April Game Thread

[tjfla]

It's not even May. Our prices SHOULD be high right now.

Well they didnt call for the trades now they called to see for June/July like what our plans were. Been telling teams that Grandy,Walker,Prado,Romo,Castro are gone and Rojas,Conley,Steck are on market but will take a great offer. Urena is NOT on the market(teams think we are bluffing) but if we get a crazy deal we will deal him. Chris Archer type deal(Not as high of a price)

[lou]

NYY have called on ALL of our guys already to figure out prices and heard the price on Urena and Rojas were nuts

Smart play is to trade Urena and call Elieser or Gallen up. Remember we have 40-60 million to spend and James Paxton is a FA

Dumb about Urena and Rojas besides a small uptrick as it's April, but the smart play is to wait until the Super 2 deadline to do anything. Hernandez can come up, but Gallen better not come up before mid-June with what he's doing.

[tjfla]

This is not in any order of upside, more of probability in my mind.

Starters - Sixto, Pablo, Neidert, Garrett

Maybe starters - Ca. Smith, Richards, Alcantara, Gallen, W. Stewart

Relievers - Guzman, Cabrera, N. Anderson, Holloway, Rogers, Guerrero, Ferrell, Elieser, Quijada, Brice, Kinley, Yamamoto, Brigham

Garret is really years away, so they really just need half of the other 8 to work out by 2021, with Sixto or Alcantara realizing their potential, and one other guy turning into at least # 3.

Yamamoto,Cabrera and Rogers actually look like SP. Dont forget we also have Julian Fernandez and guys like Eveld,Dylan Lee in AAA. Also should have a Top 3 Rule 5 Pick which we will use!!!

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Dumb about Urena and Rojas besides a small uptrick as it's April, but the smart play is to wait until the Super 2 deadline to do anything. Hernandez can come up, but Gallen better not come up before mid-June with what he's doing.

Gallen probably comes up after/around trade deadline when they shut down Sandy or Pablo

I think we are gonna trade 2 guys to NYY just depends on what 2

[lou]

I just like the idea of 2021:

Sixto, _______ (lefty, Paxton/Ray), Alcantara, Ca. Smith, and Pablo/Neidert/Gallen, with Garrett and Stewart in AAA

Guzman, Cabrera, Holloway, N. Anderson, and "take your pick" for the right handers. Maybe Alcantara shuffles here and Pablo and Neidert/Gallen fill out the rotation. Carlos Martinez was kicked to the bullpen so it's not like Sandy is better than him as a starter. Not an insult.

They absolutely need to be focusing on bullpen lefties in the coming purge of Castro, Romo, Steck, Conley, Rojas, Walker, Granderson, etc. But that's also a reasonable expectation for those players.

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Yamamoto,Cabrera and Rogers actually look like SP. Dont forget we also have Julian Fernandez and guys like Eveld,Dylan Lee in AAA. Also should have a Top 3 Rule 5 Pick which we will use!!!

We'll see what happens as guys will get injured and performance will drop for some of them, but I really have no concerns right now about the rotation (absent developing a true ace which is an issue but maybe Sixto/Sandy will save us) or right handed bullpen core.

[tjfla]

Agree with u on a Ray or Paxton tho. They have cash and can use a #1/2 LHP

1 of them and then Lindor

[lou]

Agree with u on a Ray or Paxton tho. They have cash and can use a #1/2 LHP

1 of them and then Lindor

If the Nats don't sign Rendon, they should move on him with the "Jayson Werth" deal and just kick Anderson to RF (or 1B).

Rendon and a free agent SP (allowing them to trade SP for more bats) radically changes things fast assuming the rest of the SP do hold up and "Castro and friends" get bullpen lefties and bench bats that are up within a year.

[rmc523]

I wouldn't mind if we dealt guys period. We keep asking for unrealistic deals

They missed out on Bearclaw,Steck and Conley LY by asking for crazy prices. Baltimore tried to get Straily LY and we asked for Austin Hays in return then they tried again this offseason and we asked for millions in IFA.

Teams have called on Urena,Rojas,Conley,Steck already and have heard the prices are sky high AGAIN

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Guzman and Brigham are RP. Probably move Roberson and Vallimont into that Top group as well

I don't have a problem with them starting with high demands. The question is whether they'll come down to reality.

If the Nats don't sign Rendon, they should move on him with the "Jayson Werth" deal and just kick Anderson to RF (or 1B).

Rendon and a free agent SP (allowing them to trade SP for more bats) radically changes things fast assuming the rest of the SP do hold up and "Castro and friends" get bullpen lefties and bench bats that are up within a year.

Hopefully there are some FAs left after all of these extensions.

[fish16]

Brinson not in the lineup again. gotta think hes going down soon. hopefully they wait like a month longer for sierra and/or harrison before they bring them up. sierra is now at 9/9 for K/BB on the year which would be huge if its a real thing.

[lou]

Hopefully there are some FAs left after all of these extensions.

G. Cole and Rendon are the only elite guys.

Other guys right side of 30: Ozuna, Didi, Puig, Castellanos

I'd sign Cole and Rendon to whatever they want, and opportunistically sign Didi. Pass on the rest to not invest huge money in the OF.

Rendon and Didi would really be tremendous, and then grab a SP for 2021 after these guys sort themselves out.

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Brinson not in the lineup again. gotta think hes going down soon. hopefully they wait like a month longer for sierra and/or harrison before they bring them up. sierra is now at 9/9 for K/BB on the year which would be huge if its a real thing.

Sierra can be brought up whenever, Harrison should be down until Mid-June minimum and that's assuming if he's even ready.

[fish16]

2 years of Abreu just to lock down first base for a few years. you're allowed to spend some money on the team to fix a hole for a few years. Get a power bat like him at 1b and then a guy like Ozuna for 3-4 years front-loaded with big money early and you really help the power in the middle of the lineup while we develop other guys.

we really will have a ton of room to spend next offseason with Castro and Prado coming off the books. the only guy with a contract is the last year of chens deal at 22 million.

the following guys are likely to be on the roster or spend time on the roster and will be owed just the league minimum: Alfaro, Anderson, Brinson, Diaz, Sierra, Harrison, Dean, Smith, Pablo, Sandy, Richards, Gallen, Neidert, Guzman, Eveld.

They have a bunch of room the next few years to even just add steady veterans on short term 1-2 year deals at places where we have a need, and we have a lot of need in our lineup, particularly power bats, and particularly at 1b and somewhat at SS and corner OF.

[fish16]

nick anderson will be our closer come the end of the year.

[Erick]

nick anderson will be our closer come the end of the year.

Amazing that this team didn’t capitalize on trading a single reliever last season.

[Lee Stone]

nick anderson will be our closer come the end of the year.

come the end of the month

[fish16]

What do you think the team looks like come september?

C- Alfaro, Wallach
1b- Cooper
2b- Diaz
SS- Rojas/Riddle
3b- Anderson
LF- Brinson
Cf- Sierra
Rf- Monte

SP- Smith, Alcantara, Lopez, Richards, Gallen, Neidert maybe with a 6 man rotation to limit innings if he progresses enough.

At least could be a nice taste of the future in the later months. If Sierra and Monte's plate discipline improvement is a legitimate change that is a huge development. Brinson needs to go down and just crush for a month. The pressure of being the only guy from the yelich trade up here so far, being from down here, kind of billed as the face of the franchise, and he fact that yelich is absolutely ridiculous has to be weighing on him and he would do well to get out of the spotlight for a month or 6 weeks and regroup. Being up here like he has the last 2 years clearly hasnt worked and this idea that he completely already proved himself at AAA anyways is not accurate. He was ridiculous in the ballpark in colorado springs and just solid away from there with much worse plate discipline away from home.

[fish16]

Also, don't know the likelihood he re-signs with Texas or what happens with his option for 3 years 43 millions but id consider him for a 3 year deal for a little more. Would be a big upgrade and would allow Rojas to slide into a utility role and would, once again as i've been preaching, address the hitting in the short term with significant additions while taking advantage of the huge amount of productive players we will have on the team next year and in the next few years for literally the ML minimum. Assuming Chen is the only contract we have for next year along with maybe a few arbitration guys, we will have nothing else but prospects on team control deals. With the plethora of SP we have already and coming in the next few years, i sign 3 guys if possible:

Ozuna- 3 years 65-70 million or 4 years 75-80
Andrus- 3 years- 50-55 million.
Abreu- 1 year 10 million (maybe with a club option for 8 million the next year or something) or 2 years 16 million.

Might be a slight overpay for them but you make 3 huge additions to a lineup desperately in need of impact bats, dont go past 4 years for anyone so you're taking advantage of a period where you will have lowered salaries due to team control and young SP depth without breaking the overall team salary in the upcoming years, and maybe speed up the re building process without jeopardizing the future unless you consider spending anything jeopardizing the future.

Assuming Ozuna gets say near 20 million, abreu gets 8-10, and andrus gets around 18, thats 48 million. With Chen next year thats 70 million, but with the amount of guys under team control in the rotation and lineup, the amount of arms who could become solid relievers as soon as next year, and Chen then coming off, it's affordable. It would be around an 85-90 million payroll next year, then 75 the following year and going down as the deals expire so you can ideally re-up parts of a young core.

This lineup just desperately needs 2-3 key veteran free agent additions to short term contracts given how little we have coming in the pipeline but how much SP we can have in the coming years that can be legitimately good. Not re-treads you hope you can deal at the deadline but legitimate veteran bats. Ozuna, Abreu, and Andrus are my top 3 guys.