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Otto von Ballpark

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Everything posted by Otto von Ballpark

  1. Otto von Ballpark
    Owings was playing 2B today, but Drury has been their regular 2B this season. Owings had been their primary SS.
  2. Otto von Ballpark
    It would be kinda cool if we got back into the race now. Especially if some Garcia replacement went on a nice run...
  3. Otto von Ballpark
    Sickels and Fangraphs both have ordered rankings, but admit large swaths of them have identical values attached, and they just order them on preference. Pretty much every prospect evaluator does the same, whether they share the details or not. The gap between 16 and 21, while obviously "real" in a particular evaluator's opinion, is quite likely so small in absolute valuation as to be meaningless for our purposes here. Maybe the Twins really value Littell $4 mil more than Ynoa, in absolute terms. Or maybe their preference for MLB readiness is worth $4 mil. Or some mix. But given what we know, though (16/21, the Yankees luxury tax threshold, and the Twins falling way back in the race in just a week), it appears the $4 mil was more of an incidental cost of aiming to compete with Garcia, and getting a near MLB ready arm to replace him as a fallback option, than it was a deliberate investment in upgrading Ynoa to Littell, in absolute terms.
  4. Otto von Ballpark
    3 too many zeros there! Unless it was an Austin Powers reference?
  5. Otto von Ballpark
    Colon has to be done after today, right? Gibson plus Enn or some other auditioning starter, right? Edit: oh yeah, Santiago... let's hope he gets healthy and dealt in August?
  6. Otto von Ballpark
    By any ranking that attaches a numerical or letter grade (i.e. Fangraphs or Sickels), 16 is usually about equal to 21. At that point the only difference is ceiling vs floor, evaluator preference, etc. (FWIW, Sickels had Ynoa at 14 preseason, while Pipeline had him 23.) Also, credit to Hosken in another thread, but the Yankees are actually right up against a luxury tax threshold right now: https://www.beyondtheboxscore.com/2017/7/30/16064814/jaime-garcia-trade-twins-yankees-zack-littell-dietrich-enns-strategy-buyers-sellers-deadline So I strongly suspect the Twins eating the salary was a simple condition of any deal, not a negotiating tactic to get a prospect ~5 spots higher or whatever. It is possible that the Braves simply preferred Ynoa to Littell, but to the extent that they may have not, remember that Littell perhaps was not available to them a week ago (assuming the Yankees were holding him back for Gray negotiations). Edit: none of this is to say I don't like the deals. Just that I don't think the inclusion of cash necessarily bought us a better prospect, just a different one (who we may like better, or prefer his readiness, etc.).
  7. Otto von Ballpark
    FWIW, some rational Yankee fans here don't mind the deal at all: http://www.baseballthinkfactory.org/newsstand/discussion/mlbtr_twins_yankees_moving_toward_jaime_garcia_trade/ I suspect the Yankee fans that don't like it are the more obnoxious, prospect-overrating, and average-MLB-player underrating type. Although that type seems pretty numerous, and it can still be worthwhile to annoy them.
  8. Otto von Ballpark
    Recker was basically a waiver claim that no one else wanted. Enns was probably going to be waived too, to make room for Garcia. We did get to jump the line, although I suspect the Yankees didn't care. Littell and Ynoa actually don't appear to be meaningfully separated in rank or future value, it is primarily just a preference of ceiling vs floor, closeness to MLB, etc. I won't dispute that the $4 mil cash bought us the opportunity to swap similar value prospects for one in our preferred position.
  9. Otto von Ballpark
    Enns is on the 40-man.
  10. Otto von Ballpark
    Hughes on his original contract was a great asset. Low risk, plenty of room for value either in performance or trade, and from anywhere in the rotation or pen. Hughes after the extension pretty much only had one path to value, and that was staying in Minnesota near the top of the rotation for several years. It wasn't a particularly good deal for us even if you thought he had a decent chance to be "90%" of his peak year.
  11. Otto von Ballpark
    I admit, I forgot about Pressly. Wouldn't mind optioning him again. But I'd rather look at Curtiss or maybe even Romero with that spot right now. Since we've added Busenitz and Hildenberger already, might as well give them as many opportunities as possible. Boshers is a bit of a weird case. Is he a LOOGY? Would we rather have a bench bat, or Garver?
  12. Otto von Ballpark
    Cheap rental reliever sounds like a Belisle to me, at this point. You have other ideas?
  13. Otto von Ballpark
    How about Curtiss? They promoted him to AAA too, which implies they may protect him on the 40 man this winter. And who would you send out for your Belisle clone? Keep in mind they are still running out an 8 man bullpen right now, and Perkins might want a spot soon too...
  14. Otto von Ballpark
    Weren't you predicting Jake Reed would be up by now? And now you want to add a Belisle clone?
  15. Otto von Ballpark
    It was a direct response to the quoted portion of my post.
  16. Otto von Ballpark
    Pretty sure that, yes, he is filler. It is his 4th year in AA, which probably explains some of the success. He had a taste of AAA last year and only posted a 102 wRC+ which probably didn't impress as a 1B...
  17. Otto von Ballpark
    Primarily because they are old. Not sure it is a great achievement to put away the likes of 35 year olds Omar Infante and Brendan Ryan. And Jacoby Jones, who struck out 3 times last night, has a 45% K rate in his MLB career to date... That's not to take away from Melville's season, though. He has a string of solid starts against some better teams too. Just cautioning against reading too much into the 11 Ks last night (his previous season high was 6).
  18. Otto von Ballpark
    Hughes worked out fine, for almost 2/3 of his original contract. (Don't let the extension fool you into thinking the original contract was bad.) Nolasco didn't quite work out, of course, but even there he has recovered to post a 90 ERA+ and eat 180-200 IP a year over the last half of his contract. That's what Ervin was doing the year before we signed him. I'm not saying trade him for just anything, but Ervin isn't entirely irreplaceable. In fact, I suspect he is replaceable enough that we won't get offered much for him in trade.
  19. Otto von Ballpark
    Melville's stat line looks particularly good for this game, but keep in mind Toledo has the worst offense by far in the IL. (Also they are the oldest offense by far -- good job, Tigers!)
  20. Otto von Ballpark
    It took Romero 94 pitches to get through those 5 innings. I am pretty sure he was done for the night regardless of any rain delay.
  21. Otto von Ballpark
    From May: "Johan Santana Isn't Retired Yet" http://scout.com/mlb/rumors/Article/Johan-Santana-Isnt-Retired-Yet-74907243
  22. Otto von Ballpark
    What do you mean? Their defense was bad in the outfield? Dale Murphy was a gold glove CF, and even Ibanez wasn't a liability by defensive metrics until he was 35 years old. Willingham wasn't a disaster either in his younger days, it was enough for a solid bat to overcome.
  23. Otto von Ballpark
    Not that I would compare Garver with these guys, but: Dale Murphy Raul Ibanez Jayson Werth Wil Myers Josh Willingham http://m.mlb.com/news/article/92665530/many-converted-catchers-find-success-at-new-positions/
  24. Otto von Ballpark
    True, although that's pretty negligible. Any team that cares about that $1 mil isn't going to be giving up more valuable prospects either.
  25. Otto von Ballpark
    Maybe "connected to" as in "formerly played for". Liriano would seem to be an ideal August waiver trade guy too, I could see the Twins keeping tabs on him in case they work their way back into the race.
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