sk7326

I enjoy that Dombrowski's first trade was to move four prospects (two top 100 ones) for a closer who was WAR neutral over the closer they had last year (and did it in 20 less innings). It moves the previous closer into the sort of role he probably is not built for anymore.

Given what we traded to get Kimbrel, free agency might be the only choice ...

Given that 2 seasons ago we got two dominant bullpen arms for a sack of magic beans - this is a wild overpay. Two top 30 prospects and a couple of other guys with big prospects for 160 innings which you could have found elsewhere.

two top 20 prospects for 160 innings or so of a guy coming off his worst season ... awesome Kimbrel will be fine - but this is a shockingly poor use of assets, and loses some of the real currency they had to get a starter - unless ... (hides)

They have a lot of arms and have to decide their budget. That said, selling Harvey without some major league improvement seems unlikely - you don't do any sort of teardown on a young pennant winner.

$13M is a solid price for mediocre - and a pretty good value for better than that. It does not exempt looking for better pitching - but it helps.

Travis is possible, Shaw is possible. 1B is one of the easier positions to source anyway - even not considering Ramirez. Swihart was not very good defensively in year 1 - and the question becomes, how much of it was the other stuff - the promotion by necessity. We know Bogaerts had a shaky defensive first year with all that stuff thrown at him. Coming into next year, it seems like Swihart will probably be the 100 game catcher and Vasquez the 60 game one - and the injury to Vasquez provides more than sufficient merit to this idea. I think we should be used to the idea that sweeping pronouncements about 23 year olds - especially athletic ones - is a bit presumptuous.

For me, baseball is one of those sports where the individual contribution is easy enough to glean - the reason statistical analysis works in baseball is that at its heart, it is a series of one-on-one interactions, compared to 5-on-5 NBA or 11-on-11 NFL. Now I would never just run down the list of bWAR, fWAR leaders and stop there, but it is a fair starting point to identify player value. But the direction and magnitude can tell you whether the player created reasonably close value. Obviously a good team gets more mileage out of value than a bad one (the marginal value of wins). And yes, the MVP can be a pitcher (the real reason the Pedro year was so scandalous) and it can be from a bad team. (using team results too heavily in MVP voting means you are voting on crappy teammates, not MVP)

Also the pitch count here did not matter as much as the 4th time through the order. You see evidence that the 4th (and sometimes 3rd) look at a pitcher makes a significant difference (the familiarity and fatigue intersect).

Familia was also lights out the entire rest of the postseason. Just giving the Royals a 4th look at a pitcher with the season on the line was dicey. It wasn't as bad as Grady in 2003, or Bob Melvin (a good manager too!) not moving a muscle as Jon Lester imploded in the WC game last year, but it was bad. Collins was suboptimal all series.

Gold Gloves are largely reputation based - and usually a player has to become good offensively to get on people's radars. It's silly of course. Cy Young tends to be solid largely - there are some shaky years (Welch over Clemens in 1990) but largely the voters seem to do fine. MVP you get a lot of doozies because of how open ended the criteria is and writers projecting the value of contention (which means it's a referendum on a player's teammates). In my lifetime as a fan, just looking at the AL there have been howlers. For a quick version, I used baseball reference, and said it was a good vote if the MVP was within 1.5 WAR of the lead. This means that a bad choice is one where there were obviously better candidates. I noted a couple of borderline years where voters chose the 2nd best player by WAR in a year where the leader was a pitcher who lapped the field. 1987: George Bell over Boggs, Alan Trammell, Clemens, Viola 1989: Yount over Henderson, Boggs, Saberhagen 1992: Eckersley over Clemens, Mussina, Appier, Puckett 1993: Thomas over Appier, Griffey, Olerud, Langston, Lofton 1995: Vaughn over Randy Johnson, Valentin (and yes, Belle) 1996: JuanGone over Griffey, ARod, Knoblauch, Hentgen 1997: Griffey over Clemens (Griffey was actually a good choice 2nd in the AL in WAR but Clemens was such a monster that year) 1998: JuanGone over ARod, Clemens, Jeter, Kenny Rogers, Chuck Finley, Pedro, Belle, Nomar 1999: Pudge over Pedro, Alomar, Manny, Jeter 2000: Giambi over Pedro, ARod 2002: Tejada over ARod, Thome, Halladay, Derek Lowe 2004: Vlad over Ichiro, Johan Santana, Schilling, ARod, Tejada 2006: Morneau over Santana, Sizemore, Vernon Wells, Chien Ming Wang, Carlos Guillen 2009: Mauer over Greinke (Greinke was really good for KC that year, but Mauer was excellent choice among "everybody else") 2012: Cabrera over Trout What is encouraging though about all the awards is that as the writers have turned over, the voting has gotten better informed. There are notably "finer" choices in the 2000s.

Collins bullpen deployment was dreadful all series. Using Familia in a 6 run game for mop up, then the next night bringing him for a 5 out save, and then not using him in the situation where he was most successful. That was Grady-esque. Considering I have seen the Red Sox - down 3-2 in consecutive years come basically 5 outs away from winning 4 straight do or die games in Yankee stadium (with a one legged pitcher and John Burkett's entrails, and a guy on 2 days rest as 3 of the 4 starters) - the hypothesizing about the Mets in KC is foolish.

It's a lot worse than that - apparently Shapiro said he strongly disagreed with some of Anthopolous' deadline deals. The deals which got them 2 wins from the pennant. This sure feels like Rogers is going to cheap out after building a team that can contend next year with just a couple of moves.

BTW: The Anthoopolous business is a major major cluster for Toronto

No - because the conditions are known. It's one thing to enter a gig with your eyes open - it is another thing to have the gig you have change.

It's a treatable illness.

I am curious now with the Toronto job open whether he gets a call - who knows what direction Shapiro will take that.

It is. Shows that at the end of the day, these are jobs. Your old boss gets replaced, that might be enough to change gigs - especially if you are in demand.

As I've noted - not a centerpiece of a deal but a valuable one. Good, cheap help is hard to find. His risk is actually quite low - as is his ceiling. He can get on base, the bat is streaky and the glove is breathtaking.

Small samples - he also recorded his only big league save in the toughest spot of his life. Let's not lapse in clutchy mcclutcherson arguments. His stuff can sustain for the contract mostly. He'll get paid very well by somebody and be worth it - mostly.

Bradley wouldn't - although he should be the first guy they offer for anybody. There is power in telling somebody "I have a solid starting CF who will cost you $1.5M for the next three years". That has real value. But I think the Mets would want Betts - as well they should.

Technically Hoyer and Cherington did the Beckett thing

Hard thing with dealing Harvey is that Betts and/or Bogaerts almost has to be in the deal because the Mets are built to contend, and it'd be hard for Alderson to make a deal that will hurt the major league club in the short run. If this were a true sell-off then something like Devers (if you are a believer to the extent that a lot of the industry is) and another guy might be sufficient. But the Mets are going to want major league return. You could argue the same for Cleveland although there are more financial constraints there, but that roster looks promising - that team when Lindor got settled in started to look very good. Both of those teams will want some major league return in a big deal.

Well that and hitting a homerun in 6 straight games

There will be fewer - and likely better openings than Seattle. (which has that combination of poor farm and ownership who does not want to tear down)