Ray

If nothing else, Shapiro’s ability to attract and develop talented executives is second to none. Goes back to his days in Cleveland really. By that virtue alone, I really want him to sign a long term extension here. I’m not quite sure what the hold up is there.

I’d imagine Thomas Hatch and Joey Murray start at AAA as well. I really like that AAA rotation. It’s taken a while to get to the point where it’s full of 20 somethings as opposed to signing retreads to minor league deals to fill it up. The Cardinals have always had a good rotation seemingly because of this. Pitchers are inehrantly unpredictable as it is, but they always have a young guy who comes up and posts a 3.50 ERA. Prime example: Daniel Ponce de Leon.

We threw 36 year old Edwin Jackson out there for 8 starts last season Let's count our blessings here

Looks like he sits around 90-91 mph on his fastball, but can reach 94. 72 mph curve, 84-86 mph splitter.

My bad, apparently it's $3M each year, so it's 2 years/$6M.

2 years, $6M

32 years old, went 16-4 last year with a 2.78 ERA. Video of him in 2019: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=R0Ky2WwnJn8

It’s surprising to hear so little mentioned about Ken Giles this offseason. I bet you could get something really good for him in this market.

The Mets DFA'd an interesting reliever arm to make room for Porcello. Stephen Nogosek, 24 years old, 96 mph fastball, 10 K/9 in the minors

I may be wrong (and this may be wishful thinking), but I don't get the sense that the Angels and Dodgers are as big of a favorite to sign Ryu as people think. Angels need more than one good SP. Signing Ryu wouldn't give them that much to play with for a second SP. And they still need a catcher. Plus, they need durability out of their signed starters, whereas we can pay a guy $20M and just plug Anthony Kay or Zeuch into the rotation. Dodgers haven't engaged at all with Ryu if you go by reports. I don't think they'd sign Ryu unless he took less money, and I don't see Ryu taking less money at this stage of his career. This may have changed with the Kluber trade and Bumgarner signing though. The Twins are the team that I'd be worried about. They're contenders, they have the money, have the need. But if we can't outbid the Twins, we don't deserve Ryu anyways.

There's no doubt in my mind that on a per start basis, Ryu is one of the better pitchers in the league. His career stats speak for themselves: 2.98 ERA, 3.32 FIP, 3.42 xFIP. That's top notch. Obviously that's discounted to an extent due to him not pitching full seasons, but it's still nearly 750 innings of fantastic results. The big question about him is the health, but it should be encouraging that he came back from so many injuries and posted such a great season. Probably because he doesn't rely on velo to get it done, so you can also argue that he'll age well as a pitcher, barring major injury. 17-20 starts per year of Ryu is still more than worth $20M on a $/WAR basis. I think the Blue Jays in a vacuum are the best team for him. We can easily afford the $'s he'll likely want. We also have the luxury of having enough AAA pitching depth that him getting injured wouldn't be disastrous, unlike some other teams. The Angels need durability and more than one good pitcher. They're not going to put their eggs in one basket. The Dodgers just don't seem that interested in overpaying him and probably want to set their sights higher. We should be able to beat the goddamn Twins in a bidding war.

Yeah, I’m thinking there might be something really off with Klubers medicals if teams didn’t step up and beat that. I mean, the Yankees could’ve easily beaten that package. So could the Padres and Angels who both have significantly better farm systems than the Rangers. Seems a little odd.

There’s more, according to Levi Weaver on Twitter

Jed Lowrie + Dom Smith for nothing. I’d even be willing to do something. Makes so much sense.

Now trade for Dom Smith

Doesn’t look like the Dodgers have had much, if any, contact with Ryu this offseason. Here’s what Ryu had to say: “If the Dodgers wanted to re-sign me, they would have told my agent. I haven’t heard from him yet, and honestly, I don’t have much to tell you right now.” I’m trying to think about best fits for Ryu, and I don’t know, assuming we offer him a 4th year I feel like there’s a significant chance we can get him. Given his injury history, I think Ryu is much more likely to go to the highest bidder over taking a discount to play some place he prefers geographically. 4 years $80M and I think he’ll be in Blue.

Looks like it’s down to 3 teams for Tsutsugo.

Keep Valera, ditch Urena.

Clearly we should do nothing and waste a pre arbitration year of Vlad, Bo, Jansen, and Cavan.

Pearson, Anthony Kay, Zeuch, Patrick Murphy, Joey Murray are all going to be AAA depth as well. Solid depth.

Nationals should definitely sign Donaldson.

It’d be a fun exercise to calculate how much commission Scott Boras has made this offseason for himself. He’s at $814M in guaranteed contracts between Cole, Strasburg, and Rendon with Ryu, Keuchel, and Castellanos still left to go. Does he get to $1 billion???

You know it’s an exciting free agent signing when the discussion immediately turns to provincial tax brackets.