metafour

I saw the Tulo trade as dumping Reyes (a dead weight contract) to get a guy who was figuratively just turning the clock back a year or so on Reyes, with an even longer contract that would become dead weight. This is basically exactly what ended up happening. It was a completely short-sighted move, which I guess you could excuse as "necessary" at the time, but anyone with a brain should have been able to foresee that a guy who couldn't stay healthy at all in his 20's (Tulo's injury history was historically bad) was going to be a complete mess in his 30's. Why the hell would you expect him to "age gracefully"? He was obviously going to fall off a cliff as no shortstop (a highly physically demanding position) can survive that many major injuries. The majority of you falsely evaluate prospects given up. Its not a matter of whether or not the guys we traded away became anything or not. Prospects are like currency: the evaluation comes from what you used your currency on. AA's biggest mistake wasn't trading prospects away, it was that he kept acquiring overpaid declining veterans that ended up completely f***ing up our payroll flexibility. The fact that no one from that Marlins trade became a star player doesn't magically negate the fact that we added something like $60 million in payroll that ended up being horribly inefficient allocation of resources. Need I remind you all that a year after that trade we actually went into the season with Osuna and Castro up from A-ball to fill the bullpen, Norris in the rotation, and Pompey in the OF? Those were desperation moves because we had no more payroll flexibility to fill holes with valid options, so we were forced to rush up a bunch of kids to patch holes on the roster. Osuna ended up working out, the other 3 were flops. Trading your farm for Chris Sale is fine; the STUPID move is trading your farm for guys like Dickey (old and a fluke), Reyes and Johnson (injury risk and obvious significant decline risk in the case of Reyes who was an all-speed type of player that wouldn't age well), and then Tulo (monumentally bad injury history with tons of years left on his deal) who was actually brought in because we had to FIX the mistake that was Reyes.

He didn't "fall", he went in the range where players like him typically go in. Brent Rooker put up MUCH better stats than Beer did in the strongest conference in NCAA baseball (the SEC) and no one was hyping him up as anything other than a ~Comp 1st-2nd round pick. Sure, you can make the case that Rooker was older, but even Gavin Sheets put up roughly similar stats and he went in the 2nd round. Seth Beer really wasn't doing anything overtly mind-blowing as a 1B/DH college masher; there's guys like him in most drafts, and they typically fall in that range.

Holy s***: https://prospectstorm.com/2018/07/03/toronto-blue-jays-2018-mid-season-top-15-prospects/

They are signing other players, guys that will be six-figure bonuses. OF Amell Brazoban and C Javier D'Orazio were two that we were connected to prior to today, and we just signed another kid.

https://www.fangraphs.com/blogs/the-fringe-five-baseballs-most-compelling-fringe-prospects-107/

From Ben Badler's new Top 50 article I take it:

Three pitchers combined for 8.2 innings of perfect baseball in Bluefield today before Matt Harris gave up a HR on the last out

No, because they are quite obviously inferior to both of those teams.

Reality doesn't matter anymore. Everything is social media and the army of internet "social activists" will tear Rogers a new one if the allegations are true and they back a woman-beater, its just not worth the P.R nightmare. The CEO of Twitter just had to come out and apologize because he ate a Chic-fil-a sandwich, the issue being that Chic-fil-a has kind of made bad press due to apparent pro-Christian/anti-gay viewpoints, so any association with that company is like a no-go zone. Look at what Starbucks had to do because two black people in ONE of their multi-thousand or whatever locations were wrongly mistreated, they figuratively took it up the ass as if company policy dictated that all blacks that enter should have the police called on them. These companies are all walking on pins and needles, its comically pathetic how spineless they are when it comes to kneeling for these professional victims who control public opinion on the internet.

Situations like these show the most extreme example of priority differentiation between front offices and ownership. Obviously, very few in the front office would be in favour of dumping him for his alleged crimes. On the other hand, with a publicly traded corporate owner, optics and maintaining brand reputation will always take precedence over things like "are we dumping a guy for ten cents on the dollar". I cant imagine any way that Osuna lasts here with Rogers owning the team. Baseball goes on and they'll find someone else to close games, they aren't going to take the heat with standing behind a woman-beater, not in a country like Canada where this s*** has taken precedence over almost everything.

Also, player placement absolutely means something, hence why Vlad Jr. and Eric Pardinho skipping the GCL entirely and going straight to Bluefield was an obvious tell by the organization that these two were believed to be extremely advanced for 17 years old. The GCL and the DSL are not comparable leagues, not even close, hence why most top IFA signees skip the DSL entirely: its not a challenge.

What in the f*** are you even talking about? They gave Jimenez more money and assigned him to a higher, more challenging level. Coaching and development? You think that the f***ing dirt fields of the DSL where half the pitchers walk 50% of the batters they face is somehow a BETTER situation for Hiraldo to develop in, versus the GCL where the team plays at the SPRING COMPLEX of the organization and has access to far better coaching, medical, and nutrition? You just wrote one of the single dumbest diatribes I've ever seen posted on this forum. The Dominican Summer League is s***-tier baseball. To state that they sent a player that they supposedly like more down to play in that situation as some sort of "player development" decision is absolutely retarded. Miguel Hiraldo is learning nothing facing DSL pitchers. Its a league wherein you can pretty much just not swing the bat at all and still get on base at a ~30% clip.

"Numerous" out of how many hundreds? It is rare, period. The Rays for instance not only started Brendan McKay (the best college player in his draft) in their equivalent of Vancouver, they actually started him in Low A (ie: Lansing) THIS season which means that our placement of Warmoth (Dunedin) was more aggressive. I'm not going to waste my time looking over every player because I already know that I'm right, but in last year's class virtually every college player drafted in the first round except Kyle Wright was sent to short-season ball, and even he made a handful of appearances in the GCL before he was sent to High A. College guys who are immediately started in full season ball are typically pure relievers who can be rushed through the system. This is hilariously wrong and common sense should have dictated that to you. Even the best college teams in the country (your Florida's) have numerous players who won't even sniff pro ball period, or even make it out of Rookie ball if they do get drafted, so how the hell can college baseball be the equivalent of High A where every player there has at least earned their way to that level? The Cape Cod league MAY be the equivalent of High A, but that is because its a collection of artificial rosters made up of the best college players in the country.

Yes, but who got assigned to the GCL and who got sent to the DSL? The implication is that the Jays themselves see Jimenez over Hiraldo. Do you get what I'm saying? Its not even a knock on Hiraldo, just a reminder that this Jimenez kid probably deserves some hype himself. I assumed that Hiraldo may have been sent down for visa reasons myself, but this seems like far too long a stint in the DSL for something like that.

No he's not, he's in the DSL. I love how no one talks about Leonardo Jimenez who: signed for more money, got placed in the GCL above Hiraldo, and is hitting .455 to date himself in the short GCL sample.

Its a short jump, but it doesn't make sense to send a kid right out of college out to go play against dudes that have been playing for months.

Why would he start in Lansing? Few if any recently drafted college signees start in full season ball. Vancouver is the typical assignment. He's in the GCL for likely a handful of games just like Warmoth last season.

Groshans did have 3 errors at SS today.

I mean they placed him below Leonardo Jimenez who came from the same class and got more money than Hiraldo, who is also hitting .455 in the (short) GCL season so far. Make what you will of that....

Happ's value may actually have risen. When it comes to pitching, unless you're talking about a multi-year asset, there really isn't much difference between a half-season and a full-season when it comes to valuation. Anyone buying at the deadline is paying a premium and doing so for the playoffs anyway: that means that they want a guy for that second half to help push them in, or they're already realistically playoff bound and want to load up for that run regardless.

Bec signed for $5,000. We actually have a bit more money to go overslot somewhere. Enough to sign that reliever from North Carolina if he's smart.

Interesting Vlog here from Jordyn Adams on draft day. At ~7:25 they show our pick at #12, and his entire family gets really anxious as if they are anticipating us to pick him. Its even funnier as Jordyn Adams and Jordan Groshans both have the same first name, so hearing "Toronto selects Jordan..." obviously gets them even more excited. We had been mentioned to be in on Jordyn Adams, and to me this really signals that we may have given him seriously strong consideration, to the point that his representation obviously believed that we might take him at #12. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OZ9lHLemp0Y

Oh, no. Career ender for sure LMAO. His career sample is a few games greater than Randall Grichuk's ~.100 start to this season. Put that into perspective for a second. I'm not telling you that he'll hit, but to write some kid off after less than 50 games is absurd, especially a HS catcher, and a HS catcher who was pitching on top of hitting to boot. He also only has 1 strikeout in 6 at-bats to date, which doesn't mean s*** yet, but he was striking out at nearly a ~30% clip last season.