dew1679666265

I don't see any way that team is as good as the team I listed, especially since we'd still have plenty of payroll room in my scenario to pick up a Santana, Jackson, or someone similar for the 5th starter role as well. Upton's a clear upgrade over BJax, even if Upton doesn't rebound all the way back to the 4-5 WAR player he's been 4 of the past 6 seasons. Santana has had one season comparable to the season Garza is currently having and that was back in 2008. This season Santana has a 4.63 xFIP and a -.5 WAR. Any improvement Hutchison is over Raley is completely overshadowed by the gap between Garza and Santana. Your team is probably a lot closer to this year's than it is to 80 wins.

Yeah, that was too strong. I got a bit carried away. Out of curiosity, what is our current pace? We'd have to go 19-40 to finish the year with 100 losses, but I'm not sure what we're actually on pace for.

This jumped out at me as a key difference I think we have in this debate. You see, I don't think we're as far away as you think from being at least respectable and some luck away from possibly contending. Bear with me on this and keep in mind this is not what I'm predicting the Theo regime will do - nobody on this board knows what their plan is - just what I think we could do if we actually want to start winning games again. Also, I'm going to throw out some numbers, but they're more general suggestions than actualities, so don't get too hung up on them. If we keep Garza, say on a 5/85 extension, and pick up Liriano on a 1 year deal with an option then we field this rotation: 1) Garza 2) Shark 3) Liriano 4) Wood 5) Raley? Then on the offensive side, we pick up Upton on either a 1-year prove-it deal or on something like 4/48. We then can either swing a trade of Soriano/DeJesus or keep Jackson in AAA. Let's say we keep both - Soriano still doesn't draw interest and the offers for DeJesus just aren't worth it. That gives us this lineup: RF) DeJesus SS) Castro 1B) Rizzo LF) Soriano CF) Upton 2B) Barney 3B) Vitters/Stewart C) Castillo/Clevenger The fifth rotation spot is a pretty big question, but I tried to be as conservative as I could with signing players - we could easily pursue an Edwin Jackson or even Anibal Sanchez if we wanted to commit further. Offensively, we're better than this year but still a bit on the weak side. There's a lot of projectability with it, though, and it could be decent if Soriano keeps up anything close to what he's done this year and one of Vitters/Stewart surprises. The defense, however, is above average at every spot but third (and maybe catcher, I can't think of Castillo's defense off the top of my head) and very good at a number of them. Is that team a playoff contender? Not without some luck, but it's also not the 100+ loss abomination we see this year. Field a competent bench and get some luck with the pen and maybe we give .500 a good run. The real positive is we're still getting a number of young guys considerable playing time and getting ready for a serious push in 2014. And as an aside to all of this, between June 25 (Rizzo's callup) and July 30 (the day before the mini-firesale) we were 19-10. Small sample size, but it's an indication that this team has some talent now that we've got a couple big bats (Rizzo/Soriano) in the middle of the lineup.

Well, we've been sucking for a couple seasons now and we'll probably kinda suck in 2013 even if we keep Garza and add a piece or two. We've added a few elite pieces and have a couple in the majors already. We have a chance at least next season to grab another 1-2 and hopefully more and then at that point you do what every other team in the league that tries to win does, you use every advantage you have (and we have more than most) and you find players who fit what you want to do and develop them well. I know you don't like to hear that, but ultimately your success in your farm system comes down to how well you execute the process. I don't buy that only the 3-5 worst teams in baseball will come away with elite talent each year. They might have a slightly better chance with a little more money available to be spent, but we hold an advantage over pretty much every team because we have some of the best talent evaluators in the game. If the only way to get elite talent in the new system is to be awful, then the elite talent in the minors of contenders will dry up pretty quick and they won't be able to replace them. Again, you've yet to answer this question, but what happens if we tank next year, end up with the #3 pick and miss on the two elite talents you want - Rodon and Ward? If your answer is just do our best with what's left and then start building, then I'll ask why can't that building process start now? If we were guaranteed to get one of the two and the one we were guaranteed to get was a Harper/Strasburg/Prior type prospect, then I might be more open to tanking one more season. But I'd be pretty pissed if we tanked the 2013 season, finished 3rd, and didn't even get one of the guys we wanted. I've never said he would be Travis Wood, I said he'd be a better version of Wood. But nonetheless, if he doesn't hit his ceiling, then he'd be a nice player but hardly worth trading a legitimate TOR starter for on his own, and that's the most likely scenario if the rest of the trade is a 19 year old in A ball.

I don't know the FO's master plan, so I won't theorize on it. What I do know is that I don't see any reason to tank two more seasons before we try to win again, so I don't have a problem in that regard over bringing Garza back.

I was a little off with my math earlier. I think a deal will very likely be five years, I don't see any way he gets a contract the same length as Hamels just signed. Therefore, if he signs an extension this offseason, I think there's a good chance it'll start next season - giving him a raise in 2013 and buying out 4 free agent years, meaning we'd have him during his age 29-33 seasons. If he signs it during the season next year, it'd kick in after the year obviously and would carry us through his age 30-34 seasons. He'll clearly be in decline in the latter stages of that contract, but I don't know that he's likely to decline considerably in that time frame. I was looking at GB% and K/9 specifically as improving - this is his highest GB% of his career and the first time in his career that he's had 8+ K/9 in back to back seasons.

If you were looking for proof that some posters don't bother reading before chiming in on every single topic in the history of the universe - here's your answer. SCS' post came before the edit.

I'm at a loss as to how this doesn't apply to Garza. You're making a number of different arguments here and I'm struggling to see how they're related. You're not finding a Hamels type player at Garza's pricetag in free agency, you're not even going to find a Garza type player at Garza's pricetag in free agency. My point is we have a chance to keep a very good pitcher and help ourselves in building for the future and it doesn't make a lot of sense to me for us to trade him for a decent young player and a few longshots with upside when we don't need to do that.

I like taking risks like that too, but not at the severe expense of the major league roster. I just have a fundamental problem with intentionally tanking multiple major league seasons to make ourselves a little more likely to get a guy who might be able to help us a lot 3-5 seasons from now. The minor league system is very important and we need a top-notch one to continue to supply the major league roster, but we can get that top notch system without tanking multiple seasons for slight player improvements. And on the Wood/Hutchison issue, yes we were hopeful that Wood would become a mid-rotation pitcher, just like we'd be hopeful that Hutchison would become a mid-rotation pitcher. It's not a guarantee that Hutchison hits his ceiling, and it's actually more likely than not that he doesn't. That's why I so staunchly believe we should get a high upside, (near) major league ready arm as the centerpiece for Garza - so that if/when he doesn't reach his upside, he's still somewhat comparable to the player we gave up. I'm not arguing we shouldn't have a top notch farm system, I'm arguing that we shouldn't sacrifice multiple seasons to make it happen. You talked previously about wanting to get one of Rodon/Ward in 2014, but you never answered what happens if we don't get them? Since we seem to have to have one of them in our system before we can think about competing, do we sacrifice seasons until a comparable elite prospect is available? Or do we just take what we can get and start building then? And if we could build a contender then without Rodon/Ward, why can't we now? This is a potential never-ending cycle you're talking about. There's always another elite prospect we could go get or another 19 year old high upside guy in A ball we can trade for if we're willing to sacrifice another ML season or two, so where does it stop? Why are we ready to start building if we get Rodon or Ward in our system, but not before? And was it really worth it if we sacrifice a ML season or two more and then don't get Rodon/Ward? I also think you're making it way easier than it actually is to get a young, elite superstar when there's maybe 1-2 available per season. There are more teams than ever that can make the postseason and likely fewer players like what you're describing on the market. Best case scenario, we better be willing to pay a king's ransom just to be in the running for some of these players. Worst case scenario is the year we're finally ready to try to contend, nobody comes available and we either overpay for a lesser player or put off contention for a year. We need to be ready to make a move for a young superstar should one come available, but we should not bank on being able to get one at our whim. It's not smart management.

If you figure Garza's value at this point is around $15 million AAV (I think he's worth a little more, but that's quibbling), then you better be ready to pay his free agent equivalent probably $18-20 mil per season. Or you better be ready to take a chance on a guy with more ability than his performance would indicate (kind of like what we did with Lilly a few years ago). You really should focus on replacing Garza with a piece from the trade rather than bank on finding his equivalent on the FA market. On a side note, Fangraphs has Garza worth $22 million last year and on pace to be worth about $12 million this year. If you average those two numbers together, you get his average value as a Cub as $17 million per season, assuming he doesn't improve his numbers in the second half. That might be a dumb way to do it and it may mean nothing, but I found it interesting.

You're probably right on the 4 year deal, it was kind of a random thought I had last night that I probably got too hung up on. That said, there's no way I wait until free agency on Garza. I'd work on both extending him and trading him this offseason and then really buckle down on extending him through the first half of next season. If we get down to the deadline and it's clear there's no bridging the gap between the two sides, then deal him at the deadline. I don't see any way he ends up with a 6 year deal, though, since a clearly superior pitcher who is the same age as him (Hamels) just signed a 6 year deal. I guess maybe he could give up some money to get an extra year, but I'd be surprised if he liked that option. I fully expect him to be extended by whoever has his rights and think it's much more likely than not that he ends up with a 5 year deal - either taking him through his age 33 season (if he signs this offseason and it replaces the arbitration year) or through his age 34 season (if he signs at some point next season).

If that established younger guy is out there to be traded for. You mentioned Longoria and Price yesterday, but the Rays almost certainly won't be motivated to move Longoria until the 2014 offseason at the earliest and probably later. They may be more willing to move Price in a year or two, but then you're adding a 29/30 year old pitcher, giving a massive amount of talent for him, and immediately giving him a long term extension. I realize that we don't have to target one of those two, but I think you're envisioning it being easier than it is to find an established superstar available on the trade market. In large part, organizations - especially small market clubs - are getting smarter and are finding ways to lock up their young talent for longer periods. Look at what the Rays did with Longoria/Price, or the Rockies with Tulo, or the Brewers with Braun, etc. If you're banking on having superstars available at the exact time we need them, you're taking a very significant risk. When we acquired Wood, he was a mid-rotation arm with multiple years of control. You're billing Hutchison as a mid-rotation arm with multiple years of control. I'm sure he has more upside than Wood does and he's considerably younger, but the most likely scenario, again, is that he's a little better than Travis Wood. Most players don't hit their upside, they generally fall a little to a lot short. So if his upside is a 3ish type starter, then you have to plan for him to be at least a little worse than that. Then if he hits his upside, it's a bonus. So again, the most likely scenario that we're looking at if we trade Garza for Hutchison/Syndergaard (and I'd love to have Syndergaard in our system) is that we end up with a better version of Travis Wood and a little extra money to spend on longshots in 2014's draft/IFA period. That doesn't make me very enthusiastic.

Included in that list are about 8 guys who are either having really fluky seasons (Dickey, Capuano, Vogelsong) or are old/injured enough to make it very unlikely they repeat this season (Colon, Lohse, Millwood, Westbrook, Kuroda). Limiting it to just the guys who can reasonably be expected to repeat this level of WAR, you have Garza as around a top 30-35 type. Looking solely at xFIP, Garza's 25th in the majors with two pitchers (Dickey, Blanton) have flukish seasons in front of him. According to SIERA, Garza is 26th with the same two pitchers having flukish seasons in front of him. Is Garza elite? Not unless he can figure out how to replicate his 2011 season. But he's a really good pitcher and not one easily replaceable. We're not getting to his age 35 season unless we give him a 7 year deal, and I don't see that happening. The most likely occurrence is we're buying his age 29-33 seasons and possibly his age 29-32 seasons if he settles for a 4-year deal in the hopes he gets one more really big contract. Given his steady - if not improving - peripherals the past couple of seasons and the fact that he's not been overly abused during his ML career, a considerable decline by age 32-33 is pretty unlikely.

I just can't believe it actually went down this way. Cespedes didn't show a particular preference for Oakland during the process and even said he expected he'd end up with the Cubs and didn't seem to mind that prospect. It's really hard to believe that a free agent who didn't have a strong preference in where he played just decided he'd ignore the chance for more money and didn't bother to give the Cubs a chance to respond. It's far more realistic to think that Cespedes' camp gave the Cubs and As a chance to make a final bid, the As came down to 4 years and the Cubs would not. Thus, Cespedes chose the better option for him.

Oh yeah, I enjoy the debate. It's not what you said, it's what you didn't say that I took exception with. Option B is an extremely high risk option, since even with the Theo regime at the helm, 19 year olds are much more likely than not to flame out than they are to come close to their ceiling. The trade you mentioned is much more likely to provide us with a slightly better version of Travis Wood and nothing else than any other scenario. On the other hand, we know Garza is a TOR type pitcher and even if we ended up giving him a 5 year deal (I see 4-5 as most likely, with 4 years very realistic since he may want a shot at another big contract), we'd only have him through his age 33 season. There's a lot of risk with any pitcher, but outside of the usual injury fears you have with pitchers, Garza is a relatively low risk, but high reward, option.

I'm guessing both sides moved on when the DBacks asked about Castro and Theo responded with at least two of Upton/Skaggs/Bauer. Theo could have responded with a flat "No" as well... Very possible. I just figure Theo would have at least given them the chance to do something dumb rather than just shoot them down. That said, I love Starlin and would have no issue if every call about him began and ended with Theo saying he's 100% untouchable.

I'm guessing both sides moved on when the DBacks asked about Castro and Theo responded with at least two of Upton/Skaggs/Bauer.

And with every player in davell's list, we have to give up talent of our own to get them. None of them are FAs, so we're giving up talent to get them as opposed to just keeping the TOR pitcher we already have.

It's there, but there's a much, much higher chance that Garza will continue the same statistical pace he's been on the past couple of years for the majority of a contract that would, at the longest, have him under team control through his age 33 season than that there will be an equally talented - or moreso - player available in FA who can be had on a reasonable deal at exactly the right time for us. To put it another way, going with option A, the only real risk you face is that Garza suffers some fluke injury and/or randomly becomes terrible between his age 29-33 seasons. With Option B, there's the risk that whoever this hypothetical FA is will be available at the right time, will be at least as good as Garza, can be had at a reasonable price (or thereabouts), and that he won't suffer some fluke injury and/or randomly become terrible between whatever age range we sign him through. And that's not even considering all the risk involved in trading Garza, essentially, for a slightly better Travis Wood, a longshot with a bunch of upside, and the possible chance to sign/draft a couple longshots with a bunch of upside.

Come on davell, you're better than overly simplifying things like this. If that were all there were to consider, no team would ever retain a veteran player.

Because obviously the only two options available were a video game style rebuild or to do things exactly the way Hendry did them.

He's on pace for about 2.5 fWAR with an abnormally high HR/FB rate and really awful defense dragging it down considerably. As you said, normalizing his HR/FB rate through xFIP bumps him up to on pace for 3.5 fWAR and if there's any chance of improving his defense, that fWAR could rise some more (though honestly I don't know how much of a bump he could get through fielding improvements). I don't think it's outlandish to see him as a 3-3.5 fWAR pitcher going forward with potential for better with some improvements. All that said, if he asks for a Matt Cain contract and refuses to ever budge from that, then you try harder to deal him. I expect, though, that he'll stick to the Cain comp as long as he can (much like Hamels stuck to that 7-8 year deal thing as long as he could) and then if it's clear he's inferior to that then he'll drop his demands to something more reasonable. And who knows, maybe he reverts in the next year to the 2011 version and a Cain deal looks reasonable. The beauty of our current situation is, we don't have to decide now nor in the offseason. We have nearly a full calendar year to evaluate, negotiate, and field offers before we must make a decision. We can always make a decision before that, but we don't have to.

Price is certainly something to be considered, but his peripherals are still very good - outside of HR ratios and defense. If you think he'll continue to have the highest HR/FB ratio of his career (over 16% at most recent check) and that he's hopeless defensively even with the Theo regime working with him, then I guess you wouldn't like him a lot. On the flipside, his K/9 has remained in the same area for 3 straight years now, his BB/9 has decreased each of the past 3 years, his GB% is in line with last year's career high, and his xFIP is the second highest of his career and much closer to his 2011 than any previous year.

I can't imagine the Rays are going to be all that motivated to trade away integral parts of their team who are making, probably, less than $15 mil AAV. Longoria has club options through 2016 that don't exceed $11 million, the 2014 offseason is the soonest I could see them even thinking about trading him and, knowing how smart Friedman is, they're going to want to clean out anybody's farm for him at that point. Price is a little more realistic, but he turns 27 (this is surprising to me, thought he was younger) this season, so he'll be turning 30 the season we'd pay a king's ransom for him and extend him for huge money (to justify giving the king's ransom). That scares me with a pitcher. All that said, I realize you may not have intended them specifically, but I think they're two good examples of how teams are getting smarter today (especially the smaller market teams) and are finding ways to keep their young talent for longer periods. I simply don't buy that there's going to be an abundance of great young talent available for us, and the ones that are will be in such high demand that the cost will be exorbitant for them. That's why I think it's so important to start filling out the roster with value buys like Upton and Liriano now so that we don't have so many holes that must be filled in one offseason. It's also why keeping Garza can be so beneficial - if the plan is contention in 2015, he'll only be 31 so heavy decline is unlikely at that point and he's one less unknown to have to plan around.

I'd be interested to know what Hendry has anything to do with this. Other than, I guess, anybody who wants to win games soon must be pining away for him or something. I was reading a bit into your thought process for wanting close to major league ready talent for Garza. I was being a bit of a jerk, honestly. Sorry about that. Haha, not a problem. I'm trying hard not to come off as anti-Theo or something because I'm not. I have the utmost confidence that this regime will make us dominant. If their plan is to tank 2-3 years (including this one), I don't agree that it's the optimal plan, but I believe they'll make it work. I am happy that we finally have leadership that has an organizational philosophy and a plan and will stick to both, even if I don't necessarily agree that the plan is the best one.