moonslav59

What really should be the expectations when you are handed these winter spending budgets with so many holes to fill? 2020: $40M and about 12 roster slots to fill (The $40M did not even come close to replacing lost contracts that included Betts, Price & Porcello) 2021: $40M and about 9 roster slots filled 2022: $50M and about 7 slots filled All this with basically just Houck positively contributing anything from the farm over those 3 seasons. Maybe, expectations were set, too high. It's hard to work miracles within this context. Granted, Bloom has not worked all that many wonders with his FA signings, although what is usually expected when forced to sign 2nd and 3rd tier FAs? He did well with Wacha, Strahm, Hill, Refsnyder, Kelly, Kike '21 version, Renfroe & Ottavino (trade w German for Yankee salary dump) Rule 5 & Waiver additions: Whitlock, Schreiber, Arroyo (Ort Trade additions: Pivetta, McGuire, Hosmer (free salary), German, W Abreu, D Hamilton, E Valdez, Verdugo, Wong, Downs, RHernandez (Seabold, Cordero, and a whole bunch of prospects, including Binelas, Wallace, Koss, Ferguson, Rosier and Park) The Story signing is still too early to judge, but he looks better than Semien & Baez. Not so well with: Paxton, Diekman (although dumping him for McGuire seems to more than make up for the signing), Richards, Perez, Marwin & Andriese (both only $3M) I'm not saying Bloom deserves a "feather" for the overall grade for these moves, but given the circumstances he was handed, he looks to have done a pretty good job building the roster depth and farm to a point where the foundation is to a point where a handful of major additions via free agency or trade and about $90M to spend, this winter, the outlook looks way more positive than it has at anytime since before the 2019 season began. I see an overall plus. We have about 15-18 prospects or recent grads that will likely be given serious looks, this year. The amount of slots on the roster needing serious upgrading is at about 5-7- maybe 8, which is way better than 2020 (about 19-21), 2021 (about 11-13) and 2022 (about 8-10.) The $90M spending budget is more than Bloom has had to spend in any of his other 2 years combined, and that's not counting the $10M he already spent on extending Kike. (He had about $130M winter spending in his 3 years, combined, while losing key salaries like Betts, which to me brings the actual number closer to $100M.) He has about $100M to spend in 2023, counting Kike, so let's give the guy a chance to set his legacy as our GM. This may very well be a sink or swim year for Bloom, but if he does a decent but not great job, and our future continues to grow brighter, as it has every year, I think he may still be the GM in 2024, even if we lose the first round of the WC series. It should be an exciting winter season, for once.

TBR with 8 (1 WC loss)

I remember thinking signing Scherzer or Verlander to shorter deals might be the best idea, since we seemed to be avoiding super large and long deals. Here are the biggest deals, last winter. How many look good, now? $43 x 3 Scherzer $35 x 3 Correa (opted out) $33 x 10 Seager $27 x 6 Freeman $26 x 7 Bryant $25 x 7 Semien $25 x 2 Verlander $24 x 3 Stroman $23 x 6 Story $23 x 6 Baez $23 x 5 R Ray $22 x 5 Gausman $22 x 2 Rodon $21 x 1 Syndergaard $20 x 5 Castellenos $20 x 4 Schwarber $20 x 4 Marte other 4+ Years 15.4 x 5 ERod 15 x 4 C Taylor 14.5 x 4 R Iglesias 14 x 4 Jon Gray 13 x 4 Av Garcia 11 x 4 Matz

Heard the same on Semien & Baez, but Suzuki was the most talked about.

It did not upset most of us.

H a p p y T H A N K S G I V I N G !

That does seem to be a powerful motivator for some.

One amazing statline for DHern is his K/9 rate. His 85 IP sample size is small, but among all MLB with 85+ IP in the history of MLB, only 8 pitchers have a better rate: 15.3 J Hader 14.8 A Diaz 14.7 Chapman 14.5 Dev Williams 14.5 Betances 14.4 Kimbrel 14,3 Karinchak 14.1 N Anderson 14.0 DHern Since he walks so many batters, his K% ranks only 21st (32.3%,) but still that's pretty damn good. It's the 18% BB rate (7.7 BB/9) that he can't seem to overcome.

There are only 6 players on the 40 man roster who were on the 40 man at the end of the 2019 season. Others were in the system but not on the 40. Those 6 are (in order of 40 man seniority) Barnes (added 9/14) Sale (added 12/16) Devers (added 7/17) Brasier (added 7/18) Taylor (added 11/18) DHern (added 11/18) Dalbec was added 11/19, but the other 33 were added after Feb, 2020 (Verdugo). This is fast becoming Bloom's team, although many of the younger players were in the system, when he arrived.

His xFIP of 3.49 was even better than his 2018 3.79 xFIP. His .793 OPS Against was nothing to brag about, but it was better than Crawford and Bello's in 2022. I'd say Ort, Brasier and DHern are all in the same rocking boat. Taylor may be, as well, if he's not over his injury.

But, he throws as hard as DHern, That was the point I was responding to. Again, I'm not defending Brasier. I think he'll be DFA'd, at some point this winter, but he's not some junk ball pitcher.

That's part of it, for sure, but it still puzzles me how these two minor deals are so upsetting to some. Do they really believe these are the only types of moves Bloom will make, this winter?

Yes, it's a broken record, no doubt. Nobody learns anything.

This happens early winter every year. There are 30 teams looking to sign or trade for players. Someone always complains after just about every significant signing. Now, in keeping with out times, people are complaining about minor deals. We could sign Judge, Turner and deGrom for $10M each, and someone would still complain about Nimmo signing with the Mets.

MLB.com has him at 5-11 and 151.

It sure does help. One could argue "crapshoot" on the fact that the AL Cy Young Award winner was not the one that carried the Astros to a ring.

It's a long winter. I feel pretty certain, Bloom will make some bold signings and or trades. There will be a lot to talk about, at some point.

If you take RHern off my DFA list, it only makes my point stronger. No, I don't think Park is below Dalbec on the to be DFA'd list. Maybe we pull off a trade of one or two of these guys for lower level prospects not n eeded to be on the 40 man, and Dalbec, Downs, Duran and DHern- the D-leaguers- would be near the top of that list. One might also call it the sell low list, but maybe some team wants them.

Not many real good players have signed with anyone. The clock is ticking, but there is a lot of time left to make the bold moves we are expecting or hoping for.

The Phillies did, yes, but the clearly best team won.

I do think the Sox will not DFA DHern, first, but I think he's about tied with Brasier. You do know Braiser throws 95-97 and touches 98, often. https://www.fangraphs.com/players/ryan-brasier/5615/graphs?pitchgraphs=true&statArr=&legend=1&split=base&time=daily&start=2020&end=2022&rtype=mult&gt1=15&dStatArray=FA&ymin=&ymax= I'm not defending Brasier. I think they both should go, if we add 5-6 new players. Their velo charts are pretty similar: https://www.fangraphs.com/players/darwinzon-hernandez/19848/graphs?pitchgraphs=true&statArr=&legend=1&split=base&time=daily&start=2020&end=2022&rtype=mult&gt1=15&dStatArray=FA&ymin=&ymax=

So, #2-6 go, but if we sign a 6th FA, who is #6? It has to be DHern, Downs or Duran (maybe via trade.)

I'm not trying to rub it in. Most disliked the deal to some extent on day one. Yes, he was rather consistent from 2017-2019, despite that word just not seeming appropriate for JBJ, but those 3 pretty even years were all major step downs from 2015-2016. OPS+ 119 '15 118 '16 89 '17 92 '18 89 '19 Now, had JBJ just given us a 90 OPS+ in '22, he'd have lasted the year, so it's not like there was no hope, at all. I had hopes, too. However, I was not all that excited about his 116 OPS+ in the short 2020 season. JBJ, as we all knew, has had several short stretches of hitting very well. I did not see that season as any sort of renewal of hopes. Obviously, the Brewers did. After the horrific 2021 season and heading into his age 32 season, the "hope" was too long a shot to realistically think it would happen. I applaud the idea that our defense needed improving, but all D and no O OF'ers are a dime a dozen, and we paid dearly to get JBJ back. I'm not gloating that some of us were right about the deal "making no sense," but the only hope for that trade was always about Binelas and Hamilton.

I did not know he was rule 5 eligible, since he was on the 40 ma roster, already.

I'm not sure how adding 2 players makes it any easier to pick someone on Rule 5.