BTS

I wonder how long it would take for Shatkins to accept if someone offered to take Smoak's contract on with nothing coming back the other way.

You don't really acquire young, athletic players on short term free agent deals. I think people expecting this team to maintain success are overstating the extent to which this team was built sustainably. Look at what's happened to most of the key contributors from 2015: Price - left in free agency Buehrle - retired Dickey - declined, left in free agency Bautista - declined, free agent Encarnacion - free agent Cecil - free agent Martin - ageing, declined? Tulowitzki - ageing, declined Maintaining this as a true talent 87 or 88 win roster for multiple seasons was always going to be next to impossible. I think expectations should be shifted a bit: - built a roster that projects somewhere between 81 and 85 wins - avoid long-term financial commitments - continue building for the future so that the next elite team is sustainable - cross fingers that the low 80s win teams catch some breaks and sneak into the playoffs

Clutch score measures a player's performance in high-leverage situations vs. their own performance in context-neutral situations. A positive score means they were better in the clutch, a score close to 0 means they performed the same in high leverage situations as in context neutral situations, and a negative score means they were poor in the clutch. The guys you list: Joe Carter = -2.07 Paul Molitor = 2.77 Jose Bautista = -3.95 George Bell = -4.00 Roberto Alomar = 2.36 So five players you that perceived as being clutch were on the whole bad in clutch situations in their careers. You perceive them as being clutch because they were good hitters (except Carter), and thus had a lot of hits, including at important times. You remember the big hits and forget the times they failed in big situations.

f***, these are good points. Not feeling too confident here anymore.

I invite you to join me in settling our differences the way BJMB gentlemen have been since time immemorial: fisticuffs at Yonge and Bloor, midnight.

Fysmc

1-year, 5.75M + 3M in incentives

Those small gains might make all the difference though. Maybe internal metrics like him a hair better than Steamer does. And they think he's a couple runs better on the bases here than in KC for the reasons you state. And they like that he's proven to be comfortable DHing. Add it all together, and they think he's closer to a 2-win guy than a 1-win guy, and they pull the trigger. Would be interesting to see where exactly their internal projections differ from his 2016 and Steamer projections.

Regarding the park, I think if you have a situation where a park is not known as a run suppressing environment, but does suppress homeruns (like Kauffman), a player who relies on the HR, like Morales, is ill-suited to the environment, and you might project a small wRC+ bump if that player moves to a similar offensive environment that yields homers. From what I understand, park-adjusted metrics really just use dirty math based on the overall run environment.

Sure sounds like this move signifies that the book is closed on Edwin.

It was actually close to 5M Toronto was responsible for over 2016 and 2017. They just elected to put it all on the 2016 books.

For payroll purposes, they decided to use the money from SD on their 2017 books, giving him effectively no salary for payroll purposes this year.

A few thoughts now that I've digested this a bit more: - I think something that probably played a factor here is stability. Not year-to-year, but game -to-game. LF, RF, and 1B are all holes, and at least one is likely to be a platoon. Morales is a switch hitter with no platoon split. He's someone that Gibby is going to pencil in 3rd or 4th every day, regardless of who's on the mound. There's value in that in a lineup that might have a lot of moving parts. - He can hit. A wRC+ between 110 and 136 in 6 of the last 7 years, with the only exception being in 2014 where he waited until midseason to sign and never got going. Projections are probably giving more weight than they should to his 2014. Also, as GD alluded to, he relies on the HR to do damage and Kaufman really wasn't a good park for his skill set. I'm willing to bet that internal projections have him closer to a 120 wRC+ next year than the 109 Steamer has for him. - There has been research done on the 'skill' of being able to DH without seeing your numbers drop, as a lot of players don't like doing it, and perform worse in the role. I wonder if the team buys into this kind of thing and saw value in Morales as a guy who is absolutely fine swinging 4 times a game and sitting out the rest. Overall, I don't love it, but I'm fine with it. I wish it were 2/22, but I think Morales will be a nice addition to the lineup in the short term. He's not Edwin, but he can hit.

Yeah, I think I'm on board too depending on what else goes down. Morales at 3/33 + a pick is more appealing to me than Edwin at 5/100 or whatever and no pick .

Nope

I think so too. I don't think they'll want to commit to using one of Morales and Edwin at 1B every day for the next three years. I expect a full-time 1B to be acquired now, for cheaper than Edwin. Probably also means Beltran and Holliday are out, as they're more DH types.

Thanks for the tip

He's graded out as around average, but he hasn't had more than 51 starts at 1B since 2009. I think he'll lead the team in starts at DH.

Yeah, and projections are factoring in his performance that year, when it probably isn't valuable data.

Yup, this is not sexy at all, but 1B and DH were completely open, and he can hit.

Morales wRC+ by year: 136 128 119 119 72 130 110 I have no idea what happened in 2014, but you can probably pencil him in somewhere as a 110-120 wRC+ guy, and he's a switch hitter with no platoon split, which is nice. Three years makes me uneasy, but as a DH who can handle 1B with some consistency, and the OF in a pinch, he improves the team. Especially given the in-house options.

Gurriel, McGuire, Ramirez, Bichette, and Zeuch added to the farm with nothing of consequence going out, all while trying to compete, is just great. Loving the direction of the team.

Holy f***, this is awesome. Absolutely love this signing. Can't see how anyone wouldn't like it.

Yea

When is the last time he projected for a wRC+ of 125? Pretty sure Steamer is picking up on the signs of decline he showed this year.