drewski6

they got yu chang off a dfa. you cna always find good defensive noodlebats.

Whats the projected wrc+

Thats great, im talking about hitting.

I disagree that we'd be 18th in runs if you subtract Duran, Bregman and only add the Japanese hitter. And also, I think the dudes who want the Japanese player are underestimating his market and hes not as cheap as they pencil him in for, either. Also, SD didnt get out of the first round.

I think me too

The reason why you would trade Mayer for Marte is so you would have one hitter in the top 50. One very good one for 2026. Because right now, we have 0. Im reading the arguments why not, and Im very hesitant to move Mayer myself for a lot of reasons mentioned. It does open a hole, I get that. But lets not act like there is 0 point to getting a dude who would be easily the best hitter on our team next year. Ortiz and Manny are not walking through that door.

Of course, haha. Carrolls name is a deal breaker, im sure. might even get you blocked.

I would have liked Lodolo, I like the pitcher a lot. We , at this point, have 11 pitchers and 0 guys who were top 50 hitters last year (if we move Duran for Lodolo). If you think one 22 yr old sophmore (Roman) is enough, you are punting

Rotation was a strength of the team last year, youve added 3 pitchers already. We're flipping our best trade chip (an offensive player) for a .....fourth pitching acquisition? What happened to two big bats? What happened to one? But Okajoko has 0 major league at-bats. Who hits second, third, fourth? ANd if its a wildcard (okie), abreu, and story guess what? Rotation is NOT going to matter. Cuz your fourth place. Five aces and your fourth place. Is Kutter Crawford hitting third? You all may think you want pitching and defense even if it comes with noodlebat city, but ive seen that movie before and you'll be turning off the game when its 2-0 in the second because we'l be averaging 1.8 runs / game. Then 3 of your five aces will get hurt. The BP will start blowing games and we'll be talking about 2028 in July while Pumpsie takes a victory lap. Do you, though.

Cedanne, Duran, Bello, Mayer for Corbin Caroll and Marte take it or leave it.

TY for reading the longer post.

Im not including mayer for joe ryan.

good counter point

good clarification

Sure. But my point (and this is not about the specific players being mentioned): If you are worried about 2026-2036 equal weight, you will likely not be as aggressive building the best team possible for 2026-2028 (shorter window) as teams that prioritize that shorter window over the larger 10 year window. Okay. Well, we'll get them in 2030, right! Well now its 2030 and you are trying to build a team that can compete from 2030-2040 (still looking at a ten year window) but now you are competing with an entirely different team (that first team won a championship in 2028 but now has bad contracts and is screwed for a few years, okay). But now theres a different team that is prioritizing 2030-2033 (short term) and overpaying (giving away too many years to FA's) window. Lets say they get a ship in 2032. Thats okay, we'll get em in 2035, right? Now its 2035, and we wanna make sure we are good for the next 10 years! So we are equal weighting them and trying to build a team that will be competitive from 2035-2045. That team that won this ship in 2032 is trapped under the bad contracts (hahaha, look at those fools) but theres a brand new team focusing on the short term. And they start gobbling chanmpionships from 2035-2038. Well, those fools might be celebrating today, but just you wait until 2040! Now its 2040, and we want to make sure we are good for the next 10 years! But while we are looking to be as good as possible over a long term, we arent being as aggressive in the 2040-2043 window as some teams that are prioritizing that window. And guess who's back now that its 2040, its that team that won a championship in 2028 bolded above. And you are thinking you are going to hurt yourselves 5 years out just like you did last time! Sure, but they are embracing the cyclical nature of this and now they are set up for a second compete window while we've been kicking the can down the road for decades.

I would only preach caution with this line of thinking. And its my usual catch phrase: if you are always dreaming about tomorrow , tomorrow never comes. YOu wanna choose mayer to build around , fine. But 5 years from now, I dont want to be hearing would you raher have mayer at $x or the NEXT 22 year old. Youll always get more value from a WAR divided by salary for the next one on their way up. So there comes a time where a team needs to decide if they are going to consider themselves in a "window" and not exclusively chase expected future value or if they are going to perpetually punt and kick the can down the road (like the As and Pirates do). This is not a case for Polanco over Mayer, just an acknowledgement that if you are basing your decision on expected future value of 6 years vs 2, then you are not prioritizing the short term. And thats a trap. There is a time to prioritize on the short term and I honestly believe for a big market team its at least 50% of the time (small market you have to take longer to rebuild). Not saying we should go for Polanco, but lets say it was an elite player , who you can get. Youll always be able to find someone more valuable and therefore youll always be able to justify not getting an elite player and thats not where i want to be. A team that breaks every potential signing down to value vs other options. Thats great when you are at certain points in your cycle, but to get over the hump, there comes a time when we should stop value chasing. We may be in that mode and just not like Polanco (which is fine) or we may fail to understand this (like that article I posted a few days ago points out). Teams that ALWAYS look 5 years out and chase maximum efficiency are the pirates and a's. Its fine to look 5 years out, but if its 5 years later and youre still looking 5 years out, you arent ever really being aggressive. And a lot of that is punting on accountability. Look at Bloom years. Look whats coming down the pipeline! Dont worry about these last place finishes. All Im saying is this mentality conveniently takes the pressure off performance in a perform or die sport.

Hes also a lot more athletic (he just doesnt look it)

But I 100% agree netiher Polanco nor Kim are worth crying about, its too early in the offseason for that. Maybe if spring training was starting next week, rosters were mostly set (so teams arent looking to trade a whole lot) and this was our last chance to add WAR > 2 players externally. Then maybe a little panic would be warranted. But certainly not right now over Polanco or Kim

They feel and seem high; however, inflation only goes one way, and one thing I think we've seen regarding changes in contracting, is that what separates the contracts from the very good (or better) vs the contracts for "serviceable"/"solid" has been more about years and overall contract than AAV. So by that I mean, teams are willing to pay a higher AAV to keep contracts short-term, and thats why the AAV of these contracts seem high. In baseball, its rare that contracts "snap back" but not uneard of. There are years when free-agency gets especially wacky, but I dont think this is one of those years. Just like theres trends to what we are all looking for in ballplayers (obp vs power vs defense) some "eras" seem to prioritize one over the other, I think the current contracting "era" is that average players get 20-25m for 1-3 years and significantly better than average players get 24-30m for significantly more years (of course age when inking the contract matters a lot as well). Think of it like this: people use to haggle on price when buying a car. But these days, the price is kind of the price (excluding third party sales) and maybe you can get them down a little, but where you negotiate these days is "I want free tune-ups for 3 years" or "I want a free set of extra floormats" Relative to baseball contracts, I think the AAV are becoming less variable , and they seem to be high teens -low twenties for "useful" playres and mid-twenties to low thirties for better than useful players. But where the negotation come in are the structure (opt-outs, protections, incentive vs guaranteed, years)

TY and apologies. Defending exploitation didnt feel to me like something you would excuse. Thats not your brand.

Out of everyone who currently reports to me, the guy who has been with me the longest - is the second from the bottom in pay. Part of it is bad luck regarding when he came in. He is a good friend of mine , and always has my back. Weve worked together previously. He is incredibly loyal, focused, and my right-hand. He is my ace and Im not sure I even want this VP job without him helping me manage it. He will never quit, he will never ask for more money - but he is underpaid, and Im (today) making a stink with corporate and HR about it. SHould I not? Whats my incentive if he continues to do great work wihtout the raise and will never leave. Who even are you, Notin? I didnt think you were this guy

Very simple question - do you not see this as exploitation of a fan base's loyalty and passion? Remember when Kraft fired Mayo after 1 yr, he said "I see myself as the custodian of a public asset", I promise you , if/when it suits them, you'll hear similar from Red Sox.

No, replacing Devers and Bregman with Okamoto and Kim does not make one of the best offseason in bb history lol, and again, you continue to overlook that there are multiple ways to get to the same payroll number. We are sick of the third tier shopping, we are sick of the overpaid AAV 1 year deals, we are sick of always finding an excuse to not get more elite players. We have one elite player Crochet, who we locked up at a discount. This team has gone up 2b in value in the last 5-7 years, and its frankly unacceptable.

Wake me up when we sign the #2 FA.

At this point, Im more comfortable saying top 4. But we'll see.