Thoughts for a Monday

1.  In the off-season we should sign McKenzie, Quantrill and Beiber to extensions.   The first two should be relatively cheap due to their age.  Beiber's won't be cheap but his is as important as the other two as he is such a role model.   This will all have to be done delicately because, unless they are willing to take hometown discounts, I don't see us risking long term deals on Plesac or Civale at this point although I would love it if they were all locked in for a few more years.

2. George Valera promoted to AAA.  It's about time.

3. Alex Call was picked up off waivers. I hear the Vegas odds are now at a million to one of Reyes making it through waivers.  I am guessing Washington, also, for Reyes.

4. Speaking of Reyes, it will be interesting if the back story ever comes out.  You just don't DFA a guy with another option left when he is coming off as productive a career as he has had so far.  Not one real hiccup.   Something is going on here that basically told the Guardians this guy was NEVER getting any better while in Cleveland.  Such a shame.  I wish Franmil all the best but I think we will be looking at another Gio Urshela here with all of us gnashing our teeth for years to come that we let Reyes go for nothing.

5. When talking about our prospects I have this to say:

a. Valera - He oozes ability.  He clearly needs more refining as he s often fooled and it doesn't seem, to me, that he can outmuscle the times he is fooled.  He needs work on that.  I don't think he is on a steep trajectory right now but he is progressing well.

b. Rocchio - Again, oozes ability but I think he needs to spend time around Rosario and Jose.  I just don't see that overwhelming desire to play hard and get better that I would like to see.    Not that this dims his prospect star at all but it certainly doesn't add to possibility that he would be in the majors by mid-season of next year, if at all next year.

c. Tena - Ditto for Rocchio but Tena looks like he is doing it all on natural ability at this point.  And I have seen him get thrown out stealing on balls that I thought he should have been able to go in standing up.  

d. Payeton Battenfield - Wow, what do you say here?  The guy is dominating at AAA but they called Gaddis up instead.   Due to his lack of velocity I wonder if they his promotion to the 40-man this winter is as set in stone as I once thought it was.

e. Tanner Burns - Speaking of low velo, Burns was 91 mostly in his last start and sometime was only htting 89 mph.  No matter how good your command is, no way you can put away ML hitters with his stuff.  Something has to improve.

f. Tanner Bibee - The opposite side to the Burns coin, Bibee is 95-97 all the time.  I think, right now, he has passed every other pitching prospect n the organization except for Daniel Espino and Gavin Williams.  He just looks so dominant to me.   

g. Logan T. Allen - Shis struggles and low K numbers at AAA are a red flag to me.  I hope it improves as he adjusts to this level but he, like others, are no longer on a fast track to the majors, at least in my opinion.

h. Bo Naylor - Has stuff to learn but appears to be on a steeper path than all the other position players still in the minors.    I hope he makes the team out of spring training next year and, gven their aggressive promotions this year, I think that is really possible.

i. Cody Morris - I love him as a bullpen arm, starting this September.  

j. Hunter Gaddis - He is, to me, a bullpen arm.   Even though he was barely missing the zone in his first start which really dug him a hole, I think his stuff plays better out of the bullpen.  I know it sounds like blind optimism but I think he will be just fine and have an extended big league career.

k. Xzavt ion Curry - I see him as another bullpen arm.   He is so short and I just feel that the bullpen is where we can maximize his tools.

l. Joey Cantillo - If he could stay healthy he would be knocking on the major league door.  His numbers are eye-popping but his injury history makes it anything but a slam dunk he will be added to the 40 this winter.

m. Gabriel Rodriguez - If he finishes the season playing like he is right now, he makes this winter tougher.   Still, looking at what a (relative) disaster that putting Noel on the 40 man last winter is becoming, I wonder if the Guardians will ever be inclined to do this again.

n. Alexfri Planez - His HR numbers are eye-popping until you see how he screws himself into the ground because he is swinging so hard.   The talent is there but the learning curve is likely to be a long, bumpy one.  Think Akil Badoo if he had never been called to the majors.

Thoughts for a Saturday

 Paul Hoynes wrote this morning that the Guardians were obviously giving up on the season to play the young guys.  I scoffed a little as I thought that was a really bleak outlook.   

Then I saw the news today.   Bobby Bradley released and Franmil Reyes DFAd.  

When you get sent to the minors because you sucked in the majors (Bradley) and then you look as bad at AAA, it is sometimes good for a change in scenery.  Obviously even the most minor deal couldn't be had for Bradley so he was released.  Don't know whose fault it was, Bradley's or the Guardians but a guy with this much promise should not flame out this badly.

As far as Reyes, this was a shock.  My guess is, and it is only my guess, is that there are some attitude issues here.  Going all conspiracy theory on this one, a lot of Reyes' underperformance seemed to start when Jose Ramirez signed his extension.   I wonder if Reyes was hurt that he didn't get an extension, too, after his last couple of seasons and just went through the motions.  Only he and his teammates know for sure but if he had attitude when he went to Columbus, that certainly could have been the last straw for this organization.   Certainly he didn't tear it up when he went down to AAA even thosgh that sample size was ultra-small.  The math doesn't add up for them to DFA him so soon unless there was more there than a single season slump for a guy who has shown this much so recently in the majors.

For both these players it is just a waste, almost an insurmountable waste, that we will likely lose both these players and get nothing back.  Now, of course, Reyes could go unclaimed and, as this is the first time he has ever been DFAd I think he has to accept his assignment to Columbus.   If so, this is just a paperwork move to remove him from the 40-man.  If some team picks him up on waivers that team would be on the hook for almost $2 million of his remaining salary.  Even then, however, here you have a guy who hit 30 HRs last year and 37 in 2019 who has 1 option remaining heading into next year.   It think it is a fair guess to assume he will be snapped up by the Pirates or Reds in short order here.  If not, we have him at AAA and can bring him back up if he ever gets it together.

Hunter Gaddis was not awful last night.  He looked about the same as he did at AAA, factoring in that he knew throwing the ball down the middle would have been death in the majors.  Basically, he just wasn't ready.  Now he needs to go back to AAA and get ready.  I really, really believe that him starting this game is a good sign because I know he can't be considered a fungible (extemely expendable/replacement level) asset.  So Gaddis, who was on the bubble to be added to the 40 man this winter due to a numbers crunch, is now on the roster.  He made it, which is good for the future of the Guardians, in my opinon.

Jake Jewell up to the majors?  Fungible assets.  I doubt if Mikolajchak would have been called up if he had struck out 3 in a row the other night instead of giving up 5 hits in a row as he is a prospect who they wouldn't want to DFA to create roster space.  So they bring up Jewell and DFA him if they need his spot.   Just like they have with other guys this season.  No news here.  

Christmas in August

 Somewhere in my late teens through my 30s, as an Indians' fan I saw September as a second Christmas.

After months of agony watching my would-be heroes thrash around chasing mediocrity, I got to see what the future held., unwrapping newly minted major leaguers fresh off the legends they created in the mnors and the hope it brought that this group would turn the tide and make the Cleveland Indians more than mediocre.

Yes, September 1st, rosters expanding, and all the callups from AAA and even sometime from AA gave me hope for the future of my favorite baseball team.

Tonight felt a lot like Septembers of long ago.   A lineup filled with guys fresh from their conquest of AAAA competition in AAA.  

I am older and possibly a little wiser now.  I think I can tell the difference between a guy who hit .300 at AAA and a guy who had a solid-enough foundation to transfer those results to the majors. I know that 28 year old rookies end up as 29 year old AAA veterans soon thereafter.  Miracles seldom happen in baseball.

But there is always that hope that these new heroes will stand the test of time.

Still, tonight looked more like those Septembers of old than I would like. Benson, Jones and Freeman hanging up O-fers (albeit against one of the best teams and pitchers in baseball).  The word that Hunter Gaddis will be make his major league debut tomorrow.  The likelihood that someone else will be DFA'd (hopefully Castro).  It just sounds all too familiar to my memory.

So, while I really liked seeing these guys coming up and getting a chance to play with the idea that the guys they are bringing up now will be on the roster this winter, things still haunt me.

Benson looked a lot like the guy from previous years, not this year.

Jones is looking more like his former self, too.

Freeman, well, I worry about his low walk rate and ask myself if this warning track power, like Kwan's, will eventually catch up to him as outfielders start to squeeze him and pitchers challenge him with high fastballs knowing he can't jerk it to or over the outfield fences. 

I was 100% sure that Gaddis was going to be rostered this winter if he just finished the season like he has pitched so far.  I am far from 100% sure that he is ready for this.  

Then it occurred to me.  There was comfort in those July and August days of old.  Mediocrity was comforting.  It was always, well, mediocre.  Tully and McCarthy.  They were guys out of the 70s and 80s.  But these new guys.  Analytics say they have a good chance to succeed.  This should be different, right?

Now it gets real.  We saw who we didn't want to be (Chang, Mercado, Zimmer) but it haunts me whether, just like many of those September heroes of the past, these July and August heroes of 2022 will meet the same fate.

Then I start to dream on the Grady Sizemores, Manny Ramirezs, Albert Belles and even the Cory Snyders of the past and I hope.  I hope against my memory that this time it will be different.  This time it will be more like the 90s than the 70s and 80s.   

This sure is fun...until the polish wears off of the moment and it isn't fun, or real, any more.  

Go new Guardians...and the ancient 'veteran' Guardians of 1-4 seasons of experience, as well!  My mind has already built my WS roster of 2023 around all of you.

Post Deadline Hangover Post

 Well, not a hangover in terms of drinking.   Just that my brain hurt from thinking about this stuff.  Here are some thoughts.  I have broken the teams making trades down into groups.

CLEVELAND GUARDIANS 

I disagree with those of you who say we should have done more.  My guess it that it was like the Rockies' GM said.  They wanted our Range Rover and were only willng to give us their Subaru.  Look, Antonnetti hinted at it again today.   They couldn't find a deal that made sense for them as the deals they were presented would cost a lot in terms of prospects and would block guys we already have.  Sound like Sean Murphy/Bo Naylor to you?  It does to me.  So, you say, if it is our plan to compete while looking at which players will be here in the future, why are underperformers like Reyes and Clement still on this team.  Answer: They are not, sort of proving his point that he said later:  Last year our 40 man was clogged with guys like Chang, Mercado and others.  That won't be the case this winter so he thinks we won't have a serious roster crunch.  (Maybe, maybe not from my POV).  Plus, as he said, last winter was hard because the guys we protected HAD to be protected even though we knew not many of them were ready to help the team this year (what I have been saying for some time).  Next year he thinks those guys WILL be ready to help.  So, in that situation, why bring in rentals?  Our goal is different than some teams who are trying to squeeze into the playoffs.  It is obvious that teams like the Yankees and Astros would flat out kill us in the playoffs right now.  So you get in and get waxed.  So what?  Either miss the playoffs or go a one-and-done, not much different.  So the Guardians not making trades of prospects for veterans?  He said that time will come.  He also hinted that we are in a good position because we are not paying bloated contracts to underperforming or injured players, meaning, to me, that there is an increased likelihood that we could have money to spend.   In the end, if you are Cleveland you have to play the long game, even if it blows up in your face in the future if key guys don't perform or are lost due to injury.   I can see a path forward for the Guardians.  

As I have said, they key for me, is to work with this roster to not lose guys in the Rule 5 and turn our excess into useable pieces for a multi-year run...just like we did in the 90s and mid-2010s. Antonnetti still needs to prove he can do that and he needs to start this winter BEFORE he has to freeze the roster.

In the rest of this post I will look at selected teams to see what they did and how it fit their plan.  In my next post I will look at the veterans picked up by teams and see how they would have helped or not helped the Guardians and what the approximate cost would have been in terms of which prospects it would have cost us.

WIN THE WORLD SERIES

(1) San Diego Padres -This team decided to make a huge push to finally scale Mt. Dodger.  Even when they managed to beat the Dodgers they didn't make it to the WS.  They have put together a virtual all-MLB lineup.   Their goal was simple: collect all the best players available with AJ Preller's only mandate being, limit the damage to the farm system as much as possible...but not to the point a deal couldn't be done.  

(2) New York Yankees - Look, this team is set up to win the WS.   From where they are they actually solidified their chances of getting to the WS by adding Montas, Trivino, Benitendi, Effross and Bader.  This will help them not get upset as it tightens up their starting rotation, defense and bullpen.  

(3) Houston - Like the Yankees, they are just shoring up things.   They know what their competition (the Yankees) are doing so they keep up and help to avoid an early upset in the playoffs and position them to compete with the Yankees.

WIN THE DIVISION, SOLIDIFY THE WILD CARD

(1) Seattle - Look, they have to get past Houston or, at least get enough talent to compete with Toronto, Tampa Bay

(2) Minnesota - Look, they have the lead.  All, in theory, they had to do was to do more than Cleveland and the White Sox.  Mission accomplished.  They will NEVER be able to overtake the Yankees.  They may be able to sneak out a series from them if all things come together but we know the goal and it is important to remember as Cleveland falls in this same situation.

(3) Toronto _Noah Synegard, Rasel Iglesias, Whit Merrifield, Zach Pop, Jay ANthony Bass, Mitch White - Mission accomplished

DON'T UPSET THE LONG TERM PLAN

(1) Tampa Bay

(2) Baltimore

(3) White Sox

(4) Texas 

(5) Cleveland -see above

I DON'T KNOW WHAT THE HECK THEY ARE DOING

(1) Boston

(2) Detroit

(3) Kansas City

MAKE A NEW LONG-TERM PLAN

(1) Oakland - Pretty obvious

RESET AND CONTINUE ON 

(1) Los Angeles - Instead of pannicking they just dumped the guys they could or guys on expiring contracts they had no use for and, by keeping Ohtani, they bought themselves until the end of this off-season to see what direction they will be going, a lot of which could be determined by Mike Trout's back.

Final Thoughts - Trade Deadline

 I, for one, am glad we did not make a trade today.  People will say that we could have done this or that but, except for Soto I don't know if there were any guys I would have wanted today, even Sean Murphy.  Some of that is due to expiring contracts, some of that is that we have enough of whatever it is would have traded for.  But I would have used this opportunity to consolidate prospects to get great prospects for good prospects.

To be real, I don't know if any of prospect geeks like to part with prospects.  For those of us at a certain age, we lived for years on the hope of a confluence of prospects and veterans to give us a good enough mix to make the, at the time, Indians, a power in major league baseball.  

Many of us got to experience that in 1995 and continued to experience that most years since then.  Rooted in tthat, at least for me, was the knowledge that your tomatoes always taste better when you grow them in your own garden.   Thus, when one of our own prospects succeeded and, in so doing, helped my team to succeed, it made it all that much sweeter.

I never, ever, considered that this could be done in as homegrown a fashion as Antonnetti, Chernoff, and staff have done it.  

Yet, although some of the guys on this year's team came as young veterans or advanced minor leaguers, here we are with an essentially homegrown team.

In his press conference today Antonnetti stressed the importance of team chemistry.  None of us have the insider knowledge to know which players fit that chemistry and which don't.    What I think many of us can figure out, however, is the following:

(1) It is likely a waste of a year if you have to give significant numbers of starts to Tully, McCarthy, Pilkington and Bryan Shaw.  You just put yourself behind the 8 ball too much.  That was the beauty of 1995.  Yes, you had lots of homegrown young guys but you had Dennis Martinez and Orel Hersheiser, Eddie Murray and Dave Winfield.   

(2) It is not sustainable, from a maximization of resources perspective, to build a team on homegrown talent if you have any sort of vibrant farm system (and ours is REALLY vibrant right now).  By that I mean that if you have a good player development system and develop bunches of good players you are not going to be able to keep them all.  There just isn't room on your 40-man roster for all of them.  There has to be a balance of young players and older players who are obtained by trading our excess of young players.  You just can't lose the worst ones of them because you get to a point where the worst ones are Will Brennan, Oscar Gonzalez and Will Benson.  Losing guys like that for nothing cannot be acceptable in the model that Aontonnetti is trying to sell us on.

So, here are my comments directed towards the Guardians' management:

(1) To Antonnetti and Chernoff - Neither of you have shown the ability of take our excess of young players and parlay 3 good prospects into one great prospect, for example.  We are quickly reaching a point where our prospects, like those tomatoes, are going to rot on the vine if we can't 'pick' them, either by getting them playing time or trading them for proven assets that can help us win now.  It is a 'flaw' that I have pointed out repeatedly and today showed me, once again, that I have no evidence to support that you can do this.

(2) Today should have been not just about fit right now but about fit next year.   Look at our pitching prospects.   It is highly probable that next year ZERO of our top pitching prospects will be ready to pitch in the majors.  Look at Logan T. Allem, Daniel Espino and Gavin Williams.   It is likely that none of them helps us in the rotation next year.  These are great prospects but if they are not ready we may be forced to endure loss after loss when we throw guys like Tully, McCarthy and Pilkington to the wolves.  You just lose too many games to make up.   Ditto for Ernie Clement.  Just like Mercado, Zimmer and Chang before them, the time has past when you can afford to put these guys on the roster, let alone play them if you are forced to have them.  So Clement and even, possibly, Owen Miller, should be gone next year.   Clement has cost us games with his glove and he hasn't had an extra base hit since May 1st.  If there is one thing I don't like about our manager is that he will continue to throw guys out there who we know are very likely to fail.   This has to stop next year.  We need to stop giving him guys like this because he overuses them and it costs us games.

(3) Today we had a chance to free up spots for guys who are not on the 40-man to be placed there this season and/or this winter.  One thing I hope I heard wrong from Antonnetti today is him celebrating the contributions from Gonzalez and, maybe wishfully, Brenson going forward.   Gonzalez was a mistake that didn't happen to cost us because there was no Rule 5 last winter.   So we can celebrate our good fortune on that.  However, what we should be saying is "Never Again!!!"  Our lack of activity today DOES put us at risk of losing the next Gonzalez to the Rule 5 this winter.  By your inaction today you have lost the right, in my opinion, to ever say "Well, we can't protect everyone".  If you aren't going to trade them you HAVE to protect them.  You are out of free passes on these types of situations.  You have gone down this path, now make it work.

The clock is ticking.   You, Guardians' management, can keep threading the needle but you need to use a better quality of thread. You can't keep a Chang on the roster at the risk of losing a Gonzalez, or a Benson, or a Brennan or, for that matter, even a Gabriel Rodriguez and an Alexfri Planez.  You must find a role for Curry and Gaddis so both can be on the major league team next spring.

I agree with Antonnetti's comment today that there are some guys at AAA who can help us this year and some guys at AA who can help us next year.  It is just time to commit to every one of those guys and stop wasting any repetitions on guys like Clement, Bryan Shaw, Tobias Meyers, Chang, Zimmer, Mercado, Tully and McCarthy. The Franmil Reyes situation should be a shining light in that regard.  Whatever is wrong with Franmil he needs to fix it or get out of the way.  Happened with Bobby Bradley.  Needs to happen with Franmil.  

Hey, Chernoff and Antonnetti, be proud of how you juggled players to not lose any quality players to being DFA'd.  That has been wonderful and you can use it on a roster cantaining real prospects this winter and next year..   Just don't put yourselves in a position, by keeping 4A players on your roster,  where you have to do that again.  EVER.

Draft Deadline - Ongoing Blog Post

 OK, here is where I will be putting all my comments about trade deadline deals.  There may be separate posts about specific deals that involve the Guardians but most of my comments will be here.

1. Josh Hader to Padres - Wow, this is interesting.  The Brewers get a less superior closer, a former top prospect and two current prospects for 1+ years of Hader.  Makes the Padres a lot better but the Brewers are clearly playing the long game here., even though the closer they are getting back offers no more long term control than Hader.  Looking at the Castillo trade, I think the Padres got Hader on the cheap, relatively.

2. Scott Effross to Yankees - While this isn't a huge move it very interesting. Effross has LOTS of control left but is a gimmick guy, a side-arming righthander.  The Cubs get the Yankees #6 prospect (now slotted by MLB as the Cubs #8 prospect) who is at AAA and doing well as a starter.  Seems like a steep price for the Yankees to pay.

3. Luis Castillo to the Mariners - The Mariners traded their two best prospects and another of their top 10 prospects and a lower ceiling prospect for 1+ years of Castillo.   This really sets the bar high for what teams can ask for in return for these star players who have more than one year of control.  Imagine what Soto is worth in prospects if that is what Castillo is worth.

4. Minor trades - Edmundo Sosa, Chris Martn, David Peralta, Ehire Adrianza, these are all minor trades where the trading team didn't get much back and the team they were traded to might have gotten a small piece that can help them in certain situations win a couple of games down the stretch.  Nothing to talk about here except that the return was very small, in my opinion, compared to what the Cubs got for Effross.

5. OK, its Deadline Day and, in fact, we are 3 hours from the deadline.  Some amazing stuff has happened as San Diego has placed itself firmly in the WS championship driver's seatm although the Yankees helped themselves in the Montas trade.  The Twins have made themselves better and the White Sox are incrementally better.  Other teams who may impact the Guardians ability to make the playoffs have also helped themselves, especially the Mariners with their acquisition of Luis Castillo from the Reds.  The Rays think they have helped themselves by obtaining Jose Siri.

6. As of this hour the Guardians have not acquired anyone.  They have made a significant move that I suggested they make, sending Franmil Reyes to Columbus instead of DFAing him or giving him away for almost nothing in an addition-by-subtraction trade.   So there is that.   It is a catch 22.   The Guardians need to condense their good prospects into great prospects or young, controllable veterans at positions of need.  If they can't do that, why trade?  That is why the Sean Murphy trade talk is such an issue.   Bo Naylor is nearly ready and do you hold the fort and bring him up next spring or do you pull the trigger to that deal giving up prospects who could net you needed pieces.   This is really a problem that I have identified before with this front office.   They have been burned before (Yandy Diaz, for example) by giving up on prospects too soon and I don't think they want to get burned again.  I love a little analysis paralysis but you have to be able to make trades like this.  After this year's draft we have like 27 (exageraton) left-handed hitting outfielders with speed, good hitting ability and no power.  That plus the 2021 draft where we netted a bunch of college pitchers means that if everything works out we will be creating a logjam soon.   We need to find creative and efficient ways to use that excess to get to a place where we have a more balanced system.

7. We have our one trade: Sandy Leon for Ian Hamilton.  No, not Ian Happ, Ian Hamilton.

8. Noah Syn

Congratulations to Will Benson...and hmmmm?

 Posturing around the trade deadline is always interesting.  I used to think it was a combination of organizational pride and maybe bonuses to the scouts and FO personnel if a guy they drafted made it to the majors.  This was a reason that made sense to me because in my experience there were a number of times guys, not necessarily for the Guardians, were brought up to the majors only to be traded after only a short time.   

So when a guy is brought up to the majors for the first time or comes off the IL right before the trade deadline it always makes me go hmmmmm?   

So, when Will Benson was called up today (per Guardians Prospective on Twitter) it made me wonder what was up.  Benson is a former first round draft choice and while we all know that baseball people say the frst year player draft is a crapshoot (security blanket language in case draft gurus screw up a first round pick), it makes people think that you (scouts, FO, player development) aren't totally inept if you can at least get your first round picks to the majors.

So you get your cake and eat it too.  You bring a guy up who you are about to trade just so you can say he made his major league debut with your club.  Then you trade him.  

Sounds like conpiracy theory but I have seen it happen enough times for me to wonder if it really a coincidence.

So, welcome to the majors, Will Benson.  Watching you at AAA this year tells me you have really earned this promotion as you have put up huge numbers including raking against lefties.   Let's hope we get to watch you for at least the next 6 years mashing for the Guardians instead of being traded for some guy who is gone after this year or doesn't produce.