Orgfiller

If only he didn't also have the health of 30+ year old Chris Sale.

Pop is hot garbage so hard to argue just about anyone else' inclusion over him lol. I guess he's been fine in Spring and the stuff in theory has potential. On the other hand, with Yariel also starting out in the bullpen, he's pretty much that long arm with some upside, and I don't know how common it is to have multiple guys capable of going 3+ innings in the bullpen at once.

Ah I missed the option. Still, I would think we'd rather a higher upside option in Walker over known kitchen sink/gas can probability Ryan Yarbrough who is realistically only there to eat up low leverage innings.

I'm glad you brought up Springer becoming a platoon bat, because I think there's a high chance him and Roden are rotating LF/RF duties by mid-late May/early June, particularly if there's further decline or just lack of a bounceback with the bat. Springer can also feasibly play all 3 OF positions still, at least CF for an inning or two in a pinch, so would have less of a need for Loperfido/Clase/Berroa being a necessity on the roster with Varsho healthy if they're not performing.

Hard to disagree with most of this. I agree that Barger is hitting himself onto the roster, and he has a longer sample at AAA to merit the callup, with Roden likely coming up after a couple of months of further strong performance or in case of an injury. This is Schneider's make or break year, if he struggles again, particularly against lefties, he'll be an early demotion candidate. Orelvis hasn't done enough IMO to outperform the other hitters on the brim, and his defense is still a question mark. Hell, they even have Wagner getting 3B reps to increase his utility on the roster. Loperfido will make it on the basis of being able to play CF with Varsho still recovering and hitting marginally better than Clase, but he's also in hot water as Berroa has looked capable on both ends (insane BABIP SSS aside) and is the same age. I think Matheson missed Josh Walker for the bullpen, hard to see a scenario where his contract is dumped and he's looked decent in his outings. Everyone else is a no-brainer for the pitching depth chart with Swanson and Burr on the IL to begin the season.

Didn't see this brought up although I may have just missed it. I was wondering why we haven't seen much of Josh Kasevich lately and were seeing so much of Josh Rivera, and the reason is the former reaggravated an existing stress reaction in his back early in spring. From Rotowire: Stress reaction in back March 7, 2025 Kasevich will be sidelined several weeks after aggravating a stress reaction in his lower back in a game last weekend, Arden Zwelling of Sportsnet.ca reports. ANALYSIS It's not clear when Kasevich suffered the initial injury, but he's now had a setback. The 24-year-old infielder finished last season at Triple-A Buffalo and will be assigned there once he's healthy enough to play.

Don't you think it's even weirder blocking your DH slot with a 37 (turning 38 in August) year old on the decline? At this point in his career it's more likely that JDM gets worse as opposed to him bouncing back. Wagner and Roden are both lefties, can play a semblance of a position, and aren't among the slowest runners in the league only to get even slower. Obviously they're rookies so the error bars are greater, but they also literally project better than JDM. Most importantly, they earn the league minimum and won't blow up our tax bill and any additional penalties that arise as a result. It should also be noted that Wagner and Roden are not extremely young, they're in their physical primes. They need to be given an opportunity now while they're at their best physically.

Bloss summary: 3 IP 0 R 5 K 1 BB 1 H The stuff: 12(!!) swings and misses on 37 pitches Fastball: 94.7 mph avg, T-96. 18 inches of iVB, 2 whiffs Slider: 86.3 mph avg (thrown slower on purpose?), 2600 RPM, threw it as often as the 4SFB. 9 whiffs on 15 pitches Curveball: 77.5 mph avg, 2700 RPM. Only threw 4 of them, more of a get-me-over pitch for stealing strikes Changeup: 88.2 mph avg. Only threw 3, got a whiff on one

By far the best Bloss has looked this ST. Fastball reaching up to 96 with regularity and good command of it, with an impressive breaking ball which was eating up the righty hitters. 5 swings and misses in an inning of work.

Sandlin looks like such an uncomfortable AB, if he can get the walks under control he could be a real weapon out of the bullpen. You can put him in after just about anybody and it's a completely different look.

Depends on his recovery. He could have a Verlander esque bounceback post TJS to have enough to get in, not that JV wasn't already a shoo-in by that point. It's getting tougher and tougher for SPs to meet the traditional HOF standards, and Cole is among the top of the post 2010s crop, if you ignore pre-2010 debutees like Scherzer, Verlander, Kershaw, Greinke, etc. Him and Chris Sale I think will raise the question of the modern HOF standard for SPs. Workhorses in their relative eras, no doubt aces, 1 CYA each. Sale is currently ahead by a significant margin so he should have an easier path. If Cole rebounds to put up one 4+ win year and a couple of 2-3 to close out his career he might still have enough of a shot. Otherwise he'll fall into the Felix Hernandez bucket of just not enough longevity.

Seems like a Lucas Luetge profile. Lefty that only throws cutters and sweepers, both of which tunnel perfectly with each other. Had some great seasons for the Yankees in 21-22 as a lefty who you wouldn’t mind facing a RHH.

Hey @Brock Beauchamp seen this error message a couple of times now. Usually gets resolved on a refresh but wanted to flag it nonetheless. Unrelated, the board has been loading a bit slow still, no changes since a few days ago when I first flagged it.

Grayson is following the Manoah arc almost exactly. Stud rookie year, elite-ish sophomore season, breaks. Same ages too. Manoah was way better those two years though lol. Cleared him in fWAR and lapped him in RA9-WAR.

I could also see Nathan Lukes traded for a bag of chips that happens to be classified as a starting pitcher. The org just hasn't given him a chance despite continued success in AAA, and he doesn't even play CF anymore in the minors which severely limits his utility. Now 30 years old on his last option year, the writing is on the wall for him. Just can't see him being kept over Berroa, Loperfido and Clase who are younger and/or have more options, all of whom play CF.

Bastardo and Manoah are currently on the 40-man and are recovering from TJS, so I think that's an easy pair of 60-day IL immediately to begin the season which opens up two spots. Not sure if you can/want to 60-day IL Macko who hasn't debuted, but if it's possible then that's another spot that opens.

Myles Straw might just be hitting his way onto the roster. Not exactly looping balls into the outfield, he's been driving the ball often.

I think Jimenez makes the team, otherwise there's no backup 3B/SS behind Bichette and Ernie Clement. Wagner probably makes it as a 1B/2B/DH type who platoons againt RHP, and Schneider is likely the LHP LF/DH platoon. You add a backup C and that leaves one bench spot open for a utility infielder. If Orelvis or Barger rakes then one of them could take it, assuming they can play 3B, which makes Ernie the de facto only backup SS. At the end of the day all these guys have options so it's not a super big concern to keep them all and shuffle them as required depending on injuries or underperformance to the fringy guys.

Kirk looks incredible this spring. If he could carry this batted ball performance into the regular season a 5 win season will be easy to make.

He saw a brown guy and the letter J in a name he's never seen before and knew he wasn't making that mistake again.

He's also a mediocre at best defender which I think is as big a reason as any as to why he hasn't stuck at the MLB level. You can do something with a guy with his characteristics as long as he plays decent defense at either SS/CF or a couple of positions lower on the defensive spectrum.

ICYMI: Nimmala hits a bomb on a 96 mph fastball. Explosive swing, you can see how quickly he turned on it. Off of a 5 year MLB vet with good stuff. https://www.mlb.com/bluejays/video/00u7xoku6J7XfIbb9356/reels/nimmala-s-bomb?partnerId=web_video-playback-page_video-share Side note: his name is 100% being pronounced incorrectly by the Pirates broadcaster.

Bloss with a somewhat rough outing in terms of command, missing often with the fastball. The shape of the pitches looks decent, fastball averaging above 94 with 18 iVB, a tight looking breaking ball with 2600 RPM. The command was poor though and I think the swings and misses lagged as a result. I think there's hope here as a #4-5 starter with #3 upside if either the fastball ticks up or the command improves. Obviously also remains to be seen how he can handle a typical starter's workload over a full season. Good depth to have to start the year nonetheless.

Josh Walker looking pretty good. Generic career minor leaguer who converted to relief pretty late, lots of Ks and BBs in the minors. The stuff is good from the left side, fastball averaging about 94 with a nasty looking sweeper/slurve pitch, 5 whiffs on the latter on 8 pitches. https://www.fangraphs.com/players/josh-walker/23617/stats?position=P

Gausman struggling with control, but the fastball velo looked good, 95.6 mph average in that first inning with 3 whiffs on 12 pitches. Splitter was particularly missing often but the shape looked decent. All pitches faster than last season's average by at least 1.5 mph, the "slider" (cutter?) averaged 86.3. Kirk just hit a bomb to dead CF.