2023 Game Thread

[lou]

Robert is conservatively playing as a 4+ WAR player and signed for four more seasons (two not guaranteed which is also huge if he gets hurt) for $67.5m. So call it 4.33 seasons for $72m. Surplus value floor here $80m, ceiling could be $100-110. The rough estimate is FV50 guys are worth $20-25m, and a steep drop for the FV45s to a quarter of that in an eye of the beholder scenario. Ignoring Eury who would be the obvious choice as a centerpiece, we're talking Eder, Meyer, Berry/Cappe/Watson (has to be valued as FV50 by them), Vargas, Mesa Jr., and maybe Monteverde/Miller/Millbrandt/etc. for him. And that's the floor. Maybe Cabrera or Rogers would interest them but they probably want healthier/more control guys. Might be two of Berry/Cappe/Watson. Marlins are seriously disadvantaged here not having a FV55/60 guy to move to impact the value so it's going to cost the house to me. I don't see it being a match, nor the White Sox selling here. And if they do sell, someone else has a better prospect to give. The Giants would be all over him and have better guys they can move (Harrison, Matos). He's a top 10 player in baseball right now signed for nothing you know. It's like trading Sandy in July last year. What's that cost? A lot.

[lou]

Fangraphs gave N. Meyer a FV45+, White FV45, and Aldermann a FV40 in the draft. May not seem like high grades but very few FV50s were dished out and only 7 teams had a second player FV45 or better. Generally, it seems like the analytics nerds liked their draft which is all you can hope for. They did give Morales a FV45+ grade and he went to the Nationals, so that one has serious potential to haunt the Marlins for a long time if White doesn't work out and he does. We'll see in a few years.

They took a guy (Brock Vradenburg) in the third round who sounds interesting - 6'7 1B with low K totals. That's a big dude if they can unlock some power if the tool is he is a hitter first. https://www.mlb.com/prospects/draft/...denburg-802544

And it sounds like they got a few more of their typical development arms/bullpen types. Draft what you're good at and maybe one or two of these guys become a Nardi.
-A pitchability lefty like Fulton and Monteverde - https://www.mlb.com/prospects/draft/emmett-olson-801207
-A 6'7 lefty - https://www.mlb.com/prospects/draft/justin-storm-814193
-A guy who took off a year, came back throwing harder, with a FD/SL reliever floor, SEC - https://www.mlb.com/prospects/draft/...lindsey-701604
-Vanderbilt's closer - https://vanderbilthustler.com/2023/0...-eighth-round/


This is a nice draft on paper. The only thing I am surprised about is they didn't take a true catcher, but maybe (hopefully) they have big plans for Aldermann there.

[rmc523]

Vvm, kolek, and skipworth fighting to the death over who the biggest bust was.

what was even the skill set that made vvm appealing? He has no power, doesn’t appear to be a good hitter, didn’t walk much. Just a little speed in center?

the other guy they were trying to sign around the same time, Sandy Gaston, also sucks for the rays

Wasn't there talk that his brother was the "real" target, but to get him, they had to get both?

[Nick]

Wasn't there talk that his brother was the "real" target, but to get him, they had to get both?

I don't think I've ever heard that. They paid VVM way more than VM Jr. so I find that hard to believe.

[fish16]

Wasn't there talk that his brother was the "real" target, but to get him, they had to get both?

other way around and it just happened to work out in a way that VMJR was the better prospect. VM JR was the throw in and happened to turn out to be the better player

[fish16]

Robert is conservatively playing as a 4+ WAR player and signed for four more seasons (two not guaranteed which is also huge if he gets hurt) for $67.5m. So call it 4.33 seasons for $72m. Surplus value floor here $80m, ceiling could be $100-110. The rough estimate is FV50 guys are worth $20-25m, and a steep drop for the FV45s to a quarter of that in an eye of the beholder scenario. Ignoring Eury who would be the obvious choice as a centerpiece, we're talking Eder, Meyer, Berry/Cappe/Watson (has to be valued as FV50 by them), Vargas, Mesa Jr., and maybe Monteverde/Miller/Millbrandt/etc. for him. And that's the floor. Maybe Cabrera or Rogers would interest them but they probably want healthier/more control guys. Might be two of Berry/Cappe/Watson. Marlins are seriously disadvantaged here not having a FV55/60 guy to move to impact the value so it's going to cost the house to me. I don't see it being a match, nor the White Sox selling here. And if they do sell, someone else has a better prospect to give. The Giants would be all over him and have better guys they can move (Harrison, Matos). He's a top 10 player in baseball right now signed for nothing you know. It's like trading Sandy in July last year. What's that cost? A lot.

I would give whatever the White Sox wanted (obviously to an extent) from the prospects not on the roster (and obviously Eury) to get Robert. That's the kind of power hitting center piece at a premium position that would really take this lineup to another level. He's already signed at a below market value so even though it is a good amount of money, it's worth it. You can then take a little bit of the load off jazz defensively and move him to 2b again, move Arraez to 1b long term starting immediately, and then you really have something if you can get Robert without giving up any of the current major league pitching staff. Plus he's cuban, which really doesnt matter to be honest, but it doesnt hurt.

Long term we would still need a C and SS, but that's a big big piece to add. Or you can slot edwards in at 2b and keep jazz as a mostly DH to try and keep him healthy.

Next year you can have

C- ______/Fortes
1b- Arraez
2b- edwards
SS- ______/Berti
3b- Segura
LF- DLC/Myers?
CF- Robert
RF- Sanchez
DH- Jazz

SP- Sandy/Eury/Luzardo/Cabrera/ whoever is left
RP- Puk/whoever is left, bullpen isnt terribly hard to find.

[fish16]

random, but a name from the past who just retired at 23 is freudis nova. Back in 2016 he was supposed to be our big international signing and he ended up getting busted for roids prior to us signing him for 2.5 million. He ended up signing with the astros in the IFA market for 1.2 million and never did much of anything with the bat in the minors and just retired.

[sports24/7]

Victor Victor was always overrated by the fan base. I remember at the time when I did a little digging into the scouting report on him I couldn’t figure out why everyone was so excited about the signing. He was going to be an average hitter at best who could play good defense in CF. The fact that he netted us a real prospect in his brother might be a best case scenario in the end, anyway.

[Nick]

Victor Victor was always overrated by the fan base. I remember at the time when I did a little digging into the scouting report on him I couldn’t figure out why everyone was so excited about the signing. He was going to be an average hitter at best who could play good defense in CF. The fact that he netted us a real prospect in his brother might be a best case scenario in the end, anyway.

well our FO experts obviously overrated him too when they gave him $5.25 million signing bonus.

[rmc523]

Victor Victor was always overrated by the fan base. I remember at the time when I did a little digging into the scouting report on him I couldn’t figure out why everyone was so excited about the signing. He was going to be an average hitter at best who could play good defense in CF. The fact that he netted us a real prospect in his brother might be a best case scenario in the end, anyway.

Eh, plenty of other teams reportedly wanted him too, so it wasn't necessarily just the Marlins.

[lou]

Victor Victor was always overrated by the fan base. I remember at the time when I did a little digging into the scouting report on him I couldn’t figure out why everyone was so excited about the signing. He was going to be an average hitter at best who could play good defense in CF. The fact that he netted us a real prospect in his brother might be a best case scenario in the end, anyway.

2018 - It took four trades for bonus space to sufficiently pad the Marlins’ international free agent coffers in excess of Baltimore’s top mark, or at least to come close enough that the appeal of Miami made up the difference, and snag the Mesa brothers. The pair signed for $6.25 million, $5.25 million of which went to 22-year-old Victor Victor. Mesa began playing in Cuba’s Series Nacional when he was 16. He had a breakout ’16-’17 at age 20 and swiped 40 bags while slashing .354/.399/.539. He was seen stateside the following summer during Cuba’s tour of the CanAm League, but didn’t play well. After he defected, teams’ only looks at Mesa were in a workout setting. Cuban prospects have sometimes undergone drastic physical transformations between the point at which they’ve last been observed in Cuba and their workouts for teams. Sometimes these changes are positive, as with Luis Robert, who looked like an Ancient Greek sculpture when he worked out for teams in the Dominican Republic in 2017. Sometimes they are not; Yasiel Puig’s living conditions made it impossible for him to remain in baseball shape for his eventual workout in Mexico. But this was not the case with Mesa, who retained the sort of physicality he possessed during his last several years in Cuba. He ran a plus-plus 60-yard dash time, threw well, and hit some balls out to his pull side during batting practice. Mesa has a linear, contact-oriented swing that we think will lead to below-average power output in games. He can hit, defend, and add value on the bases, but there’s real doubt about the game application of his power. In aggregate, it looks like an average to slightly below-average offensive profile on an above-average defender at a premium position, which amounts to a low-risk, moderate impact prospect who should be ready for the big leagues relatively soon. He garners frequent comparisons to Cubs CF Albert Almora.


Did not age well. That's a FV45+ grade BTW.

[lou]

Wow on this one from ESPN - https://www.espn.com/mlb/insider/sto...vorite-classes

The best organizations at drafting get their various departments on the same page, then settle on a point of view on what they scout and develop well -- then lean into that as hard as they can. In the MLB draft, creating value is the name of the game, not trying to fill big league holes; you can use trades and free agency to do that. So, sure, the Marlins could panic that they haven't picked or produced a ton of solid-average position players in the draft. But instead, they realized that they create value more reliably with high-ceiling pitchers and leaned hard into that, landing some great projects for pitching consultant Dave Wallace & Co. In Noble Meyer and Thomas White, the Marlins took the top two prep pitchers with true frontline potential (in a year where most teams were scrambling to sort through the position players). Meyer and White alone would make a solid draft, but coming back with two position players with everyday upside in Kemp Alderman (80 raw power, above average speed) and Brock Vradenburg (late bloomer with a chance for an above average hit/power combo) rounds out a strong top of the draft. I would bet that at least two of their next four picks (lefties Emmet Olson and Justin Storm, righty Andrew Lindsey, outfielder Jake DeLeo) end up big leaguers, as well.


Effectively, they had the best draft in their eyes. What an unexpected surprise.

Maybe more of a reason to move some of the upper farm for controlled players as the MLB team is extremely controlled (especially if they do give Arraez, Luzardo, and Eury the obvious extensions, maybe Jazz if the health can be written off) and the lower farm is starting to really fill out with a plus draft. Get control years at MLB level and you can sit on the A ball guys for 2 years and there is reasonable hope at every position group (Mack/Hernandez/Alderman, Berry/Vradenburg, Vargas/Watson, Watson/Cappe, Cappe/Lewis, Alderman/Mesa Jr./Sanoja/Peguero/Gerardo, Noble/White/Miller, tons of RP).

[Lee Stone]

Wow on this one from ESPN - https://www.espn.com/mlb/insider/sto...vorite-classes

The best organizations at drafting get their various departments on the same page, then settle on a point of view on what they scout and develop well -- then lean into that as hard as they can. In the MLB draft, creating value is the name of the game, not trying to fill big league holes; you can use trades and free agency to do that. So, sure, the Marlins could panic that they haven't picked or produced a ton of solid-average position players in the draft. But instead, they realized that they create value more reliably with high-ceiling pitchers and leaned hard into that, landing some great projects for pitching consultant Dave Wallace & Co. In Noble Meyer and Thomas White, the Marlins took the top two prep pitchers with true frontline potential (in a year where most teams were scrambling to sort through the position players). Meyer and White alone would make a solid draft, but coming back with two position players with everyday upside in Kemp Alderman (80 raw power, above average speed) and Brock Vradenburg (late bloomer with a chance for an above average hit/power combo) rounds out a strong top of the draft. I would bet that at least two of their next four picks (lefties Emmet Olson and Justin Storm, righty Andrew Lindsey, outfielder Jake DeLeo) end up big leaguers, as well.


Effectively, they had the best draft in their eyes. What an unexpected surprise.

Maybe more of a reason to move some of the upper farm for controlled players as the MLB team is extremely controlled (especially if they do give Arraez, Luzardo, and Eury the obvious extensions, maybe Jazz if the health can be written off) and the lower farm is starting to really fill out with a plus draft. Get control years at MLB level and you can sit on the A ball guys for 2 years and there is reasonable hope at every position group (Mack/Hernandez/Alderman, Berry/Vradenburg, Vargas/Watson, Watson/Cappe, Cappe/Lewis, Alderman/Mesa Jr./Sanoja/Peguero/Gerardo, Noble/White/Miller, tons of RP).

I can't believe the Marlins passed on ACC POY Ryan Teel. Catchers that can do it all are rare indeed. Teel's offensive numbers were about identical to those of Adley Rutchmann in his final year at Oregon State.

Kyle Teel MLB mock draft scouting report: Where Virginia catcher ranks among 2023 prospects | Sporting News

[lou]

I can't believe the Marlins passed on ACC POY Ryan Teel. Catchers that can do it all are rare indeed. Teel's offensive numbers were about identical to those of Adley Rutchmann in his final year at Oregon State.

Kyle Teel MLB mock draft scouting report: Where Virginia catcher ranks among 2023 prospects | Sporting News

Gotta take the Ws as they come Lee. I did say earlier I would have taken Teel and Morales, but maybe the Marlins know something and there are vastly higher ceilings with the arms.

All and all, I'm not sure we can argue the draft plan. Seems like the did a good job.

[Namaste]

What would we have to send to Anaheim for 2.5 months of Ohtani?

We win the World Series and then he resigns with Anaheim in 2024 for $575 million, right?

Ohtani never makes the playoffs again and he wears a Marlins cap during his HOF induction.