IndyCrew

Giving up your first round pick would be an awful thing to do to your new scouting director.

I'm optimistic about our farm. I haven't been able to say that in the past 3-4 years.

Yeah, Lawrie did a lot to burn bridges here.

I went on a police ride-a-long in high school. The one thing I learned is that when you get pulled over, and the officer gives you an ear full, it usually means you're going to be let off with a warning. If they were going to give you a ticket, they'd just give you a ticket. That makes me think this is all a scare tactic to whip the staff into shape. If MA really want to fire RRR, I think it would have happened swiftly. This free fall has happened over the last five weeks, and we've been out of the playoffs for the last week. They've had time to think about these decisions. On the other hand, I'm not sure they can stand pat at this point. After those comments, it is going to be hard to sell firing Narron and cutting Reynolds as a solution.

I don't think Mark and Doug are satisfied with just being competitive. It's easy to say "trade them all," but we don't know what prospects are being made available. Would you really be satisfied trading Loshe or Garza for a couple C-level prospects? The whole "blow it up" philosophy is contingent on being able to get impact talent in return. The trend lately is to covet impact prospects. I'd argue that Melvin has been taking the Money Ball approach of exploiting what is undervalued in the market by signing Loshe and Garza to under-market deals.

I remember when Melvin took over, and then when Mark became owner, and how exciting it was that the team was doing research to figure out how to build a team "the right way." They were utilizing Sabermetrics, pilfering ideas from the A's and Twins, keeping payroll low, drafting upside players that would reach the minors in the same window, and throughout the process, they were keeping us baseball nerds in the loop. Face it, that stuff is like crack to us. After a decade of no plan, no real coherent strategy of building the club, we finally got the transparency we demanded, and it made me feel like I was part of the rebuild. I miss that. Melvin keeps everything close to the vest now, so it makes some of the moves he makes seem like he doesn't have a plan, and he is just randomly patching holes. I'm willing to give Melvin the benefit of the doubt as long as I know he has a plan. I want to hear that he tried to make some trades to replenish the farm, even if there was no interest. I want to hear that he contacted several 1B before he went with Reynolds and O. I want confirmation that his strategy is to get a rotation of 2s and 3s (under market value) because he believes the offense and bullpen will win you games, and getting an Ace isn't realistic at this point. I'm fine with treading water for a couple of years and merely competing for a wildcard spot, as long as they have a strategy to bring up the next wave of impact players together. I just feel out of the loop and can only guess at what they're thinking.

Gamel was horrible at 3rd, and decent at 1st.

1-Coulter 2-T Taylor 3-Arcia 4-Medeiros 5-D Williams 6-Gatewood 7-Harrison 8-Denson 9-Jungman 10-Lopez 11-Lara 12-Reed 13-Roach 14-T Wagner 15-J Bradley 16-T Williams 17-Mcfarland 18-B Diaz 19-T Cravy 20-Delmonico 21-Hellweg 22-Y Rivera 23-J Rogers 24-H Morris 25-Demuth Next five: Pena, Neuhaus, Magnifico, Ratteree, Goforth

It's interesting that H&T thinks all the new guys will be up, and Outlander doesn't see any up. I know the Crew is slow with progressing prospects, but what is a realistic window to see Gatewood, Lara, Harrison, and Medeiros?

I'll add that you can change positions if there is a reasonable chance the move could be made. In other words, Gatewood sliding over to third would work, but Braun moving back to third wouldn't.

I don't post much on this forum, but reading your opinions and projections gets me through the workday. I was interested in who you thought would be on the roster next year, in three years, and in five years--and I'm basically meaning from our farm team. So, how about an exercise where trades and free agents aren't allowed, but extensions are. Players can only come from our system (Including Lara). Who you got? 2015 C - 1B- 2B- 3B- SS- LF- CF- RF- SP1- SP2- SP3- SP4- SP5- CL- 2017 C - 1B- 2B- 3B- SS- LF- CF- RF- SP1- SP2- SP3- SP4- SP5- CL- 2019 C - 1B- 2B- 3B- SS- LF- CF- RF- SP1- SP2- SP3- SP4- SP5- CL-

I'd say so. A couple of injuries, and/or a streak--like your Cards seem to always do, and everything will be jumbled up.

#19--Cincinnati Reds--Michael Conforto--Oregon State Although more bats are getting picked than expected, I'm surprised he's still on the board.

1. Clint Coulter 2. Jimmy Nelson 3. Tyrone Taylor 4. Mich Haniger 5. Orlando Arcia 6. Victor Roach 7. Michael Reed 8. Jed Bradley 9. Tucker Neuhaus 10. Taylor Jungmann 11. Devin Williams 12. Chris McFarland 13. David Denson 14. Nick Delmonico 15. Jorge Lopez 16. Nick Ramirez 17. Hunter Morris 18. Hobbs Johnson 19. Tyler Wagner 20. Zach Quintana

Selection #6--Seattle Mariners Aaron Nola, RHP, Louisiana State I had five players in my top tier, and all five are off the board. This pick came down to Nola and Zimmer. With King Felix in the rotation, a complete tear down and rebuild would waste prime years, so I'm looking for fast risers to the show. Nod to the polished pitcher.

If you're still looking for people, I'll take the Mariners and Reds.

New poster here. I've been reading this forum for the last decade, but this is my first post. I've always seen the drafting philosophy following more of a ETA to the majors trend than impact talent. With Fielder, Braun, and Weeks, we drafted impact bats that were all on path to hit the majors at the same time as Gallardo, Hardy, and Hart. It was an amazing wave of prospects, but the organization seemed very deliberate in promoting them at the right time. I remember everyone thinking 2007 was going to be the year they all came together. The next wave came with a few misses on young pitchers, and more impact bats. Most of the high-end prospects were traded for win-now pieces. After that, we focused on players that were close to the majors. Jungmann was even talked about helping the rotation immediately. The great rebuild of 2004 had Melvin talking about being consistently a contender. I think his plan was to swing for the fences with his high picks to build a good team, and then to supplement it with depth and solid, fast-rising, high-floor prospects. Unfortunately, a lot of those prospects didn't live up to expectations. At this point, I think we need to aim for a year where we can get a lot of the big contracts off the books, as well as graduate our impact talent. Taylor, Roache, Coulter, Williams---When will they realistically be ready? 2016? 2017? Whatever year they decide, their drafts should reflect.