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Cap'n Piranha

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Everything posted by Cap'n Piranha

  1. Cap'n Piranha
    Yup, I called that out in my post from Thursday at 8:55 (start of second paragraph). I’m under no illusion that my viewpoint is how current MVPs are decided. I’m saying it should be, because the current system only considers one side of the value coin. Change the name of the award to MOP (Most Outstanding Player), and I’d have no issue whatsoever with the current criteria.
  2. Cap'n Piranha
    Exception that proves the rule--you can only name one example? Also, Duran was not exactly high level in the middle of 2017; He was 19, had yet to pitch more than 64 innings in a season, and had a 4.24 ERA (4.98 FIP, 4.53 xFIP) with less than 6.5 k/9 in low A. Intriguing piece to be sure, but he was not a top 100 prospect, or anywhere close to it.
  3. Cap'n Piranha
    It's not about the lowest cost--that's the misnomer here. If Mike Trout goes out and puts up a .400/.550/.800 slash line with 75 homers and 60 stolen bases, all while winning the platinum glove in CF--which results in 20 WAR--he can absolutely win MVP, even with a $37M salary. Value is about balance between production and cost; look at Costco for example. Costco does not try and sell the cheapest possible goods, they try and sell goods that are at the highest possible intersection of high quality and (relatively) low price. MVP should not go to whichever pre-arb player has the highest WAR, it should go to the player who has the best mix of high production and (again, relatively) low cost. A 6 WAR player at $14M a year is not a better player than 8 WAR Mike Trout at $37M. But given the extra $23M a year to spend elsewhere, they are more valuable.
  4. Cap'n Piranha
    When I see posters claiming that the only impediment to teams winning is owners not being willing to spend more, it is clear some people do expect the owners to lose money. If no one expects the owners to lose money, then there clearly is a cap to how much players can make (total team revenues less all other costs to operate an MLB franchise). Therefore, the more an individual player makes, the less pay there is available for other players, unless of course, we do expect an owner to lose money.
  5. Cap'n Piranha
    Planning to retire/being eligible for FA are essentially the same thing in the eyes of a team trading for talent at the deadline. There is no team that would trade for him with the plan to re-sign him. To emphasize that point--can you think of a single player traded at the deadline before they were set to become a FA that signed an extension with the acquiring team rather than hit FA? I can't, and I bet you can't either. Therefore, no one trading for Gray is turned off by his musings about retirement, since it's completely irrelevant to the remainder of this year, which is the only span of time the acquiring team is interested in.
  6. Cap'n Piranha
    Anyone trading for Sonny Gray at the deadline knows full well he's an impending FA. Gray saying he might retire does not impact his trade value one bit.
  7. Cap'n Piranha
    Steve Cohen might be. And if all owners acted like Steve Cohen, I guarantee you most owners would lose money.
  8. Cap'n Piranha
    Expecting owners to lose millions on their teams every year just because "they can afford it" is silly. Most people who spend more than they make because they can afford it pretty soon find they no longer can. Why do you think the Angels have had such a hard time selecting the right players for their supporting cast? Is it possibly because they have to minimize their spending to an average of $4M-$5M per player, thus creating a shallower pool of talent from which to choose? I'm not arguing what the rules are--I'm arguing what I believe to be the true definition of value. Getting a disproportionately higher level of production for pay is incredibly valuable, as it frees up teams to spend more on other players. This is in no way debateable. Whether you want to include that in your calculus is entirely up to you, and is of course your right, but to pretend that in modern baseball it is irrelevant how much a player makes is just not rooted in reality.
  9. Cap'n Piranha
    Just my first look at the schedule-- Wins--Tampa, Chicago, @LV, Green Bay Losses--@Philly, LAC, KC, SF, @Denver, @Cincy, @Detroit, Detroit Toss-ups--@Carolina, @Chicago, @Green Bay, @Atlanta, NO It feels so Vikings-y for Young to have his coming out party against us, with Thielen going for 140 and 2TD, we always struggle in Chicago and Green Bay, Bijan Robinson could run all over our defensive front, and Derek Carr seems like the kind of average-ish QB that the Vikings make look like a HOFer. So I think 9-8 is the ceiling, with 4-13 the floor, which makes 6-7 wins seem likely. That could yield a pick anywhere from just inside the top 10, to all the way back to 14/15. Either way, probably not enough to get the franchise QB, which suggests that we should all start looking at 2025 mock drafts.
  10. Cap'n Piranha
    This is a really great point. Imagine Falvine walks into Joe Pohlad's office; "So we're about to miss the playoffs for the third straight year despite that record payroll you gave us, so time to start trading players away! By the way Boss, we're really good at our jobs! Should we start talking about our plans for 2024?"
  11. Cap'n Piranha
    Nothing the Angels do surprises me. Undeniably the worst run organization in baseball. To have the 2 greatest players of the last 20 years on your team and for the last few years concurrently, and yet to have only one playoff appearance in 14 years? That's absolutely awful.
  12. Cap'n Piranha
    All fine for you to think that, but a player that costs less while still producing does help his team win by leaving payroll space available to get other players. Part of why the Angels are closing in on a decade since their last playoff appearance is because they've been paying 2-3 players $50M-$80M for the last decade, leaving them no space to build up a better supporting cast. Those expensive players soaking up the payroll have therefore not been valuable, since their presence impeded the overall team being better.
  13. Cap'n Piranha
    Yeah, just a difference in definitions here. I'm saying that in a vacuum, the Twins could make an acceptable offer, meaning that they can at least be in the running. The two teams that I could see being the main competition are MIA and NYY (both bottom 5 in 3B wRC+), so I guess it comes down to what are those teams willing to offer, and what do the Cards think of those prospects compared to whomever the Twins would dangle.
  14. Cap'n Piranha
    I see no scenario where Lewis playing the OF is not the most logical option for the 2024 Twins. He's not going to play short. Polanco will likely be back next year since his option has vested, so he's not going to play second. Brooks Lee is likely to take third sooner than later. When you add the benefit of Lewis playing CF (since Buxton seems unlikely to ever be a "fulltime" CF ever again), it's simply a no-brainer. I agree that making the move in the middle of a season is a bad idea (since it's related to how he was hurt last year), but with an entire offseason to get reps? There's no other option in my opinion.
  15. Cap'n Piranha
    I wasn't saying the Twins have the best collection of pitching prospects, I was simply responding to the idea that the Twins don't have the requisite arms to make an offer that STL would accept. Would some other team be able to outdo the Twins? Perhaps. It really depends on what STL thinks of what the Twins are offering--maybe STL thinks with a couple of tweaks they turn Varland into a 2, and they're in love with Raya.
  16. Cap'n Piranha
    Mike Trout and Aaron Judge should not win MVP--because they are not valuable in the sense that they are getting paid more or less appropriately for how they are producing. They should win outstanding player awards, but value brings salary into the equation--Trout is 3rd among hitters in salary and Judge is 1st. In WAR, Trout is 16th and Judge is 27th. In the AL, Wander Franco is probably the MVP; 5th overall in WAR and costs $2.5M. You could also go with Garcia at 9th overall in WAR and only $750k in salary. In fact, you could have Franco, Robert, Garcia, Ramirez, and Heim on your roster for $27M and have 17.6 WAR (Trout is 3.1 and Judge is 2.8) and still have more than $10M left when compared to Trout or Judge.
  17. Cap'n Piranha
    For just Arenado, I'd bet the Cards would be perfectly happy with some combo of Varland, SWR, Prielipp, Raya, or Festa. Especially if they're clearing most of Arenado's salary, allowing them to sign pitching in the offseason.
  18. Cap'n Piranha
    Agreed--I would give up Varland, Winder, and Miranda in a heartbeat for Arenado and cash. I just can't imagine any universe in which STL trades both those guys without getting at least 1 top 100 prospect, if not 2.
  19. Cap'n Piranha
    It absolutely is not. If you don't think you can/don't want to resign him in the offseason, it would be silly to value him as anything more than a 2 month rental. If he's the missing piece (like how the Rays viewed Nelson Cruz in 2021) maybe you don't care. But Hader, as good as he is, does not turn this team into a Top 5 outfit, capable of challenging for a World Series crown. As such, giving up 12 years of cheap pitching depth to be only slightly less at a disadvantage in the wild card round is not a good idea.
  20. Cap'n Piranha
    Quick, name 5 other teams in the last 15 years that have made the World Series with a deeply flawed team, on a par with the 2023 Twins.
  21. Cap'n Piranha
    So just to clarify, the Pohlads won't bring up rookies, because they're pie-in-the-sky, fans will boo, then stop coming to games, and they'll lose money. They also won't bring up re-treads, because again, fans will boo, then stop coming to games, and they'll lose money. So the only player acquisition vehicle left is spending market rate on prime free agents--and you think the Pohlads who according to you care only about whether or not the Twins make money, will choose that last and most expensive of routes?
  22. Cap'n Piranha
    I pass. Arenado's walk rate is the lowest it's been since 2015. His k rate is the highest it's ever been. His ISO is the lowest (save 2020) it's been since 2014. He makes more soft contact than league average. He's chasing more, but swinging at balls in the zone less. He's making less contact, despite getting more pitches in the zone, and he's swinging and missing more. At least according to fangraphs, he's been clearly worse defensively across the board (for what those metrics are worth-having not watched a single Cardinals game this year, I have no other source of evaluation). That all sounds to me like an aging, declining, very expensive player (even with COL paying $4M/year, he's $31M next year, $28M in 2025, $23M in 2026, although only $11M in 2027); the Twins might already have one of those in Correa, so to have those two eating up $50M+ for the next 3 years is a big risk if they both continue to decline from their late-2010's heydays. Now if the Cardinals wanted to eat most of the contract and take back Miranda and a low A flier? I could possibly get on board, but I have no idea why STL would do that.
  23. Cap'n Piranha
    Last year's rookie pitchers were Cano, Hamilton, Sands, Megill, Winder, Varland, Romero, SWR, Ryan, Henriquez, Moran, and Duran. 3 of the Twin's 10 best pitchers by ERA (Duran, Moran, Henriquez) were rookies, 4 more (Winder, Varland, SWR, Ryan) were top pitching prospects (which generally draw a lot of fan interest), and the other 5 combined to pitch 95.7 innings, which is less than 7% of the total innings pitched by the team last year--it's the equivalent of getting 2 outs a game. So now that I've yet again proven that rookies aren't coming up and sinking the ship, do you still want to stand by your incorrect assertion?
  24. Cap'n Piranha
    Umm, the Top 3 OPS on the team belong to minor league rookies (Wallner, Lewis, Julien). Those 3 combined make less than 10% of Carlos Correa, and are hilariously outperforming him. You're just not living in reality my man.
  25. Cap'n Piranha
    What makes more money, a team that plays listless, uninspired baseball for multiple years, or a team that actually builds hope through a collection of exciting young players who together from a dynamic competitive core? The Pohlads are in business, and understand the concept of "startup costs"--losing money now to make a lot more later.
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