Laika

Don't care much for people correlating his ego or attitude with his decline. He was good, then he very obviously got hurt and his stuff fell off considerably. It had nothing to do with his mental side. The guy was annoying from some perspectives but through 2022 you could still very much think about him as the kind of guy you would hate from other side of the field but love to have on your team. And at just 24, he had a lot of time to settle into a more normal athlete psychology.

Indeed. It makes DS's reverse splits seem even less reliable than the small sample size would indicate.

Sonny Gray lied about wanting to play for Yankees before 2017 trade, Brian Cashman says ORLANDO, Fla. — It all started with a little Gray lie? Sonny Gray made waves last week after he was traded from the St. Louis Cardinals to the Boston Red Sox, saying that he “never” wanted to play for the New York Yankees in the first place and that he was excited to join Boston, “where it’s easy to hate the Yankees.” But Yankees general manager Brian Cashman said Gray lied behind the scenes about wanting to play for the team before the club acquired him in 2017 in what wound up as a failed marriage. Speaking to reporters at the Winter Meetings on Sunday night, Cashman said Gray — then pitching for the Oakland Athletics — was telling people at the time that he wanted to play for the Yankees and that Gray later admitted he was fibbing the whole time. “When he was with the A’s, he was telling our minor-league video coordinator, ‘You got to get me over to the Yankees,’” Cashman said. “‘Tell Cash, get me over to the Yankees. I want out of Oakland. I want a championship.’” Cashman said Gray was “communicating that to a number of different people … that he wants to be a Yankee.” But in his second season in the Bronx, after Gray told Cashman he was surprised the Yankees didn’t trade him at the 2018 deadline, he came clean to the general manager. “That’s when he told me he never wanted to be here,” Cashman said. “He hates New York. ‘This is the worst place.’ He just sits in his hotel room.” Cashman said when he reminded Gray he had told people he wanted to be traded to the Yankees, Gray laid the blame on his agent, Bo McKinnis. “(McKinnis) told me to do that,” Gray said, according to Cashman. Cashman said Gray told him McKinnis “told me to lie” because “it wouldn’t be good for my free agency to say there’s certain places that I don’t want to go to.” “In 2017, Sonny did not have no-trade rights with the Oakland Athletics, so he had no legal right to have input as to where he would be traded or if he would be traded,” McKinnis told The Athletic when reached for comment Sunday night. “As such, he made no statement that he did or did not want to be traded to any specific team, and thus, there was no statement that could have included a lie. “The Athletics had no obligation to inform Sonny of any trade communications they had with other clubs, so they never told him they were potentially trading him to any particular team. As an aside, if a player does not want to play for a particular club — thus potentially not performing at their best if they were with that team — it does not help their career and future free agency to lie their way into a trade to that club.” A short while later, McKinnis sent another message to The Athletic: “So, Brian is trying to make people believe I told Sonny to, in Cashman’s words, ‘lie’ to the minor-league video guy to try to get Sonny to the Yankees — even though, per Cashman, Sonny did not want to be with the Yankees — to subsequently somehow help Sonny’s free agency. This makes zero sense. … Further, the words, ‘I want out of Oakland,’ have never been said by Sonny. He loved his time with the A’s.” Cashman said he told Gray the Yankees might not have traded for him if they had known how much he didn’t want to play for them. “‘I wish you would have told me well beforehand,’” Cashman recalled saying to Gray. “‘I wish we knew this before we even tried to acquire you, that you never wanted to come here.’ We tried to do our homework.” At his introductory news conference at Yankee Stadium in 2017, Gray appeared thrilled to join the team. “I couldn’t be happier with how it all played out,” he said at the time, “and I couldn’t be happier to be here.” Then Gray spent a miserable 538 days with the club, going 15-16 with a 4.51 ERA in 41 games (34 starts). He was frequently booed before the Yankees traded him to the Cincinnati Reds in January 2019. When the Yankees acquired Gray for Dustin Fowler, James Kaprielian and Jorge Mateo, he had already been an All-Star with Oakland in 2015. He has since made All-Star teams as a member of the Reds and Minnesota Twins. Gray immediately struggled when he joined the Yankees midseason in 2017, going 4-7 with a 3.72 ERA in 11 starts and never seeming to be on the same page with then-pitching coach Larry Rothschild. Then, in 2018, he went 8-7 with a 5.08 ERA in 20 starts before the trade deadline. Cashman said Gray thought the Yankees would trade him before the deadline. When it didn’t happen, the pair spoke in an office at Yankee Stadium. That was when Gray revealed to Cashman that he never wanted to be a Yankee in the first place. Cashman replied that in the offseason, he’d do his best to trade him. “I told him, ‘Nothing I can do about it now,’” Cashman said. — Ken Rosenthal contributed to this report.

Hardware and contextual impact I guess 6 time AS + 9 time GG + MVP + MVP candidate by voting a few times vs 2 time AS + 3 time GG + topped out as 3rd in MVP voting and never got serious consideration outside of that year Have to think that Olerud continues to get discussed and might eventually get in one year via Veteran's Committee. Similar case as Alan Trammell, just a bit less career WAR. ??? I don't remember how the Eras / Veteran's Committee works. Can players just stay on it forever?

Lawlar + Mayer is a fun infield combo. Arizona can collect all of the pre-bust fake shortstop prospects.

Nope.

From The Athletic this morning. It really seems like this is the best chance to find a fit for Berrios. Severino is owed $25M and $22M (player option) Berrios is owed $18.7M, $24.7M, and $24.7M Very similar post-trade CBT AAVs Severino projects better so it makes no sense on paper but there are personnel factors - it seemed like both SP had relationship issues in 2025 with their current organization. Perhaps the As want someone more reliable and steady. Maybe a C prospect or some $$$ is involved bridges the gaps. Severino is more viable as a relief option, if everyone is healthy and he is outperformed by Ponce.

Clement Schneider Career Split (%) 8.04% -3.10% PA career v LHP 462 320 Regressed platoon split 6.44% 4.94% Proj wOBA 0.311 0.319 Proj split v LHP 0.324 0.330 Proj split v RHP 0.304 0.314 Mint defender vs statue so you would never pick DS over EC because of splits.

Yeah huge upgrade on Turnbull etc. He could go either way. Do they stretch him out and just have him as SP8 on the depth chart or do they adjust his stuff or mix and try the RP route again?

He's more useful in Buffalo. It allows them to potentially carry an additional asset into the season. The contract being bad has this one upside of nobody else wanting him so they could force him down lol

This isn't an optioning though

This might be wrong

Wtf Seattle

tbh be was not very good and got very lucky for most of the year They are probably hoping someone takes him but if not I guess they can option him? Buffalo Rodriguez

This is weird timing. Hoping someone trades for him? The 40 man is at 39 with him and Cease and Ponce

https://www.baseballamerica.com/stories/explaining-baseball-americas-updated-mlb-prospect-grades-risk-system/

BA does two grades a think. Ceiling and reasonable expectations

https://blogs.fangraphs.com/estimating-hitter-platoon-skill/

Regress your platoon splits, you f***ing n00b Defense is a big part of the equation too

I agree with giving Ernest some CF reps, particularly if they bring in an infielder or sign Bo back. Ernie played some CF way back and some OF in the minors, a bit in the majors. He could probably be a decent enough CFer with reps. If Ernie is cooking in 2026 he is an every day player for me but he can play a different position every day. I don't like all of this 400+ PA talk though. This guy needs 650+ PA.

member's only I guess? can't bring myself to pay for Fangraphs not sure why they need more sales

Why? Oviedo sucks. The Red Sox are acting like a small or mid market team so far. Their 2025 trade deadline was pathetic and so was the Devers trade. They are operating like a franchise with an identity crisis.

https://goldin.co/item/oct-20-2025-alcs-game-7-actual-george-springer-7th-inning-go-ahead-homnxlcg?queryId=eyJxdWVyeUlkIjoiODlhY2EwNTE0ZGQxZTQ3ZDQ5YTc1NzFiMmUyNmJjM2IiLCJjYXJkSW5kZXgiOjEyfQ%3D%3D

Vernon Wells LOL there's one more case against signing Bo