loss if he does get hurt. If the offers aren't there right now, there's a big potential advantage to holding him and a fairly low loss if everything goes bad. The balance is likely in favor of holding him if no one is desperate right now.

I read that as one part with decent MLB value in Musgrove, a guy who looked a lot like a bust or back of the bullpen reliever (Feliz), and a guy with a high ceiling but a low chance of reaching it. If we got an exactly comparable package, people would be furious with Getz.

Perhaps the most important part of this - it doesn't come close to where Josh Allen was after year 3.

This really isn't doing justice to these guys though - Michael Feliz did top out as the Astros #5 prospect according to MLB.com - in 2015. In 2016 he had dropped to their #10 prospect, in 2017 he was off their list. When Moran was traded, he started out as the Astros 25th ranked prospect in 2017 and he slotted in as the Pirates #8 prospect in 2018. Moran was absolutely not a top 100 MLB prospect in 2018 at least per MLB.com, although some of the other sites discuss him as a controversial player. Fangraphs had Moran as a 50 FV player, Musgrove as a 50 FV player, and Feliz as a 45 FV player at either the time of the trade or the time when they were last ranked, and as of that point Feliz had 2 full major league seasons in the bullpen with an ERA above 5.

10% boost for the legendary Nicky Lopez though!

I mean, CJ Stroud clearly had a lot of question marks last year, that's why he didn't go #1. He was a solid QB prospect but compared to Williams for example, the hype is night and day. Stroud was "he's got a shot to be a strong QB but we'll see". Caleb Williams was "Suck for Luck" level of hype, we've been hearing about him as the obvious #1 pick and he's been analyzed at that level for 2 years. Fields vs. Stroud I can see it being a narrow choice after Fields was pretty darn good on a team surrounded by horrible weapons in 2022. Just an example, these aren't hard to find:

Rick Hahn after reading this post:

I don’t know what this season will look like for him on health or performance but I do think this raises the chance that they listen if they get a serious bidder. Ditto next offseason.

Like you said it will all depend on whether someone blows them away, but you also can’t talk about building a good football Team and ignore the QB and cap hit/rookie contract topics.

2.21 ERA and 1.117 WHIP in a little more than half a season out of the bullpen in ‘22, ERA of 6 as a starter last year. Guessing he was out of options.

I'm saying this repeatedly right now because I expect the opposite to happen. And yeah, the opposite happened with Fox, the opposite happened with Nagy, so the Bears have a pattern here of "not firing the coach, drafting a QB, then firing the coach first year".

The other side of this is that having access to Williams potentially sets you up for a big career boost if he has a good first year. Bobby Slowik of the Texans may well wind up a head coach this year thanks to CJ Stroud after 1 year as an OC.

Throw in Bijan and Kyle Pitts and maybe we can talk?

As I said yesterday, if they're doing this and they draft a QB, they must commit to the same staff in 2025 barring their OC trying to overthrow the US government or something like that. They cannot fire their OC or HC just because the team or the QB struggles in 2024. Make that decision today, right now. Like add a poison pill into their contracts or something like that, their salary is $1 million in 2025 but it costs the team $10 million to fire them.

My "Rick Hahn" reaction is that the Yankees have 1 super reliable guy, one innings eater, then 3 questionable up and down guys with limited or inconsistent histories, and not a lot of depth behind them, but it's super hard to add anyone else to the rotation because no one is currently hurt and there's no obvious person to say "you're in the bullpen/minors" if everyone comes in healthy. So, they sign Stroman, but they can't trade for Cease or sign Snell because they don't have a slot open for him, but there's no obvious backup plan for if and when Rodon gets hurt or whatever else. This was the Hahn in 2022 setup - "you can't sign another pitcher because you can't bench anyone so we're going to sign the dregs and put them in the bullpen", and then Lynn, Kopech, and Giolito are hurt early leaving their rotation for a week as Cease, Martin, Velasquez, "please let Cueto get here soon", and Mr. Offday.

If the Yankees do sign Stroman, am I right that their rotation sets up as: Cole Stroman Rodon Nestor Cortes Clarke Schmidt (no really, THE Clarke Schmidt). Seems like a pretty "Rick Hahn" rotation to me?

of this year? Naw, in a perfect world Quero is hitting well in the minor leagues on 9/1. Don't rush him up to the big leagues.

The more negative version of this could be that Getz doesn’t care about prospects and really likes his veterans so he doesn’t mind burying and losing guys, especially if his coach doesn’t like a guy.

In both 22 and 23 Cease had an OPS about 100 points higher against lefties. However the details are rather interesting. In 22, most oF the difference was in OBP, neither side hit him well but lefties got on base more. He had a lower K/BB ratio against lefties by a lot, over 60% of his walks Went to lefties. In 23, the OBP is similar for both hands but there is a big difference in slugging, Cease actually had a higher K/BB against lefties but he gave up a ton if home runs to lefties, over 60% of the home runs he gave up were to lefties. So, 2023 Cease would likely have a big problem with that short porch. 2022 Cease might walk some lefties but that’s a guy who is still good In the Bronx. As usual, the question for the acquiring team is which cease they will get.

The only thing more white Sox stupid than starting him in the rotation with no restrictions would be sending him to the bullpen and burying him there. They already did the dumbest one so I will expect him throwing 90 pitches in April in Chicago until proven otherwise. I will give them credit if I’m wrong.

Naw. No one ever demands accuracy from these sorts of links, there are never consequences if they're wrong. The closest you'd get is Morosi saying "oops sorry Ohtani isn't on his way to Toronto", and he went right back to his reporting of leaks without ever burning his source, and with people continuing stating things he says are rumors about other moves. They're getting eyeballs and clicks, and it's the role the GMs want them playing.

Because the White Sox have been telling Rosenthal "We will get a strong package for Dylan Cease" since November?

Not with the moves they've made, no. Pretty much every "leak" and "Insider report" makes sense if the White Sox have spent the offseason trying to pump up the market for Cease using deliberate messages to anyone who will listen. Over and over it's been how much demand there is for him, how high his price is, but how they totally expect him to move, how they're talking to team after team. For right or wrong, they believe that doing this in public will help them strengthen the offer that they receive for him.

I will bet you that in August we are angry because of how often Dejong is playing while Montgomery is sitting.