moonslav59

If no one will pay him, then he shouldn't/won't opt out, in theory, but then again, players and agents have been wrong about their value before. I could see a team making us take back a player with a high (but lower than JD's) contract to offset the high cost of a DH/PT OF'er, or we just kick in $4-6M to jack up the return we get for him. I do not think there are a lot of teams looking to pay $22M for JD, but it just takes one.

What ever the titles, I'm glad we have some smart new blood in the system.

Maybe that's exactly what happened, or they reached the end of can be done.

Nice win for the Stros.

Had a feeling you were joshin'.

1) We would just trade JD rather than pay him to opt out. 2) No way we get even near $100M, let alone under it. My guess is we'll be around $200M next year. 3) Let's give the guy some breathing room.

No, it won't be easy, but in theory, if this guy could help build the Rays to respectability with 1/3 the budget, it may not take long for us to get back to the top. I admit, I know very little about this guy, so maybe my rosy glasses are doing the talking. I'm more optimistic , now than a few days ago and much more so than before we let DD go.

I think it's going to turn out well with this guy. I'm hopeful he can build the farm up quickly, cut some salary and then fins some bargains on the market.

Chaim the New GM! https://www.mlbtraderumors.com/2019/10/red-sox-to-hire-chaim-bloom.html?utm_source=dlvr.it&utm_medium=facebook

Where is your supporting evidence?

It's a trade-off. We expected more good years from Pedey, and had he not got hurt, maybe they would have off set his final 2 years. It is a big gamble, but getting 2 more prime years on the front end for Betts makes the gamble worth it. Take the Price deal. Would it look so bad had we gotten the 2 years before he came here added to his deal? Sure, it might still look bad, but clearly not as bad. Year 1: 3.11 ERA in 171 IP Year 2: 2.45 in 221 IP. Take the Pedroia deal: what if he signed it 2 years earlier. It would be over right now and we'd have this instead: 2012: 4.3 WAR 2013: 4.9 WAR Hell, I'd almost take Pedey on a 10 year deal with those two years added and the final two still to come. Even the Pablo and HRam deals would look much better, if we signed them 2 years earlier and they put up the same numbers with us. They might still look bad, but not horrible. Betts is still young. He's got a lot of prime still left to go. Losing him for the meat of his prime would be a shame.

Would a 10 year deal to a 23 year old be okay?

It's virtually impossible, by the odds, to flip a coin that many times and get heads every time. It's not a snake bite. They lost to better teams. It's kind of surprising they have no wins, and it's almost enough to make me want to change my vote to "No, not at all." Almost. One reason could be that many of these lower teams make the playoffs by being balanced and having good 4th, 5th and 6th starters but not great top line 1-2-3 starters. The playoffs, with so many days off, favor teams with monsters at the top of their rotations. The rich and powerful teams. Teams that pay to have a great closer. Still, the better teams win more often. I can't understand why this is even being debated.

It certainly is, and that is one reason they play 162 games to determine who makes the playoffs. No doubt, luck, momentum and other factors play into who advances and wins it all, but the better team does win more often than not. We can argue about how much more, but I find it hard to believe anyone thinks it's totally random- that it is a "complete crap shoot." I answered "To a limited degree-but generally not," but "It's half true" seems reasonable, too. In football, the best team wins more often than baseball, but the one and done playoff format makes it so the best teams don't win all the time. Basketball and Hockey play series like baseball, and I think the better teams win more often in those sports than baseball. In my earlier post, I used W-L records to show who were the best teams and who were not, and I realize that is not always a true measure for ranking the contenders. Take the Nats, they were the best second half team but not a top 2 NL team by record this season. There seems to be very few total surprise winners of the World Series, where a team did not finish in the top 2-3 of the league in W-L and did not play very well at the end of the season. No big trades made them better than their records indicated, yet they went on to win it all. If it was "mostly" a crap shoot, one would expect it to happen fairly often. Since 2000, I only see the 2006 St. Louis Cardinals as the only eye-opening WS winner. They won just 83 games, that year. The 2014 Giants were a bit surprising, but they had won in 2012. People point to the Royals win as a fluke, and the fact that they had crappy SP'ing, made it seem like a long shot, but they had the best record in the AL that year (2nd best in MLB).

I'm 100% in on Robo umps. Pitchers will learn what a strike & ball is. batters will learn, too. No arguments. Get the game over with!

No, they won't. My post was in jest.

I agree, and even without JD in the line-up, we should score a lot of runs. With the budget space cleared by trading JD or seeing him opt out, we can replace Porcello and add a pen arm. We may not get "flashy," but maybe that is what we need to do anyways.

So, maybe we package Betts and Price in a trade to the Dodgers for the next Ruby de la Rosa.

To me, very soon means by 2021 or 2022. I'd be fine with 2024, if the team and farm look very strong by then. If we keep the budget just under the tax line, we should still be fun to watch next season, even if not playoff bound. (I do think we can make the playoffs without JBJ and JD, if we spend the money saved wisely.)

And, the team's JD decision, if he decides to stay.

I would hope so. The comps are not really that good, since Bags was traded as a prospect and Betts is proven and making $28M+.

Yes, but Dan D did provide a nice foundation for Theo to work with. Plus, I think Theo was given a fatter checkbook. We went from an $81M budget in 2000 to $127 in '04 and $143 in '07.

My point was about NOT letting Bagwell go and Not letting Betts go, either. With the lousy comp pick we might get for Betts, we'll be lucky to get a decent RP'er.

I'm not saying we don't have a history of meddling, but I will say not all of it bad. All I'm saying is Lucchino is not around anymore. He was the punching bag for a lot of posters. Maybe the people who might "meddle" in the future will have a more positive influence. Maybe they won't meddle, and we'll wish they had. I'm just saying, "Who knows?" I don't know much about this new guys, so I'm not about to say make him king and anoint him the only guy who makes decisions. Many successful teams and businesses make team/group decisions.

2016-2019 WAR 34.9 Trout 30.7 Betts (Mookie is closer to Trout than Yelich) 25.4 Yelich 24.2 Rendon 23.2 Lindor 22.8 Altuve 22.6 J Ramirez 22.4 Arenado 21.7 Bryant 20.5 Bregman 19.8 Freeman 19.7 Y Grandal 19.7 Bogaerts Other notables: 17. Machado 18.1 19. Judge 17.8 25. Harper 15.6