Season Super Game Thread

[fish16]

The Victor Victor comp that I've read is Albert Almora. If that's the case, does it really matter whether Miami signs him or not?

Funny that even in something like this youd prefer a small sample size. Most reports have him being a large impact player but you chose one random scouting report. Especially for prospects, any one scouting report by a particular guy is to be taken with a grain of salt.

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Baltimore having the most money to spend in their pool and not spending it on a guy like VV would be one of the single cheapest and most ridiculous things ive ever seen. Like MLB should probably intervene in their affairs ridiculous.

It really boggles my mind how some of these owners run their teams. I dont know how some of these cheap owners amassed their money if they dont realize the savings they would realize in the long run on top of having more successful organizations if they just invested money into their IFA and draft/scouting teams rather than ignoring them and doing the single most inefficient thing in baseball in terms of value by signing ML free agents.

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Holy shit Isaac Galloway just hit an absolute blast in Fenway with me watching for the first time in quite a while. Good for him, he'd be a real interesting piece if he ever displayed any kind of plate discipline in his career.

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Given that free agency in 2020/2021 isn't as good as "Manny Machado," I think this makes a lot of sense if they are willing to make that financial and marketing plunge. I mean, I know this is a 1% scenario but:

Prado and Chen - $31 million (for fuck's sake)
Realmuto - $7 (big arbitration raise)
Dietrich - $4.5 (arb2/was super2)
Rojas - $2 (arb2)
Urena - $3 (arb1)
Conley - $2 (arb1)
Cooper, Riddle, Anderson, Dean, Brinson, Ortega, Club Controlled 1B/OF type, Club Controlled Backup Catcher, Richards, Ca. Smith, Pablo, Alcantara, Steckenrider, Wittgren, Guerrero, Brigham, Merandy, Garcia = 18 club controlled dudes for $11+ million
=Just over $60 million

Trade - Castro, Straily, Barraclough

Machado even at $30+ million fits into a $90 million budget and if they also cast out Dietrich, Rojas, and Conley, which no one is losing sleep over, they can get that down another $10ish. I feel pretty confident they could get two young 1B/OF types and a backup catcher trading those 6 guys/Rule V/cheap acquisitions, and just promoting Peters or Quijada in place of Conley to fill out the roster.

I mean Machado is a dream scenario, but purely on a money and personnel level, they can jump into that pool 1 year early and I like that idea because I'd rather spend on him versus someone like George Springer or Gerrit Cole who may be the more marquee names available later. What an offseason that would be, if they extended Realmuto and signed Machado to be home with his family.

Will never happen.

I know it would never happen anyways and getting Machado would be huge regardless, but, in theory, I think id prefer one more year like this year before investing in major pieces in FA. Have another year to evaluate and see what players will be in your core and then pounce in free agency in 2020 or 2021 when you are closer to contention and have a better idea of how things are progressing in the rebuild.

I think if we keep JT and sign a Bour type 1b we can have a really fun and closer to .500 team next year. I could see mid 70's in wins next year and then fringe wild card contention the following year ideally. The young pitching has yet to have one blossom into an ace, but I really love our new found depth in the rotation. Seems we can run 6-7 strong guys who are solid mid rotation pieces ideally (Smith, Pablo, Richards, Urena, Alcantara, and then vets like Straily and Chen on top of guys who could be ready mid year next year in Neidert and Gallen). If just one of these guys can develop into a top of the rotation guy our rotation would be ridiculously cheap (minus Chen's dead weight if he's still here) and under team control for a very long time.

[Namaste]

Marlins did the ol’ strand the leadoff triple in the 4th tonight.

[fish16]

Marlins did the ol’ strand the leadoff triple in the 4th tonight.

We've perfected the move. And we're patent pending on stranding the bases loaded with no outs.

[fish16]

Would like to have seen what our future would have looked like if we just did the same rebuild but kept Yelich. I think the return will be ok when we look back on it, but he's just such a great hitter and has turned into a legit future superstar and his contract is such a value. Yelich and JT getting locked up long term would have been a pretty incredible place to rebuild around with the young pitching we have in year 1.

[Namaste]

Would like to have seen what our future would have looked like if we just did the same rebuild but kept Yelich. I think the return will be ok when we look back on it, but he's just such a great hitter and has turned into a legit future superstar and his contract is such a value. Yelich and JT getting locked up long term would have been a pretty incredible place to rebuild around with the young pitching we have in year 1.

What makes you think the return for Yelich will be ok when we look back on it?


Marlins are doing some heavy Marlins’ing right now.

[fish16]

What makes you think the return for Yelich will be ok when we look back on it?


Marlins are doing some heavy Marlins’ing right now.

I think they got back 3 guys who could all become everyday good regulars and that was kind of the point of the trade theoretically in that we were trying to just replenish the system and lineup with talent. This year for Brinson has been almost as bad as can be possibly managed for both performance and contractual reasons but I think he has what it takes to become a good everyday CF like a Carlos Gomez in his prime with more power.

Monte Harrison still put up 20 hr's and 30 sb's despite the k's and he was still pushed to start the year at AA after just 60 games last year in A+ ball. I think he can get better and start next year in AA, improve the K rate, continue to improve in AAA and then come up next september at the earliest.

Diaz is a prototypical 2b in today's game. He might have a lower ceiling but i feel like he has a pretty high floor given his skillset. Hope they give him time to master AAA and get the extra year of service time regardless of what they do with Starlin. Dont let that issue affect Diaz.

Yamamoto has performed really well when he's pitched but he just hasnt stayed healthy. Looks like a potential bullpen arm at the very least.

I think the return will turn out good, I just hate getting rid of a guy like Yelich who is just an incredible player regardless of the return. He is a legitimate MVP candidate this year and will only get better as he continues to add muscle. And that contract was the best thing that Loria and Samson did as owners.

[Namaste]

I think they got back 3 guys who could all become everyday good regulars and that was kind of the point of the trade theoretically in that we were trying to just replenish the system and lineup with talent. This year for Brinson has been almost as bad as can be possibly managed for both performance and contractual reasons but I think he has what it takes to become a good everyday CF like a Carlos Gomez in his prime with more power.

Monte Harrison still put up 20 hr's and 30 sb's despite the k's and he was still pushed to start the year at AA after just 60 games last year in A+ ball. I think he can get better and start next year in AA, improve the K rate, continue to improve in AAA and then come up next september at the earliest.

Diaz is a prototypical 2b in today's game. He might have a lower ceiling but i feel like he has a pretty high floor given his skillset. Hope they give him time to master AAA and get the extra year of service time regardless of what they do with Starlin. Dont let that issue affect Diaz.

Yamamoto has performed really well when he's pitched but he just hasnt stayed healthy. Looks like a potential bullpen arm at the very least.

I think the return will turn out good, I just hate getting rid of a guy like Yelich who is just an incredible player regardless of the return. He is a legitimate MVP candidate this year and will only get better as he continues to add muscle. And that contract was the best thing that Loria and Samson did as owners.

What an incredibly positive spin on trading a MVP candidate who had an outstanding club friendly contract for 2 lottery tickets and a bag of roasted peanuts.

[fish16]

What an incredibly positive spin on trading a MVP candidate who had an outstanding club friendly contract for 2 lottery tickets and a bag of roasted peanuts.

As if youre not also putting a negative spin on it by calling it 2 lottery tickets and a bag of roasted peanuts?

[Namaste]

As if youre not also putting a negative spin on it by calling it 2 lottery tickets and a bag of roasted peanuts?

I find my spin to be a lot more closer to reality than yours.

[fish16]

Side note just looking at the NOLA box score: you cant tell me Nick Wittgren doesnt deserve a spot in the bullpen in the majors given his track record and given what we've thrown out there this year. Weird how he's seemingly been banished to AAA and not given another chance.

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I find my spin to be a lot more closer to reality than yours.

time shall tell then.

[lou]

Side note just looking at the NOLA box score: you cant tell me Nick Wittgren doesnt deserve a spot in the bullpen in the majors given his track record and given what we've thrown out there this year. Weird how he's seemingly been banished to AAA and not given another chance.

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time shall tell then.

Wittgren might be service time oriented, they can probably prevent him from being a Super2 in 2020

[Maddawg]

Because they are stupid and, at least in Loria's case, dont see how beneficial it can be long term by creating depth in a system which in turn can lessen the need to overpay mediocre free agents later on. That was the thing with Loria that never made sense to me given that he is a billionaire. He was completely unable to see that short term investments in the draft and IFA can pay off in a huge way down the line not only through an additional avenue to find star talent, but also in building a complete organization with depth. If we had actually invested in the draft and IFA, we would have been able to ideally develop more cost controlled talent and would have not even needed to sign ridiculously mediocre free agents to big money deals like (Volquez, Chen, Ziegler, Tazawa, Salty, Buck, Heath Bell, etc). This point is the whole reason why Loria was such a bumbling moron as an owner: he wasnt even good at being cheap. He just liked short term high priced fixes rather than building a healthy organization with lower yearly investments in young cheap talent that would have made his organization both successful and cheap.

Loria flat out was incapable of seeing that small annual investments in young talent will make your organization better, more sustainable, and will almost eliminate the need to sign mediocre players to big money. It is the most simply concept in the game and in business in general, and Loria just did not understand it.

See there are things we 100% agree on....

[lou]

I think they got back 3 guys who could all become everyday good regulars and that was kind of the point of the trade theoretically in that we were trying to just replenish the system and lineup with talent. This year for Brinson has been almost as bad as can be possibly managed for both performance and contractual reasons but I think he has what it takes to become a good everyday CF like a Carlos Gomez in his prime with more power.

Monte Harrison still put up 20 hr's and 30 sb's despite the k's and he was still pushed to start the year at AA after just 60 games last year in A+ ball. I think he can get better and start next year in AA, improve the K rate, continue to improve in AAA and then come up next september at the earliest.

Diaz is a prototypical 2b in today's game. He might have a lower ceiling but i feel like he has a pretty high floor given his skillset. Hope they give him time to master AAA and get the extra year of service time regardless of what they do with Starlin. Dont let that issue affect Diaz.

Yamamoto has performed really well when he's pitched but he just hasnt stayed healthy. Looks like a potential bullpen arm at the very least.

I think the return will turn out good, I just hate getting rid of a guy like Yelich who is just an incredible player regardless of the return. He is a legitimate MVP candidate this year and will only get better as he continues to add muscle. And that contract was the best thing that Loria and Samson did as owners.

I mean, we all said that as soon as it happened, why trade him when you have him for 5 years.

If they get a 3 WAR and a 2 WAR starter out of them, it'll be an OK trade based on them saving half of Yelich's contract value and they can apportion that money elsewhere. They aren't going to win it unless they get a Realmuto and a better Anderson out of it, and that's going to be tough.

[fish16]

See there are things we 100% agree on....

I knew there had to be at least 1 thing!

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Wittgren might be service time oriented, they can probably prevent him from being a Super2 in 2020

Worrying about wittgrens service time should be the least of their concerns. He's a decent middle reliever. He should be up here.

[lou]

Worrying about wittgrens service time should be the least of their concerns. He's a decent middle reliever. He should be up here.

Sure, but they owe Chen and Prado $64 million combined next few years. If they can hedge a million bucks on Wittgren by keeping him down an extra few months in 2018 while not contending and having to keep Hernandez and Graves up for Rule V purposes? Go for it. Who cares.

I know you don't disagree and this is a stupid topic, but I am all about them doing anything like this to save money for when it matters. This is a "good at being cheap" scenario which I agree with you Loria was bad at.

Do this a half dozen more times (Garcia seems like a candidate for this, they basically did this with Alcantara this year, wait to call up Neidert and Gallen until June 20, 2019, etc.), and you can afford an "extra" $10 million a year player in 2022. Literally.

This is why Brinson is still such a dumb decision.