KingKat

+ Rays have a lot of MI options that should allow them to cover 2B.

Ah come on... Take one for the league.

I know you hate Jeff Mathis but Mathis at 2 million per is better than Salty at 1.5. Only plus of Salty is that they might have an agreement in place where they cut him if he doesn't make the 25. I'm kind of hoping that this is the case and that Salty i only there to be a plan B if Jimenez doesn't look the part. I've been bearish on Jimenez but now I'm rooting for the positive reports on his catching to be vindicated.

Minor league deal... That would indicate that they haven't ruled out Jimenez.

I don't know how to interpret these numbers but that looks bad and bad jives with what I've heard generally. http://www.statcorner.com/CatcherReport.php

I'm convinced Desmond is going to bust hard. That track record is just so riddled with inconsistencies and red flags. I really think that deal has the potential to be a complete write off.

I really don't care much about the difference between 20B and 40B. Precedent suggests that the likelihood of hitting on the pick is the same. If push comes to shove, I'd guess I'd go with 40B just to leave some wiggle room if this were to happen to someone slightly better than Ventura but still not elite (which isn't exactly a huge concern either).

What is this hair splitting? He's had a WAR above 0 exactly once in his career just like Org said.

Frankly, I think the Braves are crazy to not have signed Thole as insurance. I mean sure it could work out fine but why not have a plan B in case it doesn't? Reminds me of when the Red Sox thought they didn't need Doug Mirabelli and then had to go back to the Padres and ask for him back.

I'm more interested in evaluating their respective defensive skill and all around catcher play than riding the hot hand. They're both bad but whoever is better at run prevention has the better floor.

Replacement-ish level player for depth. Nothing to see here.

Projections on these type of guys aren't very reliable but fwiw, Steamer projects him to be about the same A.J. Jimenez which is very not good.

Handsome Jeff Mathis, a player that BTS s*** on, went for 2/4$. I would have rather have payed that than pay 1.5 for Salty.

Hochevar seems like the wiser investment right now but it's so hard to tell. We really don't know much about their current physical state. Recency bias tells that Holland is the bigger question mark.

Yeah it has to be an amount that doesn't get in the way of other things otherwise what's the point.

He really sucks. If true they must be a) not very confident in Jimenez at all and be offering him a rock bottom salary.

Other than being a former closer, I don't really see what makes Holland a more enticing reclamation project than Hochevar.

Yeah that's fine. My only point is that "what's in good taste" could be a sliding scale. I mean it's surely not tasteful but it's also probably not as big a deal over there as it would be here. The anecdote that was shared about Taveras definitely suggests a different standard.

Hochevar doesn't generate much discussion but he's an intriguing name. Because I had him in fantasy, I noticed that he's still really good when he hits the field. He put up a 4.44 K/BB which is only a hair below his awesome season of 2013. Of course he also only pitched half sa many innings and was buried on the depth chart but there's some intriguing upside there even if it comes with some with health caveats. He's 33 so not young but he's not THAT old for a pitcher. He has the raw ability to outperform Grilli and as much as I love Jason, I wouldn't mind having someone who could theoretically push him down a rung on the depth chart and more bullpen depth would also give the team a bit more flexibility with Biagini if they ever decide that they need to stretch him out. It's all comes down to scouting Hochevar's potential health.

Yeah and it's not like it's a terrible bullpen as it is. Atkins has Loup in his back pocket whose career splits indicate that he should be fine if ever he was used as a strict loogy. There should be enough guys to handle the high leverage inning effectively which is what matters most and there are some intriguing names to round out the cast (Sparkman, Floyd, etc.)

There is a benefit to achieving clarity on this matter though Dinger's right that it's not a huge benefit in terms of future application. I think there's a certain subset of owners in this group who to some extent value clarity for its own sake and that's legit even it's not something that Dinger can relate to.

Well maybe people just aren't as squeamish about that kind of stuff over there as North Americans tend to be? I mean I don't know much of anything about Dominican news culture but I think it's a least plausible that the standards are different.

Atkins made it pretty clearly that the team is not on board with the new reliever valuations. There's too much volatility with non elite relievers (I'll leave the question of the volatility of the elite ones to another debate). Atkins is bidding his time. One of two things is likely to happen. Some but probably not all of these relievers will get what they're looking and Atkins will scoop up what's left OR one of these guys is just going to get fed up and lower their asking price and provoke a market adjustment. Atkins' patience stands to be rewarded either way and the later scenario seems pretty probable because it's January and all the teams seem to be holding firm not just the Jays when it comes to paying these guys. It doesn't seem like the market in general sees enough separation s to be willing to overpay for whoever would theoretically be the best. I guess that's my roundabout way of saying that I think the Jays will land someone but they probably won't lose sleep over which of the similar assets on the market it is. It will be Salas is the dominos fall that way.

O.K. I guess they ended up compromising on that. Early talk was that they would drop it altogether. Knowing that you can get out of the q.o. system altogether after accepting is probably going to incite more players to accept the q.o. and re-enter the market unencumbered after only one year.

Can you drop it with the Southern Ontario hate? It's really quite inappropriate and out of place.