The Official 2017-2018 Hot Stove Thread

[totdprods]

5 minutes ago, Stradling said:

If I could get Gardner for basically nothing, I do that and move Kole.  But the Yankees won’t give him away, he is a consistent 3 WAR player and last year was almost a 5 WAR player.  They aren’t giving him away. 

And if you were paying a big price, you may as well spring for Yelich.  

I like the idea of a conventional 4-man bench with a 4th OF, or getting extra creative, going with a 3-man bench (Rivera, Valbuena, and a multi-positional IF/OF) and bringing up a 4th OF as needed with the 13th pitcher going to AAA.

[Ohtaniland]

5 minutes ago, Stradling said:

If I could get Gardner for basically nothing, I do that and move Kole.  But the Yankees won’t give him away, he is a consistent 3 WAR player and last year was almost a 5 WAR player.  They aren’t giving him away. 

They want to get a frontline pitcher so they need to move some salary. With the young talent they already have and with Gardner under contract for only one more season they would move him quickly and cheaply. I agree that Kole would have to get moved to take advantage of Gardner’s leadoff capabilities. 

[Hubs]

23 minutes ago, totdprods said:

And if you were paying a big price, you may as well spring for Yelich.  

I like the idea of a conventional 4-man bench with a 4th OF, or getting extra creative, going with a 3-man bench (Rivera, Valbuena, and a multi-positional IF/OF) and bringing up a 4th OF as needed with the 13th pitcher going to AAA.

I understand that Valbuena is frequently thought of as a bench piece, but with platoons at DH and 1B, I do think CJ Cron may not be the "starter" like he has been the last two years. 

PA at 1B in 2017: Cron 368, Valbuena 162, Marte 93, Pujols 25

PA at 1B in 2016: Cron 396, Pujols 117, Marte 95, Choi 59, Soto 1

PA at 1B in 2015*: Pujols 396, Cron 214, Navarro 36, Green 11, Krauss 11, Iannetta 2, Perez 1, Butera 1.

If Pujols is platooning, then the split should be closer to 300 a piece between he and Valbuena, but that basically leaves out Cron entirely.

Valbuena is the other left handed bat and was third on the team in HR last year, he's going to play. So is Pujols, and that leaves Cron out. The most I could see Cron getting is 300 PA, and that would mean Valbuena isn't producing and/or playing a bunch of 3B. More likely I see him getting maybe 200 PA. And since he has no options, that isn't a good use of a roster spot.

* In 2015, Cron got the lion's share of the DH AB's.

 

[Ohtaniland]

9 minutes ago, Hubs said:

I understand that Valbuena is frequently thought of as a bench piece, but with platoons at DH and 1B, I do think CJ Cron may not be the "starter" like he has been the last two years. 

PA at 1B in 2017: Cron 368, Valbuena 162, Marte 93, Pujols 25

PA at 1B in 2016: Cron 396, Pujols 117, Marte 95, Choi 59, Soto 1

PA at 1B in 2015*: Pujols 396, Cron 214, Navarro 36, Green 11, Krauss 11, Iannetta 2, Perez 1, Butera 1.

If Pujols is platooning, then the split should be closer to 300 a piece between he and Valbuena, but that basically leaves out Cron entirely.

Valbuena is the other left handed bat and was third on the team in HR last year, he's going to play. So is Pujols, and that leaves Cron out. The most I could see Cron getting is 300 PA, and that would mean Valbuena isn't producing and/or playing a bunch of 3B. More likely I see him getting maybe 200 PA. And since he has no options, that isn't a good use of a roster spot.

* In 2015, Cron got the lion's share of the DH AB's.

 

Pujols playing time is largely due to his contract. If it wasn’t for that, Hosmer would be here and both Cron and Pujols would be gone. 

[totdprods]

I honestly would be surprised if Cron is on the team in '18. We're either short an arm, or have a really awkward roster with 3-4 guys who are basically 1B/DH types (Cron, Bert, Ohtani) with Valbuena having at least 3B on his side. 

[totdprods]

5 minutes ago, OHTANILAND said:

Pujols playing time is largely due to his contract. If it wasn’t for that, Hosmer would be here and both Cron and Pujols would be gone. 

I guarantee Eppler would have gone the Alonso/LoMo/Santana route if we had a legit 1B need instead of signing Hosmer.

[Stradling]

41 minutes ago, OHTANILAND said:

They want to get a frontline pitcher so they need to move some salary. With the young talent they already have and with Gardner under contract for only one more season they would move him quickly and cheaply. I agree that Kole would have to get moved to take advantage of Gardner’s leadoff capabilities. 

They won’t just give Gardner away.  He’s their third most valuable player.  Elsbury is a different story. 

[ettin]

3 hours ago, ettin said:

 

The original question was does it count against the AAV cap and it does not.

MLB and the Player's Union regulate contracts to ensure no one is handing out performance bonuses that are out of whack. For instance you don't promise a player that if he pitches 1 inning he gets a $5M performance bonus. MLB and the Player's Union would be against that (MLB believing the organization is trying to circumvent the CBT threshold while the Player's Union will be wondering why that money isn't guaranteed in the contract in the first place).

When the Angels offered Pujols the $10M personal services contract and added in those performance bonuses it was not viewed very kindly by MLB but because it was such a monster contract a $3M performance bonus wasn't looked at as an oddity. Also MLB shut down the ability for teams to provide personal services contracts after a player has retired because of what happened with Albert.

Any performance bonus that is earned will be added to actual club payroll for that season. However in terms of the Luxury Tax and AAV a performance bonus is not added into the calculation for determining AAV, only signing bonuses (of which I believe Albert received a $10M one initially if I recall correctly).

So to summarize the Luxury Tax threshold is not impacted by a performance bonus.

That last sentence is incorrect. I was thinking about the fact that the Angels actual club payroll is about $10M more than the current Luxury Tax calculation so it shouldn't matter for this year but as I said the money is added to actual club payroll which could conceivable push us over the CBT threshold if we took on more money before the season or during the season.

Ultimately the extra $3M probably will not matter unless we take on a lot more payroll between now and December 2nd, 2018.

[totdprods]

5 minutes ago, Stradling said:

They won’t just give Gardner away.  He’s their third most valuable player.  Elsbury is a different story. 

If they paid half of Ellsbury's salary and threw in a truly good prospect or a couple fringey 40-man guys who would be helpful I'd consider it...

[NJHalo]

19 minutes ago, totdprods said:

If they paid half of Ellsbury's salary and threw in a truly good prospect or a couple fringey 40-man guys who would be helpful I'd consider it...

Ellsbury has a full NTC, and would only approve a trade somewhere he was guaranteed to start.

Brian Cashman was just on WFAN, and he sounded desperate to shed some salary, and he wants Darvish. It was funny listening to him complain about the Ohtani bidding. He was complaining about having to fly over to Japan, only to find out when he got there that he wouldn't sign with a team east of the Mississippi, or one that had spring training in Florida. Cashman was saying he was moving mountains to make this happen, but never had a chance.

[Angel Oracle]

1 hour ago, Stradling said:

If I could get Gardner for basically nothing, I do that and move Kole.  But the Yankees won’t give him away, he is a consistent 3 WAR player and last year was almost a 5 WAR player.  They aren’t giving him away. 

Except that Gardner's arm is very meh.   And Upton doesn't have the arm for RF either.

[ten ocho recon scout]

4 hours ago, Stradling said:

If I could get Gardner for basically nothing, I do that and move Kole.  But the Yankees won’t give him away, he is a consistent 3 WAR player and last year was almost a 5 WAR player.  They aren’t giving him away. 

Im not suggesting this, but what about trading calhoun for gardner? (Again, not suggesting this). Would the angels be better off with calhouns offense skill set or gardners?

[krAbs]

 

Probably not true, but if true, eff that noise.

[Stradling]

Maybe he doesn’t want to play in NY. 

[Docwaukee]

14 minutes ago, krAbs said:

 

Probably not true, but if true, eff that noise.

that sounds like BS

[krAbs]

Just now, Dochalo said:

that sounds like BS

Michael Kay is also BS - apparently he predicted that he had an inside source saying Judge was going to win MVP.

That's the kinda price that makes me want to have nothing to do with Darvish, though.

[VariousCrap]

Darvish for seven years is ridiculous. 

[Angel Oracle]

38 minutes ago, krAbs said:

Michael Kay is also BS - apparently he predicted that he had an inside source saying Judge was going to win MVP.

That's the kinda price that makes me want to have nothing to do with Darvish, though.

Just this to be said to Michael Kay:    "See ya!"

[Stradling]

Angels will sign him for about $105 million, I have no sources.  

[krAbs]

2 minutes ago, Stradling said:

Angels will sign him for about $105 million, I have no sources.  

Unfortunately, its 1 year/$105 million.

[eligrba]

I play Atari with a dude whose sister is the girlfriend of Darvish's second cousin and he says the Angels are signing him.

This dude also managed 10 teams and wrote for a number of national blogs about baseball and pet grooming.  Dude is connected.....that is all I am able to say......

[Warfarin]

1 hour ago, eligrba said:

I play Atari with a dude whose sister is the girlfriend of Darvish's second cousin and he says the Angels are signing him.

This dude also managed 10 teams and wrote for a number of national blogs about baseball and pet grooming.  Dude is connected.....that is all I am able to say......

If the Angels are signing him, then why hasn't a deal been announced?

[Stradling]

40 minutes ago, Warfarin said:

If the Angels are signing him, then why hasn't a deal been announced?

If any of the other five teams are signing him, then why hasn’t a deal been announced?

[Troll Daddy]

Darvish and Ohtani make sense ... rooming, hanging out, eating, and practicing together. They can even be travel buddies to Japan and back. 

Big brother Darvish can be his mentor. 

[Troll Daddy]

The Padres and Marlins each made a huge acquisition this week, though not the kind we typically cover here on MLBTR.  Yesterday, FanGraphs stalwart Dave Cameron announced he will be joining the Padres to help build out their Research and Development department.  And this morning, former MLBTR contributor Bradley Woodrum announced he’s joining the Marlins analytics team.  Cameron and Woodrum were among the best sabermetric analysts operating in the public sphere, and we’ll sorely miss reading their work.

traderumors.com

very interesting