Official 2021-22 Hot Stove League Thread.

[tdawg87]

1 minute ago, mmc said:

 

Damn. I would have loved him as a bench guy. I don't think either of those guys are even ranked in the M's system. Correct me if I'm wrong.

[Stradling]

Stroman is the safe pick with upside after the risky one year deal for Noah. 

[Dtwncbad]

“I probably asked her ten times if she wanted to get sushi.  Ten times!  And now she suddenly likes sushi?”

[Warfarin]

3 minutes ago, tdawg87 said:

We won't hear anything until the last minute. That's how this team operates. Probably an Arte thing. I like it, honestly. Much better than the "*Team* is in talks with Stroman but nothing imminent" crap from Heyman.

Same.  Heyman's Tweets are annoying - just basically team XYZ is interested in this player, talks on-going.

Passan is great to follow - he usually just posts when a deal is done, as opposed to the perpetual "so and so is talking.."

[totdprods]

2 minutes ago, Warfarin said:

Same.  Heyman's Tweets are annoying - just basically team XYZ is interested in this player, talks on-going.

Passan is great to follow - he usually just posts when a deal is done, as opposed to the perpetual "so and so is talking.."

Heyman has also broken a few of the signings though. 

[tdawg87]

2 minutes ago, totdprods said:

Heyman has also broken a few of the signings though. 

Blind squirrel, nut etc...

[Warfarin]

1 minute ago, totdprods said:

Heyman has also broken a few of the signings though. 

He has, but few compared to the other notables (Passan, Rosenthal), and 99% of his Tweets are either just his own random thoughts or just "so and so has a need for pitching and is interested in all these free agent pitchers."

[tdawg87]

Bob Nightingale is the worst. Fuck that guy.

[totdprods]

Just now, Warfarin said:

He has, but few compared to the other notables (Passan, Rosenthal), and 99% of his Tweets are either just his own random thoughts or just "so and so has a need for pitching and is interested in all these free agent pitchers."

That’s Twitter for ya ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

[Warfarin]

Just now, totdprods said:

That’s Twitter for ya ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

Yeah.  That's why I highly value those that mainly just post actual news or content, instead of spamming your feed with all these random thoughts or "rumors" that almost always lead to nothing.  There aren't many like the former, so it's cool when I actually see it.

[mmc]

8 minutes ago, tdawg87 said:

Damn. I would have loved him as a bench guy. I don't think either of those guys are even ranked in the M's system. Correct me if I'm wrong.

A bench guy?  He’d easily start on this team.

[jsnpritchett]

3 minutes ago, mmc said:

A bench guy?  He’d easily start on this team.

Yep.  Plus, he's a free agent after next season and will probably get $7M+ in arbitration.  So that's why his acquisition cost wasn't that high.

[tdawg87]

1 minute ago, mmc said:

A bench guy?  He’d easily start on this team.

I mean, yeah you're probably right. He's just played SS 7 innings in his MLB career. He did play more earlier in the minors.

I guess he could play second and Fletcher moves to short. But it's a moot point now.

[tdawg87]

Everytime @mmc posts I get excited but then I remember he would post a thread first if it's breaking Angels news.

Please, Minasian.

[AngelStew43]

I still think it is Max.  Trout wants him, Ownership wants to keep Trout (and Ohtani) happy to be playing in Anaheim.  

If I am wrong, then I hope Chuck's little birdie lands us a SS.  Like Seager.  

[Inside Pitch]

7 hours ago, Warfarin said:

Bingo.

I think Eppler's biggest shortcoming though was that he didn't really build up the farm system, or, well, he wasn't very good at it.  We have a few good prospects, but we by no means have a top tier system.

Even with his misses, if he drafted better, he could have gotten away with some of his free agency mistakes.

He did inherit a terrible system (courtesy of DiPoto), so I don't blame him for that, but he did have 5 years, which is enough time to overturn the farm system and start to see a flurry of impact players.

He wasn't awful at it, as we do have some legit prospects, but I don't think he was that good at it, either.

This is what I am most hopeful with when it comes to Minasian - given his background, I'm hoping we can see significant improvement in how we draft and develop players, such that we don't need our GM to enter free agency and spend 60+ million to fill all the holes that we have.

The notion that he didn't build the farm up enough is 100% built on peoples reliance on farm rankings as their primary view or resource for the general health of a farm system.. Reality is those rankings are heavily influenced by graduations, and in the Angels case, guys were aggressively promoted and elevated to the majors not because they were ready but because the MLB team was in dire need of help. Had it not been for premature promotions a half dozen guys might all still be prospect eligible and the narrative changes. 

If Sandoval, Suarez, Marsh, and Adell all blossom into legit MLB players this year nobody will be singing the farm's praises but all of them would have been fruits of it's labor.

[Warfarin]

4 minutes ago, Inside Pitch said:

The notion that he didn't build the farm up enough is 100% built on peoples reliance on farm rankings as their primary view or resource for the general health of a farm system.. Reality is those rankings are heavily influenced by graduations, and in the Angels case, guys were aggressively promoted and elevated to the minors not because they were ready but because the MLB team was in dire need of help. Had it not been for premature promotions a half dozen guys might all still be prospect eligible and the narrative changes. 

If Sandoval, Suarez, Marsh, and Adell all blossom into legit MLB players this year nobody will be singing the farm's praises but all of them would have been fruits of it's labor.

That last sentence is the important part - "if."  Certainly if they do go on to be really solid MLB players, then that will change the narrative.  For now though, I do think he was average, at best, in terms of building the farm system.  We'll see though what happens though over time in terms of the aforementioned players.

I do think he should share some blame in terms of premature promotions of prospects.  A GM should have a long-term view of the organizational health, and if a player isn't ready yet to be an MLB contributor, then they should be held back.  I recognize that he probably was desperate to save his job and received pressure from his owner to see immediate results, but rushing prospects doesn't usually lead to good outcomes for either the prospect or the team.

[tdawg87]

Chuck pls

[eligrba]

9 minutes ago, Inside Pitch said:

The notion that he didn't build the farm up enough is 100% built on peoples reliance on farm rankings as their primary view or resource for the general health of a farm system.. Reality is those rankings are heavily influenced by graduations, and in the Angels case, guys were aggressively promoted and elevated to the minors not because they were ready but because the MLB team was in dire need of help. Had it not been for premature promotions a half dozen guys might all still be prospect eligible and the narrative changes. 

If Sandoval, Suarez, Marsh, and Adell all blossom into legit MLB players this year nobody will be singing the farm's praises but all of them would have been fruits of it's labor.

Correct me if I am wrong, but Sandoval, Suarez and Barria were aggressively promoted because Eppler was so bad at signing major league pitchers.  Their promotions was more out of necessity which interfered with each players' development.  I can see all three of those pitchers being important members of the staff for the upcoming season.

To your point about farm rankings, if all of these pitchers stayed in the minors for the past three years, AW would have a much different perspective of Eppler's work.

[Inside Pitch]

25 minutes ago, Warfarin said:

That last sentence is the important part - "if."  Certainly if they do go on to be really solid MLB players, then that will change the narrative.  For now though, I do think he was average, at best, in terms of building the farm system.  We'll see though what happens though over time in terms of the aforementioned players.

I do think he should share some blame in terms of premature promotions of prospects.  A GM should have a long-term view of the organizational health, and if a player isn't ready yet to be an MLB contributor, then they should be held back.  I recognize that he probably was desperate to save his job and received pressure from his owner to see immediate results, but rushing prospects doesn't usually lead to good outcomes for either the prospect or the team.

That last sentence "if", is true of every farm system. 

The Mariners had the number 2 system in baseball less than a decade ago ... Name even one star player from that bunch?  Paxton is the closest you'll come.

I don't think there was any desperation to save his job.  I think there was a lack of organizational depth and money available to him.  Sometimes I wonder if people have been watching the same I have.

The "he had 5 years" mentality lacks any real insight too.  Eppler had zero moveable parts when he arrived save for players he needed to field a roster, there was no selling off to speed the process up.  The first year amounted to 3 months of draft prep using his predecessors people, he had zero top 5 picks, mostly all high school draftees early on because there was a massive need to inject upside into the system.  Just about every report on the system going into 2021 talked up the youth and the upside.  I mean they entered 2021 as the youngest system in all of baseball

The he didn't do enough narrative is exactly the same mindset ignores all that and focuses on scoreboard.

[eligrba]

1 hour ago, tdawg87 said:

Damn. I would have loved him as a bench guy. I don't think either of those guys are even ranked in the M's system. Correct me if I'm wrong.

He played for three different teams in 2021.   I wonder why?

[jsnpritchett]

1 minute ago, eligrba said:

He played for three different teams in 2021.   I wonder why?

Nope.  Played for the Pirates (where he'd been since they drafted him in 2013) and then was traded to the Padres.

[Inside Pitch]

14 minutes ago, eligrba said:

Correct me if I am wrong, but Sandoval, Suarez and Barria were aggressively promoted because Eppler was so bad at signing major league pitchers.  Their promotions was more out of necessity which interfered with each players' development.  I can see all three of those pitchers being important members of the staff for the upcoming season.

To your point about farm rankings, if all of these pitchers stayed in the minors for the past three years, AW would have a much different perspective of Eppler's work.

Yes, of course they were brought up because of failures at the top, that and the complete lack of organizational depth. 

Now name all the top end arms that would have been willing to sign for the money Arte made available to him.  

It was a shitty situation made worse by the one year FA failures, no question.

[eligrba]

Just now, Inside Pitch said:

Yes, of course they were brought up because of failures at the top, that and the complete lack of organizational depth. 

Now name all the to end arms that would have been willing to sign for the money Arte made available to him.  

Stand by:

[Inside Pitch]

Just now, eligrba said:

Stand by:

Lol...  Perfect response...