bill hAll Star

The fans are definitely starting to speak with their wallets. Attendance is down in all major and college sports and the evidence suggests that it's going to continue dropping. MLB is down 6 million per year from its peak. Nearly half of NFL teams are not selling out. It's also clear that inflated attendance numbers (counting "tickets distributed" instead of "tickets scanned") is disguising the true nature of the decline. I won't speculate on all the reasons for the decline (they are numerous) but I think the key relevant point is that more than other sports, MLB depends on local fans watching their local teams. So it's a problem if the talent gets concentrated in 4-5 super-teams like is currently the case. Television is the major reason. There's going to be a strain on TV now, but fan interest is alive and well. Maybe less people show up at the park because they want to watch it on TV, but revenue probably isn't down because the teams have gotten smarter and bilking fans out of a few more bucks once they walk in the doors of the ballpark.

Rather see if they are interested in Quantity over Quality. Ray/Ortiz/Supak/Nottingham If that's the best offer the Marlins can get for Yelich, Jeter might as well just pack up the franchise and move it somewhere else. Nottingham and Ray have the potential to regain their high prospect status, but there's a good chance that that entire group of 4 barely makes a dent in the majors.

The thing is, while the DBacks could win a Wild Card game, they are likely eliminated from this discussion because that very competitive division could drown them out of a Wild Card slot or they could just lose the 1 game playoff. The Nats are good, but Murphy and Harper are free agents next year. If we're talking about multiple years here, the Cubs have a better outlook. And Scherzer may be hitting a regression age soon. I also think that the Nats' depth will soon be an issue if they do keep this thing chugging past 2018. They've got Robles, but I'm not sure if they have a deep farm system to keep a competitive season afloat if they start dropping some of their superstars. Agree that on paper the NL is the Dodgers/Cubs/Nats with NL West Team A vs. NL West Team B/Cards/maybe Brewers for the WC game. Maybe the Phillies or Braves enter the discussion, but I doubt it. The Dodgers may be favored, but it's another chance in the playoffs for the Cubs. They'll definitely have a shot.

I'll give them this year. Let's see how Hendricks and Lester and Rizzo and Heyward and Zobrist and Quintana and other key players on their team age. Out of those 4 teams I listed, the Cubs pitching is the worst and it isn't even close. The Cubs are also at serious risk of being passed by the Brewers or Cardinals by 2019 or the Reds by 2020. Swings happen in baseball much quicker than most people realize. Young teams get projected to be OK with big upside, often the upside happens and they win 90-100 games. See Cubs/Yankees/Twins/Brewers. Often teams with established players in their late 20s and early 30s and no depth whatsoever will see injuries and guys fall off a cliff lead to a very quick decline. See Brewers, Giants, Tigers, Phillies, Pirates...and very soon Cubs. The Cubs may not have great depth, but the key members of their team are in their primes. Even Heyward is only 27. Lester and some of the relievers are really the only guys that aren't. I agree that they've exposed themselves to some depth issues, but these teams can stem the tide for a few years in which injury occur. The end of the Tigers' run (2014) had key players: Miggy (31), Kinsler (32), Victor Martinez (35), Scherzer (free agent to-be), Torii Hunter (38), Verlander (31), Sanchez (30), Rajai Davis (33), Porcello (not a ton of control remaining, traded away), Nathan (39). A lot of their depth was of the utility man variety. The Cubs' 2018 roster has: Zobrist (36), Lester (33), and half of their bullpen is 29-32. That's it. All of their key position players/defenders are in their 20s. I disagree that their pitching is much worse than the Brewers and Cards'. They have arguably the best defense to prop up their pitching. They probably are going to just shuttle relievers around if they have pitching depth issues to make it through the year.

This isn't exactly true about Friedman. Living in Los Angeles, you would think Friedman was the devil on some levels the past few years for hoarding Joc Pederson, Corey Seager, Clay Bellinger, Alex Verdugo, Walker Buehler, Mithcell White, Yadier Alvarez. Now some of them have graduated to MLB and become studs (Seager and Bellinger), some have been rather meh (Pederson) and some haven't graduated yet (Verdugo, Buehler, White, Alvarez). However, Friedman hasn't dealt any of them to create the super bullpen like the Yankees (Zach Britton was targeted but never acquired) to supplement Jansen. Nor did he deal any of them for Giancarlo Stanton who desperately wanted to play here. A lot of consternation for a fan base of a team that has limitless resources to buy MLB players but is also sticking to a draft and develop philosophy. We should be grateful that Epstein doesn't run the Cubs like Friedman runs the Dodgers. I agree that if asked, I'd maybe take Friedman, but the point is that these guys will still play big market ball if they can. Friedman basically lit $50 million on fire with Scott Kazmir. While it was to repair some issues with financial constraints some of his own doing and some he inherited, he took on $40 million of Matt Kemp. While Kenley is really good, they're still going to be paying a reliever $60 million dollars over 3 years starting in 2019. He held on to Urias, which still may pay off, but maybe it robbed them of a World Series a few years back or this year, who knows. He's doing all of this under a likely directive to shed payroll to get under the tax threshold. And he's still throwing prospects out and spending a fair amount of money. That's what big market GMs do, even if shrewd.

Obviously big spending teams have a decided advantage, but one flaw here is that a lot of big contracts are swapped from losing teams to winning teams at the trade deadline. A team taking on some big money rentals could add tens of millions to their payroll while deducting that same amount of money from other teams who are out of the playoffs. That could be enough to bump a team up or down a bracket, and teams with playoff hopes will often be willing to expand their maximum payroll at the deadline due to the hopes of making that up with the extra revenue from the playoffs. In those examples you speak of, that means that the middle/large market team is already in the playoff hunt...further agreeing with the suggestion of big markets having an advantage. Also, teams like Detroit were in the top 10 and dropped into the middle bracket most likely when they made some trades, so it can also potentially cancel out over time.

The Patriots were lucky that a 7th round pick turned into arguably the best player in NFL history. The Packers were lucky that 2 HOF QBs either came out of nowhere or fell to them. The Astros were lucky that a 5'4" 2B turned into an MVP and that their buy low risk on Charlie Morton turned into one of the better playoff pitching performances in recent memory. The Royals were lucky that the A's choked in the Wild Card game and that they basically got to and later won a World Series with relievers and baserunners. At a certain point, you begin to wonder if skill is involved. Make enough smart risks, and 1 or 2 will pay off hall of fame level dividends.

Yeah, this is kind of crazy. There's an inflection point on value. You can hoard 1000 prospects and manage your system correctly, but at a certain point, all that allows you to do is to overpay some free agents (that tend to still earn their value) or make a prospect trade. It was definitely smart of Epstein to take over the franchises he did at the point that he did, but there are 20 other GMs that have taken over similar franchises and have not done the things he's done in the past decade. Honest question: what's a good GM? Freidman, viewed as a genius in Tampa, while he's under some cost-cutting constraints (likely by the franchise) and is a bit more budget savvy, still spends a ton of money and trades away prospects now that he's in a big market. It's not all about pretending that you're running a $50 million payroll and patting yourself on the back for building a Wild Card team team for that budget even though you're offered by your owner to have a $200 million payroll. Friedman correctly held on to Bellinger in trade talks, but he's also made plenty of trades and spent plenty of money to try to win within his window. The Cubs also held on to several prospects that will be starting for them for years to come. The Astros just had a brilliant build and they'll go down the same road that Epstein's teams have. It's what you do. Sure, several other savvy GMs could do what Epstein has, but he's not an idiot and I think you are horrendously discounting what he can do. I want to emphasize this. By the time that Bryant, Rizzo, maybe Harper if they so choose, etc. are all free agents or exiting their prime, their window will likely have been 7 or 8 years, unless this really sinks fast. They still have time to replenish things by 2022. They could still choose to keep Bryant, who won't be that old after arbitration for him ends and have the end of Contreras' arbitration plus a ton of money to spend and probably a few new prospects coming up.

Sure, there are some teams that even signing Arrieta won't move the needle much. But a team like the Phillies could easily be in the mix for a top notch FA starter. A young, talented core with money to spend. I think it's more the asking prices than anything for them, they aren't over there like "well the nationals are too good, so we might as well not even try competing yet". Same for the Rangers, if they thought they had no chance...Hamels would have been traded already and they wouldn't be so widely reported to be in the mix for the top SP. There are only maybe 6-7 teams this year that appear to be tanking or in full rebuild mode. The remaining teams have their reasons for not having signed the big FA already, I just don't think any of them are "well those other 7 teams are too good, I'm not going to try and compete with them". It's not really an either/or thing. The Phillies are waiting it out for next year's crop and the Rangers still have plenty of time to unload Hamels if they need to...they have a good enough roster and ammo to at least see if they can hang around the race until the trade deadline.

Absolutely I do. I not only think he does, I know he does. He just recently got Epstein to overpay for Quintana, trading pretty much the last of their farm system. Epstein is basically Dombrowski 2.0. He has a very talented 25 man roster, but it also has it's warts and he has no ammo left to plug holes as he overpaid in prospects to plug holes with short term fixes. He also has significant payroll issues coming up with guys like Bryant/Baez/Schwarber/Russell all hitting arbitration, so I doubt we see a spending spree anytime soon. The more dumb moves Stearns can help Epstein make, the more their window shrinks. Sure, Epstein is shrinking the window a little bit, but unless this is coming across wrong on a message board, you have a very strange negative tone towards a guy that has built 2 franchises that have won 3 World Series titles and have plenty of time to win at least 1 more with the Cubs. I don't think many moves that Epstein has made are that dumb given the constraints of baseball and their payroll. This post nearly got me to post the "wut" or question mark gif. They're all in to win a World Series in the next four seasons and have plenty of time to replenish the farm system, and if it isn't replenished, they were probably going to be rebuilding anyways...or they can try to buy their way out of it one more time. I find it kind of strange that having a 10 year window (even for a large market) is considered stupid GM moves. Even if Eloy and Gleyber are absolute studs, I don't know if they'll reach the value of what the Cubs traded for. They correctly dumped Soler, even if Davis didn't win them the WS. Chapman got them a World Series, which I'm not sure they'd have gotten without trading Gleyber. Maybe they'll overpay for Alex Cobb, but in 2021 or 2022 when the Cubs have a good sense of whether they'll hit the reset button or know that they have a way to keep the thing going I don't know if they will say, "ugh, man...we have 1 year, $16 million left on this Alex Cobb contract. We're screwed."

I don't think other teams being well built significantly impacts what other teams will do. If the Brewers were willing/able to spend $150 million this year, they'd be far more aggressive targeting the high end pitchers. They aren't going to NOT target them because the Cubs are too good and even adding one or two good pitchers won't make them good enough to compete on paper. The Cubs fell almost 10 games short of their general consensus projection last year. The Giants fell almost 30 games short. The Mets fell 15 games short. Mariners 10 games. Tigers 20 games. Blue Jays 10. Orioles 10. This stuff isn't written in ink. Any of the Dodgers, Yankees, Cubs, Astros, Indians, Nationals, Red Sox could fall off a cliff just like the Giants this year. That's how it is every year. There are 15 or so teams that are either well-built (Indians) or are completely loaded money-wise (Giants/Red Sox). Yeah, you're right. I bet someone like the Red Sox will completely fall apart this year. But, you know what? The Yankees will be good in turn. So I'd still stand pat if I'm the Orioles. It's not just a single bet. Sure, I'd put some money on just the Cubs falling short of projections this year. But the odds of the Cubs falling short, the Brewers holding up their end of the bargain, AND the Cardinals not having a good enough year...now you're getting to long odds in a parlay of bets. If I'm an owner/GM, I'd absolutely stand pat in a year that I don't think I have a chance because I'm two years away and my division has two juggernaut teams. The odds of me becoming the best team isn't just a one-way thing of one of the teams in front of me struggling. The odds are extremely long that all of the big market teams are worse than me AND my team is worth its weight of what I did this offseason to "go for it."

Your Brewers example doesn't fit very well, but I tend to agree regarding Santana. Unless the Dbacks are in dire financial straits, I don't see why they can't sign someone to a 1 year deal that can play RF reasonably well and post a 750ish OPS. Maybe someone like Ichiro for $2-3 million? Maybe Jaso or Jason Werth? What I was implying is I wouldn't bother trading Corbin if I was them UNLESS I was filling a hole at the MLB level. The only hole I see is RF, they seem solid everywhere else. I'm sure Santana would interest them, but maybe not at the prospect cost. Sorry, I kinda conflated my discussion about Corbin with the Santana for Ray suggestions from earlier, which stoked my Davies or Anderson for Schoop offer, which still isn’t perfect, but it’s better. Corbin would cost less.

I think the main culprit of this offseason is mostly the luxury tax. Some of that involves teams wising up, but I don't think the 20 teams that sign a lot of longer-term free agents just woke up this offseason and all decided that they're done signing longer contracts. So, no, I don't think this is an enlightenment period of not signing longer contracts. That may gradually be entering owners' minds over time, but I have a hard time believing they all woke up in the same offseason and got hit on the head with the realization, and what we're seeing is the new norm. Maybe it's collusion because the owners are mad about the luxury tax and want change in the next CBA. Maybe it's all because they're going to all go bonkers next season and wanted to pay a lower tax level. The threshold is bumping up by almost $10 million next year, so if everyone positions themselves under this current level, not only will they once again be reset and be a first-time offender in 2018 if they get one of the prized free agents, if they're smart, they can still come back down from that big number back under the threshold in subsequent years because the threshold is much higher in coming years.

I think most ideas regarding the DBacks needing more bats are a bit overblown. They'll probably just sign a cheap, one-trick-pony hitter on the free agent market, but they were doing fine even without JD Martinez last year. They can probably see how the year is going and trade for another rental bat for peanuts if not signing a cheap one. This would be like people telling the Brewers they should trade away Chase Anderson or Davies (plus something) or a healthy Nelson for Jonathan Schoop. Now, I will say that in your example that Corbin is a bit more expendable on the back end of the rotation, but I think that neither the Brewers nor the DBacks want to trade away pitching depth, unless it's a lucrative offer for the DBacks to get out of the end of Greinke's deal.

I'm not so sure I'd call it full-blown collusion, as I think a lot of this has to do with some teams just waiting to try to get Harper/Keuchel/etc. while under the luxury tax threshold... ...but I really hesitate to agree with the idea that 20-30 owners all woke up this offseason and said, "wow, I really should be listening to the analytics on the contracts/age on these guys." Just last year, contracts that many on here call "ridiculous" were still being thrown out. Did the 15 owners that traded off throwing these contracts out to players all wake up and decide that it's not a good idea? All in the same offseason? That seems insane. The fact that the Giants are doing everything they can to pinch pennies and stay under the tax threshold all while trying to win at all costs tells me all that I need to know. It isn't so much collusion, but definitely a combo of some collusion and teams wanting to get back under the tax threshold. The Giants essentially signed Evan Longoria to a 5 year deal at age 32. Why would they do that if they are part of this new enlightenment era? Strangely, Longoria wasn't a free agent (AKA new money)...sooooooo....maybe that's why? The Yankees just took on $275 million dollars of a player that will be likely a bad contract for $100 million of it. Again, not new money, though. I sense a pattern...

That's why you include team option for the 3rd year. Hiura's the best pure hitter they've drafted since Braun. I'd be quite disappointed if he's not the full time 2B if not opening day 2020, but at least after the super 2 time expires. A team option for the 3rd year means nothing to Walker (other than a small buyout) and could actually be seen as a negative to him, which was the basis for all of the discussion of offering enough to obtain him. Sure, if Walker was willing to take 2/$22 right now AND he wanted a team option for $12 million with a $2 million buyout, sign me up. But if Neil wants a 3rd year, said team option is not going to make him say, "OK, now I'm in."

Yeah, the Brewers have a weird situation where I am not really attached to keeping any of our 2020 or 2021 free agents. Santana and Davies are the only young ones, but neither is a free agent then and if either explode, they’ll be priced out of our payroll anyways. I’d go to the 3rd year with Walker if I had to, especially since he can be the super-utility guy in year 3.

My issue is that the Brewers are going to give a decent value to Broxton that the Giants should have no interest in paying. They could just get a defense-only CF to go with Hanson and Hernandez and just go the defense route or they can wait it out and squeeze Dyson or Maybin in under the threshold. Either get a AAAA for a bag of balls that’s basically the same player as Broxton just with less power or get an equally valuable free agent.

That's essentially what he did last year for 0.7 WAR. I'll grant you the better defense so we can round up to 1 WAR. It could just as easily get worse as it could get better, though. So his range is probably .5 WAR to 1.5 WAR. Broxton did have a great 2016, but a lot of his success at the plate came because he was somewhat platooned. Almost half of his PAs came against LHP. Something that you're not really suggesting that he'd be doing in SF. He also had an abnormally high BABIP that got him to that solid hitting line in 2016.

Harrison's a nice player, but I kinda give the same argument when discussing trading for pitchers. I'd rather just spend the money on similar or even slightly inferior free agent than spend the prospect capital. Granted, the Pirates kinda gave away Cole. If he was really, really cheap in terms of prospects...then maybe.

Broxton's been striking out at this rate since he entered professional baseball, other than portions of a few stops in AA where he had only a 25% K-rate instead of 30-35% (38% last year). This is is a one year position opening for CF. This whole thing is becoming hypothetical, because again, the Giants are going to roll with McCutchen in CF, but the Giants will have some money to spend again next year and can keep filling the hole with 1 year options or splurge next year on another long-ish term CF option. So being it a one year position, they can just take a risk that Dyson's speed is still there or that Jackson or somebody like that is still good enough if they did want to fill CF. That's the same risk of Broxton improving his hitting or getting his OBP above .300 against righties.

I think you're overrating Broxton by a fair margin. Before Broxton went bonkers at Coors Field and Bartolo Colon, there were discussions of cutting him here. But this part about Dyson is interesting because we've openly discussed why Broxton needs to be in a platoon and...Broxton is on the wrong side of the platoon! Dyson currently plays superior defense to Broxton even as of last year (per Fangraphs). I noted above that McCutchen appears to be the CF anyways, but I do think that you might be putting your blinders on with Broxton trying to make something that works out for the Brewers. Dyson is getting older but he's amassed a 14 WAR in his career with seasons of 2 and 3 very recently. Broxton was 0.7 last year. This isn't the perfect situation to use WAR because it's a defense-heavy argument with stadiums and age and platoons factored in, but Broxton is bordering on a AAAA guy, of which there are 20-30 guys to choose from in free agency or cheap in trade if the Giants want a CF. Broxton might struggle to put up a .300 OBP and he's a solid, not spectacular CF. That's not something I see the Giants using their final resources to buy when there are so many other options that offer that. Also regarding the age comment: the Giants just traded for a bunch of older guys. I doubt that signing Dyson, Jackson, or Rajai Davis would be a problem given age, even if there are concerns with speed in CF.

tldr above: It appears that McCutchen is going to be the Giants' CF. We can go through a lot of other discussion but if they want a defensive CF and McCutchen truly was going to move to a corner, there are cheap defense-only guys on the FA market and available basically for free via trade that can provide basically what Broxton does in that park.

I think Broxton makes so much sense for the Giants. He has the big time speed to cover a ton of ground, not as much as Hamilton but the latter will cost far more in prospects and more in salary as he's already in arbitration. Also with Broxton, I don't think that park will suppress his power much. Most of his HR were not cheap. I know it isn't often, but if he connects...it's going a long way. With Broxton in CF I would say they have plus outfield defense with McCutchen and Pence. Disagree. The Giants are almost always in the top 10 in lowest K%. Usually right around the top 5 for the past decade. Why would they want a guy that strikes out 35% of the time? Now, if he costs them basically a throwaway prospect, sure. On the Giants website, McCutchen is now listed as their starting CF with Parker in LF. They can go out and Dyson who is probably a better defender for cheap. If Dyson costs them $2 million, maybe they'll have to do some sort of trade where they trade trash for trash to save $1 million or something, but all of these options are probably superior to trade for Broxton, which they barely have any ammo left to trade for even though I don't think he's worth too much on the market. Maybe Dyson is more expensive but there are a handful of guys that are on the market right now that are fast and can be had for nothing. Or, there are probably several guys riding the bench for teams or sitting buried in AAA that are fast like Broxton and can muster a .700 OPS like Broxton likely would with an everyday role playing in AT&T park. I'd argue that Gorkys Hernandez who the Giants currently have might make more sense because his style of play fits AT&T park better and he's fine on defense as a CF. Looking at it, they've already signed Alen Hanson, who is a utility man but plays his best defense in CF. With him and Hernandez, they have plenty of defense-only CF that probably don't have the pop Broxton does but their bat is not a huge dropoff due to Broxton's K% and RHP issues. Broxton is a heavy strikeout, solid defensive CF 4th OF or maybe pessimistically a AAAA guy for us. I think the Giants have 3-4 solid/good defensive CF guys that give away a bit in power but put the ball in play enough to not be too much worse of a hitter there. I just don't see the need for the Giants if they're dying to have a faster guy roaming CF. They probably already have several of those guys.

Broxton definitely fits the cost need (for Now). Good enough defense. As I said before, platoon splits are worrisome when handing him an everyday role and trying to win a title as the Giants are. Finally, I’m not sure the Giants will like him much at the plate. They always put good enough contact hitters out there in that park. Broxton is the anti-AT&T park hitter. Beggers can’t be choosers, so maybe they’d trade something to acquire him, but I think they’d maybe be looking at other options.