Bertz

Rojas was the 3rd youngest guy to rack up at least 300 PAs in Hi A this year. And while the production was light, no red flags in terms of BBs, Ks, or GBs. Like 1908 I think having him on the top 100 is a bit aggressive, but he's a very very good prospect.

I'll be curious to see if they revisit O'Hoppe specifically. He had an awful 2nd half including an August that was, no joke, the worst month I think I've ever seen from a legitimate hitter: .099/.163/.176 with a 45% strikeout rate and a -7 wRC+. (yes that's a negative number) He was somewhat fine in September, with a strong 124 wRC+ but an elevated K rate at 31%. You wouldn't think too much of a month of that strikeout rate outside of the context of his August, but right next to his August it certainly gives some additional pause. So if you do re-up with Anaheim, you've gotta have a good explanation for that August. Was he hurt? Did he hit a wall fatigue wise (he had never caught 100 games in a season before)? Was there some emotional letdown after almost getting traded?

I'm a bit torn on that Cam ranking. On the one hand if he got mid 1st round draft grades from your publication, 6 weeks of beating up on kids in A ball shouldn't change your mind on him very much. On the other hand, I could have said the same thing about Hoerner and Shaw (and I'm pretty sure with Hoerner I did) and those aggressive bumps were completely vindicated.

Sugano reads very boring and Taillon-y, which I'd hope is a tier below the level Jed's looking at this winter. That said, older less velo dependent guys like Imanaga, Kenta Maeda, and Hiroki Kuroda have come over without a ton of fanfare and still been stellar.

This would be a very good mind to bring into the org for one of those special advisor type roles. And if Jed needs to be shown the door sometime in the next year....

Yeah I think I would like more of these series to go to 3 games

Literally the first batter OFC

The Mets' bullpen will obviously blow it but I'm enjoying the turnabout of the Brewers facing a SP throwing 91 MPH fastballs down the middle and still somehow not being able to do anything.

MLBTR has a good article on the Astros this afternoon Reading between all the lines here Framber feels like the likely productive veteran to get dealt, but Tucker getting dealt isn't crazy.

This is actually the thing I struggle with most this offseason. I am not super desperate for a guy I can latch onto as an "elite bat." But at the same time I: A) Think the #1 thing this offense needs is a lefty masher, and obviously those guys are almost overwhelmingly righties and B) Like you also don't like the way the lineup is balanced after adding that lefty masher I really wish there was a good versatile lefty infielder we could add to the bench as the 10th on the position player side. Gen Z Ben Zobrist essentially. You could add a lefty masher and also this unnamed infielder and put the lineup in a really good position every single day. But this left handed infielder I want doesn't seem to exist. You either get guys who can't really cover defensively like Brandon Lowe, or Miles Mastrobuoni types who have the defense and can hit at AAA but have not shown they can hit in the bigs yet.

So let's sort through some of the FA SP options. I took every pitcher from this past season who threw at least 100 innings, and set up 4 flags: IP - Did they throw at least 150 Innings? A major reason we need a SP this winter is lack of durability from the young pitchers currently in org ERA - Did they manage an ERA under 3.80? League-wide starters had a 4.09 ERA, so 3.80 is a cutoff for results that you'd consider an unequivocally "good" season xStats - Did they manage an xFIP and xERA under 3.80? Between these two numbers, xERA taking contact quality into account, xFIP purely distilling to peripherals, you can largely triangulate skill and avoid a luck based ERA mirage Stuff - Stuff+ and PitchingBot are both available on Fangraphs and have very different approaches to quantifying stuff. I flagged every starting pitcher that at least one of the two flagged as having above average stuff From there, how many guys met each threshold? Below are the FAs that met all 4, 3 of 4, and 2 of 4. 4's - Corbin Burnes and Max Fried 3's - Blake Snell (missed on innings), Yusei Kikuchi (ERA), Jack Flaherty (stuff) 2's - Nate Eovaldi, Nick Pivetta, Luis Severino Michael Wacha. Sean Manaea, Andrew Heaney, Jose Quintana I feel like this largely tracks with perception. Burnes and Fried are stars, the next three guys have a wart or two that keep them a tick behind (they compare to Steele and Shota who came in as 3's for instance), and the 2's are all guys who you probably like but almost certainly don't love. I will note, since he's my guy, that Nate Eovaldi *just* missed being a 3 because his ERA and xERA were between 3.8 and 3.9. I'd consider him like a 2.5. And then I don't want to go through every possible trade option, but some regularly mentioned ones: 4's - Framber Valdez, Kirby and Gilbert from SEA 3's - Crochet (innings), the rest of the Seattle guys 2's - Mackenzie Gore, Brady Singer, Reese Olson

Curious how Houston responds this winter. Last year it was foot firmly on the gas pedal because the farm was trash and the MLB roster had very little of consequence under control past '25. But with Diaz and a couple young pitchers popping the post '25 roster doesn't look totally desolate, though it's definitely not in good shape. Is it still all gas no brakes for one more big year? Or do you deal a Tucker and/or a Framber and try to pull off a somewhat unlikely soft landing?

I know the Astros are inevitable but it does not look good for them right now

Bieber seems like a good and realistic option for adding a 2nd SP. Otherwise? Unless you win the Sasaki lottery or make a HUGE investment into the rotation (e.g. a guy like Nate Eovaldi is your "other guy"), it's a bad idea. Everyone is focused on the injury risk of the youths, and that's unfortunately a very real thing we need to worry about. However that needs to be balanced against the performance risk of this other guy. If Assad has a 5 ERA on Memorial Day next year, he probably gets a trip to Iowa, certainly at minimum he gets shifted to the bullpen. If you sign Michael Wacha to a two year deal and he has a 5 ERA on Memorial Day...nothing happens for at least another month. We can all scream "it's a sunk cost it shouldn't matter" until we're blue in the face, but you know how it works in practice with well compensated vets. The Cubs next year have six optionable young SPs of consequence who are more or less major league ready. Each has warts, and there's no law against multiple concurrent injuries, but I think it's much more likely that we get positive production out of the 5/6/7/8/+ rotation spots by rotating the youths than we gey by locking another spot down with a vet. Add in the opportunity cost of that added salary and it's clear cut IMO.

It can probably be assumed that nearly anyone on one of these teams making decent money is at least somewhat available this winter.

If Bellinger opts out. and we go with this assumption for how arb plays out, I'm showing payroll at $157M. Add another $5M buffer for bonuses, roster churn, etc. and you're looking at $79M under the LT. There are various places you can quibble or reasonably make different assumptions, but for the sake of having a nice round number in our minds $80M is a good place to start.

I'd be surprised if Taillon’s not the 4 with Assad the 5. I think Craig might have fully come out and said Assad's earned a spot for next year?

Feels like this one is heavily dependent on medicals. Shoulders are scary but if his arm looks clean then I feel like that's a good gamble.

I wouldn't expect two, I think we need to be careful about relying on the young pitchers for too many innings but that feels like overcorrecting. That said a nine figure pitcher contract feels more likely than it has in a long time.

3 things that seemed more than just press-speak: 1. An implication Cody's going to opt out 2. Wrigley played extremely pitcher friendly this year, which needs to impact how you evaluate both the offense and the pitching from this past season 3. There was a line about making prospect trades, but not ones that are too focused on the short term. I read that to mean more deals in the Busch/Paredes mold

https://www.mlbtraderumors.com/2024/10/projected-arbitration-salaries-for-2025.html Paredes a bit higher than I expected but generally no surprises. More than half these guys likely get non tendered next month.