2018 Spring Training

[fish16]

I think Hellickson is the guy we end up signing now, and hopefully soon.

[tjfla]

I think Hellickson is the guy we end up signing now, and hopefully soon.

Offers are out there just waiting. Hellickson/Ubaldo/Cahill/Feldman However they really aren't worried-staff thinks Turner could be the guy for the spot
Its like the Jon Jay/Melky/Maybin thing-first one who takes deal.

I still think Jacob Turner sucks but anyone realize he is just turning 27?

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Here are our out of options guys

Marlins-Derek Dietrich, Justin Nicolino, Dan Straily, Tomas Telis, Jose Urena

Means(if accurate) Despaigne and Smith can get sent down

[rmc523]

Offers are out there just waiting. Hellickson/Ubaldo/Cahill/Feldman However they really aren't worried-staff thinks Turner could be the guy for the spot
Its like the Jon Jay/Melky/Maybin thing-first one who takes deal.

I still think Jacob Turner sucks but anyone realize he is just turning 27?

- - - - - - - - - -

Here are our out of options guys

Marlins-Derek Dietrich, Justin Nicolino, Dan Straily, Tomas Telis, Jose Urena

Means(if accurate) Despaigne and Smith can get sent down

So he (Turner) crashed and burned before and has bounced around since. But now he'll be fine? Haha, ok!

[tjfla]

So he (Turner) crashed and burned before and has bounced around since. But now he'll be fine? Haha, ok!

Thats what I said but like mentioned they don't care about 2018. Staff thinks he is a good option to eat some innings. They prefer to get another vet and keep Turner in AAA until needed but aren't worried if no one takes their offer

The thing to remember about 2018 and even 2019 is they don't care about them. The goal is to get the young guys up(after May) to see what they got/build some value on the vets to trade them for stuff they can use and deal with the minor leagues thru IFA/Draft. They want and envision a Top 3 Pick in 18 and 19

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After May-Alcantara/Gallen/Peters/Richards can all come up to Majors if they show something in AAA. No reason to keep them down after May if they look good.

[rmc523]

Thats what I said but like mentioned they don't care about 2018. Staff thinks he is a good option to eat some innings. They prefer to get another vet and keep Turner in AAA until needed but aren't worried if no one takes their offer

The thing to remember about 2018 and even 2019 is they don't care about them. The goal is to get the young guys up(after May) to see what they got/build some value on the vets to trade them for stuff they can use and deal with the minor leagues thru IFA/Draft. They want and envision a Top 3 Pick in 18 and 19

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After May-Alcantara/Gallen/Peters/Richards can all come up to Majors if they show something in AAA. No reason to keep them down after May if they look good.

I'm going to laugh when we somehow do better than last years' team.

[lou]

I kind of want them to be trail blazers at this point and go for a 2 man rotation and 11 man bullpen. It would work.

Urena (J. Garcia/Turner availability 1 IP each)
Straily (Ca. Smith/O'Grady availability 1 IP each)
Conley/Despaigne (as the most logical # 3 and # 4 SP, trust them to throw 6 without needing Garcia, Turner, Smith, or O'Grady)
J. Garcia/Turner
Ca. Smith/O'Grady

RP - Ziegler, Barraclough, Wittgren, Steckenrider, E. Hernandez

(I've dumped Tazawa here)

An innings distribution could be:

Straily/eventual trade replacement of Alcantara/Peters covering innings - 190
Urena - 170
Conley, Despaigne, Garcia, Turner, Ca. Smith, O'Grady - 110 IP each (30 - three IP appearances, 20 1 IP appearances) - 660 IP
Ziegler, Barraclough, Wittgren, Steckenrider - 65 each (260 IP)
E. Hernandez - 50 mop up innings
Minor league replacements, the Ellington's of the world, Gallen after mid June, etc. - 120 IP


Even better if you sign a veteran innings eater, and do a 3 man rotation / 10 man bullpen, which kicks Ca. Smith or O'Grady to the bullpen, the other one in AAA, and along with Peters and Alcantara on the 40 man, as well as Ellington, eventually at least Gallen, maybe Richards, you can rotate in a fresh arm every 10 days on constant roster churning.

Just saying. You probably need "Kluber, Carrasco, and Bauer" to do this and make Salazar, Clevinger, Tomlin, and someone else your four 110 IP assassins, with a reasonable replacement for any of them in AAA if someone gets hurt (i.e. Alcantara and Peters), but the Marlins do have an opportunity to be cute and throw waves of fresh arms at guys in a non-contending year to see who sticks with MLB competition. That would be fun at least to watch.

[fish16]

I keep forgetting Turner is on the team. Id be OK, even if we get new front office guys, with the team implementing a flat ban on trading with the tigers. Both the miguel trade and the Anibal/Infante trade looked good when made and really just could not have turned out worse. We got rid of Miguel Cabrera, Dontrelle Willis, Omar Infante (good 2b), and Anibal (good SP in his prime) and the best we go back was Burke Badenhop? We honestly didnt get terrible value in either deal its just crazy how poorly trading with the tigers has worked out.

As for the rotation, we obvious have 2 spots locked in Urena and Straily. I think we will sign 1 guy like a Hellickson so thats 3 spots with the 3rd going to whoever we end up signing. So we now have 2 spots remaining for any combo of Nicolino, Conley, Smith, Despaigne, Alcantara, Peters, Jarlin, Hernandez, and Turner. I think they know Peters and Alcantara need some time/service time issues so they will be in the Zephyrs rotation. I think it ends up going to Nicolino as 1 guy given that they are talking about his new pitch/eliminating an old one and the K numbers look decent so far and he's out of options. The other spot i think ends up going to Conley to start and then i think he will struggle and Smith will come into the rotation in mid-late april after a few AAA starts. Despaigne is a pure bullpen arm, Jarlin needs to work on his stamina in AAA if he's going to be a starter, and Turner can be sent down so i think he's a break glass in case of emergency guy down the line. Hernandez looks like a keeper but i think they dont throw him into the rotation yet given his inexperience and just try to hide him as a middle relief option for this year.

Urena, Straily, Hellickson, nicolino, Conley. Marlins baseball- you gotta be here.

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How does it work with options for rule 5 guys after they are kept on the major league roster for the entire first year? Can we then send them down the following year or how does that work?

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As for the lineup, it seems like we're pretty set in stone with the only question mark being whether they keep Brinson up to begin the year or play it smart with service time. Anderson is almost guaranteed to be up and im actually ok with that even though the service time implications say we should keep him down.

Locked in stone right now we have:

C- JT
1b- Bour
2b- Castro
SS- Rojas
3b- Anderson
LF- Dietrich
CF- ?
RF- Cooper/Van Slyke/ Maybin if Brinson is up to start the year.

One reason i could see them keeping brinson down is that even though he has hit well he has a 10/1 K/BB ratio in spring in just 30 AB's and is 0/3 on stolen bases. Little things like that could be an excuse to keep him down for the month. anderson doesnt really have that though given that he raked in AAA last year, was decent down the stretch in the majors or at least held his own, and his plate discipline has been tremendous in spring with a 5/7 K/BB ratio.

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I kind of want them to be trail blazers at this point and go for a 2 man rotation and 11 man bullpen. It would work.

Urena (J. Garcia/Turner availability 1 IP each)
Straily (Ca. Smith/O'Grady availability 1 IP each)
Conley/Despaigne (as the most logical # 3 and # 4 SP, trust them to throw 6 without needing Garcia, Turner, Smith, or O'Grady)
J. Garcia/Turner
Ca. Smith/O'Grady

RP - Ziegler, Barraclough, Wittgren, Steckenrider, E. Hernandez

(I've dumped Tazawa here)

An innings distribution could be:

Straily/eventual trade replacement of Alcantara/Peters covering innings - 190
Urena - 170
Conley, Despaigne, Garcia, Turner, Ca. Smith, O'Grady - 110 IP each (30 - three IP appearances, 20 1 IP appearances) - 660 IP
Ziegler, Barraclough, Wittgren, Steckenrider - 65 each (260 IP)
E. Hernandez - 50 mop up innings
Minor league replacements, the Ellington's of the world, Gallen after mid June, etc. - 120 IP


Even better if you sign a veteran innings eater, and do a 3 man rotation / 10 man bullpen, which kicks Ca. Smith or O'Grady to the bullpen, the other one in AAA, and along with Peters and Alcantara on the 40 man, as well as Ellington, eventually at least Gallen, maybe Richards, you can rotate in a fresh arm every 10 days on constant roster churning.

Just saying. You probably need "Kluber, Carrasco, and Bauer" to do this and make Salazar, Clevinger, Tomlin, and someone else your four 110 IP assassins, with a reasonable replacement for any of them in AAA if someone gets hurt (i.e. Alcantara and Peters), but the Marlins do have an opportunity to be cute and throw waves of fresh arms at guys in a non-contending year to see who sticks with MLB competition. That would be fun at least to watch.

I see the arguments for a 4 man rotation, but a 2 man rotation would be horrible. Youd run the 2 guys into the ground and the bullpen would end up pitching way too many innings.

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Also idk what the price point is currently, but an Alex cobb 2 year signing would be great in my opinion. 2 years, 25 million with a mutual option for the 3rd at 15?

[lou]

They can send Hernandez to AA/AAA next year if he is up all this year.

And the idea would be keeping 10+ bullpen arms fresh, half of which are 2-3 IP guys, so you don't run the bullpen into the ground. With the failsafe being you are actually 15-16 pitchers deep so you can rotate some club controlled guys up and down for fresh arms constantly (I don't thinking churning your 12th and 13th pitcher is a big deal. For the Marlins, this is calling up/down all year O'Grady, Ca. Smith, Alcantara, Peters, Garcia, etc.). If they are all 1 inning relievers you would be obviously doomed.

Let's say Urena is knocked out in 3 innings (shortest start last year). You have your "reliever/SP" guys throw 4 and 5 (Garcia and Turner in scenario above), and now you're in your bullpen with 5+ guys available. If you're on the road and losing (since your SP was bombed), you have 3 innings left to pitch. As mentioned, probably better idea with 3 good SP (I think we have one - Straily), so you can have someone like Caleb Smith waiting for 2+ innings in the pen versus a penciled in fake start every 5th day.

Just saying. Lot's of 1 trips through the lineup and not giving guys a second look is the future of baseball. I think it would be really awesome if a team spreads 550+ IP among 3 great pitchers (Kluber, Carrasco, Bauer), and the remaining 900 innings among 12-14 guys, with a heavier reliance on the better half of those (Salazar, Clevinger, Tomlin, Miller and McAlister can pitch 2+, versus more typical 1+ IP options like Allen and Goody). It's very doable. And basically, I love the Indians.

[fish16]

Btw, I came into spring thinking Urena was a prime regression candidate and ive been really encouraged that im hopefully wrong. I think just given his style he is always going to be a guy who has a higher FIP than ERA, but I really am happy to see what he's apparently become. He will never be a top of the rotation guy, and he probably shouldnt be a good teams #3, but given what he has done last year and thus far in the spring its really good to see him become something actually productive rather than the terrible player just about everyone thought he was going into last year. DOnt know what happened his first few years or if he just needed some time to adjust, but hes finally becoming the pitcher that it looked like he could become when he was coming up. His minor league numbers looked like a pure #3 all the way up through the system and his improvement each and every year was shown through his improving numbers and control each year when you look at him having the same # of walks each year for 4 straight years) despite increasing his innings pitched every year.

Random tangent, but just wanted to take a moment to recognize a guy who was thought of in a similar way to the way we feel about nicolino now at this time last year. Could you imagine where we would have been last year and even this year if he hadnt stepped up and shown improvement.

[fish16]

Not news but Chen is not close to being ready according to Frisaro. I just dont get it. I dont remember the end of last year when he had a few bullpen appearances, but did he get hurt in those appearances? If not, how the fuck could he now not be ready by opening day this year? And can he please just get the damn surgery already. IF he did the smart thing in his first year here he would have been nearly 2 years removed from TJ surgery already and we're still playing this dumbass game with him. Its one of the most absurd things ive ever seen.

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Joe Frisaro

Verified account

@JoeFrisaro
57m57 minutes ago
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yes bc if they are ready they are playing. get the old think out of your head

And this is how he responded to someone asking if the marlins would really waste a year of team control on guys like Alcantara, Brinson, and Anderson. Cant tell what is dumber, him thinking service time manipulation is "old thinking" or the fact that the marlins might actually do that. Im getting increasingly concerned about Alcantara being in the opening day rotation for no reason given his success in spring and the lack of other viable options. Anderson will be up pretty much assuredly and I think they will stupidly do it with Brinson too. If they commit the trifecta of stupidity by bringing them all up to start the year I will be incredibly pissed even though it would make the team easier to watch.

[lou]

And this is how he responded to someone asking if the marlins would really waste a year of team control on guys like Alcantara, Brinson, and Anderson. Cant tell what is dumber, him thinking service time manipulation is "old thinking" or the fact that the marlins might actually do that. Im getting increasingly concerned about Alcantara being in the opening day rotation for no reason given his success in spring and the lack of other viable options. Anderson will be up pretty much assuredly and I think they will stupidly do it with Brinson too. If they commit the trifecta of stupidity by bringing them all up to start the year I will be incredibly pissed even though it would make the team easier to watch.

Literally blowing a year of service time on 3 of your top 8 or so prospects for 6-7 weeks of sucking a little less in a 90 loss season. So amazing.

[fish16]

Literally blowing a year of service time on 3 of your top 8 or so prospects for 6-7 weeks of sucking a little less in a 90 loss season. So amazing.

Im fine with Anderson as he's clearly MLB ready to me, definitely not with Brinson but id understand why theyd do that just because he is the new face of the franchise, but Alcantara is just flat out pure panic and reflects a failure to do the necessary front office work to get enough competent arms to fill an MLB rotation for a month or 2.

[Ralph]

Yanks DFA Jake Cave. Hopefully they go after him. He’s interesting. Especially for this season.

[fish16]

Yanks DFA Jake Cave. Hopefully they go after him. He’s interesting. Especially for this season.

eh maybe. I guess Denbo knows more than most, but last year was his 3rd year spending time in AAA and his K/bb was a horrific 82/18 with no speed and decent power but he's never shown power before last year. Whatever helps Brinson get that extra year, and im sure someone will eventually be available if we really want to keep Brinson down, but i dont see it with cave.

[tjfla]

Yanks DFA Jake Cave. Hopefully they go after him. He’s interesting. Especially for this season.

We could have used Cave and Tommy Joseph(DFA too) LY but this year really no point.

SVS is gonna make the team and can play all 3 OF spots/1B. Plus we have Cooper who can play both corner OF spots and is a better bat. We are good with OF-we need MIF/C/Arms

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Elieser and Graves are both Rule 5 which means they have to spend a certain amount of time on the ML Roster. Not sure the exact amount since they changed it. We have 3 options with them

1 Keep on ML roster whole year and they are ours
2 DFA and Send back to other team
3 Try to work a deal and get rights

If we keep them all year then next year they would likely be sent to AAA for more seasoning. Likely send Graves back and keep Elieser.