moonslav59

He does hit both handed pitching exactly equally over his career..

It's going to be the auction of the century.

I get the concern on Sale, but he still had great numbers even with reduced velocity. He's shown he can be a pitcher not a thrower. One has to think that once Sale is traded, Quintana might be on the block. I mean why stop there, if you are in rebuild mode. What has not been discussed is who else is part of these packages. If it's just Moncada for Sale, then I'd be leaning towards doing it, but they might want JBJ too. I might give Swihart, Moncada, Owens, Hembree and Pablo (and cash) for Sale and Frazier. The money paid on Pablo would be just enough to keep us under the luxury limit, if we traded Buch for a low cost RP'er or two. I think Sale + Frazier = $13.5M, so that balances out Buch's contract. We could pay $10M of Pablo's $19M a year and still be under the limit. That might not be enough to a team looking to rebuild and talking on Pablo's problems, but it's probably close.

These two guys have many similarities with Buch, although I still think Buch at his very best has three times had better stretches than these two and should be a better risk-reward gamble for some GM. Let's see what the Dodgers get for these guys, and we'll have some sort of idea what we might be able to get for Buch, if we are looking to trade him and fill some slots with the savings.

In many ways, it's nice to have almost all of our 25 man roster locked up for 2 or more years. The Pablo contract is a bummer, but he's really the only one on the luxury tax budget that is a clear drain. We will be very limited in our spending, but we have a lot of young players who haven't even reached prime yet. We should expect even more production from our 26 and under players over the next 2-5 years. That's something to be hopeful about. My guess is, we reset this year and then go over during next year's much better FA class. The tax will not be that much after a reset, and then we have a lot of money coming off the books after 2018 (luxury tax dollars used): $22M (maybe) on HanRam with his vesting option based on 105+0 PAs (17-18) and passing the physical $10.5M Kimbrel $??? Joe Kelly $??? Drew Pomeranz $??? Robbie Ross Now, it's not necessarily a good thing we're losing some of these salaries, because some of these players may be hard to replace at the same of less cost, but going over for the 2018 season might set us up to reset again in 2019, depending on how our top prospects are helping fill some of these gaps at a very low cost. Our biggest need areas have some promising prospects waiting in the wings near and far away: 3B: Moncada, Devers, Dalbec (Hernandez, Chavis, Dubon) P: Kopech, Owens, Johnson, TBall, Ysla, Shawaryn (Groome, Raudes, Lakins) 1B (assuming HR moves to DH): Travis or Moncada, Devers or Dalbec from 3B (Longhi, Ockimey) 4th OF'er: Basabe or Moncada There's still room for optimism on our budget of the future, and we there's always a chance we can dump some salary, especially if a prospect beats out a high salary player for his job, and that player is talented enough to have trade value or not need a significant payoff offset.

If we don't win in the next two years (Kimbrel's deal runs out and Price has an opt out) then I hope our longer term future will bring some rings. No doubt, we'd have a better chance with Margot, Espi and others, even if we ended up trading them for longer controlled players. Look, I do thinkw e can win in the next two years, but we're not really close to being favorites, if we can;t spend more than $10M this winter.

I hear you, but it seemed like DD went for a win in the next 2-3 years, so now we may be trying to play it both ways and may end up with nothing now, and we gave up enough of the future to damage those chances too.

I'm really high on Moncada too. It could be a huge mistake trading him for anyone. I look at it this way: we'd not only get an ace, but we'd also be able to trade a SP'er in a high demand market for something worthwhile, or we'd move a starter to the pen and solve that problem.

But, they didn't ask for Swanson and Albiers from ATL.

I used career numbers, because most of the ones from Yankee stadium were in the last 3 years. Comparing them to the career numbers from Fenway was not a good comp. You are right. Since CB is not the CB of his prime, a better comp would have been the last 3 years at each park, although the Fenway numbers would be a much smaller sample size: OPS Year @NY @ BOS 2016 .961 (201 PAs)/.250 (just 8 PAs) 2015 .786 (272 PAs)/ 1.065 (21 PAs) 2014 .772 (238 PAs)/ 1.206 (28 PAs) These sample sizes prove nothing, but they certainly don't prove CB has been a better hitter in NY than in BOS over the last 3 years. Now that CB is with HOU, and the cost was probably too high for us, even if it was a good deal, let's move on. I'm glad he's on the Astros, and the Yanks got MH.

One big thing about is the luxury tax cost vs actual cost. Only a few teams are worried about the tax...the Sox being one. Luxury cost: $6.5M per year Actual cost: 17:$12M, 18:$12.5M club option ($1M buyout), 19:$13.5M club option ($1M buyout) $37M/3 or $12.3M a year average

Good points. I wonder if Swihart, Margot and Espi would have gotten us Sale. I doubt it would take JBJ and Moncada though.

How about Pablo to balance off some of Miggy's massive overpay , Swihart, Travis, Basabe and Owens? LOL

Well, the vast majority of CB;s numbers in NY came in the last two years, and besides, the Sox pitching was better prior to the purge of 2012.

MH turns 37 in January. He only has played in 183 games total over the last two years. His OPS has been in near steady (but slow) decline since 2010: .922 2010 .912 2011 .877 2012 .879 2013 .811 2014 .804 2015 .782 2016 His lefty-righty splits are exactly the same over his career though.

Pretty close, probably. IW as just countering your point.. 2014-2016 (the years CB's been with the Yanks) ERA- BOS 98 NYY 99

But, not ever having to face Yankee pitching at Yankee Stadium has to be factored in too.

II get your point, but guys like Sale don't become available at $6.5M.... ever.

I'm glad it was them not us. $13M is insanity.

If we want to reset the luxury tax, I agree. We are going to need to settle on a platoon guy like Moss, Alvarez or Lind.

We need a LH'd hitter to pair with Young. Signing MH means Young or Beni sits vs LHPs. That's insane.

Fair enough. Signing a good 8th inning guy will probably cost the $10M we have to spend.

Moncada's 10 game MLB sample size this year has nothing to do with my opinion. Moncada ise a true top prospect. I have suggested trading him for Quintana long before his showing in the bigs this year. I realize the risk is huge risk. Moncada could be a generational talent. It's my opinion Sale already is, and at $6.5M off the luxury limit, he could help us acquire other talent in the years to come. I also have very high hopes for Devers. I'm a little worried about Moncada's defense and what position he might eventually get to be a decent fielder.

Signing MH would be unforgivable, unless it's for $3M a year. It's no secret I haven't been happy with DD's major moves, but I understood the reasoning behind them. Signing MH makes zero sense, especially if we are indeed trying to stay under the limit.

Rating catching defense has always been a tough task. For what's it's worth, here's where the playoff teams ranked on fangraph's team catcher defense page: 4 BOS 7 CLE 10 SFG 11 C Cubs 12 TEX 14 WSH 15 LAD 18 BAL 29 TOR Looks like a slightly closer correlation to better catcher defense than better catcher offense, in terms of making the playoffs.