Saturday Thoughts: First 2 Games, New Bullpen Additions, Minor League Rosters, Race for 1-1 ***Updated***

Hi from a rainy San Diego on a Saturday morning.  Lots to unpack so let's go:

***Updated to Include the Lake County Roster and Associated Discussion***

GUARDIANS ARE 2-0

Oakland is struggling.  13,000+ on opening night, 3,000+ the second game.  It's almost like playing in 2020.  I feel for the diehard A's fans.  I saw the angst in Cleveland when the Browns left.  I saw it in St. Louis when the Rams left.  At least in those cases it was not so drawn out.  Their roster is built to lose and even trades they have made to infuse prospects (e.g., Muller, Ruiz) that looked light at the time have gone way past 'light', approaching 'close to zero return' levels.  That being said, here are my thoughts from the first two games relative to how the Guardians looked.

• Bieber looked good.  More than anything else, he was classic Bieber, with the help of Hedges getting almost every single close pitch.
• This team appears much less susceptible to LH pitching, at least in the first game (more today).  Good starts for Fry and Freeman give a lot of promise.  Plus Laureano, Hedges and even Arias (LOL) are righties who at least will at least mentally psyche out LHSP, even if they can't hit them very well.
• Logan Allen is a good 5th starter on a good team.  He showed that again in game 2.  If we score a lot for him he should have a very good record this year.  If we score very little for him he will look pretty bad.  However, if he keeps his head together, his ERA and the peripherals should look the same regardless: 4.10 ERA, H/IP = 1,  BB/9 = 3, BB/K = 2.2 ,  HR/9 = 1.1, innings per start = 5.8.  He will have his good games and his bad games and the hope is that we win 2/3 of his good starts and split on his bad starts.  But this is a HUGE hope and rests squarely on the offense and defense.
• Speaking of defense, the construction of the Guardians this year makes it imperative that we play good defense.  So far our Gold/Platinum Glovers, Kwan and Gimenez look great.  Naylor, Ramirez, Hedges/other Naylor, Brennan/Laureano look like they should, Freeman looks comfortable but hasn't been challenged yet.  The one guy who looks really shaky so far is Rocchio.  His arm looks short for SS and it is possible, if Rocchio hits, next year could see a flip flop of him and Gimenez,   I don't see it this year because they need and want Gimenez at 2B.
• Not sold yet that Ramirez and Gimenez will improve from their 2023 issues of trying to do too much offensively.  Although I think Kwan and Brennan WILL improve this year over last, I am not convinced that will move the needle enough to cause a change in trajectory of this year for the Guardians.
• Laureano, with the fat contract and the guarantee of playing time, has not exactly hit the ground running, looking more like what his stats would have predicted he would be for a guy who really hasn't been a plus contributor since 1999.  
• Florial looks lost but he will get enough opportunities to give him a chance that he never really got in the Yankees system.  We may have to watch him be overmatched for 2 months here so be ready for the pain of watching him flail at fastballs in the zone and at breaking balls low and away and, of course, an inordinate number of 3-pitch strikeouts, sprinkled in with the occasional stolen base.  Of course, the issue is that you can't steal first!
• Fry had a confidence-building start in the opener as did Freeman and, to some extent, Rocchio.  Good for them as I think all three will be offensive contributors this year beyond what a lot of nay-sayers were saying when they wanted to throw all three in the trash bin over the winter.
• A key to the season and the future will be how McKenzie holds up this year.  It is almost unfathomable to me that he will have a 2022-like season but, if he does, this team's near-term and long-term fortunes go up dramatically as he always had ace stuff, IMO.

NEW BULLPEN ADDITIONS

On Thursday, right before the opener, the Guardians announced they had acquired two relievers, Zac Kent (26) and Peter Strzelecki (29), both of who took 40-man roster spots and both of whom, thankfully, are not on the major league roster.  These aere typical, ridiculous trades by our FO, doing things that are non-sensical.  Let's examine these trades:

• First, these trades were designed to provide 'much needed bullpen depth at AAA'.  A perusal of the opening day roster for Columbus shows that they have the following WITHOUT Kent and Strzelecki:
• Starters: Will Dion, Connor Gillispie, Hunter Stanley, Jaime Barria, Adam Oller
• Relievers: Aleman, Banda, Burns, Doxakis, Enright, Gose, Hickman, Labout, Sabrowski
• IL: Cantillo (SP),  Brown (SP), Arias (RP)

Looking at this list I see NINE relief pitchers without Kent and Strzelecki, almost all of them prospects.

Now let's look at Kent and Strzelecki:

• Zac Kent had a decent year in AAA last year as an opener at AAA but had a 8.10 ERA in the AFL, followed by an ERA of over 10 this spring.   26 year olds who have never played in the majors, who have had an injury history like Kent's and put up stats like this are minor league free agent signings.
• Strzelecki, on the other hand, seems like a decent addition, albeit being 29 years old.  I wouldn't be appalled if he played for us in the majors at some point this year.   

Likely, each of these guys were going to be DFA'd and would have been available at the waiver price of $50,000 or, if released, for nothing other than their minor league salary.   Strzelecki was acquired for cash, which was likely to be around $60,000 (slightly more than the waiver price).   Kent was acquired for international bonus pool money.  As I indicated in a previous post, my calculations have the Guardians having over $450,000 left in their international bonus pool for 2024 so this makes sense.  So it doesn't really cost the Guardians anything for Kent but it does, like Strzelecki he does occupy a roster spot.  

I don't see the logic in either of these acquisitions as I don't see either of these guys moving the needle on this season while both of them block prospects like Trey Benton and Davis Sharpe who will be at AA.  As I said, another head-scratching acquisition for the Guardians.   If the stated goal is to play the kids why would we add 29- and 26-year old middle relief candidates who are not needed and will, likely, take away reps from prospects we are trying to groom to be major leagues.  Add to that question the timing of the move when we were all hoping for news on extensions for guys like Josh Naylor and it was all just frustrating and even infuriating, given how little was done this off-season under the guise of playing the kids.   

MINOR LEAGUE ROSTERS

The minor league rosters are being rolled out for Guardians' affiliates.  Let's look at them to see what stands out.

Columbus (AAA)

This roster is stacked with prospects, but not so stacked that it will be hard to find playing time for our high level prospects coming out of the gate.  Here is a projected opening day lineup.

Straw CF 

Brito 2B

Rodriguez RF

Manzardo 1B

Noel LF

Schneeman 3B

Tena SS

Lavastida C

Delgado DH

When Angel Martinez comes back, hopefully soon, you could plug him in for Delgado and have a lineup of all prospects plus Straw.  This does hurt the chances of Pries, Delgado and Cedrola getting playing time and if Valera comes back soon, probably one of those guys will have to be reassigned or released.

As far as the pitching staff, it is readily apparent for the entire off-season that there is a problem with depth starters at AAA now that Cantillo is out for 2+ months with the hamstring injury.  Maybe when Lively and Curry Will Dion is the only prospect starter they have with the rest of the rotation being pieced together with AAA types.    The bullpen, on the other hand, looks really interesting with Aleman, Burns, LaBout, Gose and Enright, not to mention all the AAAA guys we acquired last fall and this spring.  Hopefully those 5 get the bulk of the bullpen experiences this season although I think their reps may suffer now that 40-man guys Kent and Strzelecki are in the group.   

Akron (AA)

There are a number of interesting positions players here.  At catcher we get our first look at Kody Huff who was acquired in the Quantrill giveaway to Colorado.  He looks like an organizational guy to me but the Guardians are apparently higher on him than his stats and pedigree would seem to warrant.  Backing him up is Micael Ramirez who still is on the edge of being a prospect.  The infield has Bracho, Frias, Watson and Tolentino, all who have prospect potential and the overdrafts Cairo and Valdes who have fizzled as prospects.  In the OF there is DeLauter, Halpin, Lampe and Planez.  DeLauter is obviously the crown jewel but Halpin is a true prospect, Planez had a Noel trajectory before he was injured and Lampe is on the borderline of being a failed slap hitter from the 2022 draft who needs a big year to redeem the scouting department for overdrafting yet another LHH slap hitter with a good batting eye.  If you remember Lampe started hot at Lake County but fizzled out, becoming more of an afterthought as the year went on.  

As far as pitching, there are a lot of underperforming guys, guys with limited tools but who are grinders and guys with potentially electric stuff if they can harness it.  EIGHT pitchers from the 2021 draft are here and they all have various levels of ML potential.  Put those guys together with Benton, Torries Jr.,, Carver, Hanner and Jones and this would be the best collection of arms on a team in our entire minor league system.  That doesn't even count former first rounder Ethan Hankins and 2023 2nd rounder Andrew Walters who has stuff electric enough he could be in the big leagues in the last half of this year.  As I said, clearly, to me, the most exciting minor league pitching staff in our system with every single guy having some chance of pitching in the majors some day. EVERY SINGLE GUY.

Lake County (High A)

***Updated as LC roster has now been published:

C Cooper Ingle

1B - CJ Kayfus

INF - Maick Collado

INF - Jose Devers

INF - Nate Furman

INF - Alex Mooney

INF/OF Jake Fox

OF - Guy Lipscomb

OF - Justin Boyd

LHSP - Parker Messick

LHSP - Steve Hajjar

RHRP - Magnus Ellerts

RHP - Trenton Denholm

RHRP - Alaska Abney

RHRP - Shawn Rapp

RHRP - Jake Miller

The rest of the players and pitching staff appear to be just organizational guys and/or returning players,  making this team not very competitive in their league but at least the guys in bold above are somewhat interesting with a number being top 30 prospects.  Maybe some of these guys, as well, will surprise us and rock our top 30 list come November.

Lynchburg (A)

Every position player is either an interesting prospect or a high college draft pick who should perform at a high level and make the team more competitive.  The pitching staff is less stacked than the position players with a lot of organizational college pitchers from the 2023 draft and some interesting returning and new arms signed through our international system.  There is a chance this pitching staff, performance-wise, could be very competitive with, of course, heightened interest in Clemmey, Humphries, Gomez and Richardson.    In summary as far as Lynchburg, I could see this being one of the most exciting teams in our system to watch as either guys will explode out of Lynchburg this year or, if healthy and not performing, fall into the organizational player bin by the end of this season.

I did want to interject one comment, though.  At least 50% of the value of Ralph Velasquez was the possibility that he could catch as a pro.  While he has a good hit tool it is, in my opinion, a Comp A or early 2nd round profile w/o being a catcher.  So the fact that they list him as an infielder is disappointing if they have, indeed, given up on him as a catcher.  My pick for that spot was Hurston Waldrep who is the 87th ranked prospect in baseball by MLB Pipeline and is starting his first full pro season in AA with a real chance to pitch in Atlanta this year, exactly where he could have been if the Guardians drafted him instead of letting him fall to the very next pick where the astute Atlanta Braves picked him up.  BTW, Velasquez was nowhere to be found in the MLB Pipeline top 100.

RACE FOR 1-1

More on this at the end of the weekend but the presumptive #1, Travis Bazzana, had a rough two nights on Thursday and Friday.  He went 1-2 with a couple of walks on Thursday but got picked off twice, once in the 9th of a 1-1 game with a couple of guys on and the batter having a 3-0 count.  His hit was an infield hit he legged out.   On Friday he had a good line on paper with his 5th leadoff HR in the last 6 games and 3 walks in going 1-2.  However, he committed 3 errors as his team got crushed 17-4.

Charlie Condon's Georgia team crushed it's opponent on Friday but Condon went a harmless 1-4 with a walk and a K.

As I said, more on this on Monday after the dust settles on weekend conference matchups.