2025 Game Thread

[Todd]

Nobody can turn a pitching surplus with an average major league roster and bad farm system into an all around terrible major league roster with no pitching surplus and a mediocre farm system quite like boy genius Peter bendix and the worst owner in baseball Bruce Sherman

The MLB roster was not average. It was literally one of the worst offenses in the game by almost every measure.

I find your love of Kim Ng and hatred of Bendix to be quite humorous.

[fish16]

Nobody can turn a pitching surplus with an average major league roster and bad farm system into an all around terrible major league roster with no pitching surplus and a mediocre farm system quite like boy genius Peter bendix and the worst owner in baseball Bruce Sherman

[Nick]

Our Bullpen looks disastrous.

But don't worry guys Janson's Junk is going to be ok!

[Nick]

Weathers out 4-6 weeks.

Of the 258 front office people hired can we get one of them to figure out why our pitchers can't stay healthy?

[Namaste]

Ryan Weathers leaves the game with a forearm strain. Perfect.

[rmc523]

from my understanding it's actually not that uncommon for teams to hire players like that, but it's just one PR blunder after another with Sherman. They should get rid of 3 of the 45 front office people we have hired to sign nobody and replace them with a team of PR people. Between that stupid blunder, and then the other shit he does just about every time he and bendix open their mouths it's just an embarrassment. It is not a major league organization.

The reporting though said several people are concerned that it’s trying to circumvent CBA rules/salaries, implying it’s not all that common….who knows

[fish16]

In other news, MLBPA is considering a toothless grievance, as nothing has ever happened before when getting one of those.

also, the Marlins apparently put out ads begging former college and professional players to come play against their Low A team for $150 a day….it was pulled down.

this ownership group is a disgrace and needs to be shown the door.

but hey, at least we have the biggest FO in baseball! Infrastructure! i can’t tell you how exciting it is to watch the FO work! Oh wait, they don’t sign anyone or do anything either!

from my understanding it's actually not that uncommon for teams to hire players like that, but it's just one PR blunder after another with Sherman. They should get rid of 3 of the 45 front office people we have hired to sign nobody and replace them with a team of PR people. Between that stupid blunder, and then the other shit he does just about every time he and bendix open their mouths it's just an embarrassment. It is not a major league organization.

[rmc523]

In other news, MLBPA is considering a toothless grievance, as nothing has ever happened before when getting one of those.

also, the Marlins apparently put out ads begging former college and professional players to come play against their Low A team for $150 a day….it was pulled down.

this ownership group is a disgrace and needs to be shown the door.

but hey, at least we have the biggest FO in baseball! Infrastructure! i can’t tell you how exciting it is to watch the FO work! Oh wait, they don’t sign anyone or do anything either!

[fish16]

some spring thoughts just looking at stats- X is really fucking good. A smart team would try to nab him on a long term deal for cheap, but we arent a smart team. We will get good production out of him for several years then deal him when he gets too expensive.

Stowers appears to just stink. Liked the addition in the rogers trade because rogers stinks, but he just seems to be a AAAA player. Though his K/bb ratio is just 15/9 unless that hasnt been updated after his most recent dreadful game.

Ryan weathers was a great guy to get. Seems to be a luzardo 2.0 scenario where they get a really talented arm for cheap because he was brought up too early by his original team or just had some early career struggles.

Mervis has had nice numbers, but he is at 18 k's to 1 walk. Reminds me a lot of brinson's spring stats when he first got here and i said the underlying numbers indicate a lot of struggles would be coming and they would be better served to give him more minor league time. Mervis will be the starting 1b on opening day, but i wouldnt have crazy high expectations.

Griffin conine really seems to have made progress as a long term piece. Not sure if he is a full time starter, but he has come a long way from this time last year where he just struck out way too damn much.

Derrick Hill and Myers could be a decent CF platoon.

I've been an otto lopez hater but he has had a nice spring. If he can develop some more power that's an interesting piece. Not sure how he and X work with the defensive limitations of X at SS and Otto lopez being elite at 2b, but 2 good pieces to have.

Norby has had a mediocre spring. Wouldnt read too much into it. but a 13/1 k/bb ratio isnt promising.

And obviously sandy looks great. If he stays healthy thats a huge return for him when they unfortunately inevitably trade him for 5 19 year olds.

Max meyer has solid stats. interested to finally see him in the rotation long term and see what he can do.

Edward cabrera stinks. Maybe he pans out eventually somewhere like andrew miller and oliver perez eventually figured it out, but its not looking good.

Cal quantrill has looked awful apparently. Liked the signing but bad spring so far.

I'd really be interested to see Sanoja get an extended run at SS if he can hold up there defensively. Dont think there is star potential, but i really like the skill set with the k/bb ratio.

[fish16]

i think the bullpen will end up being fine but even before bendix, this ownership group has been doing the same thing with the bullpen since it arrived. make 0 moves to spend a little money to get a few quality arms in free agency, spend april with a shit bullpen filtering through shit arms until they find the right mix, then finding some arms along the way and eventually having a relatively decent pen. It's been the same thing for years now. It eventually works out, but in years where they are even trying to possibly win, they lose a lot of games early because of their refusal to invest in the offseason. We had sixto sanchez in a set up role to start last year.

[Namaste]

You don't want to overreact to spring training, but why does it seem like the guys Miami will probably be relying on the most in the bullpen are getting shelled on a daily basis? As bad as the lineup will be this year, the bullpen might be even worse. I feel so bad for their starting pitchers.

Ya I followed along on MLB At Bat today. Another great start followed by Bender and Faucher getting taken to pound town. Gonna be a long year, boys.

[sports24/7]

You don't want to overreact to spring training, but why does it seem like the guys Miami will probably be relying on the most in the bullpen are getting shelled on a daily basis? As bad as the lineup will be this year, the bullpen might be even worse. I feel so bad for their starting pitchers.

[fish16]

Morlando was considered a top 10 prospect heading into his senior season and only "dropped" because he got the high school equivalent of the Barry Bonds treatment that last season and basically never got any pitches to swing at.

And he still excelled at showcases at the same time.

Also the bit of savings on that pick allowed the Marlins to spend a bit more on Carter Johnson, another highly rated prep bat.

A lot of Jazz's WAR came from his defense which you are notoriously dismissive of when it comes to defense. In 3 of his 4 seasons excluding his 20 game cup of coffee he put up OPS+ of 95, 99, 97 and WRC+ of 94, 101, and 100. He had an outlier 2022 season granted.

Jake Burger turns 29 in like a week and was 20th in the league in OPS+ among DH. He doesn't draw BB or work counts. He swings at everything. Strikes out a ton. Yes when he makes contact sometimes it goes a long way but again he rarely actually makes contact. I'm pretty sure he set a record for swinging at like 30 consecutive pitches last season or the year before.

Literally no one. Not a single person. Has said Luis Arraez sucks. Just that he has exactly one skill, hitting singles, and you overrate that ability.

No one knows if the prospects acquired for them will amount to anything. But the team wasn't going anywhere with them either and none of them are players you build around.

Didn’t realize Morlando was the first great hitter to ever be pitched around in high school.

jazz isn’t a bad defender but his war is not defensive driven. It’s also good that he is a solid defensive player and now versatile. My issue with defensive war is that it is unreliable on a year to year basis and the weighting of it. But he’s a career 105 wrc+ with the last 3 years being 134, 101, and last year 110. His issue is staying healthy because he played recklessly. And again, it’s really hard for players to produce when you surround them with complete shit. It’s not a coincidence that jazz had a great end to the year last year once he got to New York.

Jake burger is a career 113 wrc+. By team dh stats last year, that’s the 12th best dh in baseball. Name our other top half of the league at their position players?


arraez does not just do one thing well. just because he’s not a 30 home run player doesn’t mean he’s a slap singles only hitter. You don’t put up an .860 ops in 2023
as a slap hitter. He has gap power, hits for average, and has the best contact ability in baseball. If you focus on what guys don’t do you’ll be satisfied with like 10 players in baseball. Even if he’s a dh, that’s a top 8 dh in baseball last year going by his career wrc+. Again, it’s ok to have good, solid, contributing players. The guys they got are incredibly unlikely to ever contribute significantly, let alone any time soon. They all had an absurdly disastrous year last year

Every one of those guys is a guy you can build around. Believe it or not, you can keep pieces even if they aren’t superstars. You will never be able to build a team of just prospects within their team control years. You need surrounding pieces. This team has a payroll of like $70 million, and none of those guys were expensive. It’s pathetic to justify always tearing everything down unless
you have a contending team. You will never get a contending team without spending money and keeping good players while at the same time developing a farm system.

the prospect only shit rarely works out, and these franchises use it as a way for their fans to traffic in hope. It used to occasionally work because the highest spending teams didn’t also focus on their farm. Those teams invest in their farm more than anyone now.

There is 0 reason bendix had to go scorched earth and not only not sign a single guy, but not even make an attempt to. If you thought this franchise had a pathetic fan base before, just wait till you continue to trade and trade and trade your best players over and over again while spending no money. It shows 0 awareness for the market he took over. And it’s why he’s going to leave this organization worse on and off the field.

[Todd]

Morlando was considered a top 10 prospect heading into his senior season and only "dropped" because he got the high school equivalent of the Barry Bonds treatment that last season and basically never got any pitches to swing at.

And he still excelled at showcases at the same time.

Also the bit of savings on that pick allowed the Marlins to spend a bit more on Carter Johnson, another highly rated prep bat.

A lot of Jazz's WAR came from his defense which you are notoriously dismissive of when it comes to defense. In 3 of his 4 seasons excluding his 20 game cup of coffee he put up OPS+ of 95, 99, 97 and WRC+ of 94, 101, and 100. He had an outlier 2022 season granted.

Jake Burger turns 29 in like a week and was 20th in the league in OPS+ among DH. He doesn't draw BB or work counts. He swings at everything. Strikes out a ton. Yes when he makes contact sometimes it goes a long way but again he rarely actually makes contact. I'm pretty sure he set a record for swinging at like 30 consecutive pitches last season or the year before.

Literally no one. Not a single person. Has said Luis Arraez sucks. Just that he has exactly one skill, hitting singles, and you overrate that ability.

No one knows if the prospects acquired for them will amount to anything. But the team wasn't going anywhere with them either and none of them are players you build around.

[fish16]

Fish16 blaming Bendix for Morlando’s injuries.

lol

Again, nowhere in that post does it blame bendix for his injuries. Certainly blames him for a bad pick. Which it was at the time it was made. Generally you want players to play at some point. You will go through any rationale possible to absolve him of any responsibility for how much worse this team and organization is than when he took over. The only thing he’s improved is the amount of assistant gms