RammyFanny

Awful. Would have been fun to see a fully healthy Miami starting 5. Glad they found it soon.

lol You're getting Hamels for 4 or 5 years, Russell for 6.5. The years of control are almost identical, and Hamels is really good at baseball *right now*. 2.5 years isn't almost identical, and you're also paying one guy 23 million and the other pennies (for awhile). Why not just keep the potential awesomeness of Addison Russell for 6.5 years and use the extra 23 million saved to pick up a rental at the deadline and then sign someone as good as Hamels in the offseason? I don't think the extra years you'd have to give a FA over Hamels are worth Russell.

Agreed. And just to be clear, since I've been going off a massive pro-Javy rant these last few pages, I want to reiterate I'm not trying to make him into some bust proof guy if it's coming off that way. I realize he's really high risk and think it's probably going to take a few years before he gets closer to his true potential. I just don't know if it will be a few years as a passable offensive player whose dongs and hot streaks partially outweigh some of the high K's to keep him in the lineup, or if it's "let's try AAA again and we'll see you in August." I think his mostly likely positive outcome is a version of Soriano without the base stealing; a very useful player. But I think his most likely outcome is that he's playing in Japan in a 5 years. His most likely outcome might be let him tear up AAA and then trade him in a bigger package for a good position player (or maybe younger pitcher but I'll always be hesitant), but then again Theo has a pretty big prospect fetish so it wouldn't surprise me to see him ride it out and just try to make trades with the second tier top 100ish types for guys on shorter deals. And I know treymon doesn't think anyone will give up a good position player for him, but maybe we can throw in some quality nachos to the receiving team.

Agreed. And just to be clear, since I've been going off a massive pro-Javy rant these last few pages, I want to reiterate I'm not trying to make him into some bust proof guy if it's coming off that way. I realize he's really high risk and think it's probably going to take a few years before he gets closer to his true potential. I just don't know if it will be a few years as a passable offensive player whose dongs and hot streaks partially outweigh some of the high K's to keep him in the lineup, or if it's "let's try AAA again and we'll see you in August."

Please enlighten me on this massive list of players you have that fit your parameters, were promoted at similar ages to Javy, and have large K-rates but still really good triple slash lines. We're using hypotheticals because a meaningful sample size of these players don't exist and players who have posted K-rates as high as him are generally not OPSing near 1.000 and on pace to hit 60 HRs as 20 year old SS's in AA.

He better start adjusting really [expletive] fast, they are supposedly trying to win this year. Their offense has no room for him to figure himself out for half a season. Well then trade him or start him at AAA because I highly doubt its going to be that quick.

I'm saying the already tiny sample size you're confining this to is skewed because almost no successful high-K players are ever in AAA/MLB at 21, where they would most certainly would have posted Javy Baez-esque K-rates. Hey, let's drop George Springer into AAA at 21 instead of almost-24 and see if his k-rate isn't over 35%. Pedro Alvarez is dropping near 30% k-rates in AAA at 24 years old. If Javy duplicates Alvarez's best offensive season to date in the majors, he'd be the 7th best offensive 2B in the MLB and the 4th rated offensive SS in all of baseball by wRC+. I just think Javy being 6 years younger than the average AAA pitcher while showing linear improvement in his monthly K-rate there is enough to pump the bust brakes until further notice. * edited to take a point out I made about Yelich because I got my years switched up.

It's what I'm clinging to lol.

I'm not comparing them as similar players, damnit. Only saying that if a player as "advanced" as Rizzo took 3 years of major league experience to "get it" then people are stupid for expecting someone with Javy's limitations to make big improvements within 2 months. You can say this for just about every 21 year old not named Mike Trout. Rizzo's obviously the most convenient since people know his history and don't have to go look up and disect someone else's fangraphs page to understand the point. Go use Carlos Gomes or something if it makes you more comfortable. The bigger point is that it's probably going to take a few years for him unless we're lucky, but I'd bet on him getting there. Maybe it does make sense to trade him if you're trying to maximize wins now, but I'd really prefer using him to get another primeish position player that becomes available as opposed to an older pitcher. Donaldson would've been perfect. baez struck out in 30 percent of his pa in aaa. that's really, really, really bad. in rizzo's horrible disaster padres stint,* he struck out in 30.1 percent of his pa. add in that rizzo is a magic mashing machine that somehow strikes out less against better pitchers and these guys just aren't comparable at all. baez could turn things around, but he has a lot more work to do than the guys to whom you are comparing him. also, you can't use baez to get a prime position player because everybody knows about the strikeouts. *which i thank the nonexistent lord for every day because it's the only reason got him I see your point, but my inner Javy apologist says: 1) his 30% k-rate at AAA came as the youngest player in not only the PCL, but all of minor league AAA. Which is kinda the whole point I've been trying to make. 2) he always seems to struggle putridly at a new level and then get better. He's been promoted so aggressively that we see him almost linearly improve his K% to a certain point and then bam, he's promoted to face even more advanced pitchers than the already advanced pitchers he was facing in the first place. I would normally say I'm using selective beginning/end points, but I think were at the point where we can say they are legitimate improvement patterns. His K-rates for his last month before being promoted: A+: 20% AA: 23% AAA: 23% Not that we should have left him at these levels longer, but if you did it would've been totally defensible and he showed enough improvement that I bet he would've kept his K-rates "respectable" by his standards. People keep throwing out comps who were 23 or 24 in AAA and it's like, well, if we let Javy simmer in AAA for this upcoming season and the season after, I bet his AAA K-rate would look a lot better than 30%. And plz don't remind me how really really really bad a 30% K-rate is cause then I remember Kris Bryant pretty much had one at AAA while a year older than Javy and then I have bad Kyle thoughts and those are the worst.

I'm not comparing them as similar players, damnit. Only saying that if a player as "advanced" as Rizzo took 3 years of major league experience to "get it" then people are stupid for expecting someone with Javy's limitations to make big improvements within 2 months. You can say this for just about every 21 year old not named Mike Trout. Rizzo's obviously the most convenient since people know his history and don't have to go look up and disect someone else's fangraphs page to understand the point. Go use Carlos Gomes or something if it makes you more comfortable. The bigger point is that it's probably going to take a few years for him unless we're lucky, but I'd bet on him getting there. Maybe it does make sense to trade him if you're trying to maximize wins now, but I'd really prefer using him to get another primeish position player that becomes available as opposed to an older pitcher. Donaldson would've been perfect.

Dude, he was 21. In the major leagues. And he didn't have half a season, it wasn't even 1/3rd of a season. It took Rizzo, and most other 21 year olds, 3 seasons in the majors (at Javy's age) before (we hope) he really figured it out. Adjustment periods in the major leagues aren't 50 games. Javy monthly splits at Iowa (insanely young for the level): April: .617 OPS. 35% K-rate. 6.3 BB %. May: .738 OPS. 34% K- rate. 6.7 BB %. June: .815 OPS. 29% K-rate. 9.5 BB%. July: .999 OPS. 23 % K-rate. 6.6 BB%. It's like this at almost every level (unless he just dominates from the get go). The dude adjusts to every league he's been at, and never even gets left at the level long enough for his adjustments to show through to his overall numbers there. The major leagues are very difficult, and will probably take longer to adjust to. Much much longer than 2 months or whatever you were expecting him to prove last year post call-up.

I can't tell if this is a joke or not. I do know Javy was in the majors when Brett was in short season though. And I know that Javy has as good of bat speed as there is, while Brett's was questioned as to whether it'd play in the majors at all. Fine, Mike Olt then. Just it won't take a freak head/eye injury to derail him. Also in low-A ball at the same age when Javy earned a promotion to the majors.

The people that I tend to take issue with about Javy are the ones that don't seem to realize how insanely young he is on the developmental cycle (ie: those who put a ton of stock into his MLB stats last year). 21 is sooooooooo young to debut. For example, Kris Bryant played his entire junior season of college baseball at San Diego at the age of 21. The same age Javy was batting 2nd in the major leagues. Like, take sneaky's comparison list for example . At 21, Alfonso Soriano wasn't even in the United States. Ian Desmond debuted at 24. Danny Espinosa was in college/low A ball at 21. Brandon Wood just started AA. You can drop almost anyone in the MLB at 21 and they'd be god awful. That's not to say a Javy is guaranteed to improve in the tons of extra developmental time he has, but he has two things going for him: 1) he has shown rapid improvement at almost every level when given time to make adjustments (before quickly being promoted and then rinse/repeat) 2) he doesn't have to turn his k-rate and walk rate into amazing numbers, he needs to improve them to be "acceptably bad" vs "historically bad" and he'll still be an extremely valuable and rare commodity considering his position and power. Now of course it's probably going to take a few years to get there, so I can understand some people wanting to trade him now if you want immediate results in the W/L column. But people insinuating he is/will be a bust are way to premature imo. I would have been open to mitigating risk and trading him for someone like Donaldson. But Hamels at 31 being paid lots of money (even if it's below market value).... Ehhh. But I hate pitchers so I assume everyone's arm is going to fall off.

I'm looking back through Javy's B-Ref page and holy crap did I forget how much he massacred AA at only 20. I'm used to his usual .500 OPS for the first month dragging down his line. .983 OPS with 20 hrs in only 54 games. That's 60 dongs per 162 as a 20 year old SS in a league extremely advanced for his age. Signed, Javy apologist.

That sounds like a great plan. Any three of them are totally replaceable. DO YOU SEE THE INHERENT PROBLEM YOUR STATEMENT CREATES I sure don't see any problem that my statement creates. Re-signing Fowler covers CF for probably 4 years to eliminate Almora and McKinney. We already have an Castro, Baez, Russell, and La Stella to handle SS eliminating Torres. La Stella and Watkins should be able to handle the utility role that Alcantara is expected to fill. Vogelbach is probably destined to be a DH. 4 years of Hamels certainly eases the pain of losing Johnson. Add to that the fact that all of them are prospects which means they might not reach their potential. Meanwhile, adding Hamels gives us one of the top rotations in the ML for the next 3-4 years. The problem is that three easily replaceable players are easily replaceable for a reason, and won't net you Cole Hamels. And Logan Watkins is terrible and can't handle anything. Not to mention he's already out until 2016.

But that hurts 2015. I'm aware, but I'll accept that in order to keep Javy's massive potential for pennies. And it's not like we can't score a good rental at the deadline with our second tier guys. I mean I'm not saying it's some asinine idea, I just think the alternatives are more desirable and not farfetched.

I'm not against this strategy either, but Greinke is older than Hamels, Samardzija is just 1 year younger, Price is like 1.5 years younger, and Zimmerman is about 2.5. So all those guys next year will be at about the age Hamels is at now, when you can acquire them. Cueto will only be 29 next offseason too. I'd rather just go after a rental at the deadline and not have to give up a guy who was just a consensus top 10 prospect and just turned 22.

Call me a homer but I'm still not giving up a cost controlled Javy for a 31 year old pitcher when there are so many (younger) alternatives available so soon for nothing more than money.

I'm kind of with him on Lester. I think some meatballs are going to be slightly disappointed when he doesn't duplicate last year and they realize he isn't a super duper "ace" like i've seen a few randos make him out to be. That said, I also could totally see him duplicate last year by moving to the NL and working with Bosio so who knows.

Kaplan said on his show yesterday that the Cubs want to do 3 years. And pushed that his source is really good.

As only he can. #HugeTits

There's a PTA/PTR joke in there somewhere.

Wonder if we have a little more payroll than people think. The day after Moncada pretty much eliminates us we are suddenly in on Shields... A little bit different since some of the Moncada thing could be deferred over three years, but there's a chance we've got a little change left., especially since dumping Castillo/Wood/Wada (if needed) frees up like 11 mil if we need it.

http://m.mlb.com/news/article/108325226/yoan-moncada-my-goal-is-to-sign-with-a-team-soon For anyone that had a shred of hope left, the quotes from Moncada wanting to sign soon and start training with the team ASAP in order to make the majors as soon as possible pretty much officially eliminate us.

You'd think Meph would make a random post once every few years with a different username/IP. Hopefully the dude's still alive and stalking J.R. Towles somewhere.