MLB 2020

[biggie]

Well there's already been some discussion of baseball on the Yahoo! fantasy app as well as trash talking in the 2019 thread so I figured let's get this thing started.

We have just under 2 weeks for pitchers and catchers to report, the Red Sox still don't have a manager, & Mookie Betts may soon be a member of the NL West.

I'm sure ButteredToast is having a grand ol' time.

Now as I end every seasons' opening post....


P L A Y B A L L !

 

[Del Rio]

Cards made absolutely no moves of note this offseason and even lost Ozuna. But the Crew and Flubs arguably lost even more this offseason, so as long as we finish ahead of them I'm good. Reds might be decent for once kappa

 

[Texas Cloverleaf]

Whomever the owner of Bichette's rights is, are you willing to trade them?

 

[Captain Skywalker]

I'm a happy Reds fan this offseason :] Shout out to the Cubs for letting us sign Castellanos and Strop. And the Brewers for letting us sign Mike Moustakas. And Japan for letting us sign Shogo Akiyama. Honestly, the Cubs and Brewers are overrated so I think the only competition is STL.

 

[Stallion]

Whomever the owner of Bichette's rights is, are you willing to trade them?

This would be me. I'm open to hearing you out, but it's not going to be cheap.

 

[Stallion]

Also biggie are you doing that usual thing where you mention who's keeper eligible and their cost closer to the draft? And it's 5 keepers for this league right?

 

[biggie]

Also biggie are you doing that usual thing where you mention who's keeper eligible and their cost closer to the draft? And it's 5 keepers for this league right?

Yes indeed. The eligible keeper list will most likely come well before draft cost calculation. Maybe we should nail down a date now for when I should base the costs off of.

Also it's up to 6 keepers.

 

[Captain Skywalker]

This would be me. I'm open to hearing you out, but it's not going to be cheap.

Whomever the owner of Bichette's rights is, are you willing to trade them?

Nick Senzel and Jonathon India for Bo Bichette who says no?

 

[ButteredToast]

From everything I'm hearing, the Red Sox are heavily leaning towards their bench coach Ron Roenickie as the Cora replacement but they're waiting until the Red Sox league investigation is over to name him in the off chance he is indited and they have to fire him. So I'm convinced they'll have a manager.

Chris Young also came out and said that he brought the Apple Watch idea over to the Red Sox from the Yankees sign stealing efforts. He has since denied he ever said that but I'm telling you... if you think the Yankees ain't going down swinging in this whole thing too right after the Red Sox...

As for Mookie, screw the fans that want him out of town and screw the ownership for leaking lowball offers to the public to try and justify him being traded. Red Sox ownership has me by the balls because it's not like I'm going to stop being a fan of the team. But how the Red Sox ownership cheapskates out on its own homegrown players and demands them to all take a massive discount and then goes on to give massive bags to free agents in spite of the home grown guys is beyond me.

Pay Mookie his $38 million or whatever at the end of the year. Set a precedent for Devers that we take care of our own players. Send a message to the league that Boston is where you want to be as a player. And just pay the damned home grown people what they're worth.

 

[Captain Skywalker]

I'm not a Red Sox fan so I'm curious:
Does Mookie Betts leading the team to a title in 2018 justify the idea of him being traded? The idea would be that the team is content with the one WS title and sell off Mookie because it would be cheaper without him and since they've won a WS recently, that they're okay with not winning more.
If that's NOT the case, then I am puzzled by the ownership wanting to send him out of town. You would think the potential for more WS titles would give the ownership a reason to keep Mookie but I guess being cheap is more important. Granted, the contracts handed out to Eovaldia, Price, Martinez, and Sandoval are probably to blame here
I'm a Reds fan and they haven't even won a playoff series since I've been alive so at this point I would be okay with one WS title. But the Red Sox aren't the Reds. It's different in Boston. Boston fans aren't starved for success like Cincinnati fans are

 

[ButteredToast]

I'm not a Red Sox fan so I'm curious:
Does Mookie Betts leading the team to a title in 2018 justify the idea of him being traded? The idea would be that the team is content with the one WS title and sell off Mookie because it would be cheaper without him and since they've won a WS recently, that they're okay with not winning more.
If that's NOT the case, then I am puzzled by the ownership wanting to send him out of town. You would think the potential for more WS titles would give the ownership a reason to keep Mookie but I guess being cheap is more important. Granted, the contracts handed out to Eovaldia, Price, Martinez, and Sandoval are probably to blame here
I'm a Reds fan and they haven't even won a playoff series since I've been alive so at this point I would be okay with one WS title. But the Red Sox aren't the Reds. It's different in Boston. Boston fans aren't starved for success like Cincinnati fans are

The only time that the Red Sox sign homegrown players long term is when they accept below open market value and take a home town discount. This has been the case. They did this exact same thing with Nomar in 2004 and refused to pay Pedro in 2005. They refused to give Lester a fair extension, traded him, then tried to sign him back in free agency to low ball him again. Ellsbury was treated the exact same way as well. Same with Kimbrel.

I think that Red Sox ownership believes (with probably good reason) that new acquisitions to the team is worth more in terms of attendance, attention, and value on their ball club. They'd rather pay up for a new shiny toy than to pay the players who got them there what they deserve.

And if a player refuses to get paid what they deserve, they leak the deal to their media partners and it comes out that "Mookie turns down a 10 year $300m offer because he doesn't want to be here in Boston" beings that casual fans look at that $300m number and don't understand how insulting that is to Mookie.

 

[Captain Skywalker]

The only time that the Red Sox sign homegrown players long term is when they accept below open market value and take a home town discount. This has been the case. They did this exact same thing with Nomar in 2004 and refused to pay Pedro in 2005. They refused to give Lester a fair extension, traded him, then tried to sign him back in free agency to low ball him again. Ellsbury was treated the exact same way as well. Same with Kimbrel.

I think that Red Sox ownership believes (with probably good reason) that new acquisitions to the team is worth more in terms of attendance, attention, and value on their ball club. They'd rather pay up for a new shiny toy than to pay the players who got them there what they deserve.

And if a player refuses to get paid what they deserve, they leak the deal to their media partners and it comes out that "Mookie turns down a 10 year $300m offer because he doesn't want to be here in Boston" beings that casual fans look at that $300m number and don't understand how insulting that is to Mookie.

Free agency should be viewed as a way to improve an already decent ball club. It shouldn't be the by all end all way to contend. My Reds tried to be patient with their home grown talent but most of them have sucked so they used free agency to build a better base. But by no means should home grown players be treated poorly in terms of value. I'm not a fan but I would hate for Rafael Devers to be treated this way in the future. Baseball is better when players stay with the club long term, at least in my opinion. The White Sox gave Luis Robert an extension before he even made the big leagues, and Atlanta secured the bag for Acuna and Albies before they ever had a chance to hit the open market. The Reds left Nick Senzel off the Opening Day team in favor of Scott Schebler who, after being demoted, hit .216 in AAA.

 

[tennisace]

so what play is john henry bankrolling? just curious.

 

[biggie]

Red Sox Reportedly Saved Money Last Year by Giving Fake World Series Rings to Scouts and Staffers

Classy.

 

[Texas Cloverleaf]

James Paxton out 3-4 months after cyst removal surgery in his back.

So much for that keeper

 

[Finchinator]

FUCK

 

[Captain Skywalker]

The Red Sox are so cheap lol. When you have an MVP player, you pay him. This move is terrible

 

[ButteredToast]

Again, the Boston Red Sox have a history of doing things like this with their star players. Nomar, Pedro, Manny, Lester, Ellsbury, and Kimbrell were all pretty much given the boot out of Boston because they refused to take team friendly deals.

If you're trying to tell me that the Red Sox ownership is cheep, they're not. They have paid for talent my entire life. I have no doubt that they won't pay for talent moving forward. They will continue to be, if not the top payroll in baseball, in the top three. They have delivered 4 championships to a baseball club that thought just getting one was an impossibility.

I hate that the Red Sox players are not treated right and are given the option of either taking less than they're worth or getting shipped out of town. But at the same time, Red Sox ownership has proven that they know how to assemble a winning team and know how to rebuild.

It's a weird dynamic. Ownership does not have "In Bill We Trust" type levels of a pass from me, but they have some type of pass for always having some kind of a plan and converting.

We traded Nomar and won the world series that same year. We let Pedro walk in 2005 and won a championship in 2007. We ran Terry and Theo out of town in 2012, tried to frame Youk as a clubhouse cancer, and traded our core of AGon, Beckett, and Crawford out of town and won the next year in 2013. In 2014, we let Ells walk in free agency to the Yankees and then lowballed the dick out of Jon Lester after trading him away. Again, we walked away with a world series shortly after paying up for Price, Sale, and JD.

I don't know. I love Mookie and I love the Red Sox and I wish it could have worked out. But if I had my way in the past, I probably would only have 1 championship in my lifetime instead of the 4 that I have now. So I'm going to be grumpy in the present, hope to god that this trade falls through because of the medicals, and see where things go from here. If 2020 is a rebuild year, at least it'll be during an Olympic Summer.

 

[biggie]

We traded Nomar and won the world series that same year. We let Pedro walk in 2005 and won a championship in 2007. We ran Terry and Theo out of town in 2012, tried to frame Youk as a clubhouse cancer, and traded our core of AGon, Beckett, and Crawford out of town and won the next year in 2013. In 2014, we let Ells walk in free agency to the Yankees and then lowballed the dick out of Jon Lester after trading him away. Again, we walked away with a world series shortly after paying up for Price, Sale, and JD.

Not for nothing, but in a vacuum this sounds like a complete dick of a franchise.

 

[UncleSam]

Not for nothing, but in a vacuum this sounds like a complete dick of a franchise.

Nice guys don’t win championships. I respect that they value winning for the fans over attachment to players, who happen to make millions on millions of dollars playing a game and for whom I have no sympathy.

Way WAY too many teams value treating the players right over winning for the fans - my Tigers being one of them. Sports writers might say nice things about franchises like that and their players might be happy, but the fans sure aren’t. And it is looking increasingly likely that the two WS they made in a five year stretch while having the highest payroll in baseball (more or less) is going to be their peak for the foreseeable future. I’d infinitely rather have had them be dicks to the players and have delivered a championship or two, much less four.

 

[Stallion]

James Paxton out 3-4 months after cyst removal surgery in his back.

So much for that keeper

Look on the bright side, you were saved from the inevitable in-season Paxton injury.

 

[Captain Skywalker]

Nice guys don’t win championships. I respect that they value winning for the fans over attachment to players, who happen to make millions on millions of dollars playing a game and for whom I have no sympathy.

Way WAY too many teams value treating the players right over winning for the fans - my Tigers being one of them. Sports writers might say nice things about franchises like that and their players might be happy, but the fans sure aren’t. And it is looking increasingly likely that the two WS they made in a five year stretch while having the highest payroll in baseball (more or less) is going to be their peak for the foreseeable future. I’d infinitely rather have had them be dicks to the players and have delivered a championship or two, much less four.

This doesn't make sense considering that the team needs Mookie Betts to be a championship contender. It would be one thing if they let go of someone like Brock Holt but Mookie Betts is a top 3 player in baseball and letting him go isn't just pissing off fans, it's making the team actively worse.

 

[UncleSam]

This doesn't make sense considering that the team needs Mookie Betts to be a championship contender. It would be one thing if they let go of someone like Brock Holt but Mookie Betts is a top 3 player in baseball and letting him go isn't just pissing off fans, it's making the team actively worse.

If they were trying to win right now ya. But they know their payroll is overblown and they don’t have the pieces around Betts to win before he becomes a liability (in the event they keep him), so in essence he is not someone that they can keep around and contribute to winning another championship.

Out of all the teams that have held on to long time greats compared to those who let them walk, how many of those who let them walk ended up regretting it. You think the cards regret letting Pujols walk, and you think the Tigers don’t wish they had let Miggy walk?

 

[Captain Skywalker]

If they were trying to win right now ya. But they know their payroll is overblown and they don’t have the pieces around Betts to win before he becomes a liability (in the event they keep him), so in essence he is not someone that they can keep around and contribute to winning another championship.

Out of all the teams that have held on to long time greats compared to those who let them walk, how many of those who let them walk ended up regretting it. You think the cards regret letting Pujols walk, and you think the Tigers don’t wish they had let Miggy walk?

Lol the Albert Pujols and Miguel Cabrera (and to an extent Joey Votto) contracts are not even comparable to Mookie Betts' situation. Mookie Betts isn't past his prime like Pujols and Miggy were when they signed their long term contracts. Mookie is in his prime RIGHT NOW and the team needs him to be championship contenders. Sure, a core led by Rafael Devers, Xander Bogaerts, and Andrew Benintendi are good but they need that superstar to be a serious contender. That superstar is Mookie Betts.
Also, I don't understand the idea that "these guys are paid so much I have no sympathy". An athlete is still a person. Sure, they have the best job on the planet that will earn them millions but it's still just a job. If your boss tried low balling you if you ask for a raise, would you be happy? No you wouldn't because you would feel like you're worth more than that.
Also you say that they don't have the pieces to win a WS even though the team is still largely the same as it was 2 years ago?

 

[UncleSam]

No, they almost certainly can’t win the WS this year. They’re too old, overpaid, and injury-prone to have a serious shot - the only way they could win is if literally all their best players stayed healthy and had good seasons, which in their case is extremely unlikely to happen. Could they give it one more go with Mookie? Of course they could. But in the 95%+ cases where that fails, it all falls apart. They get nothing when he walks and also have to eat Price’s contract, further reducing their ability to compete for years to come. They’re in a pickle that’ll take years to get out of most likely, but honestly the turnaround could be faster than expected with their core of young players if they can develop a few more guys and find the right free agents to bolster their team (something that’s impossible with albatross contracts like Price’s around your neck).

For what it’s worth if there was a franchise tag in baseball I’d agree with you - they could keep Mookie an extra year that way and probably get two more shots with the current group rather than one. But one shot just wasn’t worth it to them, so good judgment in the end. Whether Mookie gets the Dodgers over the hump, though, is anyone’s guess.