Rule 5 to CWS - Shane Smith Discussion Thread

[Jim Goulart]

 

[Outlander]

As expected, Shane Smith made the White Sox Opending Day Roster

 

 

[Seth Stohs]

 

[liveforoctober]

Happy for him! I want him to do well.

[Jim Goulart]

 

[Jopal78]

1 hour ago, Jim Goulart said:

 

Will it? He threw a lesser percentage of strikes in his start than Chad Patrick did tonight, and there’s seemingly no love fest going on for Patrick. 
 

 

[duewizard]

All due respect to Tyler Jay and Connor Thomas as they are serious profesionals who've put in a lot of effort to get to where they are but I cannot understand how either of them got a spot ahead of Smith.Yeah yeah Smith is no established pitcher or top prospect in comparison to what you have in Jay (who was DFA'd in the end!) I really don't get how they didn't protect him.

[Joseph Zarr]

5 minutes ago, Jopal78 said:

Will it? He threw a lesser percentage of strikes in his start than Chad Patrick did tonight, and there’s seemingly no love fest going on for Patrick. 
 

 

This has little to nothing to do with RHP Chad Patrick - who is a fantastic pitcher in his own right and in his own way; who we (I in particular) celebrated all last year in our reports and Minor League threads; and who rose up tremendously in his first MLB start when the Brewers desperately needed him to (coming off a sick day, no less!). This thread is entirely about Shane Smith, the pitcher. AND, within that, this thread has to do with raw pure 'stuff'. and his evolution as a pitcher. As I've said on numerous occasions: the Brewers, plain and simple, let too talented a pitcher go to another organization for free. It was a strange and silly oversight and it was a mistake. It made no sense the day they left him unprotected and it still doesn't. 

BUT, also, at this point it's really all about celebrating the opportunity Shane Smith does have. He has a meaningful opportunity with the White Sox. He showed quite well tonight. He shows all the flashes and glimpses of what he could become. Flashes and glimpses he gave us all routinely the past two seasons as a Brewers. I'm personally still miffed he isn't a Brewer. BUT, I'm way way way more invested in supporting the player and his career arc. And, that is why I will visit this thread throughout the season.

[Jopal78]

6 hours ago, Joseph Zarr said:

This has little to nothing to do with RHP Chad Patrick - who is a fantastic pitcher in his own right and in his own way; who we (I in particular) celebrated all last year in our reports and Minor League threads; and who rose up tremendously in his first MLB start when the Brewers desperately needed him to (coming off a sick day, no less!). This thread is entirely about Shane Smith, the pitcher. AND, within that, this thread has to do with raw pure 'stuff'. and his evolution as a pitcher. As I've said on numerous occasions: the Brewers, plain and simple, let too talented a pitcher go to another organization for free. It was a strange and silly oversight and it was a mistake. It made no sense the day they left him unprotected and it still doesn't. 

BUT, also, at this point it's really all about celebrating the opportunity Shane Smith does have. He has a meaningful opportunity with the White Sox. He showed quite well tonight. He shows all the flashes and glimpses of what he could become. Flashes and glimpses he gave us all routinely the past two seasons as a Brewers. I'm personally still miffed he isn't a Brewer. BUT, I'm way way way more invested in supporting the player and his career arc. And, that is why I will visit this thread throughout the season.

I suppose it depends on hown you define “shows well”. I think we can all agree Chad Patrick kind of labored to get through 4 2/3 for Milwaukee yesterday, yet he threw a higher precentage of strikes in his outing than Shane Smith did in his 5 2/3 inning start.
 

That Smith went 5 2/3 throwing a lesser percentage of strikes than Patrick while walking more batters than he struck out suggests to me perhaps he had a little luck on his side against the Twins.

So yes, good for Smith, he has earned a spot in a big league rotation. But he’s probably going to need to pitch better than last night for me to think he is “the one that got away” or criticize the front office for leaving him exposed to the Rule 5.

 

[SF70]

The organization unquestionably made a mistake not protecting Smith. Many of us here knew that the day he was left unprotected. Most of the rest of us knew that when word leaked out that the Chisox were going to take Smith first overall in the R5 draft.

Every organization makes these types of mistakes so we are not alone. Baseball life will go on. Happy for Smith getting his opportunity. 

[Playing Catch]

I'm not here to defend the decision, as I didn't like it at the time either, but we don't know all the facts involved. Just a few ideas that could have colored their decision...

- They wanted more lefties on the 40-man (e.g. Connor Thomas)
- They didn't like Smith's medicals
- Behind the scenes promises or conflicts with agent/player/teammates/coaches
- Some kind of pitching magic metric that convinced them it wouldn't work in MLB.

My point in bringing this up is simply to note that the Brewers, of late, haven't conducted themselves as a thoughtless, professionally negligent outfit. They seem to put a lot of thought into all of their decisions -- and perhaps this was an example of overthinking it. Paralysis by analysis.

If anything seems thoughtless about this is that the White Sox picked him with the first pick, (seemingly) based on what a newly-hired pitching coach suggested.

[JohnBriggs12]

1 hour ago, Jopal78 said:

I suppose it depends on hown you define “shows well”. I think we can all agree Chad Patrick kind of labored to get through 4 2/3 for Milwaukee yesterday, yet he threw a higher precentage of strikes in his outing than Shane Smith did in his 5 2/3 inning start.
 

That Smith went 5 2/3 throwing a lesser percentage of strikes than Patrick while walking more batters than he struck out suggests to me perhaps he had a little luck on his side against the Twins.

So yes, good for Smith, he has earned a spot in a big league rotation. But he’s probably going to need to pitch better than last night for me to think he is “the one that got away” or criticize the front office for leaving him exposed to the Rule 5.

 

I thought Patrick was in complete command.  When he needed to get a strike he got one and for the most part he stayed out of the middle of the zone and moved it around.  He kept the Royals off balance, by backing them off the plate.  His fastball, when it's accompanied by an effective cutter is plenty good enough to get major league hitters out, but he can't miss too often in the middle of the plate.  He kept hitters from looking in one spot.  That's the key for all but the guys with the huge power stuff.  He had 2 unintentional walks in basically 5 innings.  That's fine

[Jopal78]

3 hours ago, JohnBriggs12 said:

I thought Patrick was in complete command.  When he needed to get a strike he got one and for the most part he stayed out of the middle of the zone and moved it around.  He kept the Royals off balance, by backing them off the plate.  His fastball, when it's accompanied by an effective cutter is plenty good enough to get major league hitters out, but he can't miss too often in the middle of the plate.  He kept hitters from looking in one spot.  That's the key for all but the guys with the huge power stuff.  He had 2 unintentional walks in basically 5 innings.  That's fine

To each their own I guess., He was more effectively wild in my book, and showed some moxie keeping it scoreless without his best pitch.

But… Patrick wasn’t getting any swing and miss on the cutter (in fact he got just 6 swinging strikes the entire night) and in the first three innings he wasn’t landing the cutter in the zone when they laid off it either.
 

Unless the Royals had put the first or second pitch of the sequence in play, Patrick seemingly was behind in the count. I agree he hit his stride in the 4th and finally got couple swing and misses on the cutter, but at that point he was beginning to run on fumes and was completely spent by the time he K’d Isbel for the 2nd out in the fifth. I wouldn’t call that complete command, though the box score looks nice. 

[umphrey]

5 hours ago, Playing Catch said:

I'm not here to defend the decision, as I didn't like it at the time either, but we don't know all the facts involved. Just a few ideas that could have colored their decision...

- They wanted more lefties on the 40-man (e.g. Connor Thomas)
- They didn't like Smith's medicals
- Behind the scenes promises or conflicts with agent/player/teammates/coaches
- Some kind of pitching magic metric that convinced them it wouldn't work in MLB.

My point in bringing this up is simply to note that the Brewers, of late, haven't conducted themselves as a thoughtless, professionally negligent outfit. They seem to put a lot of thought into all of their decisions -- and perhaps this was an example of overthinking it. Paralysis by analysis.

If anything seems thoughtless about this is that the White Sox picked him with the first pick, (seemingly) based on what a newly-hired pitching coach suggested.

I’ve gone through that list in my head a few times and I really can’t figure it out. I think it has to be the lefty explanation. His numbers were awesome last year and when you’re talking about the 26th man on the roster, you don’t need to nitpick medicals or anything like that. Sometimes we add a 26th man for about 2 weeks and then DFA him for a shiny new toy. That and probably some pitching metric thing which may or may not turn out to be a complete fail in this case. 
 

That or maybe someone like Murphy or a pitching coach just disagreed with the FO and said they needed a vet for that spot and they gave in. 

[endaround]

2 hours ago, umphrey said:

I’ve gone through that list in my head a few times and I really can’t figure it out. I think it has to be the lefty explanation. His numbers were awesome last year and when you’re talking about the 26th man on the roster, you don’t need to nitpick medicals or anything like that. Sometimes we add a 26th man for about 2 weeks and then DFA him for a shiny new toy. That and probably some pitching metric thing which may or may not turn out to be a complete fail in this case. 
 

That or maybe someone like Murphy or a pitching coach just disagreed with the FO and said they needed a vet for that spot and they gave in. 

Except he didn't need to be the 26th man, all he needed was a 40 man slot.

[Joseph Zarr]

3 hours ago, endaround said:

Except he didn't need to be the 26th man, all he needed was a 40 man slot.

This has been my overwhelming main gripe. And supported by the nascent refinement of raw tools beyond most in the system - Closer/ Middle Reliever/ Starter he had proven he could do a little bit of everything. He had developed the slider in the AFL and it was coming along and already had a plus curve amd change up (in my book). And now he is routinely showing up on Pitching Ninja's page.

Anywho. At this point, it simply is what it is. And, the best path forward for me personally is to sincerely wish all players involved in the greater conversation to excel and turn into the best versions of themselves. 

 

[Oxy]

A month after not protecting Smith in the rule 5 draft they traded FOR right-handed Grant Anderson, who only has 1 option remaining. 🤷‍♂️ Between Tyler Jay, Tyler Alexander, Grant Wolfram and Tyler Anderson (on the Angels...still), I honestly didn't even know Grant Anderson was a different person and currently on the roster until he tried to pitch the other day....

[CheezWizHed]

These threads always feel like being in 6th grade where that one friend of yours finds out that you have a bruise on your shoulder so every time he walks by, he punches you on the shoulder and makes the bruise bigger. 

It is pretty clear the Brewers made some mistake... bad scouting, planning, hoping he'd slip through, "wait, he wasn't already on the 40 man and we missed the deadline?", etc... 

Good luck to Steve.  If we lost one gem, we've also found many gems with the end of the roster churn. 

[Joseph Zarr]

2 hours ago, CheezWizHed said:

Good luck to Steve.  If we lost one gem, we've also found many gems with the end of the roster churn. 

Is Steve the guy who keeps punching your shoulder?

[CheezWizHed]

2 hours ago, Joseph Zarr said:

Is Steve the guy who keeps punching your shoulder?

That must've been it!  The front office typed up a list of names to protect and autocorrect prevented Shane Smith from being added because we tried to add Steve instead... 😂😬🤦‍♂️

[Jopal78]

5 hours ago, CheezWizHed said:

These threads always feel like being in 6th grade where that one friend of yours finds out that you have a bruise on your shoulder so every time he walks by, he punches you on the shoulder and makes the bruise bigger. 

It is pretty clear the Brewers made some mistake... bad scouting, planning, hoping he'd slip through, "wait, he wasn't already on the 40 man and we missed the deadline?", etc... 

Good luck to Steve.  If we lost one gem, we've also found many gems with the end of the roster churn. 

Why does it have to be some sort of mistake? Why couldn’t  the calculus simply have been they didn’t think Smith would help them as a starter in ‘25, they had a cadre of other bullpen arms with major league experience and preferred to keep a spot available to snag a player they thought might shake loose from another organization? Seems more logical than some gaffe by an otherwise astute talent mining organization. Heck, maybe there were simply players they had more money/draft capital invested in where their talent evaluators weren’t ready to pull the plug on just yet. 

Good deal for Smith though, setting up his future making by making $750k in the big leagues this year. However, I’m not going to get all bent out shape that the front office didn’t protect an undrafted swingman with an intriguing stat sheet from the Rule 5

[wallus]

I would rather have Smith than Thomas quite easily. There had to have been some red flags that the team saw.

[harrydalton]

Unless the Brewers explain their decision on Smith (JOKE!!) there's little value in continuing discussion. Most comments  agree, as do I, that it was a mistake. Pretending it was a trade for Thomas or Patrick is silly.

[TURBO]

It was a  mistake, and it is just that simple. 

It's ok to admit that the FO made a mistake, really, it is...

[CheezWizHed]

The only way it isn't a mistake is if Smith basically tops out as a replacement-level player.  There are a couple of players they have now - including Thomas - that I'd bet will have less chance at producing a positive WAR than Smith.