Antonetti/Vogt 2024 Season Wrap-Up Press Conference - My thoughts

 The parable about the 3 blind men and the elephant comes to mind when I think of all the summaries of this zoom call press conference that I have heard.

So, to add another take, here goes:

1. George Valera gets his 4th option year. Now, when some people come up with a prediction like this they bring up an old tweet and say, in their own way, "I told you so".  I won't do that, posting, instead, to this blog, that nobody reads anyway, right?

Two details from Antonetti's comments on this topic:

• The Guardians didn't have to apply for Valera to get the extra option year
• Valera was granted, by MLB, an extra option year as Antonetti put it "based on his history and minor league performance.

This decision by MLB brings hope that Noel (in 2025) could have a 4th option and Brito (in 2026) could get a 4th option a year later as he has one left that he will likely use sometime in 2025.

(3) Most interesting to me was Antonetti's comments on the off-season outlook

• He said that how the Guardians will do in 2025 will be dependent on the progress of the guys who are already here
• The team will try to balance that with acquisitions when felt that those acquisitions can help them reach their goal of winning the WS.

(4) Vogt said that the team wants its players to have more resources going forward, starting this off-season.  Not sure what that means but the tone implies that they MIGHT want the players to take advantage of places like Driveline and hitting schools to improve their performance.  It also could include things like more access to analytics and more interaction with the coaching staff over the winter.

(5) As far as the injured ML pitchers, Antonetti commented (I have summarized and also projected timelines based on his comments, so these are not his exact words)

• Beiber's timeline is somewhere between next April and September but that his progress, so far, makes it look like the shorter end (June?).
• Stephan is on about the same timeline although it is more likely that he could be back in April or May as relievers tend to have a quicker recovery from TJ surgery as they don't have to have the innings buildup SP do.
• Hentges is out for the entire 2025 season.
• Karinchak will be ready for 2025 spring training and has one minor league option left (per Fangraphs)

(6) Antonetti said they will continue to support Bieber's rehab and CA went to extremes to say what Bieber has meant to the organization in his time here.  Some might take that as a farewell knowing they can't meet his asking price.  I tend to take that as him saying how important they think he would be to their future.  He said that the team told Bieber how much they would love to have him back and Bieber was interested.  But every team and every free agent says that stuff around this time of year, sooooo...

(7)  Among renovations this winter the clubhouse will have a massive renovation with more room and state of the art facilities for the players.

(8) Vogt sounded optimistic about Rocchio and Bo Naylor in terms of how much progress they have made this year but hard to tell if that is real enthusiasm for having those players be part of 2025 and beyond or just company speak to camouflage their intent to upgrade at SS and C in the off-season.

(8) Vogt said he wouldn't change a decision he made in the post-season and that they had planned for every scenario in the post-season with the coaching staff, analytics and others having a voice, meaning that the process, based on analytics, is what will determine things going forward.  This, to me, as a science guy, is good news.  Consistency tends to bring good results because everyone knows what is expected of them.  I think, although we might not agreed with all of his principles, is something Francona should have taught all of us.

(9 Vogt said how important Craig Albernaz was to the team this year.  I would be worried because Albie is being interviewed for managerial jobs but I think with what Vogt has learned from him this this year, Albernaz is a nice to have for the 2025 coaching staff but not, like he was in 2024, a must have.

(10) They are partnering with Gimenez this off-season to make his offense more consistent. This, to me, could mean they are having him attending a hitting school somewhere. Antonetti fell short of saying Gimenez was a cornerstone of this team which, to me, is interesting, because sliding him over to SS, IMO, makes him a cornerstone.  

(11) Regarding starting pitching and pitching in general Antonetti stressed they have a good young core of pitchers in the majors but that the also have a number of young pitchers "on the cusp" of helping the ML team.  I think this speaks volumes for guys like Aleman, Webb, Nikhazy, Davenport, Denholm, Messick, Peterson and Mace as well as relievers like Enright, Misiaszek and Mikolajchak and others for the bullpen.  He did say they value veteran SP implying that they would look at FAs where they could (Bieber, Boyd, Cobb, other value guys) but that they would also consider going with the young guys who, as he said, are "on the cusp".  I think this may spell them moving on from McKenzie and Allen to add 2021 draftess to the roster this winter to avoid losing them in the Rule 5.

So there are my impressions.  Don't know if I am just another blind man examining the elephant.  I guess we will see.