tartan22

let's not body shame the kid

i thought about caveating that for this reason but. one guy who hit (and not even at the ML level yet) is still a really good rate, and that's more of a "gave something legit to get something legit" situation rather than a "we're comfortable dumping this guy for a short-term asset" situation

i get thinking this is an overpay / not liking the deal on first impression / thinking you could have gotten more out of rojas, but for all the flaws of this front office, one thing it seems like they've earned some goodwill on is having a good eye for which prospects it's OK to give up on agree it seems steep, but i'm not gonna stress about it blowing up in our faces until rojas actually turns out to be good!

did they just pull this from this random twitter account?

garrett is presumably a flier, not a pivot, but i don't think there is worse timing for that news to break

alright, doubt away!

trusting cerami with cubs news over a gambling podcaster. especially one whose own "outlet" is re-posting the cerami report that he's trying to contradict

usually "i don't see this news anywhere outside of a twitter account who i don't know" is a pretty strong signal that something isn't real, especially when it was posted two hours ago. but if you're still not sure whether it's legitimate or not, you might be inclined to scroll down his feed and see posts like this ultimately, there's just no way to know for sure whether this guy is a genuine reporter. only time will tell

very lightly dipping your toe into the deferral waters is a good bit. saving $1m a year on the actual value of the contract is just the kind of creative accounting that could put this team over the top

you realize people just have to click back one page to see you actually said "nobody in our rotation projects as better than an average ERA" you have subsequently qualified that to say that one of our starters doesn't count, and also some of the projections don't count, and also you can decide the average era is lower than it actually is

i've been kind of confused as to why we haven't shown any interest in bichette if we are in on bregman, so i'll take that report bichette + using shaw in a package for a front-end pitcher was always my dream 'feasible' offseason. (seems like we probably wouldn't trade shaw even if we did add a 3b, given the noise around nico's future, but you could still add a solid SP via trade with other pieces)

given hoyer's remarks on pitching at the start of the offseason, i don't think there's a player left in free agency who would qualify as a success for addressing the need as he defined it. you can't come out in november hammering on that as the big thing you're going to focus on and then walk away with "zac gallen bounceback year?" as your solution you gotta swing a trade at this point. you have the resources, go out and make a move

sometimes pessimism and frustration is justified. i also think it's stupid to complain about every single free agent who signs somewhere else, or to act like we've massively missed out on the SP/3B markets when there are plenty of options still left to sign. but the reason i started grousing after the fairbanks signing specifically is because he was the last big-name bullpen FA left on the market, and his signing elsewhere is an affirmation that the front office is going to continue operating under the philosophy that it isn't worth it to pay the going rate for an established relief arm. i think that's bad roster-building, i think the lack of a go-to guy in the bullpen has hurt us even when we've (impressively) been able to cobble together a solid relief unit from spare parts, and i think now is a reasonable time to express your concerns about that approach to assembling a team if it helps to mentally append a "but if they make a bunch of good moves later then i will be happy about that" to my posts, then go right ahead

also like...sorry if this makes me a cynic, but i'm not going to jump to "maybe we're not spending on a reliever because we're going to give $50m to an impact bat and starter instead :)" until i see them actually sign one (1) of those two types of players unless we get a radically different approach to how this front office pursues desirable free agents, they should not be operating as if they will actually be the top bidder for players like imai or bregman. the flexibility to get guys like that on "good deals" is nice, but if you're not going to be aggressive about spending on them, then you shouldn't also be using them as an excuse to pass on more realistic opportunities to upgrade the roster