Whether it's your first Bonnaroo or you’re a music festival veteran, we welcome you to Inforoo.
Here you'll find info about artists, rumors, camping tips, and the infamous Roo Clues. Have a look around then create an account and join in the fun. See you at Bonnaroo!!
Boston needs to catch a break? Please, your organization has been so poorly run these past few years. The AL East is GREAT baseball now THANKS TO THE YANKEES. The competition will be great and something baseball has been lacking. Just because the Sox can't get it together (even though they are making good moves) isn't the Yankees fault. Give ME a break, the Red Sox just need to catch up. I'm sorry I just think that post was ridiculous because it seems like you don't want your team in a good division.
And I don't like what the Yankees have done this offseason so far and now Youk? No thanks. The Yankees should be signing Hamilton in the offseason, preparing Chavez to take A-Rods spot and develop Chris Stewart to be our starting catcher.
Maybe I'm missing something....but what's so bad about this trade?
He gets Shields (top tier pitcher) and Davis (solid mid-rotational pitcher....and also married to my ex g/f's best friend, he's a pretty cool guy) and gives up one top level prospect and 3 mid-level prospects.
The Royals are close to competing in a weak AL Central and now they have their ace pitcher, plus another guy to fill in the rotation. WIth both their lineup and pitching in need of serious upgrades I don't see why this is such a negative. I realize Shields is 30 and Davis is (I believe) 27, but there's also no guarantee that Odorizzi is anything above average and they have to give up a bat like Myers to get a top level starting pitcher.
Maybe you guys can sway my vote, but without looking too far into the two lower-level prospects or waiting for the Rays' PTBNL, what's so bad about this deal?
Maybe I'm missing something....but what's so bad about this trade?
He gets Shields (top tier pitcher) and Davis (solid mid-rotational pitcher....and also married to my ex g/f's best friend, he's a pretty cool guy) and gives up one top level prospect and 3 mid-level prospects.
The Royals are close to competing in a weak AL Central and now they have their ace pitcher, plus another guy to fill in the rotation. WIth both their lineup and pitching in need of serious upgrades I don't see why this is such a negative. I realize Shields is 30 and Davis is (I believe) 27, but there's also no guarantee that Odorizzi is anything above average and they have to give up a bat like Myers to get a top level starting pitcher.
Maybe you guys can sway my vote, but without looking too far into the two lower-level prospects or waiting for the Rays' PTBNL, what's so bad about this deal?
For one, Wade Davis wasn't even average in his two full seasons as a starter. He did well out of the bullpen last year, but relief pitching was the only thing that didn't suck for the Royals last year.
Also, Shields will be 31 in like a week and only has two years left on his contract. Even if Hosmer/Moustakas/Cain all progress well, what's the ceiling for the Royals, maybe like 83-85 wins? They're basically trading six years of team control of a top 10 prospect for a chance to maybe potentially compete for a sh*tty division in the next two years, only to return to sucking in 2015 and beyond. If you trade a prospect like Myers you absolutely need someone with more than two years left on their contract. And preferably not someone on the wrong side of 30.
Maybe I'm missing something....but what's so bad about this trade?
He gets Shields (top tier pitcher) and Davis (solid mid-rotational pitcher....and also married to my ex g/f's best friend, he's a pretty cool guy) and gives up one top level prospect and 3 mid-level prospects.
The Royals are close to competing in a weak AL Central and now they have their ace pitcher, plus another guy to fill in the rotation. WIth both their lineup and pitching in need of serious upgrades I don't see why this is such a negative. I realize Shields is 30 and Davis is (I believe) 27, but there's also no guarantee that Odorizzi is anything above average and they have to give up a bat like Myers to get a top level starting pitcher.
Maybe you guys can sway my vote, but without looking too far into the two lower-level prospects or waiting for the Rays' PTBNL, what's so bad about this deal?
For one, Wade Davis wasn't even average in his two full seasons as a starter. He did well out of the bullpen last year, but relief pitching was the only thing that didn't suck for the Royals last year.
Also, Shields will be 31 in like a week and only has two years left on his contract. Even if Hosmer/Moustakas/Cain all progress well, what's the ceiling for the Royals, maybe like 83-85 wins? They're basically trading six years of team control of a top 10 prospect for a chance to maybe potentially compete for a sh*tty division in the next two years, only to return to sucking in 2015 and beyond. If you trade a prospect like Myers you absolutely need someone with more than two years left on their contract. And preferably not someone on the wrong side of 30.
See, this is the Royals we're talking about. They haven't competed since the eighties! A trade that can bring them some semblance of respectability is worth a shot, no?
And yes, they sacrificed their top prospect, but remember that Alex Gordon was a much bigger prospect than Myers is at the same point in Gordon's hype and he's been good, but not great. You know you're getting an ace with well over 200 IP for a guy who may very well end up letting you down the way Gordon has.
So, would I want to trade a top prospect for a 30 y/o pitcher? No. But would I strongly consider it if I was running the Royals, needed to get people to actually show up to games and see that the division I play in is the weakest in baseball (or in the discussion)? Yeah, I would. I may not pull the trigger, but I'd at least have a lengthy conversation with the rest of the front office about it.
Post by Alberto Balsalm on Dec 10, 2012 13:52:35 GMT -5
Myers is more than just a top 10 prospect too, he's arguably the top prospect in the game right now. Odorizzi is a major-league ready SP that was the Royals top pitching prospect. Mike Montgomery was regarded as their 2nd pitching prospect behind Odorizzi and, despite a bit of a setback last year, is still a top LHP prospect.
So, arguably #1 hitting prospect in the MLB (Who plays a position where the Royals are currently trotting out a below-replacement level OF), best pitching prospect in organization (Also top 15 in the MLB) and your next best pitching prospect for a 32-year old borderline ace with 2 years left on contract and a replacement-level arm on a team that was far from contending last year? They mortgaged their entire future to most likely be DECENT next year, I really don't see James Shields making them a contender next year, or staying in KC after his contract is up.
It's a desperate deal from a team that shouldn't have been desperate with the type of young talent they have both in the majors and the minors. However, they have a desperate GM in Dayton Moore who probably knows that he is getting fired soon if he doesn't do SOMETHING soon so he sabotaged the team's future in hope for some extra wins this year and MAYBE a play-in game birth if everything goes 100% perfect for the team this season to save his job.
From afar the deal looks eerily similar to some other desperate deals from small-market teams who were itching to compete, like when the Expos traded Cliff Lee, Grady Sizemore and Brandon Phillips (all specs at the time) for Bartolo Colon, or when the Braves traded Elvis Andrus, Matt Harrison, Neftali Felix and Jarrod Saltalamacchia for Mark Teixeira.
Obviously Myers, Odorizzi and Montgomery aren't sure things, but if those guys even come close to reaching their full potential we will be looking back at this trade in several years and laughing at how dumb the Royals are
Myers is more than just a top 10 prospect too, he's arguably the top prospect in the game right now. Odorizzi is a major-league ready SP that was the Royals top pitching prospect. Mike Montgomery was regarded as their 2nd pitching prospect behind Odorizzi and, despite a bit of a setback last year, is still a top LHP prospect.
So, arguably #1 hitting prospect in the MLB (Who plays a position where the Royals are currently trotting out a below-replacement level OF), best pitching prospect in organization (Also top 15 in the MLB) and your next best pitching prospect for a 32-year old borderline ace with 2 years left on contract and a replacement-level arm on a team that was far from contending last year? They mortgaged their entire future to most likely be DECENT next year, I really don't see James Shields making them a contender next year, or staying in KC after his contract is up.
It's a desperate deal from a team that shouldn't have been desperate with the type of young talent they have both in the majors and the minors. However, they have a desperate GM in Dayton Moore who probably knows that he is getting fired soon if he doesn't do SOMETHING soon so he sabotaged the team's future in hope for some extra wins this year and MAYBE a play-in game birth if everything goes 100% perfect for the team this season to save his job.
From afar the deal looks eerily similar to some other desperate deals from small-market teams who were itching to compete, like when the Expos traded Cliff Lee, Grady Sizemore and Brandon Phillips (all specs at the time) for Bartolo Colon, or when the Braves traded Elvis Andrus, Matt Harrison, Neftali Felix and Jarrod Saltalamacchia for Mark Teixeira.
Obviously Myers, Odorizzi and Montgomery aren't sure things, but if those guys even come close to reaching their full potential we will be looking back at this trade in several years and laughing at how dumb the Royals are
Odorizzi is a middle rotation guy at best, IMO. I see this same thing in the NFL, where unproven prospects are over-valued because of their potential.
Myers is a beast. Royals knew they'd have to trade him in order to get a ace in return, and they knew they had other young arms that could overtake Odorizzi (Zimmer is really their #1 pitching prospect, anyway).
And I think you're overrating Montgomery substantially. He's nothing special (not even in the team's top-10 prospects prior to the trade. He did have Baseball America's "nicest change-up" in the Royals' system, though.
They traded a top-10 prospect (that everyone was asking for in order to trade a starting pitcher of elite quality), a solid SP prospect, and two coin-flip prospects. Considering they need to get people to go to games (something that I weigh when reviewing trades like this) in order to even have a team, it's not a terrible trade. The Giants showed you win with pitching & defense first and hitting second, so this is following that simple blueprint to competing.
Other, simpler moves probably make more sense for the Royals. Perfect example: Kyle Lohse. Don't lose any of those prospects signing a free agent pitcher coming off a career year who got votes for a Cy Young award.
And you can thank Boras for that. However, I did think he would have made a lot of sense for KC. He's a great pitcher if the park he's pitching in can play to his strenghts. Great ground ball pitcher until he tries to elevate. For instance, I saw the Sox were talking to him and Fenway would be terrible for him IMO. However, he can make sense for some teams, even at the price he's at.
BTW Balsalm, I know you said Shelby Miller, but what do you think the Indians would do if the Cards offered Lance Lynn? With or without schumaker for asdrubal. Not your opinion, just an educated guess as to how the Indians would act.
And you can thank Boras for that. However, I did think he would have made a lot of sense for KC. He's a great pitcher if the park he's pitching in can play to his strenghts. Great ground ball pitcher until he tries to elevate. For instance, I saw the Sox were talking to him and Fenway would be terrible for him IMO. However, he can make sense for some teams, even at the price he's at.
Lohse actually really isn't a ground ball pitcher, his career GB% is around 41%, the league average is 44%. Most ground ball pitchers are above 50%.
Lohse is just an average pitcher who has gotten really lucky on balls in play the last two seasons and posted an abnormally high strand rate for his career average last season which has led to very inflated and misleading ERA and win totals the last two seasons, which will likely lead him to get 1/2 pitcher type money when in reality he is closer to a 3/4 pitcher. I really can't see a contract that Lohse will get that he will match with his value, I'd say it's almost certain that he will underperform whatever contract he ends up getting.
As for Asdrubal for Lynn, I'm really not sure because I'm not sure how MLB scouts view Lynn. I had never heard much about him until last season when he kinda came out of nowhere. Do scouts view him as a flash in the pan or the real deal? The fact that he got yanked from the rotation last season so quickly for Joe Kelly makes me think flash in the pan, but at the same time he was throwing a lot of innings for a rookie so maybe they just wanted to ease up on his arm a little bit. Upon doing some research I found out that he was a first round draft pick, and has always posted elite strikeout numbers, so that part at least wasn't a fluke.
I would be inclined to say yes, maybe with another lower level arm like a Joe Kelly thrown in, but again I'm really not sure how scouts view Lynn, he is one of the big pitching question marks heading into next season IMO.
This is just a question I'm posing for the sake of conversation (Alberto, I agree with you on Loshe): at what point does it stop being luck?
By that I mean, let's just say a guy is known for throwing balls that are put in play, but he rarely misses to the point that he gives up a lot of HR's. He posts, year after year, high strand rates and low BABIP, I mean, it'd be rare, but there has to be pitchers who have done that for the long haul, right?
This is just a question I'm posing for the sake of conversation (Alberto, I agree with you on Loshe): at what point does it stop being luck?
By that I mean, let's just say a guy is known for throwing balls that are put in play, but he rarely misses to the point that he gives up a lot of HR's. He posts, year after year, high strand rates and low BABIP, I mean, it'd be rare, but there has to be pitchers who have done that for the long haul, right?
Oh, you mean Jeremy Hellickson? Matt Cain and Jered Weaver are two other guys who continually outpitch what their peripherals suggest year after year. The latter two have something to do with being EXTREME fly-ball pitchers, although admittedly I'm not really sure why that skews their peripherals so much.
It's hard to determine when it becomes obvious that is a skill as opposed to luck. With Weaver, it's pretty easy to see that he has simply been getting better as a pitcher by looking at his BABIP trends ever since his rookie year (.312, .298, .278, .276, .250, .241). He gets better at inducing weak contact every season.
With Hellickson, the jury is still out. All the sabermatricians thought he would tank last season after he finished 2nd in the MLB (only to Jered Weaver) with an 82% strand percentage and 1st in BABIP with .223, numbers which seemed very likely to regress closer to the league average. However, he did it again this year leading the league with an 82.7% strand percentage and finishing 7th in BABIP with .261. Give him one more season of 75+ strand% and a sub .265 BABIP and I think it just becomes clear that there is something in his game (mostly pitching to weak contact) that allows him to strand runners at a very high rate and it becomes seen as skill rather than a fluke.
However, with a guy like Lohse, it just doesn't add up. Granted, something seemed to have clicked for the guy in the past couple seasons and he has become a better pitcher than what he once was. But still, the numbers don't make much sense. For example, his 77.2% strand percentage last year and his .262 BABIP are massive outliers from his career averages of 70% and .297 (both close to the league average). When you see a guy hovering around the same number (Like Hellickson so far) or slightly improving consistently each year (Weaver) it points more to gained skills. When you see massive fluctuations from one season to the next like Lohse, it points much more to random chance than skill. Especially when you dig a little deeper and see that he somehow posted the best BABIP of his career (and 9th lowest in the MLB) while also posting a career-high in LD% with 24% (6th highest in MLB). So he's getting hit harder than ever, but posting career lows in BABIP? That just doesn't add up, and sooner or later those line drives are gonna start falling in and you'll see his ERA balloon.
As a fan who has watched Lohse pitch a ton over the past few seasons, I can honestly say it seems that maturity has really just done him wonders. If I was in most teams shoes I wouldn't pay him the money he wants either, however the conversation when dealing with the Royals makes a lot more sense to me. They needed a guy who could come in and be the guy of their rotation, and Lohse could have easily filled that role albeit for 1 or 2 years. As it stands that gave up (IMO) too much to go after the moves they made. Why not just sign the free agent and retain that young talent? That's why I believe it was a superior move.
As far as Lynn goes, definitely pulled from the rotation due to innings. Ultimately, he just couldn't handle that workload as a rookie. He's a huge question mark as far as I'm concerned, which is why I would like to see the Cardinals make a play for a quality shortstop by giving him up. Especially when considering Kelly, Rosenthal, and Miller are all viable candidates to fill his role.
I am pretty excited for the Reds getting Choo. For one that was our weakness last year, nobody was hitting at the top of the lineup and he was a Reds killer.
Post by Alberto Balsalm on Dec 12, 2012 2:29:16 GMT -5
He's a great player, you guys are gonna love him. Not sure how the CF thing will go but he's a solid hitter who is above average in every aspect of the game and is very easy to like. I'm real sad to see him go but getting back Trevor Bauer (plus a serviceable replacement in Stubbs who is under contract for 3 years as opposed to Choo's 1 who wasn't coming back to Cleveland anyway) makes it pretty easy to stomach
Great American Ballpark is one of the smallest OF's in all of Major League Baseball. The only problem I see is when we go out west to some of the gigantic parks. And yeah, I thought it was a good move on Cleveland's part. He was not signing back (he won't sign with the Reds either, we just got him for this coming season so Billy Hamilton can be ready by 2014 season) and you got a top 10 prospect out of him...but you won't enjoy Stubbs.
I still can't understand the D-backs though. Pretty much trading Bauer for Didi? I guess...
Great American Ballpark is one of the smallest OF's in all of Major League Baseball. The only problem I see is when we go out west to some of the gigantic parks. And yeah, I thought it was a good move on Cleveland's part. He was not signing back (he won't sign with the Reds either, we just got him for this coming season so Billy Hamilton can be ready by 2014 season) and you got a top 10 prospect out of him...but you won't enjoy Stubbs.
I still can't understand the D-backs though. Pretty much trading Bauer for Didi? I guess...
Stubbs was actually much more of a contact hitter before he was Bakerized. He might end up in the .250-.260 range, perhaps a bit higher. Tribe needed to move Choo due to Boras and Sanchez (hasn't touched a lefty since Sanchez busted him).
Bonnaroo 2008-2013
0ct 11 Pearl Jam
Oct 12 Pearl Jam
March 16 Arcade Fire
April 29 Arcade Fire
Sept 4 Wilco
Sept 9 The Hold Steady
Oct 16 Pearl Jam
Oct 17 Gaslight Anthem
Great American Ballpark is one of the smallest OF's in all of Major League Baseball. The only problem I see is when we go out west to some of the gigantic parks. And yeah, I thought it was a good move on Cleveland's part. He was not signing back (he won't sign with the Reds either, we just got him for this coming season so Billy Hamilton can be ready by 2014 season) and you got a top 10 prospect out of him...but you won't enjoy Stubbs.
I still can't understand the D-backs though. Pretty much trading Bauer for Didi? I guess...
Stubbs was actually much more of a contact hitter before he was Bakerized. He might end up in the .250-.260 range, perhaps a bit higher. Tribe needed to move Choo due to Boras and Sanchez (hasn't touched a lefty since Sanchez busted him).
Every year he has played in the majors it has been under Baker. Who knows, maybe getting in a new situation will do good for him...but as a Reds fan he was the most frustrating player to watch. One of the fastest players in all of baseball, and he has been in the top 10 in strikeouts the past three seasons. If he just puts the ball on the ground he has a chance at getting on base and stealing second...but you can't steal first.