The one and only Masahiro Tanaka posting and bidding thread

[jays4life19]

I'd really like to see Stroman, Hutchison, Drabek and Nolin get their time at AAA. If the Jays get Tanaka or any of the other FA pitchers, I see no reason to rush any of these 4 when they have Happ, Rogers and Redmond as #5s.

 

Can we please trade Happ for salary relief and use the $$ for a FA Pitcher.

 

Trade Casey for a prospect or two also...that's like what? 9 million in savings right there.

[LunchBox]

Can we please trade Happ for salary relief and use the $$ for a FA Pitcher.

 

Nothing would make me happier, he's totally redundant and disproportionately expensive. Any idea who would take him though?

[LunchBox]

I'd really like to see Stroman, Hutchison, Drabek and Nolin get their time at AAA. If the Jays get Tanaka or any of the other FA pitchers, I see no reason to rush any of these 4 when they have Happ, Rogers and Redmond as #5s.

 

That's cool. I'd prefer to watch semi-respectable baseball, but to each their own. Twice I had to watch Ortiz pitch live last year, never again.

[Atothe]

McGowan has no business in the rotation. Stroman, Hutch, Drabek, Nolin, Happ all see starts before McGowan.

 

I see him making at least a couple of starts

[ElNik2013]

Can we please trade Happ for salary relief and use the $$ for a FA Pitcher.

 

Trade Casey for a prospect or two also...that's like what? 9 million in savings right there.

 

 

I've also posted about trading Happ and either Janssen or Santos, if not both, it's a good place to save money, but who knows if there's a market for Happ.

[ElNik2013]

That's cool. I'd prefer to watch semi-respectable baseball, but to each their own. Twice I had to watch Ortiz pitch live last year, never again.

 

 

I don't think Happ, Rogers or Redmond being the #5 starter will prevent the Blue Jays from being respectable. Besides, I'm thinking the young guys will be needed throughout the season anyway, so start them at AAA and let them continue to develop even if it's for a month or 2. Maybe they get lucky and Happ pitches well early in the year and some team takes him in a trade.

 

Remember, the rotation that we're talking about includes Tanaka so this is all fantasy since there's little chance they get him.

[vic city]

McGowan has no business in the rotation. Stroman, Hutch, Drabek, Nolin, Happ all see starts before McGowan.

 

Agreed. I think there's a good chance one of either Happ, Hutch or Drabek has a breakout year. As for Stroman, I don't have high expectations for his rookie season. It's not very often a rookie pitcher comes out and handles the AL East.

 

Just thinking...when was the last time we had a rookie pitcher come in and turn heads? Was Billy Koch a rookie? We've had a couple solid rookie seasons in the BP but that's about it. Roy Halladay had some gems early on.

[Abomination]

Just thinking...when was the last time we had a rookie pitcher come in and turn heads? Was Billy Koch a rookie? We've had a couple solid rookie seasons in the BP but that's about it. Roy Halladay had some gems early on.

 

Romero in 2009. Cecil gets some votes too probably.

[Abomination]

Gustavo Chacin

 

Yeah, that was a lot earlier than 2009 though.

[Atothe]

2005. s*** I feel old.

 

Don't be I remember that like it wasn't too long ago either, that was a great summer

[Atothe]

Looking back I enjoyed most of J.P Ricciardi's tenure other then not making the playoffs, always an interesting summer

[SAAviour]

Here is a random team that makes sense TO ME to bid on Tanaka: Houston Astros

 

this may seem odd, but Houston apparently was very involved in the Choo talks, so they are willing to spend some money. They have such a low payroll, all of his posting fee and a big first year contract would be easily manageable.

 

Reasons why

 

-Some excitement for a suffering fan base for 2014

-Below market value cost yearly beginning in 2015

-Potential of a 2015 rotation Rodon/Tanaka/Appel/Feldman/#5 is scary, and hurries up the rebuilding process (at a VERY cheap price for YEARS)

 

Haven't seen this connection before, but as Astros GM/Ownership, I'd be very into this.

 

Makes sense for the Astros, but if I'm tanaka I'm going to the dodgers before the worst team in all of baseball. Or to the cubs so I can be the guy who broke the streak. Or the jays so I could make Saaviour very happy.

[GD]

Yeah. I have a lot more good memories from the JPR tenure than from the AA tenure so far.

 

My best memory is still attending what was going to be Roy Halladay's final game at the Rogers Centre versus Tampa Bay. Halladay went 9 and Downs blew it in the 10th.

[Atothe]

Remember Kerry ligtenberg hahahaha

[Angrioter]

That facial hair. IIRC they acquired him and Terry Adams in the same offseason and they were both giant gas cans out of the pen.

 

El Poeta

http://images.usatoday.com/sports/baseball/_photos/2005-03-31-batista-ins.jpg

[Atothe]

Those were some truly god awful bullpens in the early aughts

[Key22]

Dozens of posts try to evaluate 2014 pitching staffs based on 2013 results. In fact, starting pitching isn't that reliable. Individual performance varies wildly and hence team performance does as well. The 2012 year for Boston and Cleveland showed no hint of an improved 2013, unless you think Dempster was meaningful etc etc. And Toronto's starting staff looked very solid. In contrast, Toronto's 2012 staff looked weak but before the injuries hit they had one of the best starting pitching squads in the majors ( Morrow was on his way to Cy Young contention, Hutch looked liked a keeper, tons of complete games pitched ).

 

My point is who knows what 2014 will bring, I suspect upside surprises from Stroman, maybe Morrow, maybe Hutch. Adding one solid starter who eats up innings and is no worse then a #3 roughly would help our chances immensely. If Tanaka was better then that our pitching ceiling is quite high. Given the lack of quality pitchers in the free agent market and the market prices, acquiring none of them is not the worst strategy as you say.

 

There are clearly no guarantees with pitching - two years in a row we lost 60% of our rotation. This is why we're last. Everyone blames Gibbons but when you lost Johnson and Morrow for the year, Romero implodes and Happ gets hit in the face, Dickey hurts his Neck in the first start of the year and can;t throw the knuckleball properly (and it's really his only pitch) And Buerhle kinda starts slow, JPA seems to turn into the worst catcher in history, Lawrie can't hit his way out of a paper bag, you lose you starting shortstop and lead-off hitter for 3 months and your leftfielder is playing like a 60 year old man and second base is a black hole of poop I found it kinda silly that "It's all Gibbons"

 

Now I agree - it all looks better going into next season in terms of depth - Drabek, Hutchison, Happ, Rogers, Morrow should hopefully all be back and healthy. Add in McGowan as a possible starter and Santos to the pen and things look not bad. Add in Stroman who may be ready and it's pretty bright.

 

I am looking at the team from a "in now" perspective which is where the Jay's brass seemed to me to decide to be in from last off season. So in that light If you are TRULY serious I don't think you can go into the season with minor league pitchers, injury prone pitchers beyond the 4-5 spots in the rotation. I think the Jays need two durable 200 inning kind of starters to go along with Dickey and Beurhle who are about as good as those two. Then you can slot in the 8 pitchers or so like Morrow/Happ for the 5th spot. To me this gives the team a huge breather - maybe you get lucky and Morrow stays healthy and pitches like the 1 hit guy we're all hoping is in there - cause it's in there. But unlike Verlander you can't "expect" it - what you have to expect is that he's going to blow his arm out in the first 10 starts.

 

Drabek has had 2 TJS and it's highly unlikely that he will ever pitch in MLB again - maybe but I believe the history of 2 TJS pitchers isn't spectacular.

 

The thing with all this is you're always paying for someone's past work. I mean Stroman could come up and be a shut down Ace, Hutchison could be a solid number 3 Marcum like starter - Dickey could win the Cy Young, Romero could come back and throw 190+ innings of sub 3.00ERA. But in win now mode I just think it's crazy to expect anything like that to happen.

 

Three years in a row losing 3/5 of the rotation for most or all of the season I want to say just can't happen - but then it did 2 years in a row. Maybe we can rely on depth this time.

[Abomination]

Drabek has had 2 TJS and it's highly unlikely that he will ever pitch in MLB again - maybe but I believe the history of 2 TJS pitchers isn't spectacular.

 

Three years in a row losing 3/5 of the rotation for most or all of the season I want to say just can't happen - but then it did 2 years in a row. Maybe we can rely on depth this time.

 

Drabek threw at the end of last year (in the majors), and was hitting 95mph and averaging 92.7 on the fastball. Unless he blows out the arm a third time, he'll almost certainly pitch in the majors again (and I suspect he may break camp as one of the starters).

 

The depth next year looks to be fantastic, which will probably (but hopefully not) be critical to our success. Now that we have it, we'll probably only have to use 5 starters all season. Murphy's Law and all that. I really believe we only need one more guy "guaranteed" to give us 200 innings. We should have the budget for it, or at least be able to make room for it.

[LunchBox]

I really believe we only need one more guy "guaranteed" to give us 200 innings. We should have the budget for it, or at least be able to make room for it.

 

Totally agree. Last week I jokingly brought up Bronson Arroyo, but the idea is growing on me. Rumour has it that he's holding out for a third year, preferably overpay for two or include a vesting option for the third year.

 

Yes the Dickey, Buehrle, Arroyo Old-Man-Triumvirate would allow an obscene number of HRs while providing nothing spectacular. They would also carry a huge workload while providing the very definition of consistent league-average pitching. Last year they posted 103, 102, 100 ERA- respectively over a combined 630 innings.

 

Compliment these three with the electric but uncertain right arms of Morrow and Stroman. Hutch, Drabek and Nolin provide the first line of defence followed by the legitimate depth guys Rogers, Redmond. Suddenly this is a rotation with tremendous depth, improved consistency, as well as some upside and balance.

 

Follow up by attempting to trade from the back of the BP and bottom of the rotation depth, preferably Jansen and Happ if at all possible, to solidify 2B (Danny Espinosa being the logical target). Find someone to partner with Lind as well.

 

It's not a sexy strategy, but for this team I believe it's the best option. Morrow and Stroman can only be reasonably expected to throw 150 innings each, Arroyo allows them to do just that. It's a roster that will win based on run production but doesn't need to be carried by it, 90 wins probably isn't unreasonable.

[G-Snarls]

Tanaka wants "at least" 17M per year

 

http://www.sbnation.com/mlb/2013/12/27/5247690/masahiro-tanaka-rumors-japan-yankees-cubs-rangers

[Anemic0ffense]

Tanaka wants "at least" 17M per year

 

http://www.sbnation.com/mlb/2013/12/27/5247690/masahiro-tanaka-rumors-japan-yankees-cubs-rangers

 

AA hangs up the phone. Scrambles to trade the farm...

[Sammy225]

Tanaka wants "at least" 17M per year

 

http://www.sbnation.com/mlb/2013/12/27/5247690/masahiro-tanaka-rumors-japan-yankees-cubs-rangers

 

Is he going to be as good as Darvish? No. So when Darvish is getting around 10 annually I believe, I would not be ponying up 17mil annually to an unproven guy that by all reports will not be at the same level as Darvish.

[Sammy225]

However the way some of these contracts have been going this year it makes you really think.

[GD]

However the way some of these contracts have been going this year it makes you really think.

 

Plus, you're forgetting that Tanaka has FAR more leverage than Darvish had, and Texas was already paying out the ass for his posting fee. 5/85 for Tanaka would be a great deal for Tanaka imo, he'd need to average like at most 2 wins a year. Although if you include the posting fee on that which idk if you should or not cause it doesn't count for payroll, he needs to average closer to 3.

[Sammy225]

Plus, you're forgetting that Tanaka has FAR more leverage than Darvish had, and Texas was already paying out the ass for his posting fee. 5/85 for Tanaka would be a great deal for Tanaka imo, he'd need to average like at most 2 wins a year.

 

Your right teams are bidding against each other. You just got to really trust your scouts. I am not going to be the guy to come on here and say we NEED to sign him because I have only seen youtube videos of him. It is a lot of money to give out to unproven talent. Tread carefully or we could have the next Dice-K

[GD]

Your right teams are bidding against each other. You just got to really trust your scouts. I am not going to be the guy to come on here and say we NEED to sign him because I have only seen youtube videos of him. It is a lot of money to give out to unproven talent. Tread carefully or we could have the next Dice-K

 

I edited my post btw.

 

I really like Tanaka but I think the cost is gonna get insane. If it's something like $17 AAV then yeah I'd do that.

[Sammy225]

I edited my post btw.

 

I really like Tanaka but I think the cost is gonna get insane. If it's something like $17 AAV then yeah I'd do that.

 

Probably. I would think out of 30 teams you are going to be looking at about 20 teams putting in bids and all knowing that everyone else wants him. He will be expensive. I would not go over 16-17. You might be able to entice him with a longer contract like 6/95 or something like that. It will be interesting to see what happens. I know a lot of people on this board have Darvish in the back of their minds. I have Dice-K in mine because in Japan he looked untouchable then everyone knows how that plays out.

[Chappy]

However the way some of these contracts have been going this year it makes you really think.

 

Yeah, it makes you think about not signing him. $17M per plus the posting will end up around $20M per season and I'm betting it's 6 years. At that cost for an unproven commodity that very likely may not even be better than any of Garza/Santana/Jiminez, AA is probably better off trying to sign one of those options on a 4-5 year deal at $60-$75M.

[G-Snarls]

Is he going to be as good as Darvish? No. So when Darvish is getting around 10 annually I believe, I would not be ponying up 17mil annually to an unproven guy that by all reports will not be at the same level as Darvish.

 

That's what we would all WANT to say as a GM

 

But the market says he will probably get it. Darvish is seriously underpaid. Free agent crappy number 5 starters are getting paid the same as he is. Mid rotation guys like Ervin Santana and Matt Garza are probably going to get 14-15M. Tanaka is only 25, projects as a 1/2 starter, and is not tied to draft pick compensation. And the posting fee is set at a very reasonable 20M. He'll get what he's asking for.

[G-Snarls]

6 years 105M is my guess