Thoughts for a Wednesday - pre-Thanksgiving edition

 1. Besides family and friends, I am thankful I have been able to spend my relaxation time watching the Guardians.  They are fun and a small blessing to all of us fans.

2. Looking at the return for one year of Hunter Renfroe two things come to mnd.  Why would the Brewers trade him?  Would we have wanted him at that price which may have been, translating to the Guardians farm system, as small as Eli Morgan and Hunter Gaddis?  Not saying I would have made that trade but it is certainly interesting to consider bringing in a 31-HR guy who can play RF, even if only for 1 year.

3. At the relatively small cost, would Joely Rodriguez have made sense for the Guardians?  I hope we do better than him in getting a second, quality lefty in the bullpen.

4. I am telling you, it really scares me that the Guardans are going to be making trades this winter.  My guess is that they give Zach Plesac away as it is obvious they get robbed in these 'small' deals all the time.

5. Given that the Guardians have taken the approach to not let draftees play in the minors the year they are drafted (with a couple of exceptions each year, of course), I can't really do an analysis of this year's draft.  Still, we can now talk about the 2020 and 2021 drafts as we have some data to talk about:

2020 - This was the truncated, 5-round,  pandemic year draft.  I currently rate this draft as an A-, which is surprising as our first round pick, Carson Tucker, may be playing himself out of professional baseball.  I know he has had injury issues but when I saw him play this year he looked very weak and overmatched AT LOW A BALL.  His defense looked shaky.  He basically looked like a 20th round pick.  The rest of this draft looks really solid although, right now, I don't see a single star emergng from this draft.  That beng said, Tanner Burns and Logan T. Allen look like solid pitching prospects and Mason Hickman may actually have some helium as a reliever.  The other HS position player prospects, Tolentino and Halpin, have both shown promise.  Bottom line: In a strong farm system to have 4 of your top 5 draftees be in your top 30 at this point is a really good sign and to have Hickman maybe moving fast as a reliever, this has the potential to be a really good draft down the road for the Guardians.

2021 - This is, of course, the college pitcher draft where 18 of the 21 picks were college pitchers.  It is too early to tell about some of these guys but Gavin Williams and Tanner Bibee are already top 10 prospects in our system and, currently at least, on a fast track to Cleveland.  Other college pitchers from this draft have had varying degrees of success with the jury on Nikhazy, Mace and Webb still beng out.  Plus Jake Fox, our lone HS position player drafted, looks like a keeper.  Even Connor Kokx looks like he could turn into the next Will Brennan.  In fact, at this point, none of these guys have shown themselves to be washouts or just organizational filler.  With possible conversions to the bullpen for a number of these guys and for already implemented bullpen conversions for some others, this draft stll has significantly more upside than it has shown in performance so far...and some of those performances, albeit from college pitchers in A ball, are eye-popping.  I give this draft an A with a chance to move into the uncharted "A+" territory in the next year or two if everything continues on the upswing.

2022 - Again, I hated this draft.  It wasn't, in my opinion, drafting for talent. It was very Moneyball-like where guys without the most talent were drafted because they fit the mold of Cleveland players who were CURRENTLY successful.  I have already made my mock draft piccks for this draft and I stick by them.  We will know more after the 2024 season as I anticipate most of these guys will spend all or the bulk of their season at high A ball.  If the Guardians surprise us and start some of these college hitters at AA and they perform out of the gate with a varied, quality skill set, I will reasses.  However, right now, I give this draft an on-paper grade of B- with a chance to go bust if the model they are drafting from falls flat on its face at the ML level in 2023.

And our non-tenders are...

I want to make one thing clear.  The Guardians' front office has been excellent over the past two years, especially with the cards they have been dealt.  

• Their rostering of 11 prospects last November was astute and gutsy.   I wrote that at the time. 
• Their incremental rostering of prospects during the season while removing the dead wood was excellent, as well, as they were simply using players who they intended to roster in the off-season to plug temporary gaps on the ML team during the season.  This was not a usual move as teams tend to plug these gaps with their veteran minor league signees.

This off-season I wrote that I thought they faltered a bit.  

• They traded the flame throwing Carolos Vargas for a much lesser prospect (in my opinion) in a move that cleared a roster spot
• They made a (in my opinion) ridiculous trade to obtain Juan Brito, who had to be rostered and will clog the 40-man for 3 years while burning all 3 of his minor league options leading to him either having to be on the 26 before he is ready or the organization giving up on him and DFAing or trading him for less than equal value because they have run out of those options.
• They rostered Tim Herrin over Peyton Battenfield (and probably prompted the trade of Vargas), although the former is just "all stuff, no performance" as he has only produced when his age is above league average. Twenty-six year old minor league relievers make the team as minor league invitees to spring training.  They don't take up a valuable roster spot in the winter as losing them to the Rule 5 is not generally not considered a great loss.  This move smacks of the gamble with Tobias Myers last year that failed miserably.

So, it was with great interest that I waited to see what they did at the non-tender deadline.  So, much to my dismay, they did, indeed, non-tender someone, Luke Maile.   This was, at first, frustrating to me as they could have just DFA'd him when they did the same to Gose and McCarty and saved a roster spot that we could have used to save Battenfield or Vargas.

Then it dawned on me.  If they want Maile back this move is actually a good one:

• DFAing Maile would mean he had to pass through waivers where another team could claim him even if he and the Guardians wanted to keep him.
• Non-tending Maile allows the team to negotiate with him as a free agent and roster him at any time between now and ST if they can work out a deal.  He also is not subject to the Rule 5, being a free agent and all. 

So, even though I dislike the idea of the Guardians losing other players just to keep their options open with a fungible asset like Maile (bad hit, veteran catchers are not hard to find), I get how it is a savvy move predictable for the executive of the year and his staff.

Not saying I like it as it is a treading water move and, in the short term, cost us a roster spot and forcing the team to make moves I don't agree with, I get that it is, at the moment it was done, a low-risk option that may give us some insurance on our catching situation if it is as I described above.

Still pissed over the Jones/Brito thing as I think the move was a terrible one both on paper in terms of talent and in process by what it does to our 40-man roster situation and how we likely get screwed out of the asset we obtained down the road 3 years.

However, I applaud the Maile non-tender.  It makes perfect sense to do it right now as it gives us flexibility with him if we need it, which I hope we don't, if we actually SOLVE the catching situation and not just try to put bandaids on it.

Now if we could just get our front office to not screw up any more trades this winter and get us Murphy, Puk, Abreu and maybe Haniger, we could call it a winter and look toward spring training with renewed excitement.

 

The case for keeping (or not) Zach Plesac and Aaron Civale

 OK, to switch gears, as thinking about the Nolan Jones trade continues to rankle me, let's talk one of the other conversations that is rattling around the hot stove league: do the Guardians need to get more starting pitching?

I know I could do weeks of research looking at but let's break it down simply in terms of WAR.  Plesac and Civale were so bad they each had a negative WAR (-0.8) 

So, the case could easily be made that we could do better.

But here's the rub.  In order to improve at the #4 and #5 starter we would have to give up assets in a trade or lots of money to a free agent.  

The question is, in Cleveland, is it worth it?

To me, the answer is no for 3 reasons:

• Civale and Plesac are the #4 and #5 starters.  They had career lows in WAR in 2022 so there should be some bounce-back this year, maybe into the 1-1.5 WAR range for each of them n 2023.  They are NOT Tanner Tulley, they are NOT Konnor Pilkington.  Civale and Plesac are seasoned starters, Cleveland veterans and will not make a lot of money in arbitration.  In fact, it is easy to assume that ONE starting pitcher who is a quality #4 starter acquired in free agency is likely to make more than both Plesac and Civale together. 
• We have guys in the minors on the way.  It is really possible that Battenfield (if not lost to the Rule 5), Xzavion Curry, Hunter Gaddis, Gavin Williams, Joey Cantillo, Logan Allen, Tanner Burns and Tanner Bibee could be ready around the all-star break next year.  Pilkington is always there as a stop gap until these guys are ready.
• We have more pressing needs that we need to apply resources (money, prospects) to, specifically at catcher and 1B/DH.  

Folks, this is not like collecting baseball cards.  Starting Aaron Civale as your #4 and Zach Plesac as your #5 does not kill this team and, with the limited resources we have and the fact that there are GAPING holes elsewhere that dwarf Plesac and Civale, my vote is that, especially with this FO, we don't apply resources to starting pitching.  

I say roll the dice and go with Plesac and Civale, knowing we have superior replacements on the way in case these two falter or get hurt.  

Congratulations, Terry, and some questions I am asking myself about the Nolan Jones Trade

First, congratulations to Terry Francona on being named the AL Manager of the Year.  Well deserved honor.  No one does more with less than Tito does.  I have truly lived through the greatest age in Cleveland baseball between the teams of the 1990s and the last decade with Terry Francona as our manager.  So, I consider myself lucky to be a Guardians' fan and I NEVER, EVER take that for granted because my heart is chasing that brass ring of a WS championship.  

Regarding the Nolan Jones trade I still have questions:

1. Why did that trade have to go down yesterday?   It looked like one of two things: (a) they valued Juan Brito more than the rest of baseball does and knew it was their best time to pounce on him or (b) they valued Jones so little that they felt they were getting a great deal by trading him for Brito, a one tool player at low A who will likely run out of minor league options before he reaches the majors.  

2. If we had enough left-handed hitting outfielders (I am assuming Antonetti is talking about Kwan, Brennan, Benson and Valera) why in the world did the Guardians draft 3 left-handed hitting outfielders in the first 5 rounds of the recent amateur draft?  It makes no sense.  You could have drafted excellent catchers and RH hitting outfielders and corner infielders and yet you spent all that draft capital drafting players that Antonetti said will have no chance because, like Jones, they are redundant.  And don't give me the "best player available" crap.  At every selection the Guardians have there are guys of close to equal value of who they actually drafted, especially in early rounds.

4. If Brito is so good, why did he not get a mid-season promotion this year?  Given that they had to make a decision on him this winter you guess they would have pushed him to higher level(s) during the season to see if he was worth  protecting.  But they didn't do that.  For comparison sake, Noel, Freeman, Valera, Arias and Rocchio all played at high A levels at a younger age than Brito did as part of their normal development and received mid-season promotions the year they played at low A.  .  

5. Do they really think Brito will make it the majors for good before he runs out of minor league options.  A normal development path would have Brito playing at Lake County in 2023, Akron in 2024 and Columbus in 2025, with a possible callup to Cleveland that year.  In 2026 he has to stay on the major league roster all year or be DFA'd.  

Everything that I read that Antonetti said today were good reasons for trading Nolan Jones.  But nothing that I read tells me why Jones had to be traded yesterday or why it had to be Brito and not someone who didn't have to be rostered right now.  Nor did he explain the contradictions of what he said about our glut of LH hitting outfielders we have now and why we drafted 3 more in the first 5 rounds of the draft this year.

As I have said before, losing Nolan Jones was not a problem.  It was losing him for Brito.  However, the most nagging question is if this is how they value their own prospects, how can we trust Antonetti and Chernoff to make good trades in the future?

So, Let's Look at Recent Cleveland Baseball Trades

 I have heard repeatedly how Cleveland is so good and wins their trades and read it as a justification fro the headscratching Nolan Jones trade.  So lets take a look at trades Cleveland has made over the last 4 years:  Highlighting in blue are trades we won, yellow are trades we lost, no highlighting are trades that turned out pretty much even in terms of what we got back compared to what we traded away.  Now you can argue that trades like the Lindor trades are "win" but I can argue that the Myles Straw trade, given his low batting average and Yainer Diaz's meteoric rise and Phil Maton's OK performance, could be viewed as "even".  So there can be some disagreement in my interpretations of win/lost/even.

Still, the evidence is as I thought: The Clevinger trade and Kluber salary dump are what people use to define Cleveland being good at making trades.  However, removing that remarkable trade where EVERY player Cleveland got back for Clevinger is ranging from useful major leaguer to good major leaguer/good prospect AND the Kluber trade because it brought us Clase and, in considering that both cases trades look better because the main player we traded got hurt right away, CLEVELAND GENERALLY SUCKS AT MAKING TRADES.  Eighteen trades, 4 clear wins (including Sandy Leon minor trade), 8 clear losses (including the Trevor Bauer trade), 6 even trades (including the Lindor trade). The data is right in front of you.  You can make your own decisions.  BTW, still pissed about the pathetic Nolan Jones trade.  I just hope to heck we don't make any more trades this winter because, looking at the trades below and considering the Jones and Vargas trades already this off-season, any trades these clowns make are likely to hurt this team in the short term or long term.  I have warned for awhile about how bad Antonetti and Chernoff are at making these "minor" trades.  Well, they are not much better at making larger trades, either.

1. Nolan Jones for Juan Brito (Lost in the short term)

2. Carlos Vargas for Ross Carver (Lost in the short term)

3. Bradley Zimmer for Anthony Castro (Even)

4. Tobias Myers for Junior Caminero (Lost)

5.Phil Maton and Yainer Diaz for Myles Straw (Won)

6. Jordan Luplow and DJ Johnson for Peyton Battenfield (Lost)

7. Cesar Hernandez for Konnor Pilkington (Even)

8. Eddie Rosario for Pablo Sandoval (Lost)

9. Francisco Lindor/Carlos Carrasco for Ahmed Rosario/Andres Gimenez/Josh Wolf/Isaiah Greene (Even)

10. Mike Clevinger/Greg Allen/Matt Waldron for Cal Quantrill/Josh Naylor/Gabriel Arias/Owen Miller/Joey Cantillo/Austin Hedges (Win)

11. Edwin Encarnacion/Yandy Diaz/Cole Sulser for Carlos Santana/Jake Bauers (Lost)

12. Corey Kluber for Clase/DeShields Jr. (Win)

13. Sandy Leon for Adenys Bautista (Win)

14. Mark Mathias for Andres Melendez (Unevaluable)

15. Trevor Bauer for Franmil Reyes/Logan Allen/Victor Nova/Scott Moss/Yasiel Puig (Loss)

16. Yan Gomes for Jefry Rodriguez/Daniel Johnson (Lost)

17. Walker Lockett for Ignacio Feliz (Even)

18. Jodan Luplow/Max Moroff for Erik Gonzalez/Dante Mendoza/Tahnaj Thomas (Even)

Antonetti and Chernoff, you are freakin' idiots and total incompetents at making trades

 Dear Chris Antonetti and Mike Chernoff,

You two are freakin' idiots.

Let's summarize the trade:

• You traded your #7 prospect (rated just outside the top 100 in all of baseball) who is on the roster and has ML experience at 3rd base, RF and a little at 1B and is a power hitter, something this organization is lacking.
• He wasn't taking up a needed roster spot and had a lot of potential
• You get back Colorado's #30 prospect:who:
• Colorado was tryng to trade because they didn't really want to protect a limited, low A player on their 40-man roster, meaning the Guardians should have had all the leverage in this deal
• played in low A this year meaning:
• He is likely 3+ years from the majors
• At that rate will have used up ALL his option years before he gets to the majors the first time, meaniing that if he is ever sent to the minors (usually happens to every young player at least once) he would have to be DFA'd at that time
• Creates a 'dead spot' on the roster for 3 years meaning that his spot on the 40-man will not be able to help the ML team during that time, hurting your team during that time.
• Is redundant to what we have already:
• He is another middle infielder
• He has no speed
• He is not a good defender
• He likely has little to no power

No way is this acceptable for your job title.  Hey, I disagreed with trading Carlos Vargas earlier in the day for a guy who won't help us this year like Vargas had the possibility of doing.  I disagreed with putting Tim Herrin on the 40-man over Peyton Battenfield because I think your experts are misreading both Battenfield's and Herrin's results and peripherals this year.   However, as I said in my last post, none of those moves is crucial to how the Guardians finish the next few years.  It just removed some depth and potential trading assets without anything of substance coming back.

But the trade of Nolan Jones for Juan Brito?   That makes no sense and DOES hurt our team now and for the next 3 years.  Jones immediately slots in as Colorado's #11 prospect, meaning not only have they traded up 19 spots they got a ML player who won't clog their roster and can help their ML team right away.  Colorado was trying to dump Brito as they didn't want a low A guy on their 40-man.  We had all the leverage in this trade but Colorado won this trade by a huge margin.  

This trade stinks.  There isn't one visible reason that this trade gets the Guardians a fair return.  They get screwed royally on this trade.   Hey, if Jones offended someone in the organization, I understand,  why you trade him.  But you get equal value back.  Not only did you OBVIOUSLY not get equal value back you screwed up your 40-man roster for 3 years and did not help your ML team at all for 3 years.  

No way is this acceptable and there are no excuses that you can make up that will convince anyone that you did not hurt your team today in essentially every move you made except for the obvious protecting of Martinez and Cantillo who, both, BTW, also clog your 40-man roster for at least 2 years.

I am disgusted with you two today.   Get off your asses and do your job better tomorrow.  Your past successes don't give you a pass to make monumental screwups like the Jones for Brito trade and you should have even done better earlier in the day with your 40-man roster.

First Thoughts On Today's Activity

 Carlos Vargas for Ross Carver

I don't understand this move at all.  The Guardians give up a guy who is on the brink of being a usable piece for the major league bullpen and they get back a 2oth AND LAST round pick from 2021 who had a 10.00 ERA in 9 starts at AA and has a 93-94 mph fastball.

Vargas can get it up to the plate at close to 100 mph.  What the hell?  Looks like another pathetic small trade at the deadline that will eat at us for years (see Tobias Myers trade).  

So Antonetti has proven he can't trade more experienced minor leaguers at the Rule 5 deadline and he has proven he can't trade FOR that kind of player.  

Perfect!  

I know Carver is the D-backs #23 prospect and I get that this relieves a little 40-man roster pressure but this move tells me the Guardians didn't think Vargas would help them in 2023.   So he shouldn't succeed with the D-backs this coming year, right?

On paper this doesn't seem anywhere like an equal trade in a year where it doesn't appear to me that we had a roster crunch if we get rid of Maile, Gose and Miller, none of whom are useful to this team in 2023 or easily replaceable. 

40-Man Roster 

Additions:

Angel Martinez

Joey Cantillo

Tim Herrin

Remove:

Anthony Gose

Kirk McCarty

Traded

Carlos Vargas

Analysis 

On the surface this is a mixed bag.  The obvious 2 guys that should have been added were added, Cantillo and Martinez.   

Gose should have been DFA'd as he is unlikely to pitch next year and we can re-sign him to a minor league deal if he passes through waivers (likely).  McCarty may be less likely to make it through waivers, given the guys we lost on waivers during the year (Call, Gibault, Jewell).  

I already mentioned that the trade made NO sense and it makes less sense now as we are essentially saying that we have more certainty that Tim Herrin can help us in 2023 than we did in Vargas helping us in 2023 and that we considered Vargas such a dispensible asset that we would trade him for a guy who had a 10.00 ERA in 3 starts at AA and was a 20th round draft pick in 2021.

As far as Tim Herrin, when looking at all the minor league relievers we COULD have protected, Herrin looks like about the 5th best, if you count Peyton Battenfield.  If our roster was not stacked I would have yawned at this move.  But rostering Herrin at the expense of Vargas is just stupid and, in fact, rostering him at the expense of McCarty, who has actually shown he can pitch in the majors, is not that much better.  

Leaving Battenfield unprotected is, as I said in a previous post, not the end of the world.  IF YOU DID SOMETHING GOOD WITH THAT ROSTER SPOT.  We didn't.   Battenfield being selected in the Rule 5 is almost a given, considering his history as a reliever in college and his early pro career and his success last year and the first half of this year, before he tired from the heaviest workload of his career.  The Guardans are supposed to have experts who see this stuff but I think they whiffed on this one.  He is more likely the guy we saw in 2021 if he is used as a starter and maybe an even better fit as a bullpen guy.   I can't imagine he makes it through the Rule 5 as SOME team will see what I see.  What the Guardians are seeing?  I don't know.

In the end there was very little that the Guardians could do to screw up the content of the roster, if they just protected Martinez and Cantillo.  However, they took full advantage of screwing up the edges of the 40-man roster with moves that are head scratchers.   Hopefully Herrin turns into something and Battenfield and Vargas don't come back to bite us in the butt like Junior Caminero is.   However, on paper, these moves just sucked.  When you are a low payroll team like the Guardians, you can't afford to throw assets away for nothing.  With last year (Myers) and this year (Vargas, Battenfield and, to a lesser extent, McCarty) they seem to be throwing away assets that I would have liked to hold onto and brought in or protected assets that are not, in my opinion, any more than organizational filler.