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6/27-6/29 Red Sox vs. Marlins Series Thread
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Post by manfred on Jun 29, 2023 23:54:38 GMT -5
I mean… Yoshida is 1 fWAR for more money. The wheels on the bus go round and round… I really hate how folks glaze over the fact that Renfroe is an awful fielder and is clearly a clubhouse cancer. Why else would he be playing on his 5th team in as many years if he was so valuable? I’m not saying he’s especially good. I am saying he is part of a repeated cycling of OFers that has been pretty unsuccessful. Is Yoshida a huge step up at 5/$90 mill for ages 30-35? There is a lot of motion, but it gets you back to 1 fWAR.
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Post by notstarboard on Jun 30, 2023 6:10:46 GMT -5
What about the prospects who rise? There are plenty who have gone in that direction too. Renfroe has been mediocre at best this year. He's making $12 million and has posted 1.1 fWAR with a 105 wRC+ and -4 DRS so far. Savant stats are ugly too: 29th percentile xwOBA (career wOBA - xwOBA is .008; not much reason to discount xwOBA) and 14th percentile OAA. He would be the fifth best outfielder on our team this year. I mean… Yoshida is 1 fWAR for more money. The wheels on the bus go round and round… More money, but substantially better peripherals. 79th percentile xwOBA vs 29th. Yoshida's WAR is also getting hammered for baserunning (one of the worst in the majors) - curious if that's going to be a consistent thing for him. I don't think we know quite how good he'll shake out to be since he seems to be streaky offensively.
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Post by notstarboard on Jun 30, 2023 6:13:35 GMT -5
I really hate how folks glaze over the fact that Renfroe is an awful fielder and is clearly a clubhouse cancer. Why else would he be playing on his 5th team in as many years if he was so valuable? I’m not saying he’s especially good. I am saying he is part of a repeated cycling of OFers that has been pretty unsuccessful. Is Yoshida a huge step up at 5/$90 mill for ages 30-35? There is a lot of motion, but it gets you back to 1 fWAR. It's not motion for the sake of motion. It's motion for the sake of prospects. And Yoshida's contract is ages 29-33.
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Post by incandenza on Jun 30, 2023 7:12:53 GMT -5
Which studs was he giving up for these guys, though? Two months of rentals like Pillar and CVaz? Hunter Renfroe and Andrew Benintendi in Arb 2? The only extremely valuable player that was traded was Betts on a 1/27 and that brought back 5 years of a solid RF, 6 years of what looks like an average-ish starting catcher, and 3/48 in savings on the Price contract. I'd agree it's not a good record, but it's not awful either, and there is a lot that remains to be seen from these trades. Can Winck build on this year? Can Abreu keep up his momentum? Will Valdez and Hamilton hit enough to stick in a bench role?
You seem a little too hard on Hamilton too. We've seen him at SS for a few games. SP.com thinks he could be an average defensive 2B. SS was never likely to be a long term home for him; he's more likely to be a utility pinch runner type.
I don’t want to relitigate but the small deals were small, yes, but Renfroe, for example, was so poor… no replacement, and he’s decent again this year. It was all wheel spinning. But the bigger problem is the amount of talent that has yielded nothing. It is not just the trades they’ve made, but it is also the ones they didn’t make. It is just resource management in general. Last thing… you name some guys who are “depth”… but that is the specialty these last years… get guys who slot ~15, say “our system is deeper,” and watch them slide. Downs was #2; Seabold #7; Binelas was #17; Ronaldo Hernandez was top-20 etc. and now… Nada. I’d like to see them perhaps *trade* prospects before they flame out. It seems rather telling that after a good season in Milwaukee the Brewers traded him for basically nothing (literally for Junk); he just doesn't have surplus value over his arb salaries the last couple of seasons. The mistake there was not adequately replacing him in 2022, as you mentioned; but not getting more in the trade return wasn't really the issue.
In fact as far as I'm concerned Bloom only made two real mistakes last season, and they were basically the same mistake: not getting an adequate right fielder, and not going over the LTT by more. Just signing a middling outfielder on a one year deal would have filled such an obvious need, and the team just didn't do it.
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Post by manfred on Jun 30, 2023 7:18:19 GMT -5
I’m not saying he’s especially good. I am saying he is part of a repeated cycling of OFers that has been pretty unsuccessful. Is Yoshida a huge step up at 5/$90 mill for ages 30-35? There is a lot of motion, but it gets you back to 1 fWAR. It's not motion for the sake of motion. It's motion for the sake of prospects. And Yoshida's contract is ages 29-33. What prospects? Binelas? Downs?
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radiohix
Veteran
'At the end of the day, we bang. We bang. We're going to swing.' Alex Verdugo
Posts: 6,312
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Post by radiohix on Jun 30, 2023 7:27:22 GMT -5
It still blows my mind that the Marlins got Luzardo for half a season of Starling Marte 😂 2021 trade deadline was crazy!
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Post by notstarboard on Jun 30, 2023 7:49:30 GMT -5
It's not motion for the sake of motion. It's motion for the sake of prospects. And Yoshida's contract is ages 29-33. What prospects? Binelas? Downs? The OF ones I can think of were Binelas (Renfroe), Hamilton (Renfroe), Wallace (Pillar; later traded for Wyatt Mills), Winckowski (Benintendi), Gambrell (Benintendi), de la Rosa (Benintendi), Valdez (Benintendi; bust), Wong (Betts), and Downs (Betts; bust), plus a handful of ML pieces (Verdugo, Franchy, JBJ; one starter and some gap fillers). I'm not here to argue that they could not have added more value in these trades; as much as it's fruitless to evaluate small samples of trades for prospects based on how they eventually develop, the return appears meh so far. But it's not like Bloom's just getting bored and cycling through OFs for the heck of it.
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Post by notstarboard on Jun 30, 2023 7:50:39 GMT -5
It still blows my mind that the Marlins got Luzardo for half a season of Starling Marte 😂 2021 trade deadline was crazy! He was really bad in 2021, so there was some risk of him busting too. Marlins ended up getting a heck of a deal, though!
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Post by manfred on Jun 30, 2023 8:13:50 GMT -5
What prospects? Binelas? Downs? The OF ones I can think of were Binelas (Renfroe), Hamilton (Renfroe), Wallace (Pillar; later traded for Wyatt Mills), Winckowski (Benintendi), Gambrell (Benintendi), de la Rosa (Benintendi), Valdez (Benintendi; bust), Wong (Betts), and Downs (Betts; bust), plus a handful of ML pieces (Verdugo, Franchy, JBJ; one starter and some gap fillers). I'm not here to argue that they could not have added more value in these trades; as much as it's fruitless to evaluate small samples of trades for prospects based on how they eventually develop, the return appears meh so far. But it's not like Bloom's just getting bored and cycling through OFs for the heck of it. I did not say it was boredom. But it has not made the team better (and it has periodically made the team worse). When you look at the value of the OF he inherited and what it has yielded, it is a sad spectacle.
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Post by philsbosoxfan on Jun 30, 2023 8:36:12 GMT -5
Winc needs a time out.
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Post by incandenza on Jun 30, 2023 8:55:30 GMT -5
Since everyone likes to bring this up as a point of criticism, I want to say that Cora's bullpen use yesterday is typical of what I think he's done really well this season: use the team's best relievers in high leverage situations, even if the team doesn't have a lead. (Seems like a low bar to clear, but it does go against conventional wisdom as well as how Cora has sometimes managed in the past.)
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TearsIn04
Veteran
Everybody knows Nelson de la Rosa, but who is Karim Garcia?
Posts: 2,835
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Post by TearsIn04 on Jun 30, 2023 9:02:16 GMT -5
I’m pretty sure JD wouldn’t be doing THIS in Boston this year. He had run his course and burned out. We’ve seen it many times. He’s a new man in Lala land, though. It’s like he’s 10 years younger. He has not even been particularly good this year. Yes, 18 HRs, but a .302 OBP and a 31% K rate. Worth his paycheck, certainly, but Turner has been a more valuable player. JD also does tend to start fast; he was the man in Boston last year too, but after the first few months played pretty poorly the rest of the way. Let's see how he ends up. Renfroe is a limited player, yes. OBP has never been his thing. The point is that they took on a more expensive player (whom we all feel affection for, yes) who couldn't play BB any more. They did this to get a prospect, who, as it turns out, will never be able to play BB at the ML level. I was big on making trades to take on salary and bring back a prospect. I was all in on Wil Myers from SD. And I even had Chris Davis fantasies. I thought we could take on part of that salary to add one of the Orioles worthwhile prospects and then immediately DFA CD. I thought Rougned Odor would be a good target when he had two years and $16M left. The Rangers definitely would have listened because they ended up DFA'ing him. But Bloom uses his big-market leverage coming off an ALCS year when we have big hopes and he brings back Alex Binelas and expensive, cooked JBJ for a guy who was a useful player on that 2021 ALCS team? Not what I had in mind. As far as prospect acquisitions who have risen, risen to what? Read the SP summaries on Valdez, Hamilton and Abreu and they all top out as possible utility players.
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radiohix
Veteran
'At the end of the day, we bang. We bang. We're going to swing.' Alex Verdugo
Posts: 6,312
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Post by radiohix on Jun 30, 2023 9:05:13 GMT -5
It still blows my mind that the Marlins got Luzardo for half a season of Starling Marte 😂 2021 trade deadline was crazy! He was really bad in 2021, so there was some risk of him busting too. Marlins ended up getting a heck of a deal, though! Even if he was awful back then, we’re still talking about a top pitching prospect who throws 96+ mph from the left side with many many years of team control for a 70 something games of Starling Marte who was having a terrific season I gotta say but the logic behind that trade still doesn’t compute for me. It seems to me that the whole market was crazy at the time: The Kimbrel, Baez trades were crazy too.
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Post by terriblehondo on Jun 30, 2023 9:08:16 GMT -5
It still blows my mind that the Marlins got Luzardo for half a season of Starling Marte 😂 2021 trade deadline was crazy! He was really bad in 2021, so there was some risk of him busting too. Marlins ended up getting a heck of a deal, though! He was terrible and that was why the Marlins were able to get him. So either taking the extra time to develop or the Marlins fixed him. It wasn't a crazy deal at the time.
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Post by notstarboard on Jun 30, 2023 9:26:17 GMT -5
The OF ones I can think of were Binelas (Renfroe), Hamilton (Renfroe), Wallace (Pillar; later traded for Wyatt Mills), Winckowski (Benintendi), Gambrell (Benintendi), de la Rosa (Benintendi), Valdez (Benintendi; bust), Wong (Betts), and Downs (Betts; bust), plus a handful of ML pieces (Verdugo, Franchy, JBJ; one starter and some gap fillers). I'm not here to argue that they could not have added more value in these trades; as much as it's fruitless to evaluate small samples of trades for prospects based on how they eventually develop, the return appears meh so far. But it's not like Bloom's just getting bored and cycling through OFs for the heck of it. I did not say it was boredom. But it has not made the team better (and it has periodically made the team worse). When you look at the value of the OF he inherited and what it has yielded, it is a sad spectacle. He inherited one year of Betts, one year of JBJ, and three years of Benintendi.
JBJ played his last season and was one of the best players on the team in 2020, so that was the value he yielded.
Benintendi played one of those three years in Boston, but he could not have been worse from the end of 2019 through 2020. In 2019, from 8/17 through the end of the year, Benintendi went 14-103 (10 1B, 4 2B, 1 HR). In 2020 he went 4-39 (3 1B, 1 2B) with 17 Ks before missing the rest of the year with an injury. Overall, that's a 42-game stretch where he went 18-142 with only 5 XBH. He did walk 23 times in that span, but his power had basically disappeared and he was looking completely lost at the plate. The fan consensus - not that we know that much - after 2020 was that he could not under any circumstances be penciled in as the starting LF in 2021; you either trade him and get what you can, or you sign another corner OF so he could be more of a platoon or 4th OF guy and if all went well he'd figure it out again. That was his value when he was traded. If all of the other prospects bust but Winck can settle in as a leverage reliever through his arb years, that would have turned out fine for those last two years of Benintendi; we'll see how it goes.
And Betts was traded for 5 seasons of a solid corner OF, 6 seasons of what looks like a starting catcher, and 3/48 off Price's contract. Downs busted but Wong has exceeded expectations, so it mostly washes out. Seems like a fine return to me.
Edit: And I swear I'll stop rehashing now, I'm sorry, I can't help it!
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Post by notstarboard on Jun 30, 2023 10:00:12 GMT -5
He has not even been particularly good this year. Yes, 18 HRs, but a .302 OBP and a 31% K rate. Worth his paycheck, certainly, but Turner has been a more valuable player. JD also does tend to start fast; he was the man in Boston last year too, but after the first few months played pretty poorly the rest of the way. Let's see how he ends up. Renfroe is a limited player, yes. OBP has never been his thing. The point is that they took on a more expensive player (whom we all feel affection for, yes) who couldn't play BB any more. They did this to get a prospect, who, as it turns out, will never be able to play BB at the ML level. I was big on making trades to take on salary and bring back a prospect. I was all in on Wil Myers from SD. And I even had Chris Davis fantasies. I thought we could take on part of that salary to add one of the Orioles worthwhile prospects and then immediately DFA CD. I thought Rougned Odor would be a good target when he had two years and $16M left. The Rangers definitely would have listened because they ended up DFA'ing him. But Bloom uses his big-market leverage coming off an ALCS year when we have big hopes and he brings back Alex Binelas and expensive, cooked JBJ for a guy who was a useful player on that 2021 ALCS team? Not what I had in mind. As far as prospect acquisitions who have risen, risen to what? Read the SP summaries on Valdez, Hamilton and Abreu and they all top out as possible utility players. I agree with you that the Renfroe trade didn't go well. Even if Hamilton hangs around as a speedy utility guy for a few years we're unlikely to come out ahead on that. But it's not like it was a foregone conclusion that JBJ was cooked either. The logic at the time made sense - Renfroe had been DFA'd in 2020 and then had a career year in 2021. He was getting more expensive and there was a definite risk of him regressing in 2022. Meanwhile JBJ had been solid in Boston for several seasons prior to his atrocious year in Milwaukee. You figure, sell one guy high, buy another guy low, expect a bit of regression to the mean from each, and pick up a couple of prospects to boot. Can't win 'em all.
Would you feel differently if Binelas had panned out? What if you signed Odor or Chris Davis for prospects (to the extent that those teams were looking to give up a worthwhile prospect to save cash on those contracts anyway) and those prospects busted? Everything can't hinge on whether the prospect in question pans out given how risky they are. You've commented elsewhere that you think on the aggregate the returns have not been good enough, and that is definitely the right way to think about this; if there's an issue here it isn't the concept of one or a few specific trades, but rather the evaluation of prospects in other teams' systems. I haven't been impressed by the aggregate return from Bloom's trades to acquire prospects, but I haven't been frustrated by it either. There have been some Renfroe trades that look bad, some Betts trades that look fine, and some Vazquez trades that look good. My unscientific opinion on the whole is: meh.
Winckowski, Whitlock, Wong, and Abreu are examples of guys who rose after they were acquired.
I'm going to stop replying on this thread as well in the spirit of ending the rehashing, but feel free to get the last word in.
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