max silver

Sounds like an epic movie title. If it were made I'd love to see a trailer with narration provided by the epic movie trailer voice guy.

I'm fine with whatever direction they go. If Nate can learn an effective splitter it could really help him moving forward. He doesn't quite have the same type of stuff as someone like Felix Bautista (139 stuff+ 94 location+) vs the 127 stuff+ 93 command+ for Nate. Bautista is the template for a high octane fastball/splitter/slider pitcher being an absolute terror for opposition hitters despite featuring similarly poor command to Nate.

The team might as well keep giving the guy chances until he runs out of options. This is a bit of a make it or break it season for him as at the very least he needs to show the team that he can provide some effective innings. Otherwise he would need to make the team out of spring training or would face the waiver wire. Given the premium stuff he'd be certain to be picked up by someone hoping to turn him around. It would be a nightmare scenario to lose the dude for nothing and see him develop into a closer for someone else.

There are plenty of success stories with this organization helping to turn around struggling pitchers. Stripling had a great year with the club, as did Matz. Ray won a Cy Young award, Kikuchi went from being one of baseball's worst starters to a mid rotation level of performer etc.

There seems to be a lot of smoke around Snell signing with the Yankees. That possibility along with reports that Rodon is hitting 96 MPH in the spring would combine with a dynamite Yankees rotation if these guys can manage to stay healthy.

Nate can be a weapon out of the pen if he can iron out his command to the point where he can at least place his offspeed pitches near the strike zone. The opposition can just sit and wait for mistake heaters because they can effectively spit on everything else. Maybe adding a splitter can at least give the opposition to think about in the likely scenario that Nate has no feel for the offspeed stuff on a given day. It could also serve to disrupt the timing of the opposition when they are gearing up for the heater. Nate still has tremendous stuff as evidenced by a 127 stuff+ overall rating, including 118 for the heater and 140's for both the curveball and slider. I do have a bit of trepidation that adding another pitch to the arsenal of a guy with serious command issues though. I'm very curious to get an eye on Rodriguez against major league hitters. I recall that the stuff+ system absolutely hates his4 seamer and gives it a ranking similar to Ryu's mid to high 80's fastball. It features very high spin and sit's mid 90's while featuring a bit of a cutter shape, so hopefully this is just a case of an outlier fastball that sort of breaks the stuff+ system. Rodriguez is maybe the offseason's most interesting pickup in that we simply don't know what kind of role he's going to fulfill moving forward. He's being stretched out as a starter in spring, and if he can even manage to become a good back of the rotation arm this deal offers a lot of upside. If his success out of the pen in Japan transfers to MLB he could also develop into a high octane leverage reliever so there are multiple avenues for this deal to pay big time dividends.

The MLBPA simply doesn't seem to fully understand how much of a drag the luxury tax has been on their prospective earnings. Most teams are treating it like a defacto salary cap, except the players don't get the benefits of more evenly split revenue sharing with the owners, along with a salary floor that forces the el cheapo owners to spend a minimum of money and forcing the owners to finally open the books. It's like they cut off their nose just to spite their faces.

Seems more like to me that your sorry ass would benefit more from this.

According to Tiedemann he arrived at spring training at 225 last season vs 240 this season.

Assuming no moves were made to clear payroll space (I know this is really unlikely) where would the team's payroll stand if Escobar and Vogelbach make the opening day roster.

That's exactly my point that his character flaws are largely behind his lack of an MLB job. It's a fake equivalency to point to his higher ERA numbers before he emerged as a top of the rotation pitcher later in his career and pretend like that has anything to do with why he's been effectively blacklisted by MLB.

Let's not pretend it's performance related issues preventing Bauer from being signed by major league teams.

Ultimately the 40 man issue could be a good type of problem if it allows the team to consolidate redundant assets to shore up the 26 man roster.

He's been absolutely awful at the plate since about June of the 2022 season so it seems really unlikely he'll reach those heights again. He showed signs of coming around with the bat towards the end of the season but I think his best is behind him.

With effective use of matchups and platooning I think the club can extract 2 wins if not more out of the third base position. If IKF can carry forward any of the improvements he showed for much of the season he may actually surprise us with a league average bat as he somehow managed to post a .750 OPS over a nearly 4 month stretch last season. The minor league invitations simply aren't worth getting worked up about. If Escobar shows he has something left in the tank he can start against left handed pitching and add a touch of offense to the lineup. He's a low risk short term option that can be discarded at a moments notice. If Escobar makes the team then the small army of potential third base options in the minors (Martinez/Barger/Palmegiani/Lantigua etc.) can continue to hone their craft to prepare for their initial callups. If Vogelbach sticks then Horwitz simply shifts back to AAA to bide his time waiting for a callup. These are veteran players who have experienced success in the past and if they have good springs and end up helping the club that's a plus. It's more than likely each of them is released by the end of spring and given an attempt to catch on with another team.

Go sit in the corner where you belong and eat crayons. You're like the Ralph Wiggum of this message board but too dense to realize it. You failed to realize that you just totally self owned yourself in that I actually have a wife in the first place.

Given your posting history that's about the best you can expect to receive.

Seems like you are barking up the wrong tree here. You're the person getting his knickers all twisted over the team bringing in some veterans on minor league deals to see if they have anything left in the tank.

I came across a Twitter post outlining how Escobar revamped his offseason training routine so at best he proves he has something left in the tank and can start against LHP, and at worst he starts the season with the team and shows he's washed up and the team eventually moves on.

A quick glance at Fangraphs actually shows he's historically been a stronger second half player. Career 1st Half 92 wRC+ 2nd Half 108 wRC+ His numbers took a bit of a tumble after the midseason trade, but he still managed a 97 wRC+ in the second half so it's not a terribly apt comparison to the nearly league worst struggles of no hit Whit.

White has no options and barring a completely disastrous spring somebody would almost assuredly pick him up if the club were to attempt to sneak him through waivers.

That's really rich of an obese dude to infer that he could be anywhere close to as good at baseball as Vogelbach.

Merrifield had a really rough second half to the point where he appears as though he might be cooked. His final two months of the season in particular were awful as he was literally one of the worst qualified hitters in all of MLB. (46 wRC+ over 201 PA)

I would have been cool with Grichuk as 4th outfielder for this type of coin.

I looked up Vogelbach's splits and was amazed at how poorly he's hit left handed pitching for his career. I don't recall coming across splits quite this extreme as most guys who have lefty/righty splits can at least occasionally produce vs same handed pitching. Vs LHP 2023 -81 wRC+ 2022 29 wRC+ 2021 2 wRC+ 2020 24 wRC+ Career 35 wRC+