what are GM's around baseball thinking?

[jjgman21]

might belong in baseball discussions, feel free to move.

 

while nowhere near as dead as last year or the year before, this is the third straight year where there are 20 or so teams in the playoff hunt, but very few teams make any moves.

 

what do you think is the cause? is so much of the talent concentrated in those teams that there is nobody on the other ten teams that nobody wants? is the large number of teams in the hunt dissuading GMs from thinking they can make the playoffs because there are too many teams to climb over?

 

what's the deal here. it seems the wildcard may be slowing down the flurry of deadline deals we used to see. or maybe it's just the heirarchy of teams created by payroll (there are no bad contracts on poor teams to trade away).

 

and as a side note, how would you feel if you're a Phillies fan? they are in just as good of a position right now as the Astros or Brewers to make the playoffs. all they need is an 8 out of 10 and they are probably a game or two out of the wildcard, yet they make no attempt to make a push. just the opposite, they choose to trade away one of their top players while other teams in their position are either making deals or in the 'looking to improve' rumor mix.

[goonys evil twin]

how would you feel if you're a Phillies fan? they are in just as good of a position right now as the Astros or Brewers to make the playoffs. all they need is an 8 out of 10 and they are probably a game or two out of the wildcard, yet they make no attempt to make a push. just the opposite, they choose to trade away one of their top players while other teams in their position are either making deals or in the 'looking to improve' rumor mix.

 

Every Philly fan I know gave up on this season long ago, and have been calling for an overhaul for a long time. I doubt many are upset or think management threw in the towel too soon (although they should be upset that they got nothing for Abreu).

[cubfan1955]

Only so many teams can trade with Hendry on deadline day. LA and San Diego won this years GM lotto drawing.

[rawaction]

No GMs want to give up top prospects anymore. The way to get the most out of any team is to get production out of cheap talent. The top prospect to change teams was Joel Guzman, and upside or not, he doesn't really have a legit position right now. The Yanks refused to give up their top 2 prospects. The Mets refused to give up Milledge. The Sox refused to give up Lester. And those are all teams that can seemingly get around not having a farm system.

 

For all the talk that prospects are a crapshoot and a majority of them bust, horribly....there are a ton of future great baseball players out there. Nobody wants to miss out on the next big thing.

 

Look around the ML leaderboards. You have guys like Mauer, Holliday, Wright, Howard, Utley, Bay, Pujols, Verlander, Liriano, Sizemore, etc. all under 26 and among the best players in the game. You don't see GMs willing to trade the next great player for a 2 month rental anymore.

[jjgman21]

No GMs want to give up top prospects anymore. The way to get the most out of any team is to get production out of cheap talent. The top prospect to change teams was Joel Guzman, and upside or not, he doesn't really have a legit position right now. The Yanks refused to give up their top 2 prospects. The Mets refused to give up Milledge. The Sox refused to give up Lester. And those are all teams that can seemingly get around not having a farm system.

 

For all the talk that prospects are a crapshoot and a majority of them bust, horribly....there are a ton of future great baseball players out there. Nobody wants to miss out on the next big thing.

 

Look around the ML leaderboards. You have guys like Mauer, Holliday, Wright, Howard, Utley, Bay, Pujols, Verlander, Liriano, Sizemore, etc. all under 26 and among the best players in the game. You don't see GMs willing to trade the next great player for a 2 month rental anymore.

 

I think this gets to the answer to my queery. nobody seems to want to mortgage the future to make a push any more. plus, I think we saw the old group of talent on the way out and the new group coming in, without alot of dominant players in between. I've been thinking about this lately, and it seems the vast majority of superstars are either in their first few years, or on their last legs, without a bunch in between. the 27 y.o. to 33 y.o. (approx) group in baseball right now is just not very talented.

[jjgman21]

how would you feel if you're a Phillies fan? they are in just as good of a position right now as the Astros or Brewers to make the playoffs. all they need is an 8 out of 10 and they are probably a game or two out of the wildcard, yet they make no attempt to make a push. just the opposite, they choose to trade away one of their top players while other teams in their position are either making deals or in the 'looking to improve' rumor mix.

 

Every Philly fan I know gave up on this season long ago, and have been calling for an overhaul for a long time. I doubt many are upset or think management threw in the towel too soon (although they should be upset that they got nothing for Abreu).

 

that's strange to me. if the Cubs were five games out of the playoffs right now, the fanbase would be pissed if Hendry didn't make a push, even with this group of less than inspiring ball players.

[Ding Dong Johnson]

It's more difficult to gauge who's truly in the playoff hunt on 7/31 than it was before realignment and the WC. I think teams like the Phillies were wise for making moves under the assumption that they were not one of those teams. Everyone else just stands pat foolishly thinking they have a shot, similar to this very Cubs team a year ago.

[goonys evil twin]

I think this gets to the answer to my queery. nobody seems to want to mortgage the future to make a push any more. plus, I think we saw the old group of talent on the way out and the new group coming in, without alot of dominant players in between. I've been thinking about this lately, and it seems the vast majority of superstars are either in their first few years, or on their last legs, without a bunch in between. the 27 y.o. to 33 y.o. (approx) group in baseball right now is just not very talented.

 

ARod, Jeter, Ichiro, Ortiz, Utley, Beltran, Soriano, Rolen, Glaus, Aramis and DLee, Vladdy, Abreu and Helton.

 

Webb, Carpenter, Halliday, Lackey, Santana, Oswalt, Zito

 

There's a lot of talent in that age range.

 

But yeah, teams realized that not all prospects are suspects, and that trading for a marginal veterans isn't the answer to your pennant dreams.

[goonys evil twin]

that's strange to me. if the Cubs were five games out of the playoffs right now, the fanbase would be pissed if Hendry didn't make a push, even with this group of less than inspiring ball players.

 

6 under .500, 5.5 games back, 6 teams ahead of them, a consistent history of coming up short late in the season. It doesn't seem strange to me at all. They aren't good, and their fans realize it.

[Nobody youd want to know]

I read yesterday--can't remember where--that studies have shown the addition of veteran talent has very little, if any impact, on a team's success in the second half of a season.

[rawaction]

I think this gets to the answer to my queery. nobody seems to want to mortgage the future to make a push any more. plus, I think we saw the old group of talent on the way out and the new group coming in, without alot of dominant players in between. I've been thinking about this lately, and it seems the vast majority of superstars are either in their first few years, or on their last legs, without a bunch in between. the 27 y.o. to 33 y.o. (approx) group in baseball right now is just not very talented.

 

ARod, Jeter, Ichiro, Ortiz, Utley, Beltran, Soriano, Rolen, Glaus, Aramis and DLee, Vladdy, Abreu and Helton.

 

Webb, Carpenter, Halliday, Lackey, Santana, Oswalt, Zito

 

There's a lot of talent in that age range.

 

But yeah, teams realized that not all prospects are suspects, and that trading for a marginal veterans isn't the answer to your pennant dreams.

 

Yeah, I was thinking the opposite. There's not a lot of talent over 35 anymore. Bonds is not the force he was the last few years, there's no Sosa, McGwire, Luis Gonzalez, Unit, Clemens, Maddux, having great years over 35 like there has been in recent years. Kids are running baseball right now, and their doing it very cheaply. Those are all great players above, but I think this is probably the deepest group of under 26 yo studs and can't miss prospects probably ever. And that's with a couple of weak drafts recently.

[jjgman21]

I think this gets to the answer to my queery. nobody seems to want to mortgage the future to make a push any more. plus, I think we saw the old group of talent on the way out and the new group coming in, without alot of dominant players in between. I've been thinking about this lately, and it seems the vast majority of superstars are either in their first few years, or on their last legs, without a bunch in between. the 27 y.o. to 33 y.o. (approx) group in baseball right now is just not very talented.

 

ARod, Jeter, Ichiro, Ortiz, Utley, Beltran, Soriano, Rolen, Glaus, Aramis and DLee, Vladdy, Abreu and Helton.

 

Webb, Carpenter, Halliday, Lackey, Santana, Oswalt, Zito

 

There's a lot of talent in that age range.

 

But yeah, teams realized that not all prospects are suspects, and that trading for a marginal veterans isn't the answer to your pennant dreams.

 

Yeah, I was thinking the opposite. There's not a lot of talent over 35 anymore. Bonds is not the force he was the last few years, there's no Sosa, McGwire, Luis Gonzalez, Unit, Clemens, Maddux, having great years over 35 like there has been in recent years. Kids are running baseball right now, and their doing it very cheaply. Those are all great players above, but I think this is probably the deepest group of under 26 yo studs and can't miss prospects probably ever. And that's with a couple of weak drafts recently.

 

I think the better way of putting what I was trying to get at is service time instead of age. just thinking off the top of my head and the six to 10 year corp (again, approx) is pretty weak and those that are in that range are naturally locked up long term and producing. a look at the top players in both leagues in OPS+ and ERA+ this and last year, the candidates for this year's post season awards (aside - arguably the top three candidates for the AL CY are rookies! Verlander, Liriano and Papelbon) and the All-Star rosters, pretty much confirms it. maybe that's the natural progression of things, but it seems guys in the 7-10 year range of service time would be at their peak and dominating baseball, but that's just not the case these days.