2024 Game Thread

[rmc523]

do you want them to continue to add pitching to the point where you are capably able to replace Sandy and Eury being out for the year plus Garrett and Cabrera missing significant time? All on a team that has no hitting talent to begin with? There isnt a single team in baseball that can sustain those losses, especially when that's the strength of your team. Sometimes you just fold and move on to next year. Which is what they should do immediately. Tank the season.

I’m not going to get into the endless back and forth with you. It was a horrible offseason that anyone watching baseball saw coming. Well before the injuries, they should’ve been making moves/signings on the pitching
AND hitting side that would’ve helped offset these issues.
clearly their plan is to blow it all up anyway since Bendix would rather hire 857 AGMs than actually do something to improve the team.
im in full not care mode, I’ll get score updates but don’t really plan on watching. I’m not going to invest time/money into them when they clearly don’t care either.

[lou]

oh, and since he is on the ML roster, we are about to lose 2 fucking years of service time for him because he's not going to be ready till the middle of next year. They should sign him now.

Purely strategically, you definitely wait to extend him. First, because you don't know what's going to happen. Jesse Foppert happens. Second, Kim deflecting his super 2 status matters financially here to not move up his payscale in his second service year. So 2024 is in essence year 0, 2025 year 1, and 2026 year 2 where he won't be super 2. So his arbitration years will be 2027-2029 for services years 3-5.

So he'll probably throw, we'll be optimistic, 15 starts in 2025, and we'll give him a full 30 in 2026. He did 19 in 2023. So he'll have missed about 1+ full year when this is all said and done. So that's going to majorly impact his arbitration numbers (including no super2 status, see Jesus Sanchez this year who got a scale up) and keep them suppressed as the prior year is also the basis for the raise. Even if he is fucking awesome, he's not going to get Burnes level money year 3 and year 4 is what I am saying here. His last arbitration year could roll over to superstar status though if he is a genuine ace. Basically, he became a lot cheaper today because he's going to miss these call it 40 starts he could otherwise be making.

This is a wait and see post 2025 to see what happens. He'll still be 4 years under control, and at a minimum for 1 season which is where Kim did a good thing here to preserve this leverage. Huge bargaining leverage still remains with those 4 years and lower expected arbitration numbers now. This isn't like Luzardo which was a now or never who scaled up faster being a super 2, and then was fucking great to get a healthy 2nd arbitration tender over $5m.

This completely sucks, but we have to take a step back. This season is over, but don't need to run to extend anyone now. This is about setting up the 2025 team now, and Eury is the defacto 6th SP for next year and a big time ASB addition coming for cheap.

Fuck our lives.

[Namaste]

I’m not going to get into the endless back and forth with you.

It will absolutely be endless and he'll absolutely have to have the last word.

[fish16]

I’m not going to get into the endless back and forth with you. It was a horrible offseason that anyone watching baseball saw coming. Well before the injuries, they should’ve been making moves/signings on the pitching
AND hitting side that would’ve helped offset these issues.
clearly their plan is to blow it all up anyway since Bendix would rather hire 857 AGMs than actually do something to improve the team.
im in full not care mode, I’ll get score updates but don’t really plan on watching. I’m not going to invest time/money into them when they clearly don’t care either.

ok but again, what moves could they have made that would be able to sustain this bullshit? They should have made moves, but nothing they would have done would have fixed losing 2 cy young caliber pitchers, plus losing Garrett and Cabrera for at least a month, and who knows what will happen the rest of the year. It would have been a great thing to do from a PR standpoint, but it would have ended up in the same exact place record wise, and as we've seen time and time again, that is the only thing that brings out fans.

[lou]

I’m actually glad this is happening now. I fully predicted this, but thought they’d try to rehab him and he’d wind up getting it in August. Doing it now gives the opportunity for him to come back next year

I agree, better now than August. If the season is a lost season, this is an atomic bomb to get them to do the unspeakable and make major APRIL trades tearing this shit up before anyone else gets hurt. I genuinely want Luzardo, Arraez, Scott, Anderson, Chargois, and Bell off this team ASAP. Unapologetic baseball moves. Try everyone out in 2024 and see what sticks. The team is going nowhere. Make the moves now for guys you're not keeping longterm and get full season value out of them. Tell the remaining SP, Jazz, and Burger sorry and 2025 will be better. They will get it.

I'll spare the hey they could do this in 2025 depth chart map I usually do, but they can easily put together a team that can contend for a WC even with this news if they make good Luzardo and Arraez trades, develop a few bench players (Edwards, Brujan, Rivera, DLC, Gordon, Sasaki, Mesa Jr, etc.) and backend RHP this year (Cronin, Maldonado, Sixto, etc.) so they don't have to waste money there next year, and will move payroll back to 2023 levels to $110m to fit in multiple middle tier FA types (as well as you know, sign the occasional lower class Davis/Taylor guys for some spots too if the opportunity presents itself).

What a fucking shitshow, but ultimately this just ends 2024 now for real and doesn't change too much longterm assuming Eury is coming back strong early summer next year. In fact, Eury is cheaper as I mused above.


Tank for Ethan Holliday (and yes I know its a lottery).

[lou]

ok but again, what moves could they have made that would be able to sustain this bullshit? They should have made moves, but nothing they would have done would have fixed losing 2 cy young caliber pitchers, plus losing Garrett and Cabrera for at least a month, and who knows what will happen the rest of the year. It would have been a great thing to do from a PR standpoint, but it would have ended up in the same exact place record wise, and as we've seen time and time again, that is the only thing that brings out fans.

PR matters, so does culture. You just made the playoffs and let the players out to dry. How can they trust ownership? There is a lot more to it then just saying hey they wouldn't contend anyways. I think that is why you are getting so much pushback from everyone here. The offseason was a massive failure, and that's before the injuries.

All bets are off this season now IMO, but they are going to *really* have to make real on the field moves next offseason. Everyone will give them a mulligan with these injuries and a regime change, so bless their hearts they have an injury excuse no one can argue with, but major changes are going to be needed to reset the franchise come November.

Don't fuck up the Luzardo and Arraez trades, and try out everyone with a pulse. I wanna see Sanchez batting against all left handers for 2 months. Gordon too. I want Brujan starting 5 days a week to see if those AAA numbers kick in and dead serious there. Try them all out. Let them rip. See what you have as this is 40 man evaluation time already.

[fish16]

PR matters, so does culture. You just made the playoffs and let the players out to dry. How can they trust ownership? There is a lot more to it then just saying hey they wouldn't contend anyways. I think that is why you are getting so much pushback from everyone here. The offseason was a massive failure, and that's before the injuries.

All bets are off this season now IMO, but they are going to *really* have to make real on the field moves next offseason. Everyone will give them a mulligan with these injuries and a regime change, so bless their hearts they have an injury excuse no one can argue with, but major changes are going to be needed to reset the franchise come November.

Don't fuck up the Luzardo and Arraez trades, and try out everyone with a pulse. I wanna see Sanchez batting against all left handers for 2 months. Gordon too. I want Brujan starting 5 days a week to see if those AAA numbers kick in and dead serious there. Try them all out. Let them rip. See what you have as this is 40 man evaluation time already.

That's fine, i agree, but at this point you all are bitching about why they didnt add pieces to a team that just started the season 0-7, has no all star level hitters or top prospects throughout the system, and is without 2 cy young caliber pitchers plus another 2 high level starters.

It would have been absurdly unpopular, but what they should have done in retrospect is completely blown up the team and started over. They do not have a single high level bat or top prospect. They got nothing for Stanton, Yelich, and Realmuto. Not a single piece. They got nothing from the draft. Not a single piece. 2018-2022 they drafted Max Meyer, JJ Bleday, Connor Scott, Kahlil Watson, Joe Mack, and Jacob berry in the first round. This organization has nothing. A rebuild that could have been great was completely hamstrung by a front office that couldnt identify and/or develop talent to save their life.

Jacob Berry over Brooks Lee. Kahlil Watson 1 pick before Matt McClain. Joe Mack with pick 31. JJ Bleday picks before Abrams, Jung, Riley Greene, Corbin Carroll. Connor Scott over Gorman, Nico Hoerner, Tristan Casas.

JT Realmuto for Sixto, Alfaro, and the lefty i cant remember instead of Austin Riley.

Yelich for 4 guys who were all equally horrific instead of getting Kyle Tucker.

This is not 1 offseason in the making. This is 7 years of terrible evaluation after terrible evaluation in the making. It started with Denbo, it carried through Ng. And they paired it with cheap ownership. A complete failure of a franchise.

[lou]

That's fine, i agree, but at this point you all are bitching about why they didnt add pieces to a team that just started the season 0-7, has no all star level hitters or top prospects throughout the system, and is without 2 cy young caliber pitchers plus another 2 high level starters.

It would have been absurdly unpopular, but what they should have done in retrospect is completely blown up the team and started over. They do not have a single high level bat or top prospect. They got nothing for Stanton, Yelich, and Realmuto. Not a single piece. They got nothing from the draft. Not a single piece. 2018-2022 they drafted Max Meyer, JJ Bleday, Connor Scott, Kahlil Watson, Joe Mack, and Jacob berry in the first round. This organization has nothing. A rebuild that could have been great was completely hamstrung by a front office that couldnt identify and/or develop talent to save their life.

Jacob Berry over Brooks Lee. Kahlil Watson 1 pick before Matt McClain. Joe Mack with pick 31. JJ Bleday picks before Abrams, Jung, Riley Greene, Corbin Carroll. Connor Scott over Gorman, Nico Hoerner, Tristan Casas.

JT Realmuto for Sixto, Alfaro, and the lefty i cant remember instead of Austin Riley.

Yelich for 4 guys who were all equally horrific instead of getting Kyle Tucker.

This is not 1 offseason in the making. This is 7 years of terrible evaluation after terrible evaluation in the making. It started with Denbo, it carried through Ng. And they paired it with cheap ownership. A complete failure of a franchise.

They made the playoffs, didn't do anything, and 3 of these injuries you speak of happened *after* what they should have done. You're playing the results not the offseason. I mean yes right now was it good they didn't spend money? Sure. But that's not something to compliment them on? Their dumb luck in the team got radically injured, and then went on an epic losing streak, doesn't absolve them for the sheer failure of the offseason for doing nothing to improve a playoff team. They are assholes. Plain and simple.

And the organization doesn't have nothing per the second point. There have been many failures and I'm the one that constantly rails on them for Brooks Lee and Matt McClain draft mistakes mind you, but the organization probably has two of the top 15 (Sandy and Eury), one of the top 15-30 (Luzardo), and one of the top 50-75 (Garrett) SP in the game, and then they have Cabrera, Rogers, Puk, Weathers, and Max on top of that (and I'm willing to bet there are 2 SP there at minimum), with maybe two of the top 10-15 SP prospects in the game with Noble and White behind them. There are an assortment of controlled bats (Arraez, Jazz, Burger, Sanchez, etc.) with some value and a big list of potential bench guys/relievers behind them which does matter to fill out teams at club controlled price with guys like Nardi, Edwards, Fortes, and Sixto/Bender/Maldonado/Cronin. There are a lot of good parts here even if the superstar # 3 hitting Julio/Tatis/Soto type is nowhere to be found. No one is arguing that there are 2 very notable injuries here now and that many many mistakes have been made, but at the end of the day I can assure you I can put together an internal roster for 2025 that goes 18 deep that is very good because of mainly the SP depth may be very real (including getting young guys for Arraez/Luzardo), at around $60-65m dollars, and it's just a question if they'll spend at 2023 levels to fill in the gaps. The endless Bruce question. Frankly, Sandy, Cabrera, Garrett, Max, and Puk/Weathers/Rogers may be an outstanding rotation quickly without Eury, and Luzardo was cashed in for the bats. There is a lot of hope here for a quick turnaround, but it ain't happening this year.

So yes. I think we are all here - burn it down for 2024, save money, get healthy, and 2025 is probably still an exciting team on paper opening day if they commit resources to it (the big question) even if Eury is missing half the season. If you're Bendix, if you don't blow it up right now, it's further malpractice. 20-25 teams in baseball are going to jump on Luzardo and Arraez quickly. He's the only one preventing this from happening, so we'll see what Peter does. The honeymoon is over.

[fish16]

I'm not complimenting them on not spending money. I'm saying at this point you're bitching about a team that just started 0-7 and is decimated by injuries not spending money in the offseason. It wouldnt have made a difference.

every organization has talent. The bottom line is this team has a mediocre at best team when healthy like last year, a pretty bad team when injured as they currently are, and one of the worst farm systems in all of baseball. I'm as bullish on the rotation as anyone, but Puk hasnt proven anything, nor has Weathers other than having talent and a good spring, Rogers is thoroughly mediocre, Cabrera seems to be injured a lot and cant throw strikes consistently yet, and Meyer has had 3 starts at the major league level. It's good talent, but it hasnt proven anything. When paired with a truly awful to watch lineup, it's just not a good team whatsoever, and the results bare that out.

In the lineup, you have nothing at C, Bell will be traded, Arraez is great, Anderson is on a 1 year deal, Burger is good, Jazz cant stay healthy or hit lefties (and it doesnt look like it's gotten better this offseason), and Sanchez hasnt proven he can hit lefties either. And they dont have a single stud hitter in the minor leagues whatsoever. Almost every team can list guys like this. This lineup is just not good, not talented, and pretty abysmal to watch night in and night out. And it's been that way for like 6 years since the rebuild started.

It's just not an impressive collection of talent overall in the organization, and when you combine it with an owner who has no business being an owner, plus a fanbase that just does not give a fuck to try and care anymore, it's a bottom 3-5 situation in baseball right now.

[lou]

This lineup is just not good, not talented, and pretty abysmal to watch night in and night out. And it's been that way for like 6 years since the rebuild started.

It's just not an impressive collection of talent overall in the organization, and when you combine it with an owner who has no business being an owner, plus a fanbase that just does not give a fuck to try and care anymore, it's a bottom 3-5 situation in baseball right now.

A top 3-5 longterm SP situation in baseball on this magical day in 2025 when everyone is healthy isn't bottom 3-5 by any stretch, but ownership is a major problem. And I don't think it's a stretch to say Luzardo and Arraez could quickly turn into Mayo/Westburg, Kjerstad, Norby, and Bradfield (or equivalents) and frankly, that's a big big step forward if you already have Jazz and Burger, and some quality role players like Sanchez, maybe Edwards, Fortes, and DLC/Gordon/Brujan. Sign Adames and Jansen, who you can easily afford next offseason at THIS years payroll levels, and all of a sudden you're kind of just missing that one stud bat for LF/RF, and that's when you do what Milwaukee did and blow out Noble and friends for a Yelich type player as the final piece. The SP is there which is really important absent even further injuries. We can't overlook that even if Eury just got really hurt. Things suck, but perspective is important. They botched this offseason, but things turn around real quick with the SP. Which you have noted many times, isn't healthy. We should have had two Sandy, a Eury, Garrett, and Cabrera start already. A trickle down of call it 27 innings there over 7 games is monstrous. They probably have 3 full games of innings hurt you know. Out of 7. That's nuts.

All I know is, this is going to be a really really long 155 games to go. Trade them Bendix. Do it.

[rmc523]

ok but again, what moves could they have made that would be able to sustain this bullshit? They should have made moves, but nothing they would have done would have fixed losing 2 cy young caliber pitchers, plus losing Garrett and Cabrera for at least a month, and who knows what will happen the rest of the year. It would have been a great thing to do from a PR standpoint, but it would have ended up in the same exact place record wise, and as we've seen time and time again, that is the only thing that brings out fans.

There were plenty of guys that could’ve helped this year OR in the worst case scenario (which is predictable playing out since they did nothing), they become trade chips to quickly retool on the fly for next year when we do have a better change on paper.
doing nothing was inexcusable.

[Namaste]

The Mets could end the day 0-6

[Namaste]

Lots of pressure on the Cardinals to beat the dumpster fire Marlins

[Namaste]

Arraez robbed of a hit to start the game

[Todd]

Lou finds a way to mention Danny Jansen into every post.

I've never seen anyone so enamored with such a shit player before. It's fascinating.