Around Baseball 2024

[Spanky__99]

Lol that’s awesome

 

Imagine being able to steal Soto from your cross town rival for the next decade

 

I can't see anyone beating them, they opened up at 660M, lol

[L54]

I can't see anyone beating them, they opened up at 660M, lol

 

I love that Cohen is willing to just burn piles of cash because he can. It’s fun for the sport!

[Spanky__99]

I love that Cohen is willing to just burn piles of cash because he can. It’s fun for the sport!

 

This will end quickly, whomever steps up.

[Jays24]

If we can't get Soto then it's amazing to get him out of our division.

 

Only downside is that the Yankees will probably outbid us on all the tier 2 free agents we'd want.

[L54]

If we can't get Soto then it's amazing to get him out of our division.

 

Only downside is that the Yankees will probably outbid us on all the tier 2 free agents we'd want.

 

Bregman would actually be a good fit in New York

[Jays24]

Bregman would actually be a good fit in New York

 

So would a lot of the tier 2 free agents like Adamas, Teo, etc.

 

I'm totally in the side of using the money spent on Soto on those level players instead. Soto's gonna be a 50M per season DH in about 5 years. This guy ain't Ohtani who was projected to be a stud on both sides of the ball. Seeing 660M thrown around as a starting point for him is dumb imo.

[BatFlip]

So would a lot of the tier 2 free agents like Adamas, Teo, etc.

 

I'm totally in the side of using the money spent on Soto on those level players instead. Soto's gonna be a 50M per season DH in about 5 years. This guy ain't Ohtani who was projected to be a stud on both sides of the ball. Seeing 660M thrown around as a starting point for him is dumb imo.

 

Totally agree, these are ridiculous numbers.

[Brownie19]

I think people are underestimating just how f***ing good Soto is. This is like signing a 26 year old Pujols, or even Frank Thomas. He's potentially one of the best hitters of all-time. He's plenty marketable and is worth a f***ton of money.

 

For reference, Pujols provided 51.7 WAR in his age 26-35 (10 year span) seasons.

Edited November 20, 2024 by Brownie19

[Eat My Shatkins]

I think people are underestimating just how f***ing good Soto is. This is like signing a 26 year old Pujols, or even Frank Thomas. He's potentially one of the best hitters of all-time. He's plenty marketable and is worth a f***ton of money.

 

For reference, Pujols provided 51.7 WAR in his age 26-25 (10 year span) seasons.

 

Agreed.

 

And if Vlad is actually good again, they would both in their prime years and give the Jays arguably the best 1-2 punch for the next 5-6 seasons.

[glory]

I’d much rather give Soto $700m+ than sign Bregman, Adames, etc. Give me the elite talent (at age 26!) all day. With that said, the Mets not only have Cohen but also have an enormous amount of money coming off their books. If he’s not a Met, I’d be shocked.

[Stangstag]

I’d much rather give Soto $700m+ than sign Bregman, Adames, etc. Give me the elite talent (at age 26!) all day. With that said, the Mets not only have Cohen but also have an enormous amount of money coming off their books. If he’s not a Met, I’d be shocked.

 

If the Jays managed to sign Soto, i feel it would also force the Yankees to respond by handing out a bunch of potentially bad contracts to guys like Bregman, Adames, Snell, etc.

[Terminator]

MLB's offseason sucks.

 

It's the best sport for armchair GMing, but the turtle like pace at which the transactions happen really puts a damper on it.

[Jays24]

The conversation isn't whether Soto is good or not, it's whether adding him while not being able to upgrade the team on multiple other fronts is good enough. We had Jose/Edwin for years and couldn't win crap until we put a complete full team around them with Donaldson, Martin, Tulo, bullpen etc.

 

Don't get me wrong though, I'd be one of the first to get a Soto jersey... This team just has far too many years holes, which we know isn't going to get patched up with our farm system.

[Laika]

MLB's offseason sucks.

 

It's the best sport for armchair GMing, but the turtle like pace at which the transactions happen really puts a damper on it.

 

There is always some big FA whale who holds the entire market up, these days

Obviously we have Soto now but also Roki Sasaki not getting posted until January... there are a bunch of teams who have Sasaki #1 on their hit list, they aren't going to sign Jack Flaherty for $100M when they might be able to get Sasaki for $7M

[Laika]

The conversation isn't whether Soto is good or not, it's whether adding him while not being able to upgrade the team on multiple other fronts is good enough. We had Jose/Edwin for years and couldn't win crap until we put a complete full team around them with Donaldson, Martin, Tulo, bullpen etc.

 

Don't get me wrong though, I'd be one of the first to get a Soto jersey... This team just has far too many years holes, which we know isn't going to get patched up with our farm system.

 

Sounds like Soto would be paid for by the special desperate Rogers extra bonus payroll anyway

 

So if they do sign him they likely still have a bag of cash for a couple more pieces

[jaysblue]

MLB's offseason sucks.

 

It's the best sport for armchair GMing, but the turtle like pace at which the transactions happen really puts a damper on it.

 

Yeah it's not like the NBA offseason. Need to see more action in baseball during the month of November.

[jaysblue]

I think people are underestimating just how f***ing good Soto is. This is like signing a 26 year old Pujols, or even Frank Thomas. He's potentially one of the best hitters of all-time. He's plenty marketable and is worth a f***ton of money.

 

For reference, Pujols provided 51.7 WAR in his age 26-35 (10 year span) seasons.

 

Nice reference.

 

Agree, signing Soto is signing a generational talent for the next decade. If they could lock both Soto and Vladdy up, that would be a lot of fun baseball for the next decade!

[BTS]

Clase, Kirby Yates, and Cade Smith all finished top-10 in AL CY voting. I guess it makes sense that we'll see more relievers finish that high with so few SPs throwing a ton of innings

[Spanky__99]

MLB's offseason sucks.

 

It's the best sport for armchair GMing, but the turtle like pace at which the transactions happen really puts a damper on it.

 

Yup, in a nutshell.

[Spanky__99]

Clase, Kirby Yates, and Cade Smith all finished top-10 in AL CY voting. I guess it makes sense that we'll see more relievers finish that high with so few SPs throwing a ton of innings

 

.

[Brownie19]

Driveline Baseball (@drivelinebaseball) • Instagram reel

WWW.INSTAGRAM.COM

---

133 likes, 7 comments - drivelinebaseball on November 18, 2024: "Which MLB pitchers had the best command in 2024? 🎯 With MLB awards dropping this week, Driveline Director of Baseball Ops @jack.lambert is here to walk through who graded out best in our internal models this season.".

 

I found that interesting

[Spanky__99]

Driveline Baseball (@drivelinebaseball) • Instagram reel

WWW.INSTAGRAM.COM

---

133 likes, 7 comments - drivelinebaseball on November 18, 2024: "Which MLB pitchers had the best command in 2024? 🎯 With MLB awards dropping this week, Driveline Director of Baseball Ops @jack.lambert is here to walk through who graded out best in our internal models this season.".

 

I found that interesting

 

Jays need to hire this dude.

Edited November 21, 2024 by Spanky99

[G-Snarls]

NL Cy Young - Sale

 

2nd Wheeler

3rd Skenes

[Spanky__99]

NL Cy Young - Sale

 

2nd Wheeler

3rd Skenes

 

Another comp pick missed by the Buccos, ugh.

 

Colossal mistake, that's massive value they pissed away for 3 starts past the deadline.

[jaysblue]

Clase, Kirby Yates, and Cade Smith all finished top-10 in AL CY voting. I guess it makes sense that we'll see more relievers finish that high with so few SPs throwing a ton of innings

 

Mason Miller should have AL ROY over Luis Gil.

[mphenhef]

I think people are underestimating just how f***ing good Soto is. This is like signing a 26 year old Pujols, or even Frank Thomas. He's potentially one of the best hitters of all-time. He's plenty marketable and is worth a f***ton of money.

 

For reference, Pujols provided 51.7 WAR in his age 26-35 (10 year span) seasons.

 

I think you are overestimating how good he is. Pujols consistently put up >8 bwar seasons from age 23-25. Soto has a high water mark of 7.9 this year following two years of 5.5. He simply doesn't have the hit tool nor the power tool either Thomas or Pujols had (at least not consistently). You need to get major value in the early years to make Soto's later years not extremely painful (Let's be honest, this is likely a 13 year contract). I'm not sure that value exists at 600-700 million unless you get 2020-2021 Soto but that's the outlier right now.

 

Even at $10mil/WAR, Pujols 26-35 is only worth $517 million. I just can't how anyone justifies $700 million...Ohtani at least had the Japan marketing bonus (imagine how may sportsnetNow subs rogers would have sold). Yes, 1 WAR going from 8 to 9 is extremely more valuable than going from 1 to 2 but I'm not sure we ever see Soto at 9 plus WAR.

[BatFlip]

I think you are overestimating how good he is. Pujols consistently put up >8 bwar seasons from age 23-25. Soto has a high water mark of 7.9 this year following two years of 5.5. He simply doesn't have the hit tool nor the power tool either Thomas or Pujols had (at least not consistently). You need to get major value in the early years to make Soto's later years not extremely painful (Let's be honest, this is likely a 13 year contract). I'm not sure that value exists at 600-700 million unless you get 2020-2021 Soto but that's the outlier right now.

 

Even at $10mil/WAR, Pujols 26-35 is only worth $517 million. I just can't how anyone justifies $700 million...Ohtani at least had the Japan marketing bonus (imagine how may sportsnetNow subs rogers would have sold). Yes, 1 WAR going from 8 to 9 is extremely more valuable than going from 1 to 2 but I'm not sure we ever see Soto at 9 plus WAR.

 

 

These are exactly the figures bumping around in my head. For Soto to be worth $700M on the field in free agency $/WAR figures, he might have to put up 80-90+ WAR over the term of the contract. He'd have to be 8+ WAR consistently and I'm not making that bet. We all know how great a player he is, but at some point those dollars are better spent elsewhere.

 

I also don't think there is some sort of magical unicorn dollars that Rogers will have for Soto that don't impact the rest of the Jays budget for 10+ years. I think what the owners are communicating is "go for it" if there is a very special player, a huge marketing opportunity, and a chance to put together a contender.

 

$700M for Ohtani, OK, but Soto? ehhh. That said, I'd be willing to run around the block naked if we sign him.

[Brownie19]

I think you are overestimating how good he is. Pujols consistently put up >8 bwar seasons from age 23-25. Soto has a high water mark of 7.9 this year following two years of 5.5. He simply doesn't have the hit tool nor the power tool either Thomas or Pujols had (at least not consistently). You need to get major value in the early years to make Soto's later years not extremely painful (Let's be honest, this is likely a 13 year contract). I'm not sure that value exists at 600-700 million unless you get 2020-2021 Soto but that's the outlier right now.

 

Even at $10mil/WAR, Pujols 26-35 is only worth $517 million. I just can't how anyone justifies $700 million...Ohtani at least had the Japan marketing bonus (imagine how may sportsnetNow subs rogers would have sold). Yes, 1 WAR going from 8 to 9 is extremely more valuable than going from 1 to 2 but I'm not sure we ever see Soto at 9 plus WAR.

 

First - who the f*** uses bWAR? I can't even figure out how to find WAR totals on the BR site! Drives me nuts.

 

Second - Soto put up 9.2 WAR before Pujols even entered the league. Ages 21-25, Pujols put up 37.6 WAR, Soto put up 32.7 WAR (having extrapolated 2020 out to a full season). Soto's defensive metrics in 2022 drag him down a bit, but yes, Pujols' defense and baserunning early in his career are better than Soto's (Pujols was actually a great baserunner at the time).

 

As for $/WAR, it depends on what Soto is really going to sign for. Ohtani was really $460M when you remove the deferrals (we all need to stop suggesting it was $700M). I don't know where Soto lands and I expect there will be deferrals that make the # look higher, but it might be right around that $520M value that Pujols provided when you strip away deferrals. Finally - organizations only get a few opportunities to add a 26 year old generational hitter on their team.

Edited November 21, 2024 by Brownie19

[Pendleton]

https://www.baseballamerica.com/stories/five-first-

round-picks-left-unprotected-ahead-of-2024-rule-5-draft/

 

The 2020 draft was understandably one of the weirdest and least normal in MLB draft history. The pandemic forced college and high school seasons to shut down early. For some high school teams, their season never even started.

 

We’re still seeing the effects more than four years later. Teams left four of the 11 high school first-round picks from the 2020 draft unprotected ahead of the 2024 Rule 5 Draft. That 64% success rate is well below the typical 73% rate of prep first-rounders being protected from their first eligible Rule 5 draft.

[BTS]

I think you are overestimating how good he is. Pujols consistently put up >8 bwar seasons from age 23-25. Soto has a high water mark of 7.9 this year following two years of 5.5. He simply doesn't have the hit tool nor the power tool either Thomas or Pujols had (at least not consistently). You need to get major value in the early years to make Soto's later years not extremely painful (Let's be honest, this is likely a 13 year contract). I'm not sure that value exists at 600-700 million unless you get 2020-2021 Soto but that's the outlier right now.

 

Even at $10mil/WAR, Pujols 26-35 is only worth $517 million. I just can't how anyone justifies $700 million...Ohtani at least had the Japan marketing bonus (imagine how may sportsnetNow subs rogers would have sold). Yes, 1 WAR going from 8 to 9 is extremely more valuable than going from 1 to 2 but I'm not sure we ever see Soto at 9 plus WAR.

 

If it's 700M. It won't actually be 700M in NPV. Probably like 15 years 700M with a bunch of money deferred and an NPV of like 550M.