What are the chances of Porcello being offered a contract extension?

[moonslav59]

Great response, Tyler.

 

I was a big supported of the Porcello trade and extension due to all the contract years being within prime years.

 

He will be post prime this winter, and it is showing.

 

I'd take him back at a big reduction in price, but my guess is some team will overpay by more than my liking, so I'm thinking it will probably be better to let him go elsewhere.

[TylerD]

Great response, Tyler.

 

I was a big supported of the Porcello trade and extension due to all the contract years being within prime years.

 

He will be post prime this winter, and it is showing.

 

I'd take him back at a big reduction in price, but my guess is some team will overpay by more than my liking, so I'm thinking it will probably be better to let him go elsewhere.

 

If it happens I’m making a tribute video to him. And then spending my weekend crying. But yes I’m starting to agree with you and others. Someone will offer him a decent amount that I am starting to think he may not be worth.

[moonslav59]

Lol. I still want him on the team. But his last 2 starts have been god awful.

 

No decisions should be made over just 2 starts, so you have a good point.

 

Before the last 2 games, his ERA was...

 

3.73 in his previous 8 starts

 

3.30 in his previous 12 starts

[S5Dewey]

I wouldn’t call it a conspiracy, either. MLB is trying to compete for the fandom f low attention span millennials like Thunder, and noticing how they gravitate to quick-snip streaming video packages of segments of games that contain actual action such as the one the NBA released a few years back and was a mega hit. Baseball is not conducive to this type of viewer or medium as it stands.

 

But more important in the evolution of the game, jung’s diatribe was more of the “the way it was yesterday is the way it always was” viewpoint. This isn’t the first time the ball has changed. Heck they even named “The Live Ball Era” after a previous change it what had to be the worst ever attempt to disguise it. The ball will probably change again. Ditto the bat. (Attempts made and failed to switch to maple, for example.) The gloves (which are already radically different from predecessors) and batting helmets (now with new cranial protection feature!!).

 

This is just evolution. And it’s not stopping here either...

 

All true, every bit of it. Every one of those changes was done for a reason and each of them has impacted the significance of the statistics.

 

When we compare the stats of bygone eras we tend to view the stats in comparison to how the game and the equipment are now. That's what makes it difficult to compare the different eras. For example, would Babe Ruth have been able to catch up with a 102 mph fastball? How many fewer errors would Bobby Dorr have made if he'd had the gloves of today? Would Would Bob Feller have been so overpowering if players had been encouraged (rather that discouraged!) to lift weights?

 

That's why I find it interesting to view the stats of players from other eras but at the same time I take all of their stats with a grain of salt. The game and equipment have changed so we can't view past accomplishments through the prism of today's baseball. And I'm certain that when I'm Mal's age people will be saying the same thing.

[notin]

If it happens I’m making a tribute video to him. And then spending my weekend crying. But yes I’m starting to agree with you and others. Someone will offer him a decent amount that I am starting to think he may not be worth.

 

It is funny how the worse he pitches, the more some people think he’ll be attractive to other teams...

[SPLENDIDSPLINTER]

The best thing I can say regarding Porcello is that he's durable. He's always ready to take the ball when it's his turn to pitch. Not sure though how that calculates into how much he should be paid. I would label him a reliable #3 or #4.

As most of us know, there isn't a whole lot of quality pitching out there.

[S5Dewey]

The best thing I can say regarding Porcello is that he's durable. He's always ready to take the ball when it's his turn to pitch. Not sure though how that calculates into how much he should be paid. I would label him a reliable #3 or #4.

 

In conjunction with my post (above) it'll be interesting to see how pitchers get paid in the future if the hitter's OPS climbs the way it looks like it might. How valuable is Porcillo if the new baseball prevents him from throwing his best pitch? And it's not just Rick. If the offensive #'s are exploding the pitching #'s have to be too. How long will it take owners - and the pitchers - to figure out a new strategy to offset the new baseballs?

[SPLENDIDSPLINTER]

In conjunction with my post (above) it'll be interesting to see how pitchers get paid in the future if the hitter's OPS climbs the way it looks like it might. How valuable is Porcillo if the new baseball prevents him from throwing his best pitch? And it's not just Rick. If the offensive #'s are exploding the pitching #'s have to be too. How long will it take owners - and the pitchers - to figure out a new strategy to offset the new baseballs?

 

If baseball was truly concerned about leveling the playing field between pitching and hitting, the mound would be raised to where it was prior to 1969.

Edited July 7, 2019 by SPLENDIDSPLINTER

[notin]

If baseball was truly concerned about leveling the playing field between pitching and hitting, the mound would be raised to where it was prior to 1969.

 

That would have the opposite effect.

 

But there has been some discussion of lowering the mound in the next couple seasons...

[notin]

All true, every bit of it. Every one of those changes was done for a reason and each of them has impacted the significance of the statistics.

 

When we compare the stats of bygone eras we tend to view the stats in comparison to how the game and the equipment are now. That's what makes it difficult to compare the different eras. For example, would Babe Ruth have been able to catch up with a 102 mph fastball? How many fewer errors would Bobby Dorr have made if he'd had the gloves of today? Would Would Bob Feller have been so overpowering if players had been encouraged (rather that discouraged!) to lift weights?

 

That's why I find it interesting to view the stats of players from other eras but at the same time I take all of their stats with a grain of salt. The game and equipment have changed so we can't view past accomplishments through the prism of today's baseball. And I'm certain that when I'm Mal's age people will be saying the same thing.

 

 

The changes in the game that’s effect statistics are astronomical and have hit . EVERY ASPECT of the game. From players (more teams, more races) to fields (foul poles, grounds rules, ground rule doubles, lowering mounds) to equipment changes discussed above.

 

Oh and rules, too!!

[iortiz]

The best thing I can say regarding Porcello is that he's durable. He's always ready to take the ball when it's his turn to pitch. Not sure though how that calculates into how much he should be paid. I would label him a reliable #3 or #4.

As most of us know, there isn't a whole lot of quality pitching out there.

That’s what I said since day one and some went to my throat at the time LOL!

[SPLENDIDSPLINTER]

That would have the opposite effect.

 

But there has been some discussion of lowering the mound in the next couple seasons...

 

If that would have the opposite effect, then why was it lowered in the first place?

[jung]

I wouldn’t call it a conspiracy, either. MLB is trying to compete for the fandom f low attention span millennials like Thunder, and noticing how they gravitate to quick-snip streaming video packages of segments of games that contain actual action such as the one the NBA released a few years back and was a mega hit. Baseball is not conducive to this type of viewer or medium as it stands.

 

But more important in the evolution of the game, jung’s diatribe was more of the “the way it was yesterday is the way it always was” viewpoint. This isn’t the first time the ball has changed. Heck they even named “The Live Ball Era” after a previous change it what had to be the worst ever attempt to disguise it. The ball will probably change again. Ditto the bat. (Attempts made and failed to switch to maple, for example.) The gloves (which are already radically different from predecessors) and batting helmets (now with new cranial protection feature!!).

 

This is just evolution. And it’s not stopping here either...

 

But those changes were not radical and the last live ball era followed the dead ball era. So there was considerable concern that the ball was simply dead! They have changed the baseball 3 of the last 4 years and are now onto the worst of the rocket ships with no apparent end in sight with no indication before the 2016 rocket ship that we had another dead ball on our hands.

 

As for bats, bats are not THE BASEBALL. The helmet is not THE BASEBALL and the hitter is not the pitcher.

 

Everything that happens in baseball starts with THE BASEBALL in the hand of THE PITCHER. You screw around with the baseball and the pitcher and you are screwing around with the fundamental core of the game. So IMO, what they have done with THE BASEBALL and the bias toward promoting power pitching makes everything else at to changes pale in comparison. The the changes to the baseball have made it possible to just touch it with a bat and get it to fly, have likely made it more difficult to grip the various pitches, probably even changed the spin/rotation on pitches as they come up to the plate. But probably worse has been the bias toward power pitching which as burned through an entire generation of pitchers, breaking down early and often without being able to backfill the minor leagues to keep up.

 

Why for example wasn't the change to the 2016 baseball enough? Frankly I did not think THAT was called for. However, why was that not enough? Why the 2018 ball which was hotter still and then the 2019 which is just an absurd rocket ship!

 

As for the pitcher himself, he is now stuck throwing a baseball with much lower seams and we are running though pitchers like crap through a goose because of what has been a bias toward power pitching. They are breaking down, they are being brought up too soon. Many of them should never see the inside of a MLB uni but that is the corner MLB has boxed itself into.

 

Hopefully they don't mess with mound height again in either direction.

 

The interesting aspect of the marketing of power pitching is that pitchers no longer challenge hitters. So here they are raving about velocity and nobody is challenging hitters. If you can't throw swing and miss in the strike zone, you are not challenging hitters. Predominantly breaking ball pitchers don't challenge hitters any longer and FB pitchers don't challenge hitters any longer. They don't because they can't. That was NEVER The case before. They don't get swing and miss in the strike zone and they don't get easy, weak contact outs thus driving up their pitch counts and exiting regularly now by the 5th if not 6th inning. We complain about pitchers that nibble, yet encourage it in somehow admiring called third strike K's as if called third strike K's were something special. NOOOO....swing and miss in the strike zone is actually something special because the pitcher is actually challenging the hitter in order to earn swing and miss in the strike zone.

 

Pitchers no longer even make the effort to own at least one side of the plate or the other, giving up the entire plate to the hitter, allowing the hitter to dive across the batter's box unimpeded because they can't throw inside effectively (see Rafi for a guy that dives across). They are not good enough to throw inside effectively. They don't command their pitches well enough to throw inside effectively.

 

But I keep coming back to the same things that stand out like sore thumbs. Starters no longer complete games regularly as they did and they no longer even go deep into games as they did FOR DECADES because they can't, even using 5 starters instead of 4, they can't. That has brought about legions of relief pitchers, good for about 20 pitches each. All pitchers are breaking down early and often because they are throwing too hard. That has started the conveyor belt of crap pitchers coming up from the minors that should not have come up at all or are brought up too soon to fill the holes left by the broken down rag arms that simply can't go any longer or that are on the IL and on the way to can't go any longer. All the other changes ever made in baseball over very long time horizons have not had the impact that the last 10 years of changes have had.

 

Now there are very few pitchers in MLB that can throw competently and virtually NOTHING in the minor leagues backing them up. MLB sucked the life out of minor league pitching while running throw arms like crap through a goose.

 

Since this is the Porcello thread, what did Rick do to earn his Cy Young and his best season by far? He turned into a power pitcher, exhibiting much more velocity than he ever had in his career before. That lasted all of a year and a half. He is IMO effectively a burn out now. So that worked well.

 

I would not call this a conspiracy as much as it has been a Collusion, an unwillingness to actually deal with MLB's issues effectively. They have seen my generation getting to the pushing up daisies age for a long time now. Yet with all the crap they have tried, all of it misguided IMO, 65+ year olds are 5x the demographic viewership of the 18-49 year old age category. Young fans know less and less about the game than they did generation by generation and are less interested in it generation by generation. Why would they or should they be interested in this game of 3+ hour duration that seems to be for all intents and purposes about hitting a baseball over a fence. There is just not enough game there to hold their interest. Heck if that is what this game was for all intents and purposes about when i was growing up, it would not have held my interest.

 

Going to the park itself is a fun night on the town more than it is a trip to the ballpark specifically to watch a baseball game. How many people in those seats actually know what is happening on the diamond?

[TylerD]

It is funny how the worse he pitches, the more some people think he’ll be attractive to other teams...

 

Lol. Ya this is the point I was making earlier. Until recent as Moon pointed out he’s been solid but these ugly games like against the Yankees and the low Detroit will be remembered. However I still think his consistency of starting every time he’s called will bring him some decent coin. Depends how desperate a team is for a pitcher as well. Porcello as it stands is still much better than anything the Jays have outside of Stroman so I could see a team like that throwing a decent amount of money at him.

[notin]

If that would have the opposite effect, then why was it lowered in the first place?

 

Because pitchers were dominating.

 

They still are, just not as much. It’s not like anyone is hitting .500. Or even .400.

 

But it’s still a pitcher’s game...

[moonslav59]

Because pitchers were dominating.

 

They still are, just not as much. It’s not like anyone is hitting .500. Or even .400.

 

But it’s still a pitcher’s game...

 

The only difference is that the pitchers being sought by the big spenders have ERAs of 3.00 and 4.00 not 2.50 to 3.00.

[dgalehouse]

Porcello is to Tyler as JBJ is to Moonslav. Love conquers all .

[Bellhorn04]

Because pitchers were dominating.

 

They still are, just not as much. It’s not like anyone is hitting .500. Or even .400.

 

But it’s still a pitcher’s game...

 

I guess it depends what benchmark you're using.

 

Mine is runs scored, and they're way up, due to all the home run balls.

[redsoxrules]

No decisions should be made over just 2 starts, so you have a good point.

 

Before the last 2 games, his ERA was...

 

3.73 in his previous 8 starts

 

3.30 in his previous 12 starts

 

Here we go with cherry picking the stats again. I'll do the same. Take away his cy young year and hes been pretty meh in terms of production with the Sox.

[Bellhorn04]

Here we go with cherry picking the stats again. I'll do the same. Take away his cy young year and hes been pretty meh in terms of production with the Sox.

 

But his durability is a big plus, especially the way the game is now.

[moonslav59]

Here we go with cherry picking the stats again. I'll do the same. Take away his cy young year and hes been pretty meh in terms of production with the Sox.

 

I'm on record as saying I don't think bringing Porcello back makes sense, unless he goes along with a significant hometown discount on years and money.

 

I will say that I'd rather have a starter with a 5.00 ERA have 12 games at 3.30 and 2 at 12.75 than all 14 at 5.00, or whatever it is.

[TylerD]

Here we go with cherry picking the stats again. I'll do the same. Take away his cy young year and hes been pretty meh in terms of production with the Sox.

 

Find me a 3rd or 4th rotation man that can take Porcellos place at a decent price. I still stand by Porcello in saying he will take a nice discount. Who can we get that will consistently start and give us 6 innings at a decent price. I will wait.

 

Nobody is saying Porcello is an Ace or that he will be as good as his CY YOUNG season but he is still a damn good player in the rotation. I wish he was more consistent like his play against Houston and Minnesota earlier. Rather than the play against Toronto and Detroit but it is what it is.

[moonslav59]

Find me a 3rd or 4th rotation man that can take Porcellos place at a decent price. I still stand by Porcello in saying he will take a nice discount. Who can we get that will consistently start and give us 6 innings at a decent price. I will wait.

 

Nobody is saying Porcello is an Ace or that he will be as good as his CY YOUNG season but he is still a damn good player in the rotation. I wish he was more consistent like his play against Houston and Minnesota earlier. Rather than the play against Toronto and Detroit but it is what it is.

 

Of course it will come down to the comps and costs of who is available.

 

Who knows, we may even decide to fill the 5 slot from within the system, assuming we have faith in Eovaldi being a starter in 2020.

 

Johnson

Wright

Velazquez

DHern

Shawaryn

Fill in the blank _____

 

We'll have a limited budget and many holes to fill:

 

1B

2B

Closer

Set-up

5th Starter

OF depth

SP'er depth

 

 

[Swiharts Ghost]

I'm on record as saying I don't think bringing Porcello back makes sense, unless he goes along with a significant hometown discount on years and money.

 

I will say that I'd rather have a starter with a 5.00 ERA have 12 games at 3.30 and 2 at 12.75 than all 14 at 5.00, or whatever it is.

 

what are we looking at with that without insulting the player and also not strapping the team ?guys a career 4 era plus .My proposal is 3 years at 45 with a team option .Give Rick Allstar and CY and innings pitched incentives at a tune of an additional 15 how ever we want to break it up .I can't give Rick any more years or AAV for what he's showing .1 caveat is no no trade .

Edited July 8, 2019 by Swiharts Ghost

[oldtimer]

Of course it will come down to the comps and costs of who is available.

 

Who knows, we may even decide to fill the 5 slot from within the system, assuming we have faith in Eovaldi being a starter in 2020.

 

Johnson

Wright

Velazquez

DHern

Shawaryn

Fill in the blank _____

 

We'll have a limited budget and many holes to fill:

 

1B

2B

Closer

Set-up

5th Starter

OF depth

SP'er depth

 

 

 

If we are lucky, Chavis will be improved an fill 1st base in 2020 and perhaps we will be very lucky and see Marco step up at 2nd. Our main issue is pitching and Porcello is durable but perhaps not the guy we need in the era of the juiced ball. It is hard to see any of our current minor league pitchers filling the starting pitching void and Eovaldi is far from showing he can regain his mojo. With Sale not stepping up, we are going to need at least two starters, so the question will be, can we get a guy as good as Porcello for the money? The size and length of the contract will matter. I am leaning toward replacing him.

[Swiharts Ghost]

Need a closer at this point .Evo needs to start come late Augest in my opinion .

[TylerD]

Of course it will come down to the comps and costs of who is available.

 

Who knows, we may even decide to fill the 5 slot from within the system, assuming we have faith in Eovaldi being a starter in 2020.

 

Johnson

Wright

Velazquez

DHern

Shawaryn

Fill in the blank _____

 

We'll have a limited budget and many holes to fill:

 

1B

2B

Closer

Set-up

5th Starter

OF depth

SP'er depth

 

 

Josh Taylor if he keeps performing like this maybe?

[moonslav59]

what are we looking at with that without insulting the player and also not strapping the team ?guys a career 4 era plus .My proposal is 3 years at 45 with a team option .Give Rick Allstar and CY and innings pitched incentives at a tune of an additional 15 how ever we want to break it up .I can't give Rick any more years or AAV for what he's showing .1 caveat is no no trade .

 

I'm way far away from your suggested offer, and what some GM will likely off him.

 

I might offer $18M/2 with an $8M option 3rd year and a $2M buyout, so essentially $20M/2 tops.

[moonslav59]

If we are lucky, Chavis will be improved an fill 1st base in 2020 and perhaps we will be very lucky and see Marco step up at 2nd. Our main issue is pitching and Porcello is durable but perhaps not the guy we need in the era of the juiced ball. It is hard to see any of our current minor league pitchers filling the starting pitching void and Eovaldi is far from showing he can regain his mojo. With Sale not stepping up, we are going to need at least two starters, so the question will be, can we get a guy as good as Porcello for the money? The size and length of the contract will matter. I am leaning toward replacing him.

 

My guess is we roll the dice at 1B and 2B with in system options.

 

1B: Chavis, Dalbec or maybe a surprise from Ockimey.

 

2B: Chavis, Hernandez, Lin, Chatham (maybe Holt comes back)

 

All our available financial resources (the number depends on which tax threshold we decide to stay under) should be spent on pitching, pitching and pitching.

 

[moonslav59]

Josh Taylor if he keeps performing like this maybe?

 

He may be in the mix, but at this point, I wouldn't count on him to fill any meaningful role next year.

 

(I may feel much differently, if he keeps doing well the rest of the way.