max silver

Arozarena has been mashing for months and Turner had turned around his offensive game as well a few weeks prior to the trade as well.

The team has a glut of young infield prospects they need to have a look at including Barger, Loperfido and Berroa at the major league level and guys like Roden and Clase in AAA so there are limited innings available in the outfield.

Did you mean to say Will Wagner? He's been starting at second base for Buffalo so far. I wonder how the team would handle his playing time if brought up to the majors? Horwitz largely seems to entrenched at second base, but perhaps Vlad could spend more time at third base, and there should be plenty of DH at bats available as well.

Are you referring to the early pull in the playoffs? It seems like a bit of a stretch to suggest that an early pull in the playoff suddenly make Berrios's pitches far more hittable and for him to lose his ability to garner swings and misses.

I vote Judge. He's produced all 7 of his WAR in the last 3 months and has reached a new level of performance.

Good post. Not everything needs to be so black and white. I've never once suggested the team should literally pay Vlad whatever he wants, it's obvious that both sides are going to need to meet in the middle if an extension is to be completed. I simply pointed out my opinion that Vlad should shoot for the moon in his initial ask as he has franchise player potential levels of talent and upside. If he actually wants to stay long term as he's repeatedly stated he's going to need to agree to a deal that isn't completely over and above what the market will actually bear for a player with his positional value. I never once said Vlad was "as" marketable as Ohtani in any of my posts. I simply pointed out that not speaking English in public is a non factor in athlete marketability. This even directly points back to the types of respective deals each will receive as Ohtani earned himself a $700 million deal and was literally the only player on the planet whose on field performance and off the field fame could begin to justify. I'm fully aware that Vlad simply isn't in that stratosphere and his actual offers in free agency will reflect that fact. Myself and a few other posters are simply sharing our opinion that Vlad is a marketable player and that a major media company such as Rogers can benefit from having someone of this ilk. Once again not everything needs to be framed as such a black and white situation. Does this maybe justify a few extra million a season compared to if Vlad was a boring cookie cutter run of the mill player?

tldr.

Yeah if he can ever figure out how to make more consistent contact he has monster potential.

He lowered his season FIP by 0.22 runs with the three strikeout inning.

The jays could let Houston tweak Kikuchi's arsenal to be more effective overall and then sign him back in free agency.

There's only something like 60 games left in the season so that would be a really tough workload for Serven.

Or would that be not run himself out of New York?

This season in particular has shown how important a short leash is for Yusei.

Vlad has produced to that level over a full season of play exactly once. If he finishes the season strong he has a chance to have produced at this level twice in his 5 full seasons.

You seem to fail to realize you've essentially turned into Spanky when he's at his worst and not really engaging in real discussion. These mindless insult posts are all sizzle with no steak. Where's the creativity? Come on man, you were just compared to an adolescent girl and the best you can come up with is asking if my cat has a blood sugar disorder.

I'll just add laziness to your growing list of deficiencies. You like to plagiarize other people's posts, act like a mopey goth girl as soon as things go poorly for the team, can't discern fact from opinion, and go out of your way to use derogatory terms towards disadvantaged groups. Anything I'm missing?

Is speaking English a requirement for marketing athletes? The most marketable athlete in the sport speaks nearly no English in interviews either, but maybe you missed that somehow. Vlad speaks English with a very heavy accent and is far more comfortable giving interviews in his native tongue as he's words have been taken out of context and used against him in the past. What matters is that he can communicate with his teammates, which hasn't been an issue from what I can gather. Stating that Vlad is almost universally hated by the fanbase is not a fact. There was zero evidence provided to support this statement, and as such this is nothing more than an opinion. Given how you seem to be exactly the type to believe in alternative facts I'm not overly surprised you would take that statement as fact.

The comment I was referring to specifically stated that Vlad spoke almost no English and was reviled by the fanbase. Do you think that post was somehow advocating that Vlad had any marketability whatsoever?

Betts was reportedly lowballed by Red Sox ownership and potentially didn't want to stay. If there was actually a realistic avenue to getting him signed long term letting him go was a massive mistake on the part of the Red Sox. The Astros had ready made inexpensive replacements in Tucker and Pena so it made sense to let Correa and Springer walk. The Nationals tried to extend Soto and he refused to sign long term, and the Padres couldn't afford to sign him given the likely requirements and the fact they already had so many long term deals on the ledger. I suspect the Dodgers were always planning to make a massive splash when Ohtani became a free agent, as they dipped below the luxury tax to allow for this to happen with lesser penalties. DeGrom is the best starter on the planet when he's healthy, but that is happening less and less. It was by far the more prudent decision to let someone else pay him to primarily preside on the injured list. Trea Turner reportedly was unable to agree to terms with the Dodgers and seemed destined to test free agency.

They operate a giant media conglomerate. Having marketable players is valuable to allow them to fully leverage the full strength of the media monster that they operate. They need to offer hope and entertainment value to get people into the seats and watching on television, if Vlad continues to perform on the field he offers both.

You are doing this in the opposite direction by attempting to present Vlad as a guy who offers no marketability whatsoever. Nobody is advocating for Vlad to be offered a blank check, that's an obvious straw man argument.

I think there is a chance that ownership steps in to get this deal done. This will almost certainly lead to the type of a deal that leads to a relative overpay compared to typical market rate for 1B/DH types but Vlad is the team's franchise player and there really isn't anyone else in the organization at this point to build around in his place.

Fans don't decide who gets paid like a superstar, but having said this it seems possible that the ownership group steps in to ensure something gets done with Vlad. This could very well end up being a mistake, but Vlad is a player who is very marketable to the fanbase, has repeatedly stated he wants to remain long term, and is well on his way to finally fulfilling the type of potential he's featured since he started destroying pitching in the lower levels of the minors. It seems you missed the point I was trying to make. I simply said Vlad isn't a superstar yet, but he already checks a lot of of the boxes and has potentially reached the point where he's going to produce superstar levels of offensive output moving forward. If he ends this season on a similar note to his last 3 months that will suddenly give him 2 out of 4 seasons performing at superstar level with the bat. If he does that next season as well that makes 2 consecutive years at that level and 3 of 5. He's absolutely correct to bet on himself and shoot for the moon in his contract asks. There aren't really recent player extensions that are directly comparable to Vlad, as the 1B/DH types who have signed extensions in recent years were several years older than Vlad.

What percentage of baseball fans are casual vs the hardcore types? If it's a higher percentage of casuals vs the hardcore types, then where do you go about ranking the importance of what the perception is? Becoming a superstar is largely a function of name brand value, and Vlad has reached that status already at this point of his career. He had massive levels of prospect hype, is the son of a hall of fame player, has some impressive performances in his career including a near MVP level season, a gold glove on his resume, impressive displays at the all star game including home run derby, and has a run personality that leads to him being very marketable. Vlad has checked a lot of the boxes towards attaining superstar status, but hasn't been able to reliably reach that level based on actual field level performance. He's well on his way to another top 10 in MLB level of offensive season and possibly higher than that depending on his finish. He has superstar offensive potential based on the elite level of talent and very well may be in the midst of establishing himself as a superstar both on and off of the field.

And talking down the players that he traded for in public isn't exactly the best way to endear himself to these players.