The Off-Season So Far - Lots to Unpack

 This team had easily identifiable needs entering the off-season:

• Get all their starting pitching healthy.  All but one of their top 6 starters entering the off-season had missed time with injury in 2023, three of them significant time and two of them, time at the end of the year meaning that we really have no idea how serious their injuries really were as, in-season, they only lasted a few weeks. 

• Get two starting OFers, CF and RF, preferably switch hitters or RH hitters to balance the lineup

• Get a backup catcher, preferably one who could hit AND play defense, to replace the hapless Cam Gallagher

• Get someone to replace the failed Josh Bell at DH, preferably one with the flexibility to play a position of need so DH could be used, at least part-time, as a way to rest your veterans, especially Ramirez & Naylor, while keeping their bats in the lineup.

• Solidify your bullpen, either with internal options or externally, adding one backend bullpen guy to take the pressure off of and insurance for Stephan, Karinchak and/or Clase continuing their downward slides.

That was a significant to-do list but not insurmountable, even for a team of limited resources like the Guardians.  In fact, some would say that all the pieces were already in the system, just waiting for an extended chance to succeed.  And everything else (who would be the SS, who would be the backup OFers and IFers, what would be the ordering, in next-man-up terms, of the backup starters) would be decided in ST from a plethora of applicants.  Ah, depth and competition! Always a positive, IMO.

The problem is that the way the FO has approached trying to complete these off-seasons tasks has been confusing and, in many cases, contradictory.

So let the unpacking begin:

• Claimed Alfonso Rivas on waivers from Pittsburgh - The first move of the off-season was puzzling (see below for continuation of this theme).  We brought in a guy who failed on a 2nd division team and he was left-handed, first base/DH only guy.   We have Manzardo and Naylor at 1B.  They are both LH.  This was a very disappointing way to start the off-season, considering we had to pay a $50,000 waiver fee and he blocked us protecting one of our prospects in the Rule 5.  All's well that ends well, however, as the Angels picked him up on waivers when we did his inevitable DFA, cancelling out that waiver cost, and we lost no one in the ML Rule 5 draft.
• Claimed Christian Bethancourt off waivers and DFA'd Cam Gallagher.  On the surface this seems like a good move.  Compared to Gallagher, we improved both the offense and defense of our backup catcher position...and significantly. While Bethancourt cost more than backup catchers should ($2.3 million) it was not THAT outrageous an amount considering our need for a backup catcher who can hit. To the point that it even, at some level, threatened David Fry's position on the roster.  
• Sold Bethancourt to Miami and signed Austin Hedges for $4 million -People love Hedges.  The coaching staff love Hedges, the other players love Hedges, MLB loves Hedges.  He is the perfect backup catcher except for the fact that he can't hit a lick AND he cost the penny-pinching Guardians (see Barlow scenario below) $4 million, over twice what a backup catcher should cost.  We likely recouped a little more than the waiver fee for obtaining Bethancourt, with the cash transaction (probably like $100,000) with the Marlins but, aside from that, this was a big cash outlay for a backup catcher.
• Traded Cal Quantrill to Colorado for minor league catcher Kody Huff - This move was a salary dump and a strange one, considering that Quantrill was likely, in terms of talent, the 6th starter in a 5-man rotation.  Trading him was not so much the issue.  It was giving Quanterill away for nothing.  Huff is not a prospect and we all wondered why they would make this trade if they didn't really get anything of value back.  Why not just non-tender Quantrill?  And, in the current market, what was wrong with a $6 million starter, a price that was about 50% of what backend starters were going for in free agency?  We later found out with their next move...
• Traded Enyel De Los Santos to San Diego for Craig Barlow - The reason for the trade with Quantrill became came clear when Antonnetti said that Barlow and his $7 million salary would not have been attainable if they had not shed Quantrill's salary.  The impetus for this trade was to give the Guardians another quality arm at the backend of their bullpen.  Given the number of blown saves last year by their close, Clase, and their #1 setup man, Stephan, and the inability of anyone else still on the roster to step up into either of those roles, even on a temporary basis, the trade made sense IF we thought we were going to be competitive for the playoffs in 2024.  What didn't make sense is that the Guardians, all about player control, turned 3 years of control of De Los Santos and 2 years of control of Quantrill into 1 year of control of Barlow, presumably because the 2024 salaries balanced out.  
• Signed Ramon Laureano to a 1 yr, $5.1 million deal -  So, here is where this off-season REALLY started to get contradictory.  Laureano signed FOR MORE than he was projected to get in arbitration.  How could a financially-challenged organization like the Guardians afford this amount for a guy with Laureano's history that made him look like a career platoon player/4th outfielder, when they had to do a salary dump of Quantrill and trade De Los Santos to afford one year of Barlow?  The only way this made sense is if the Guardians think that Laureano is going to be a full-time or close to full-time player, likely replacing the offensively-challenged Straw in CF.  If they are thinking that he platoons with Brennan against LH pitching and serves as the 4th outfielder then they are paying over $5 million for playing, at the most 1/2 of the time (more likely 1/3).  Signing him to do that is THE OPPOSITE of what a team that had to dump two pitchers and 5 total years of reasonably-priced control for 1 year of a quality set-up guy so they didn't have to take on additional salary would be doing, right?
• Drafted 1B/3B Devison De Los Santos in the ML Rule 5 draft - He is an emerging power hitting prospect, something this farm system is short on, partly by design with their recent drafting of multiple LH slap hitters.  But in order to remain with the Guardians, our new De Los Santos has to stay on the roster this whole year. To be clear, this is a low-risk, throw it against the wall and see if something sticks move.  If we have to return him, so be it.  But this move did show one thing: we thought we needed to bring in more power hitters.
• Lost Oscar Gonzalez on waivers to NYY - This was a headscratcher.  This team needs power and Oscar has power.  He failed in 2023 but was it just that the league caught up to him and he couldn't respond or was it just a sophomore slump?  He has minor league options left and it wasn't like we needed his roster spot.  This team just showed they were bringing in power hitters  and they just Gonzalez go for nothing.
• Signed Ben Lively to a ML deal - Money-wise, who cares?  Lively will make the minimum.  The only reason this is a headscratcher is that Lively is the type of guy  who comes in on a minor league deal.  If the Guardians say they see something in him that everyone else in baseball didn't see then that is, to me, an issue.  You don't dump Oscar Gonzalez and, in the next breath, sign Ben Lively.  Both may be found to be AAAA players but Lively has already gotten there.
• Traded Cody Morris for Estevan Florial - To be clear, this was a minor trade.  It brought in a 26-yr old, 9-year (mostly in the minors) veteran CF candidate with power and speed but real contact issues who has no minor league options left and sent away a 27-year old ML reliever with an injury history that likely precludes him from being a starter but who has options left.  The puzzling things here are that we already brought in Deyvison who must be rostered and Florial also has to be rostered, we already signed Laureano to the type of contract that, in Cleveland, has to make him a starter, we have put a premium in the last two drafts on acquiring slap hitters, Florial is another LH hitter meanng him being a full-time starter would further unbalance the lineup and we already have Brennan and Straw and have DeLauter, Valera, Noel and JRod as options for the OF.  Hey, I am not, in theory, against Florial.  It's just that we have, earlier this off-season, gone down the path with Laureano that requires him to be a full-time player and dumped a potential powerhitter in Gonzalez. Then we bring in Florial who hasn't established himself as a ML player in 9 seasons and give away pitching depth that we need because we traded way Enyel De Los Santos and Quantrill. That is, to me, very contradictory.  

SUMMARY

So, in my opinion, we have made many head-scratching moves.  I envision Antonnetti sitting in his office in 4 months, smoking a cigar and saying, in his best George Peppard impersonation, "I love it when a plan comes together".    But, right now, all I see are a bunch of moves that don't fit together and look like this ship, rather than moving in a particular direction, is completely rudderless, moving in random directions that, in the end, lead us further away from being competitive.

Right now, it is like waiting for the other shoes to drop when your octopus has put down only one shoe.