KingKat

Yep, you basically know that you have to overpay at the back end to get elite production at the front end. You just hope that a) a major injury or sudden decline doesn't rob you of the good seasons at the front and that the back end is still productive enough that the players is still rosterable despite being overpaid. There might be the odd long term contract that returns value from A to Z but it's not a realistic expectation.

The market adjustement on Gatewood wasn't something I came up with. This was the kind of analysis given by people who spend a hell of a lot more time analyzing these things than I do. The feeling being that in previous drafts, a guy like Gatewood is a mid first rounder. That being said I agree with what everyone seems to be saying. It's hard to ever say definitely that a skill or skill set is truly overrated or underrated in the draft. You can be right or wrong about all kinds of guys. Maybe Gatewood become a future superstar and then people will be kicking themselves for letting him slide. I think you do see the market adjust and react to these sorts of things but whether that means these adjustments actually lead to an improvement in the overall quality of evalution is not at all clear. It's an imperfect science to say the least. The whole process can actually seem entirely luck driven and the preparation futile but you can bet that no team is just going to throw up its arms, everyone's trying to refine this process and that, productively or not, creates trends. The fact that there is a correspondence between draft position and MLB track record suggests that at least overall there's some method within the madness and that at least in a broad sense, teams know what they're doing.

... and I said this where?

What's with the tub of popcorn on the head?

The market adjusts and the Jays seems just a little bit behind the curve. Moneyball made unathletic plate discipline guys fashionable to the point where they went from being underrated to vastly overrated (see David Cooper) then in reaction to that pure athleticism may have become overrated (D.J. Davis). Lately we're seeing a market adujustment on pure athletes (Jacob Gatewood going 41st in the last draft).

Frankly, who wouldn't?

I like d'Arnaud a lot. I'd be willing to invest in him as my COF but someone in the league would have to give me a good return for Rosario to make it worthwhile.

Jays suck at drafting position players. They acknowledged as much when they went so pitching heavy in 2013.

.266 wOBA in A. Yeah pretty much a bust.

After years of waiting, we finally go to see what McGowan can produce when healthy and it turns out it isn't much. He doesn't have the length to be a starter but he's not dominant enough for short relief either. Back end relievers with no options aren't really assetts. He still has good speed on the fastball so maybe you bring him back and focus exclusively on trying to turn him into a max effort one inning guy but you don't want to burn much more than a roster spot on him if that.

Looks like my team is just susccessful enough to not get one of the good dispersion picks.

O.K. Bert.

I really don't know what kind of value his Korea numbers would actually have in the eyes of a GM. The fact that there are three players topping his gaudy numbers suggests that not too much should be read into them.

He really shouldn't turn down guaranteed money at this point plus Thames seems like the kind of guy who values the experience of living in Korea.

That Francisco for Headley swap seems awfully good in hindsight (not that there wasn't reason to think Headley was the much better player even then).

So it's typically an offensively weak position?

How is this possible? This is a sincere question, I don't understand basketball for s***.

Well if you meant by that that they basically spent all their payroll space and a good chunk of prospect capital in one swoop, you're absolutely right but if the Jays thought that it would actually work and that there would be no other holes that would require further investment down the road, that's a serious problem. There was a lot of talk on the old board about this and a lot of people felt like if this was a unique opportunity to go all in than AA had basically blown it.

If you want to read mockery into it feel free but don't act like that's not what you're doing. Just because it's in the Moogy playbook to use the word "clearly" doesn't make it retroactively so.

This might be a good time to remind people of what Bautista actually said. "He said he was a little disapointed". To infer from that that he threw his teammates under the bus and all this other stuff from such a mild comment is a bit of stretch. Maybe he is a good clubhouse influence and maybe he isn't but let's not make it like he made a big stink over this. He really didn't.

Brendan Ryan has 30 points of wOBA on Ryan Goins. Goins really pushes the limit on the kind of offensive ineptitude you can afford to carry.

That's the real issue. The big off-season moves were acquiring Dioner Navarro and Eric Kratz and ditching JPA at catcher. The big deadline aquisition was Valencia at the cost of Kratz and a journeyman pitcher having a decent year. That's not a whole lot of progress in a considerable amount of time. AA and Beest keep saying they have money. If they have money why is it so damn hard for them to spend it?

Diaz to Goins... http://www.milb.com/multimedia/vpp.jsp?content_id=35496717&sid=t422

Yeah whatever his limitations may have been skill-wise, I don't think anyone found him to be anything other than a very charismatic player. Nice to see him be in a situation where he can succeed.

Clearly Korea agrees with him. Good on him.