OT: Raise the Jolly Roger: Congrats to the Houston Cheaters on their win

[NewAgeOutlaw]

Only the Pirates would not bat their top prospect high in the order on a hopeless and incompetent team.

Again, I get that Shelton has to try and win as a feature of his job but this is a team with like 3 major league hitters max at this point anyway so who gives a f***?

 

[dogthateats]

 

[DJ Spinoza]

No surprise there, though it looks like VanMeter will live on. Somewhat interesting that the Mets and Yankees kept Smith and Andujar, since they were heavily rumored to be traded. Andujar is kind of a flier guy who is less appealing without junk MLB time to run him out there (i.e., over someone like VanMeter for the remainder of 2022). Sort of a shame that him and Florial will never really get a chance to crack the Yankees depth chart, but not our problem.

I do think Smith could still be an appealing winter candidate. Adding him to the 1B mix and paying a little bit for Mancini as primary DH and backup 1B would help improve the depth chart.

Otherwise, something needs to give in the OF dynamic, and I'm still not really sure I see what's going on besides foot dragging. It's not great that nobody is really forcing the issue, but at the same time someone like Swaggerty has been fine enough in AAA and it would make a lot more sense to see if he can be an everyday player at the MLB level. I wish he were thrust into a pretty regular LF role, with Mitchell getting a lot of RF/DH duties, and Gamel sprinkled in for watchability reasons. Allen can be a super sub.

It's tough with Gamel, as he is at a competent level better than the others right now, but unless we intend to re-sign him, there's not much point in him playing every day. And frankly, though he could be a decent option and I enjoy watching him, there are a lot better ways to use what little money we have in free agency. Just to play that out in a too specific scenario, it'd be better to pay Mancini a "big" deal than it would be to give Gamel a modest 1-2 year deal and have similarly little money to spread around on a SP reclamation and a DH flier.

 

[ImporterExporter]

We have OF in the system that need to play. Am I wrong? What does Florial do for us, that any of about 4-5 guys can't? Or someone who fits that profile? Blocked, 2nd/3rd tier prospect who would only muddy the waters that are already muddy to begin with. Especially when you're dealing with a manager who doesn't know what the f*** he's doing as it pertains to playing time/batting order.

CF is locked down. You have Mitchell, Suwinski, Swaggerty, Bae/Marcano both can play out there. Gamel, if you're going to keep the a veteran 4th OF for the rest of the year/next year.

Yoshi is gone. VM will be next, in the coming days. It seems like Newman is going to stay the whole year and play, though I hope the talk with Cherington is Cherington telling Shelton to keep guys like Newman on the bench as use them sparingly.

The roster, for the rest of the year, should be:

C - who cares, needs upgraded this winter. Bring back Perez is the most likely option.
1B - Chavis and who cares, needs upgraded this winter. I wouldn't mind giving Dom Smith a shot, as nobody else stands out.
2B - Marcano - Newman
3B - Hayes (start f***ing hitting or get bent, btw)
SS - Cruz - Newman
LF - Suwinski - Bae
CF - BR - Swaggerty
RF - Mitchell - Gamel

Suwinski, has legit power. It's evident. He needs to be hitting, and adjusting to ML pitching. Play him every day. Mitchell has shown promise since coming back up.

We need to get reps for the people we've invested time and in some case assets (trades).

When winter rolls around, we will hopefully address C, 1B, and add a legitimate arm to the rotation. Other than that, we're packed with guys who simply need a shot. Giving those guys above a shot will allow us to readjust this winter if need be.

 

[DJ Spinoza]

I don't think Florial would have made a lot of sense for us at all, I just mentioned him in general.

I still see things as pretty murky and I am not confident VanMeter will be gone. Cherington traded for him and we've stuck with him, and now I'm not even sure a roster decision will be needed in order to promote Indy players. If nothing else gives by next week, then we're just two and a half weeks or so away from rosters expanding. With Bae having an oblique injury, I'd bet the earliest he could return is September anyways.

My guess is that Marcano will play some OF while Newman plays very often at 2B. Maybe BC thinks he can flip him in the winter, but I struggle to see it. The best case scenario for getting the OF in order might be for Gamel to mostly suit up as 1B / DH. I don't know, it seems pretty murky given that BC was very explicit that there'd be roster turnover around the deadline and we're just seeing the MLB reliever we acquired added to the mix and Yoshi DFA'd. It feels like he thought he could flip some more veterans and nobody really wanted them.

 

[NewAgeOutlaw]

When you are a low budget franchise, the last thing you can afford to do is spend money on a player who is worth negative value.

VanMeter is a career 72 ops+ hitter and worth a career -0.8 WAR.

Hell, take the baseball side out of the equation. As a business, it would be more beneficial to the franchise to pay Josh VanMeter to not be on the roster than to pay him to be on the roster.

 

[ChaosAgent]

When you are a low budget franchise, the last thing you can afford to do is spend money on a player who is worth negative value.

VanMeter is a career 72 ops+ hitter and worth a career -0.8 WAR.

Hell, take the baseball side out of the equation. As a business, it would be more beneficial to the franchise to pay Josh VanMeter to not be on the roster than to pay him to be on the roster.

This is another place I question Cherington. Yes he has to dive in the dumpster pile, but is amazing how often his guys are sub-replacement level. Bad even by dumpster standards.

Maybe not the most important thing, but more questions of ability to evaluate and develop MLB hitting. Something to monitor going forward, because let's be real there will be many more dumpster dives

 

[DJ Spinoza]

This is a pretty good point that's gotten lost in the shuffle. Cruz has only looked like himself to me at the plate about half the time, as he's clearly in an adjustment phase. It's funny that some of the idiot talking heads are already trying to call him "Mr. Statcast" or whatever, but he's basically executing offensively in a fine way and its rooted in just how impactful his offensive tools are. The HR last night was a perfect example, and the HR pace speaks for itself.

Might be a fun game to guess what his HR total will be at the end of the season. I think he has a decent chance to get to 15.

 

[DJ Spinoza]

MLB rumors: Details on Yankees’ Gleyber Torres trade talks, more

The New York Yankees held cursory talks on deals that would have included second baseman Gleyber Torres before Tuesday's trade deadline.

www.nj.com

BTW, New York media is reporting that nobody really had interest in Andujar or Florial, which isn't too shocking. They are both in their final option year meaning that the Yankees have little leverage and can end up making a minor deal in the winter or losing them to DFA.

I do think Andujar can hit, but it's also just one more in a laundry list of long shot plays, so I'm not really concerned about it. The idea of a flier like this made a little more sense on the assumption that basically all of Newman, Gamel, VanMeter, and Yoshi would be gone. With just one of them gone, things look a lot more murky, to risk just repeating myself into oblivion.

Ultimately, there's no sense being too focused on this, but just thought I'd loop this in since I mentioned it a lot over the last week. I'm much more curious to see if there's anything out there on Dom Smith. The Red Sox were rumored to like him but ended up with Hosmer for free, which is kinda weird. The Mets were also shopping JD Davis and sent him to SF in what seems like a bizarre pickup and a decent overpay.

 

[Empoleon8771]

I'd want to run with this for the rest of the year:

C: Who cares
1B: Chavis and Madris platooning at 1st
2B: Newman
SS: Cruz
3B: Hayes
LF: Marcano
CF: Reynolds
RF: Suwinski

I don't want to throw Newman aside because I think I want him back next year as the starting 2B.

 

[Empoleon8771]

Suddenly the Soto trade doesn't look as bad for the Nationals. If Soto is insistent on testing free agency, I think that greatly hurts his value. I was assuming he'd be willing to sign a mega contract with wherever he went, it seems like that may not be the case.

 

[ImporterExporter]

This is another place I question Cherington. Yes he has to dive in the dumpster pile, but is amazing how often his guys are sub-replacement level. Bad even by dumpster standards.

Maybe not the most important thing, but more questions of ability to evaluate and develop MLB hitting. Something to monitor going forward, because let's be real there will be many more dumpster dives

This is flat out bullshit and I'm going to call bullshit out. Not to mention, you can go across the sport and look at other teams who have no money to spend, and don't hit lightning in a bottle often, either.

1 WAR is literally worth 7 mil per on the open market, IIRC. Our biggest signing this off season was Quintana, no? At what? 2M for a single year. For half a seasons worth of worth (meaning roughly 1M spent) he got us a top 10 prospect (at a position of need) from an org. that knows how to scout and develop, and an ML ready arm, that profiles well as a back end reliever down the line.

Nutting is giving Cherington enough money to sign exactly that, replacement level players. It's simple f***ing math and I shouldn't have to spend time typing out these facts. 3 out of 4 of these guys are going to flop. Why? Because they're being paid to not be good. If they were better, they'd get more money. When one does pop, it's gravy but you can't expect many to do that.

Despite that, we've seen in the past 2 years, players making pennies on the dollar remember:

Nogowski wasn't crap. Alford wasn't. Neither were plus guys by the book, but they weren't awful either. Yoshi was quite good, last year. Hell, even Wilmer Difo produced replacement level #'s. Tyler Anderson. And what did we get to spend on them?

Gamel's been solid, better than 0. Chavis has. Vogey was a plus player, that we turned into a possible plus in the BP. Beede has been a very solid arm in the pen. These are dirt cheap players. Being paid to produce like 0.1-0.2 WAR.

The amount of people who cannot separate the owner from the GM when it comes to ability to spend, is astounding. OR understand there is a difference between a 1M FA and a 10 or 20M guy. Expectations. Heard of it?

Do you (others) honestly expect a third, half or more than half of the players we sign for 750K, 1M, 2M max, to be really productive ball players?

If we were signing guys for 3/45 or hell, even 3/25, and they were negative WAR players, then you can start truly complaining. Those are types you are expecting to be good or at least above average.

Like I said, we've got issues that need rectified (more SP, 1B, C, new coaching staff) between now and next winter, but flat out BS is not going to fly while I'm around.

 

[DJ Spinoza]

Yeah, I think given that they effectively needed to move him, they did well. They now have some really high variance and high ceiling talents in their system with Wood and Hassell to go along with Green, and Abrams might have some questions with the hit tool but he's still got quite a bit going for him. People seem to be totally infatuated with the complex league pitcher that they got, comparing him to Eury Perez, though a teenager throwing 103mph seems insane. As long as Gore doesn't go down with TJ, he was taking major strides this year.

I am sympathetic to the criticisms that say you should never deal a talent like Soto, but the Nationals situation is more complicated than that and I think the stronger argument is really that they've been on this path for about a year. I don't necessarily think that they should be faulted for the big contract mistakes they've made, though you can argue that they shouldn't have swung so big with both Corbin and Strasburg. They won, and they tried to keep a winner together. I don't have the step by step of all their moves ready to hand, but it definitely would have made more sense to pivot on some players and make firmer commitments to Turner and then eventually Soto. I think a looming, solely-baseball-related problem in all of this is that they haven't had much success with their farm.

Regardless, they probably have made the cleanest exit possible under the circumstances, and it remains to be seen where they'll go from here. They are only at the start of a long rebuilding process, so they'll continue to add high picks, and I presume hope that they can somehow get out of some of the contract burdens.

I do have some suspicions that Rizzo's spin is a bit of PR. Specifically, I think it's really possible that the ownership was basically told by new buyers that they had to move Soto before they bought the team. It's always somewhat convoluted to separate ownership and baseball ops, but I think they did fairly well, even though it was at the cost of using Bell in the same trade. Bell probably gets a decent package elsewhere, but it's undeniable that prospects who headlined this trade don't really get dealt anymore, much less in such high qualities. The one criticism I have is that I would have tried to get 2-3 additional depth guys added, as Washington's system doesn't seem to have a lot of depth and I doubt Preller is saying no to adding 2-3 guys who are after 20-25 in his system in order to get a Soto deal over the finish line.

 

[Empoleon8771]

I think the Cherington dumpster diving moves have mostly been neutral. For every guy who sucks like VanMeter or Yoshi, you get a guy who plays well with Vogelbach or Quintana. His dumpster diving probably averages out to slightly above replacement level, which is to be expected when you're dumpster diving.

I think the Gamel/Chavis level best sums up his dumpster diving. They'd never be starters on good teams but they're okay as starters on bad teams. Safely above replacement level but well below average.

 

[ChaosAgent]

This is flat out bullshit and I'm going to call bullshit out. Not to mention, you can go across the sport and look at other teams who have no money to spend, and don't hit lightning in a bottle often, either.

1 WAR is literally worth 7 mil per on the open market, IIRC. Our biggest signing this off season was Quintana, no? At what? 2M for a single year. For half a seasons worth of worth (meaning roughly 1M spent) he got us a top 10 prospect (at a position of need) from an org. that knows how to scout and develop, and an ML ready arm, that profiles well as a back end reliever down the line.

Nutting is giving Cherington enough money to sign exactly that, replacement level players. It's simple f***ing math and I shouldn't have to spend time typing out these facts. 3 out of 4 of these guys are going to flop. Why? Because they're being paid to not be good. If they were better, they'd get more money. When one does pop, it's gravy but you can't expect many to do that.

Despite that, we've seen in the past 2 years, players making pennies on the dollar remember:

Nogowski wasn't crap. Alford wasn't. Neither were plus guys by the book, but they weren't awful either. Yoshi was quite good, last year. Hell, even Wilmer Difo produced replacement level #'s. Tyler Anderson. And what did we get to spend on them?

Gamel's been solid, better than 0. Chavis has. Vogey was a plus player, that we turned into a possible plus in the BP. Beede has been a very solid arm in the pen. These are dirt cheap players. Being paid to produce like 0.1-0.2 WAR.

The amount of people who cannot separate the owner from the GM when it comes to ability to spend, is astounding. OR understand there is a difference between a 1M FA and a 10 or 20M guy. Expectations. Heard of it?

Do you (others) honestly expect a third, half or more than half of the players we sign for 750K, 1M, 2M max, to be really productive ball players?

If we were signing guys for 3/45 or hell, even 3/25, and they were negative WAR players, then you can start truly complaining. Those are types you are expecting to be good or at least above average.

Like I said, we've got issues that need rectified (more SP, 1B, C, new coaching staff) between now and next winter, but flat out BS is not going to fly while I'm around.

Yes, there are good players. There have also been many bad ones who take up a ton of ABs. Chang, Vanmeter, Frazier, etc.

We say "oh lol our internal guy can't do any worse," and then he does. Like would it shock anyone if Swaggerty came up and put up a .450 OPS?

Easy there Tiger. I'm going to boi 2 more years to show substantial improvement in hitting.

 

[ImporterExporter]

I think the Cherington dumpster diving moves have mostly been neutral. For every guy who sucks like VanMeter or Yoshi, you get a guy who plays well with Vogelbach or Quintana. His dumpster diving probably averages out to slightly above replacement level, which is to be expected when you're dumpster diving.

I think the Gamel/Chavis level best sums up his dumpster diving. They'd never be starters on good teams but they're okay as starters on bad teams. Safely above replacement level but well below average.

Correct. He's struck out numerous times, absolutely. But again, when you are talking 1 milish PER YEAR signings, you can't expect to have 4-5 guys turning in plus WAR, year after year. Just doesn't happen.

And, there have been good (really great when you consider value relative to what these guys are being paid) additions that turned out well for us on the field and the hot stove.

Lastly, that's a great analogy with the 2nd paragraph.

Gamel/Chavis won't start for Boston or LA because those teams can spend way above their level. That doesn't make them bad players. They just aren't good enough to play every day on a big market team.

 

[Empoleon8771]

Correct. He's struck out numerous times, absolutely. But again, when you are talking 1 milish PER YEAR signings, you can't expect to have 4-5 guys turning in plus WAR, year after year. Just doesn't happen.

Yeah, I think the argument for "Cherington has done a bad job at adding MLB talent batters" is more "spend nothing, win nothing" than "bad player evaluation".

For what he's targeting, he's doing fine. A huge majority of the dumpster diving guys have basically ended up replacement level players, mostly forgettable players that played like half a season in Pittsburgh. Alford, Difo, Heineman, Evans and such all fall around that. The only truly "awful" batters that were dumpster diving additions and were here for more than a handful of games have been VanMeter, Yoshi, Riddle and Michael Perez. Dyson was also horrible but he got moved pretty quickly in 2020.

You get what you pay for, and Cherington has mostly just been dumpster diving to add MLB batters with the Pirates.

 

[TotesTorts]

I like to think Cherrington took the job by pitching a long-term budget to Bob in which for the first few years, the payroll would be barebones and thereafter, once the team has reached a sufficient threshold of talent, he tap into the budget more vigorously.

But I also think that's likely wishful thinking.

 

[DJ Spinoza]

There's no point in taking any risks with Bednar and I also wonder if this may have factored into trade talks. I think BC might have traded him if he was fully healthy and rearing to go headed into the deadline, but to be honest the returns on relievers were somewhat lackluster IMO. It's not that surprising, GMs more than anyone else know how fickle relievers tend to be. There is continued need for them, but I think the days of "reliever X is great and has 3 years of control so he'll get an insane haul" are over.

 

[Josey Wales]

Pittsburgh Pirates

@Pirates
·
1m

We have recalled INF Tucupita Marcano from Triple-A Indianapolis and designated INF Yoshi Tsutsugo for assignment. In addition, we have placed RHP David Bednar on the 15-day injured list and recalled RHP Yohan Ramirez from Indianapolis.

 

[Empoleon8771]

I'd want to run with this for the rest of the year:

C: Who cares
1B: Chavis and Madris platooning at 1st
2B: Newman
SS: Cruz
3B: Hayes
LF: Marcano
CF: Reynolds
RF: Suwinski

I don't want to throw Newman aside because I think I want him back next year as the starting 2B.

Outside of Suwinski not getting called up yet, the lineup today is exactly what I wanted to see.

 

[ImporterExporter]

Shelton has no idea how to maximize a line up card. He's worse than Hurdle. It's mind boggling, really.

Marcano way too low. Cruz still too low. These guys hit leadoff or 2nd for so much of their minor league careers and did very well in that role. Hayes is literally slugging .350 on the year and you're putting in the 4 hole? Newman is out slugging him by more than 50 points.

It's beyond obvious this guy is a dolt.

 

[ImporterExporter]

AAA pitching isn't the solution. Get him back up.

 

[Gallatin]

AAA pitching isn't the solution. Get him back up.

All his homers continue to be on 3-2 counts. The K's continue to be over 40%. I feel quite strongly he needs more than a dozen games in AAA. He's there for a reason, that reason is to fine-tune for next year IMO.

 

[Empoleon8771]

I'm guessing Suwinski comes up when Mitchell cools off and gets sent down. He'd need to be down for basically the rest of the year to get that extra year of arbitration and they won't realistically do that. They got the extra year of control by sending him down now, so they'll let him continue to mash in AAA and then come up when they have a roster spot for him.

He's still a young player, so I don't think letting him stay on his groove in AAA is a bad solution.