Yoshinobu Yamamoto to...the Dodgers? Really? Again?

[NorthsideAvenger]

4 minutes ago, 17 Seconds said:

you had to really dig deep for those 3 examples 

And?  

All this offseason has done for the Dodgers is making Dave Robert's seat very warm. If Robert's can't win a title with this roster, then he is done in LA.

Edited December 22, 2023 by NorthsideAvenger

[17 Seconds]

Just now, NorthsideAvenger said:

And?  

there are also tons of examples of super teams working out great.

buying awesome players absolutely helps you win. the idea that being a "superteam" is a detriment to winning holds no weight. the dodgers have the best chance of winning the world series due to these moves

[Chicago Al]

Don’t worry guys, Hoskins is still available!

[NorthsideAvenger]

26 minutes ago, 17 Seconds said:

there are also tons of examples of super teams working out great.

buying awesome players absolutely helps you win. the idea that being a "superteam" is a detriment to winning holds no weight. the dodgers have the best chance of winning the world series due to these moves

Other than the 09 Yankees, I cannot think of another superteam that's won recently.

[Stratos]

54 minutes ago, Irrelevant Dude said:

Do we really know that Yamamoto would be the best player on the Cubs?  It is way too early to make that assumption.

Fair enough.  My assumption is Yamamoto will be about as good as Steele, but hard to say.

[JHBulls]

32 minutes ago, Chicago Al said:

Don’t worry guys, Hoskins is still available!

Until the Dodgers decide they want him too. 

[17 Seconds]

6 minutes ago, NorthsideAvenger said:

Other than the 09 Yankees, I cannot think of another superteam that's won recently.

since then I'd say the heat, the durant warriors, the lightning, and the blackhawks could all count as superteams. baseball is harder because of the randomness of the playoffs

[Stratos]

On the plus side, if I become a Dodger fan for the next few years life is suddenly super amaziing!  We just got Ohtani and Yamamoto baby!!

[soccer10k]

21 minutes ago, NorthsideAvenger said:

Other than the 09 Yankees, I cannot think of another superteam that's won recently.

I mean if we're talking baseball, the 2016 Cubs probably qualified. Had a ton of young talent, won 97 games in 2015, destroyed the league in August and Sept, went out and signed Heyward (I know it didn't work out but he was the most sought after position player FA), Zobrist and Lackey (3 of the top 18 in terms of FA dollars signed for that offseason) plus brought back Fowler. That's after signing one of the top-2 most sought after FA pitchers (Lester) the year before.

[Stratos]

Maybe they should figure out how to make the playoffs less random.  I say a 7 game divisional series is the bare minimum they could try.

[17 Seconds]

7 minutes ago, The20thK said:

Imagine claiming that the Cubs should have done exactly what the Dodgers have done… while also simultaneously claiming that super teams don’t win! 
 

You guys are laughable.

 

literally 1 person said super teams don't win

[Thusly Boned]

3 hours ago, The20thK said:

Imagine claiming that the Cubs should have done exactly what the Dodgers have done… while also simultaneously claiming that super teams don’t win! 
 

You guys are laughable.

 

This is bad for baseball. I don’t care what it means for the Cubs. The disparity is increasing. 

 

Both things can be true. This is absolutely bad for the sport, but there is not a firm correlation between spending a crapton of money and World Series wins. It does suck a lot of the fun out of the regular season, though. 

I suppose the only positive is the schadenfreude when a team like the '23 Mets horsefeathers the bed.

In a better world all these owners would just spend their money on their teams, but we don't live in that world, and what the Dodgers are doing is really exasperating. 

And while I won't pretend I wouldn't be mostly cool with it if the Cubs were the Dodgers in this story, it would feel slightly dirty. Like being a fan of an NBA superteam.

Parity makes everything more fun.

[Backtobanks]

6 hours ago, Chicago Al said:

Don’t worry guys, Hoskins is still available!

So is Alfonso Rivas.

[Brian707]

5 hours ago, Stratos said:

Maybe they should figure out how to make the playoffs less random.  I say a 7 game divisional series is the bare minimum they could try.

Sure, then the season ends on Thanksgiving.  Go back to pre 1969, that would make it less random but will never happen 

[CubinNY]

6 hours ago, Bertz said:

Yeah the NL Champs had Tommy Pham hitting cleanup for them and their #3 starter had a 5.72 ERA.  I don't understand how people still don't understand how random the baseball playoffs are

kind of but not really. The playoffs are not random. They are only tangentially related to the regular season due to the fact that the teams with the best records make the playoffs. But the teams that usually win the playoffs are the teams that are playing the best baseball at the time the playoffs start. That might not be the best regular-season team. 

I don't know how to make it so the best regular season teams have a better chance other than to limit the number of teams that make the playoffs and that isn't happening. 

 

[Bertz]

46 minutes ago, CubinNY said:

The playoffs are not random. They are only tangentially related to the regular season due to the fact that the teams with the best records make the playoffs. But the teams that usually win the playoffs are the teams that are playing the best baseball at the time the playoffs start. That might not be the best regular-season team. 

 

[CubinNY]

8 minutes ago, The20thK said:

If all teams acted like the Dodgers… we’d be paying 30m a year for Patrick Wisdom. The only way to curb the spending is a salary cap.

 

if the MLB doesn’t institute one soon, it will continue to lose fans. Personally, I’m one of them.  Yes you can argue that the Cubs could afford what the Dodgers are doing but it only gets worse from there. 

what?

[Irrelevant Dude]

31 minutes ago, The20thK said:

If all teams acted like the Dodgers… we’d be paying 30m a year for Patrick Wisdom. The only way to curb the spending is a salary cap.

You do realize that one of the big reasons the Dodgers have been able to go on this spending spree is that they HAVEN'T overpaid the Patrick Wisdom types, right?  They had the right combination of money to spend, payroll flexibility, and ownership commitment, along with a very attractive situation both competitively and geographically.

Yes, it is true that the Dodgers have many advantages over other teams.  The Cubs have some of those same advantages, but simply choose not to utilize them.  I'm not opposed to the concept of a salary cap, but it wouldn't address all the disparities and we all know it is never going to happen anyway.

[Jfoley89]

8 hours ago, 17 Seconds said:

I don't think you actually believe they should do this

I do. At this point wasting trade resources makes zero sense for a Cubs team that has let almost all of the impact talent sign elsewhere.  Why trade the only way the Cubs might actually get a superstar for a first round playoff exit? I'm all about maximizing opportunities, and blowing half your farm system to win the Central makes zero sense when you're not willing to back that play in FA with talent. 

[NorthsideAvenger]

6 hours ago, soccer10k said:

I mean if we're talking baseball, the 2016 Cubs probably qualified. Had a ton of young talent, won 97 games in 2015, destroyed the league in August and Sept, went out and signed Heyward (I know it didn't work out but he was the most sought after position player FA), Zobrist and Lackey (3 of the top 18 in terms of FA dollars signed for that offseason) plus brought back Fowler. That's after signing one of the top-2 most sought after FA pitchers (Lester) the year before.

I cannot articulate my thoughts at this moment other than to say that buying a superteam, like the Padres have tried to do, rarely works out. Now if you are the Astros or Cubs and currently the Braves who developed their own prospects into a superteam, I'm all for that. 

I apologize if I wasn't clear with what I was trying to say. 

[Irrelevant Dude]

4 minutes ago, username said:

$325,000,000 for a guy who has never thrown a pitch in MLB.  Jesus Christ.  

Don't forget to add the $50 Million posting fee on top of that.

[CubinNY]

1 minute ago, The20thK said:

You think wanting a salary cap so a handful of teams can make the playoffs every year while some teams have to spend years building a roster for a one time playoff push before blowing up the team to rebuild… is a bad thing? 

a salary cap is not the solution to making teams better able to compete. It is the solution to rising costs. The smart teams will always have a leg up. It just won't cost this so much. 

[Jason Ross]

Many of these mega contracts have conversations surrounding them that go like this:

"Wow, someone signed him to X years for Y money? That's crazy" Until 2-3 years later as inflation continues to set in, and contracts go up, to go "The Whatevers get that player for only $X a year AAV? That's a steal". We did this with Cole, Harper, A-Rod...feels like we're probably getting there with Seager, too. Sometimes you miss, it happens. But these mega-mega deals are usually for really excellent talents and those talents alone.

The Dodgers are run by a really smart kind of a dude, maybe the best VP of baseball. Yes, the Dodgers have a bit of extra financial backing to take these kinds of risks, but Friedman isn't an idiot. Stuff+ data exists on Yamamoto. Even ZiPS doesn't hate the contract. 

We'll see what Yamamoto becomes and if he's another example of this. But I have a sneaking suspicion this contract will work out for both parties.

[Irrelevant Dude]

5 minutes ago, NorthsideAvenger said:

I cannot articulate my thoughts at this moment other than to say that buying a superteam, like the Padres have tried to do, rarely works out.

Maybe the best thing is for the Dodgers to win so this argument goes away.  I'm tired of seeing the Cubs and others use this as a justification for not spending.  Buying good players doesn't guarantee anything, and the field will always be favored over any individual team, but that doesn't mean teams shouldn't try to boost their odds of winning.

[Transmogrified Tiger]

1 minute ago, 1908_Cubs said:

Most of these mega contracts usually go like this:

"Wow, someone signed him to X years for Y money? That's crazy"Until 2-3 years later as inflation continues to set in, and contracts go up, to go "The Whatevers get that player for only $X a year AAV? That's a steal". We did this with Cole, Harper, A-Rod...

The Dodgers are run by a really smart kind of a dude, maybe the best VP of baseball. Yes, the Dodgers have a bit of extra financial backing to take these kinds of risks, but Friedman isn't an idiot. Stuff+ data exists on Yamamoto. Even ZiPS doesn't hate the contract. 

We'll see what Yamamoto becomes and if he's another example of this. But I have a sneaking suspicion this contract will work out for both parties.

Having multiple opt outs caps this potential benefit though, with the caveat we don’t know when those are yet AFAIK.