dew1679666265
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Everything posted by dew1679666265
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Probably enough that a lot of the surplus value in having "cost controlled years" is negated. If we were planning to be good in 2012 or 2013, then having him at a super cheap cost would be a great value and him being closer to market value in 2014 and beyond would be fine. But since we probably won't be taking advantage of his super cheap years, then quite a bit of the surplus value is gone and you only get some value later on in the deal.
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I've been hearing ceiling as well as current ability. He is what he is, would be a good descriptive term to describe him. And I think you may be overestimating one because the Cubs had such issues with that last year and the back end of the rotation cost the Cubs so many games. It's important to have rotation depth, but the 2011 level of awfulness isn't likely to repeat itself because of the injury issues we had.
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Ok, I get it now. This is the drawback to focusing purely on finding guys who are cheap and looking at nothing else when you're not contending - we'll waste his first two "controlled" years by being really bad, then he hits his arbitration years by 2014 and is a FA in 2017. So we're trying to win for probably 3 of his "controlled" years, but all three of them are arbitration years, so he won't be super cheap during them. The value of his "controlled" years would be much higher if we were trying to win in 2012-2013.
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I like this plan and will assume it's Theo's plan until proven otherwise.
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I'm confused - who are you talking about with this comment? If it's Wood, as I think, then I agree and that's why I said the higher upside prospect would be much more cost efficient than Wood would be when the Cubs are actually trying to contend again.
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Pretty much everybody I've seen talking about Wood refer to him as a 4-5 starter and nothing more. That's very limited.
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Like gooney said, I don't think Theo is doing his best to ensure that we don't win in 2012, I just don't see a path to contention at this point. This team needed a decent amount of help to make it capable of contending next year, it's gotten worse since the offseason began, and most of the impact FAs/trade targets are off the market. If you see a way to make this team one that can win 82-85+ games next year, I'd love to hear it. I just don't see it without a huge amount of luck.
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On an NRI, I'd have no problem with bringing Reed in. My problem is paying him more than $1 million and guaranteeing him (for all intents and purposes) a ML roster spot. His defense is pretty weak in CF and his offense, adjusted for the extreme luck last year, is horrid for CF, much less a corner spot. Having him around on a non-guaranteed contract is fine, guaranteeing him a spot and more than $1 million is a bad idea - whether your plans are to contend or not.
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The best thing about Wood is that we control his cost for the next 5 years. Problem is, since we're clearly rebuilding for at least 2012 and maybe longer, his best asset becomes less important. I don't see any way this team contends in 2012 at this point and unless we get a few breaks (sign Prince and Cespedes and hope Cespedes hits his ceiling by 2013 would be a good start) 2013 is looking pretty unlikely. So we're looking at 3 cost controlled years for Wood when we're actually trying to contend and with a very limited ceiling, I just don't think that's worth Marshall. The prospects could make all the difference, though. That's why I would have preferred a high upside prospect - he'd be much more cost effective when we're trying to contend than Wood will be.
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How about mid term assets? Short term is the next 1-2 years, 3 at most. I think both can be great assets beyond that point - as I said, 4-5 years. That should have been more than enough time for the Cubs to right the ship. Now, it's a bit more murky as I don't know how long they plan to do this complete overhaul. I'm thinking contention in 2013 is being pretty optimistic since we've added nothing in the way of impact talent or potential impact talent yet. Probably 2014 is the earliest we can seriously expect to contend at this point, so I'd probably agree with you now on Prince. I still think punting multiple seasons is unnecessary for a big market team like the Cubs, though.
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Given how bad he's likely to be if he doesn't get insanely lucky again, he would be a bad pickup for a team hoping to contend. There are better options than Reed no matter what situation your team is in.
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If that's the case the deal will be a solid win. I just didn't want Wood being the only primary piece we were getting back. Me too. If it's Wood and a couple good pieces, I'm very happy with this trade. If it's Wood, a good prospect, and filler, then I'm happy enough with the trade. If it's Wood and a couple of fillers, then I'm pretty discouraged.
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With the right moves I fully believe they could have had a shot at contending in a weak division in 2012. If nothing else, they could have set themselves up to be the favorites in 2013. Now, it's going to take some really good moves to simply have a shot to contend in 2013, and that's if the Brewers, Cardinals, and Reds don't make substantial improvements in the next year. We've had this Prince/Pujols discussion more than a couple times and I'd guess you're aware that I believe a drop off the cliff isn't likely for either Prince or Pujols in the next year or two. I think you can still get 4-5 highly productive years out of both. That's plenty of time to bring in either, sign Darvish or a FA next year, and be the favorites in 2013 with a chance to contend this year. If you have the budgetary room for Soler and Cespedes, even better. In that scenario, you've added as few as 2 and as many as 4 long term assets and should still have the baseball budget (if it's holding steady) to spend as needed in the draft and IFA to restock the minors. If the money's not there for all of that, then a full rebuild is more understandable. But if the funds are there, then punting the next couple of years is completely unnecessary.
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I would hope we're not, but with the way we're dumping talent and not replacing it with much, we're going to have to go on a pretty wild spending spree next offseason to have a shot at contention in 2013.
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It's the offseason in it's entirety to this point that makes it clear we're punting 2012 (and maybe 2013 as well). That punt makes me like the Marshall for Wood deal less, because Wood's value is lessened by the likelihood that we won't be trying to compete for the first 2 of his 5 cost controlled years and then may take another 1-2 to become serious about contending. It's why I'd be ok with a player further away if he had a greater upside - if he makes it, then he'd make it around the time we'd be seriously thinking about contending again.
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Neifi, Miles, Macias, Grabow, etc., were inconsequential red herrings too, I guess. Reed's a bad player and will take up a chunk (small or not is irrelevant) of our payroll for no good reason. It's a poor move. Wood is a nice enough tweak if we had a good roster and just needed some good rotation depth. As it stands, he might keep us from dipping below 70 wins next year. The thing you disagreed with, though, was why we're in a rebuilding process. The point is, this team didn't need to be overhauled so radically that we completely ignore making the current roster better in the hopes that we might be decent in a couple of years. This team could have had a shot at contending this year while still fixing the minor leagues through the draft and IFA. We should have the payroll to do that, but it appears we've chosen the small-mid market path of punting multiple years while taking out time overhauling the roster. As I pointed out before, unless the renovations and other peripheral concerns are sapping our budget, we don't need to pretend we're a small market team.
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If we're doing the full tear down and rebuild mode (which it's pretty clear we are), I would have preferred somebody with more upside than a mediocre back of the rotation starter. Considering we don't appear to be planning to contend seriously for the next couple of years, if that player were further away from the majors I'd be fine with that. That said, the Marshall deal has hinged on the prospects from the start. If there's a high upside guy or two in the prospects and then you add Wood on top of that, I'm feeling pretty good about the deal. If it's Wood and minor league filler, though, I'm pretty underwhelmed.
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For his career, Wells is at 89.4 fastball velocity, to 89.9 for Wood. Not a huge difference there. The K/9 and age/cost controlled years is what makes Wood better than Wells, but if one's stuff is underwhelming then the other's is as well.
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So you sap even more talent from it and replace that sapped talent with Reed Johnson and Travis Wood? Unless this team is diverting its funds elsewhere, there's no reason we can't do the parallel fronts idea that Theo/Hoyer talked about after getting hired. There's no reason to punt at least 2012 and probably 2013-2014 as well when you're one of the biggest markets in the majors. Big market teams should reload (add talent to the major league roster while reforming the minor league roster as well) not tear completely down and rebuild for 2-3 years.
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I was primarily going off the K rates for both. However, according to Fangraphs' PitchFx, Wood sits in the upper 80s with his fastball (89.9 career) and down to 73.2 with his curve and 78.3 with his change up. He's also at 83.5 with his slider. For reference, Dave Bush sits at 87.8 with his fastball, 82.2 with his slider, 81.8 with his change, and 69.2 with his curve. Maholm is at 89.0 with his fastball, 74.2 with his curve, 82.6 with his change, and 81.2 with his slider. Wells sits at 89.4 with his fastball, 80.1 with his curve, 82.9 with his change, and 83.7 with his slider.
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This is why I'm skeptical about the explanation I just gave. It seems like an odd way to do business and it seems like there would be a better way to go through the renovation process without completely dismantling the major league (and minor league to an extent) roster. I've never been involved with this kind of large captial project, though, so I don't for sure. It's also possible that the new SABR movement is to put all the emphasis on defense and completely disregard offense - like they've done in Seattle under Jack Z. That doesn't explain Theo falling for soft tossers like Maholm and Wood, though.
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The only way I see it being necessary is if the Ricketts value the renovations and more peripheral improvements right now more than putting a good product on the field. If they're pouring enough money into all of that, it may sap enough of the available funds that they can't put a $130 million payroll on the field in the short term. If that's the case, I'll begrudgingly be ok with it because I do have faith in Ricketts/Theo, but if that's not the case then there's absolutely no reason why we should be in complete rebuild mode.
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Then I'll simply counter that they are severely underestimating Wood's value. Or they don't believe in a guy with mediocre stuff to continue being useful going forward and a 200 inning sample size isn't enough to disprove their concerns. Kind of like you with Wells, except instead of just starting Wood, we're giving up a good trade chip for him (and prospects).
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My only problem with a complete rebuild is that with our payroll it shouldn't be necessary. Unless the Ricketts are diverting funds to be able to invest in peripheral stuff (triangle building, McDonald's, renovations) that will help overall but hurt the product on the field in the near term, there's no reason to give up on 2012 without any effort whatsoever to contend. Plus, devoiding the roster of any talent makes it that much harder to compete in 2013 as well. You can't just flip a switch and turn a 65 win team into a 90 win team in one offseason. It takes time and tearing down this roster is very possibly going to hinder us from contending for the next 2-3 years.
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Don't forget about $1 mil+ for Reed.