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Front Office Chat: 2/9/24
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Hyun-Jin Ryu
3:34
Why has my market been so slow to develop? Are the inning limits from last season, combined with my age, suppressing demand? Surely there enough teams that could use solid starting pitching. At this point, it seems like a near-guarantee that I'll be confined to a one-year deal, but what might my price range be? Who would be the best team fits in your mind?
Anthony Franco
3:36
Yeah he's not a super appealing free agent to me. Limited workload within starts last year, as you mentioned. He's never thrown hard but the velocity was down another tick relative to before the surgery
3:37
I'd put him in the $8-10MM range. Pittsburgh makes sense to me. They still need starters, big enough home park to mitigate some of the HR issues he has had in the last couple years
Jon
3:37
Who will the Marlins sign to finally give all 30 teams a free agent deal?
Anthony Franco
3:37
Feels like it'll be a shortstop. Guess I'll take Rosario
bill Johnson
3:37
Even if SF signs, say, Snell AND Chapman, would that be enough to make them competitive in the NL West?
Anthony Franco
3:38
They'd still be below the Dodgers. Viable Wild Card team though and a longshot division threat if L.A. stumbles
Pitching Market
3:38
Did the Burnes trade make Cease less valuable? They are similar producers but Burnes has been more reliable and Milwaukee just settled for a mediocre return for a single season. Chicago has to be worried now right? They can't afford to mess up the trade and get something like that, but Cease hasn't been "ace" material since 2022, so he may deflate his value even more if they wait until the deadline.
Anthony Franco
3:40
No, I don't think teams will see Burnes as a great comp. Cease having the extra year of control is a huge factor. Assuming he's pitching well towards the deadline, Chicago will be able to market him as a more direct parallel with Luis Castillo, José Berríos, etc. since they're dangling two pennant races instead of one
Dano
3:40
Is Billy Eppier done in baseball after the commissioner's decision?  I find it interesting that he was the only one punished.  Seems like that's not something you can do by yourself.
Anthony Franco
3:41
Very weird development on the surface but I don't know what Eppler did, so it's hard to say whether the ban was justified. Whatever it was clearly stretched beyond the typical "phantom IL" stuff
3:42
Without knowing the details it's tough to guess whether it's a career ender, but a year-long suspension isn't easy to come back from as an executive
Father time
3:42
thoughts on where Votto ends up at this point?
Anthony Franco
3:43
Angels or Padres seem like the best fits to me
Vinnie
3:43
Do the Royals' moves this year get them to 75 wins with a continued upswing for 2025, where they can buy more pitching?
Anthony Franco
3:45
I'd take the under on 75. Even with Pasquantino coming back, I don't think the Frazier/Renfroe additions are enough on offense to spur a 19-win improvement relative to last season
3:46
They're improved certainly, but this is still an upper 60s win team for me. They're going to have a really hard time scoring
Orioles Forever
3:46
Does Fernando Tatis contract have any surplus value? Feel like its torpedo'd with suspension, injury, position change. (Maybe Cubs, Red Sox, Giants would take it on)
Anthony Franco
3:47
Nah it's above-market. It was backloaded contract to begin with, so the highest-value years were going to be the early ones
3:48
Then all the factors you mentioned plus a good, not great offensive season in 2023 dealt subsequent hits to his value. Still a really good player, but he wouldn't get $317MM as a free agent this winter
Prospects
3:48
I know you guys aren't prospect evaluators, but from your quasi-in-the-know positions, how do you think national prospect evaluators (BA, Pipeline, etc.) compare and contrast the various league/ballpark factors when ranking various organizations' young talent against each other? A system like Arizona (and most West Coast based teams) is so screwed by Reno and Amarillo being completely unfair to pitchers and so favorable to hitters. Do those guys/teams just get the short stick on stuff like PPI picks now because it's hard to justify ranking a SP on a Top 100 list (ditto for power hitters who don't have to worry about much beyond getting the bat on the ball to hit a home run)?
Anthony Franco
3:49
The PPI aspect is an interesting observation. I hadn't considered that
3:51
Public prospect evaluators are aware of the challenges with the PCL environment obviously. I think they do a good job of not overcorrecting for the environment but I could see there still being some bias against slotting a borderline top 100 pitcher on there if he's sitting on a 6.00 ERA in AAA, sure
3:53
I guess the counterpoint would be to question whether the inverse is true as well. Does Brandon Pfaadt get pushed higher than he deserved because he had a 2.63 ERA in 10 starts in Reno, where that feels like it should be impossible, late in 2022? It's an interesting question
RAGBRAI
3:53
Not much love for Pittsburgh in the NLC standings, is it mostly just pitching keeping them in the basement?  It's not like anyone really stands out in the Central, where a few lucky breaks make them more than an after thought.
Anthony Franco
3:54
They also need some offensive breakouts from guys like Cruz, Hayes, Henry Davis that the Reds already got last year. But yeah, the pitching staff is what has them at the bottom of the Central for me. That rotation outlook is rough
Lefty
3:54
Will the floodgates open on February 14th (60-day IL DAY)? Or will Boras continue to make us all suffer? Is the delay of moves good for MLB Trade Rumors traffic?
Anthony Franco
3:55
Should spur a couple small deals but it's not going to open the floodgates. No one's holding off on signing Blake Snell because they're afraid of DFAing an out-of-options middle reliever earlier than they need to
3:57
It's probably slightly negative from a traffic perspective for us. I could see it being a positive if the Boras Corp. were constantly leaking updates on the markets for these players, but they're playing things really quietly. You can argue there hasn't been a substantive Cody Bellinger report since the middle of December. That doesn't do a whole lot for us
Padres Fan
3:57
Hello Anthony. Are the Padres really opening camp with no 4th and 5th starters and no starting left and center fielders?
Anthony Franco
3:58
Haha, when you put it like that, they can't be done. I do still expect they'll add a fairly cheap outfielder and a boring depth starter
Blake Snell
3:58
If we assume $10M/WAR on the open market, did Snell and Boras really over play their hand this Winter? He's most likely to end up around 2.0 WAR in any season and if he's really good, luck into a third Cy Young Award. There's no chance they actually expect to get $30M/yr right? Even $25M/year is going to be a bad contract right away. What team is desperate enough to take that risk? Anaheim feels like the obvious option, but they don't pay for pitchers anymore, so San Francisco? They have to know Snell doesn't do anything than take them from a 4th place finish to vying for 3rd right? Would Snell agree to a base salary of $20Mish with loads of incentives to keep him motivated to be better than he realistically has been?
Anthony Franco
4:02
Projecting Snell as a two-WAR pitcher is pretty harsh. His camp clearly wouldn't agree that that's what a team should expect.  I don't love WAR for pitchers generally -- it leads to the question about how to assign run prevention credit between a pitcher and the defense behind him -- but even if you feel like he's typically a #3 caliber starter, that he has twice rattled off Cy Young seasons means he's a lot more exciting than a stable mid-rotation arm
4:03
Boras got Rodón to $162MM over six coming off a less impressive platform year with an even spottier durability track record. I still don't see why Snell would come in below that
LGM
4:03
Why are the Mets not trying to seriously contend this year, just because some of their prospects aren't ready?
Why are the Mets not even having conversations with Pete about a much needed extension?
Anthony Franco
4:05
Both fair questions. Touched on this in the Vientos/JDM question earlier but I agree with you on the first point that they should still be aggressive about making a push this year. The NL Wild Card picture is pretty open
4:07
Alonso isn't the kind of player that Stearns prioritized in Milwaukee, where they placed a premium on defensive value and routinely rotated through power-hitting first base options on the cheap. New York is a completely different animal for a few reasons -- payroll most obviously, but it's also a much tougher park for hitters so it should be more difficult to find cheap power production -- but I can see him wanting to wait that one out
4:08
Maybe Vientos does take a step forward or they decide that Baty's best suited at first base. Alonso's also a Boras client who is one year from free agency. Even if they open extension talks, the Mets probably aren't optimistic about getting anything done before he gets to test the market
Mike
4:08
Any chance the Marlins will be a wildcard  team again this season?
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