TJseven7

I expect to hear a lot of off speed talk from our arms this spring.

Well last year come playoff time their offense was anemic and their pen was a gas can strapped to a blow torch. Not saying that's a given to repeat but as I just said... peralta albers chacin hader knebel is a good playoff pen. Cain yelich braun shaw santana can slug with just about anyone.

I'd say no. Reason being Davies. Boras client, entering arby next year. He's the flip candidate if we get overstocked. Nelson Anderson Cobb Davies Woodruff pushes Chacin into the pen (heavy slider usage like swarzak, only 6.75 mil next year) or Davies onto the trade block. If you want to stay competative long term you not only have to graduate talent, but you also have to turn over your roster. You can't afford to have all talent leave in FA for comp picks. You need to have guys like Burnes jump in and push a guy onto the trade block so you can backfill your farm while you promote. Cobb would put them in a great situation. To have nelson anderson cobb is a 1-2-3 set for 4 years. Why 4? I'd expect mke to offer Nelson a fa year buyout like they did anderson once he looks right. Boras has already chirped in regards to davies being demoted at one point. Unlikely to play ball. Chacin starts off this year a starter and if all goes well closes this year in the pen as a better swarzak. Next year Davies (or at the deadline if woodruff or chacin are grooving) is dealt and Chacin starts the year in the rotation and again if all goes right Burnes bumps him to the pen by years end. It allows woodruff and burnes to sow their oats as the 4 or 5. For 2-3 years. If they can graduate up the rotation (into the 1-2 level arm region)... time for another pitcher to be sold off. Hopefully Ortiz and the kids have some SP chops by then. I think 1 more arm here is for a few reasons. Get better... get ahead of the development curve so promotions can be coupled with a pitcher getting sold off. 3 low 1 high 2 caliber arms and 2 quality starters at 4-5. I think its a plateau metric on what is demanded from your staff to succeed. Ps why no Fperalta... he's destined to be a power pen addition but I think in that role he holds his own with knebel hader. That trio with chacin albers could be downright filthy come playoff time.

Well we just saw what happens when cobb doesn't have that pitch... hes a 3.66. He has other breaking stuff to use and increase. Makes him a davies level guy which is a mid 3 to low 2. The question left to ask is what's more likely. The killer breaking ball coming back for Cobb or the pounding Arrieta took not effecting him over the next 4-5 years. I worry less about a guy who started off as a 3.0 era guy who stays constant than a 4.5 era guy who finds another gear for 4 years. Same thing goes for Anderson and Nelson. I love having them for the next 3-4 years but I'm going to be leery of their next contract. Guys like Davies and Cobb can just pitch and I expect them to decline more favorably. We also dont know the deals yet. Arrieta could still want 110/5. Cobb 60/4. Thats not as simple as 7 mil more for a possible 1. Thats an extra year and cobb is a possible 1 himself. In the next 3 years nelson anderson cobb could be 1 level guys who can hold their own vs ace heavy staffs. While arrieta could be worth his deal, cobb could get his change and exceed his deal. I feel any savings coupled with upside is something small markets HAVE to risk.

Cobb isn't a 3.

I'm more comfortable with Anderson than Arrieta and Cobb and I want Cobb. We aren't going to win those series on the strength of our starting staff. You have to win in other ways.

They would probably set a record for most strikeouts in a season combined. Is 224 the record?

Got to love his quote... I walked a sh/t ton of batters last year

I want cobb and I'll go to 60/4. Warming up on Luc at 14/2, with a 2nd year 1 mil buyout. Luc has to realize pina is going to play a bunch though. Adds 22 mil but subtracts 5.6 on vogt gallardo. Keeps the cap right around 110. I can pass on the 2b with: Cain yelich braun/santana shaw santana/thames pina/luc 2b arcia and I'm real tempted to bat 2b 9th.

Yeah 2 mil doesn't stop anything but its a lot easier to add luc for 6 to 8 mil when 5 isn't spent on vogt gallardo already. Little splashy depth deals add up. I liked the buy low on sogard and vogt... but I don't think you resign those guys. You just find 2018s version.

They are cheap and plentiful but Pina played roughly 50% of the time last year. I'd still see him as our 1 but if we spent the 7.5 mil on Lucroy instead of Gallardo Sogard Vogt I wouldn't complain. Luc hits rhp pretty well and he makes the C position much more solid. Sogard Gallardo Vogt don't do a whole lot of good. If we had luc instead of those 3 our only downgrade would be not having a backup SS. Perez hits LHP quite well and can play 2b. I don't love having two question marks at 2b and an unpredictable C plus a defense poor catcher. I see no reason for Gallardo. I don't like giving "just guys" money that could be spent on a solid 1 year plug.

And if Cobb gets the thing back, it's not just a good change, its one of the best.

All these depth arms making chacin look like a nice pricetag.

I'm pretty much hoping they sign Cobb and deal Santana in something with Cle that gets Mejia. Cain yelich braun/thames shaw arcia phillips villar pina If Mejia Huira Lutz can run to the majors in under 3 years that's a fun lineup.

Jeremy Hellickson has not aged very well for a changeup pitcher, and has struggled to come back from his injury in 2014; 2016 was good, but 2015 and 2017... not so much. And he's only a year older than Cobb. I'm more concerned about Cobb's inability to stay healthy enough to start 30 games in a season during his physical prime than his pitch types. One of Cobb's major injuries was getting hit in the face by a line drive. Are we going to worry about that with all of our pitchers? Thank you. Yeah he's not durable due to a freak comebacker and poorly timed TJ? You don't want to have it during the season. That kills more than 1 season. Guy averaged 6.1 ip to a peak 6.5 ip in his years with 20 starts or more. He just posted a season at 3.66 without his best pitch... and he has relatively low wear and tear on that arm as he's missed roughly 3 seasons worth of starts. Questioning his duability or saying he's close to garza is nonsense. Also since when did every pitcher start failing at 30. It's not RB. 30-33 is a solid window for a guy who has low wear and tear.

It would be easier for me to buy that teams are colluding to screw over Boras than free agents as a whole. That guy is just dreadful for baseball. All these good players sitting out, I 100% blame him. Him holding out like he is is causing other players not to be signed. I bet the Jon Jay' s and Carlos Gonzalez's of the world would be signed to deals if the rest of the outfield market wasn't holding up the middle class of outfielders. It doesn't even have to be the FOs at all. Basically this guy has picked audacious numbers that his clients "deserve," and like a 3 year old not getting the candy he wants, has laid down tantruming in the middle of the aisle throwing a fit and has asked his clients to do the same. He's been unwilling to come off his asking price. The league has collectively said he is asking too much. You dont have to collude to all decide these prices are absurd and you aren't paying them.

You are using dated logic that the mlb seems to be scrapping. The same logic that makes teams pay tyrod and glennon 15 mil per in the nfl. Same logic that makes carr garrapolo smith worth 25 mil. What's rodgers worth then 50 mil? Elite starters are paid 30-35 mil per. Cobb even as a 1 is around half of what those elites are worth. Arrietta a touch over cobb and yu a touch over that. They think they are going to get 20-25 over a huge window of time well into depreciation ages. Teams aren't that dumb this year. Deals have been very solid on the short term and many have incentives. The long term deals are the ones that are dying and these arms seem to want the old days. I like cobb a lot... doesn't change the fact thats hes a 2.7 war guy over basically 4 years. Darvish is around 4. Arrieta has had 3 fantastic years and is trending down. These aren't the elites. The elites of the FA class doesn't mean they deserve elite arm money.

The problem is too many Boras clients. I especially think Martinez and Arrieta could hold out into the season. Hosmer's offers are good to the point that he'll probably sign. I fully expect Lynn/Cobb to sign in the next week or so. As much as I'm generally on the team side of things, I find it a bit irritating that teams are using time as leverage. Wait until the season is closer and for players to potentially panic, it's a really dirty tactic in my opinion. I get the players are millionaires in most cases but it's still their livelihood. I'm sorry but boras is a blowhard hype man who has sold teams on a "marginally better is worth a ton" mantra for years. He's selling lemons consistently to these teams and you had to figure they'd eventually wise up. Baseball is becoming so metric based and numbers savvy that the other shoe was bound to drop. You add these bright young minds into positions of power in the league and you'll eventually get to a point where the market collapses on over priced "impact." The players all have offers they don't think are good enough. They are the delay not the owners or FO. No FO is going to risk low balling talent to a point where they give their competition an value contract. They've just stopped jumping through boras' hoops. The agents burnt bridges in the sport and now the numbers are exposing them for what they are. They mouthed off to their clients expecting a new crop of suckers and the wrong suckers bailed out of the market and the teams left aren't falling for it. It would be like the nfl owners FOs realizing keenum foles bortles with a good OC can win so there's no reason to pay carr garrapolo smith the same money as Rodgers... because they are worth about half of that. Then realizing interior OL is actually worth more than WRs and RBs. But that would take production metrics... oh wait! Shorter term deals on RP going up... Owar and Dwar producing bats still sought... None of the arms are the rare 6war stars so they aren't worth crazy money... It's very logical why this is happening.

Walker and Lucroy look like they are looking at 16/2 offers from everything that signed around them. Maybe lucroy even less as the catcher markets rough. My question at this point is what are these guys waiting for? The market isn't going to miraculously change. Right now you take what's offered. Make your choice, shorter term higher priced or longer term and discounted. Those are the options. Prove it deals came into fashion in the NFL one random offseason after a CBA. Now it's in vogue for the MLB. When a few key big spenders are looking at the tax line and 2019... and a few others are already maxed on crap they signed years ago this is going to happen. If the tops not being auctioned off to the big markets the middle markets demand isn't going to soar and they won't fight over marginal upgrades.

While the batting numbers don't pop, the fact that he's in carolina which seems to be depressing all batter numbers gives me a lot more faith in him. I worry about his fit on an mlb roster though. I think the bat will prove it can play as will the obp... but if he's not a great defender in CF and his arm isnt good enough for RF, so that leaves LF and I just dont see his offense being as good as you'd want there.

I'd rather roll with Suter/Wilkerson than sign a 30-year-old Matt Garza Alex Cobb for four years. Multi-year deals for 30-year-old #3 starter types haven't worked real well around here. Taking the journeymen out of the discussion, the Brewers have Suter/Wilkerson right now with Burnes, Ortiz, Peralta, Perrin, and Derby waiting in the wings in case of injury/ineffectiveness. I'd rather roll with that and then re-evaluate in June if a trade needs to be made than sign Cobb for four years. Oddly enough Garza was never as good as Cobb. True story. Cobb was a 2 last year and profiles as a 1 if he can regain his dominant out pitch that he scrapped all of last year. You really haven't looked into cobb well enough. Wilkerson and Suter aren't #1 or even #2 types. Suter struggles after 3 ip. He shouldn't go more than 4. He's a perfect long man. All the guys you put as waiting in the wings are free to bump Chacin after this year, or free to make Davies expendable. Anderson cobb nelson have 1 potential. You dont pass a 1 to kick the tires on a guy.

Because Braun and Broxton is better than Yelich and Cain? Or is it that counting on Braun to be healthy and in the lineup makes the team better? This teams constructed better than it was last year by a long shot. Since the offense would be better than it was last year if Braun didnt play at all I find it hard to agree with your stance. Having a true 1-2 with Santana Shaw thames/aguilar is better than the offense and defense at any point last year. This is the 1st year we have 4 OF better than our 1b... this is when Braun moves to a logical spot in his career trajectory. When you rebuild you acquire assets. When you contend you put the right pieces in place. You dont pass the right pieces because you have assets in their way. You trade the assets... when the price is correct. Yelich cain are contention adds.

Basically these numbers put Cobb as an upper level 2. Even at last years 3.66.

I think you are overselling everyone else or underselling Cobb. He was a 3.66 without his best pitch. There's a completely explainable reason for him being a 3.66 instead of a 2.8 that he was at 25-26. He's 3 era capable. He is 32 start near 200 ip capable. Non-flashy near ace territory. That's not a low 2. That's a solid 1.

That's my hope. We can put all the in case of emergency guys in CS and jump the rest from AA to august call up if we wish.