• Hey, guest user. Hope you're enjoying NeoGAF! Have you considered registering for an account? Come join us and add your take to the daily discourse.

MLB '12-'13 OffSeason OT: Magic is the New Market Inefficiency

C

cashman

Banned
Askani said:
I just woke up. It's apparently still true and I didn't just dream it.

Well fuck...
Click to expand...

image.php
 
Duane Cunningham

Duane Cunningham

Member
Well... I'm feeling a little better about it this morning. Hochevar and Chen are going to be fighting it out for the 5 spot. Last year, they were fighting for the one spot. Let that sink in. The Royals starting rotation was so empty last year that they actually fired Jonathan Sanchez during a time when they literally had only three starters. They had three starters and were running bullpen guys in the other two slots, and yet they DFA'd one of the three they had. THAT was the state of the Royals rotation in 2012. And the top two at that point was still Chen and Hoch. Two guys who are lucky to be the 5th starter an most teams.

The bullpen is pretty solid. The bats are good. Defensively, they're pretty damn good, especially with Alcides Escobar, Lo Cain and Sal Perez. In 2012, all that talent was being wasted by an almost literally non-existent starting lineup. Now our rotation is this going to be Shields/Santana/Davis/Guthrie/Chen. Or maybe Hoch or Luis Mendoza in the fifth spot. Is that a World Series caliber rotation? Hell no. But it's decent enough to compete in the AL Central. The Royals are better than the White Sox, Indians and Twins today for sure. There's a pretty good chance they'll be in the hunt in September. That's exciting if you're from KC.

This deal was probably horrible, and it's really going to suck in 2015 when Shields leaves and Myers is an east coast superstar. But I'm looking forward to 2013 a lot more now, so at least there's that.
 
W

Windu

never heard about the cat, apparently
Duane Cunningham said:
Well... I'm feeling a little better about it this morning. Hochevar and Chen are going to be fighting it out for the 5 spot. Last year, they were fighting for the one spot. Let that sink in. The Royals starting rotation was so empty last year that they actually fired Jonathan Sanchez during a time when they literally had only three starters. They had three starters and were running bullpen guys in the other two slots, and yet they DFA'd one of the three they had. THAT was the state of the Royals rotation in 2012. And the top two at that point was still Chen and Hoch. Two guys who are lucky to be the 5th starter an most teams.

The bullpen is pretty solid. The bats are good. Defensively, they're pretty damn good, especially with Alcides Escobar, Lo Cain and Sal Perez. In 2012, all that talent was being wasted by an almost literally non-existent starting lineup. Now our rotation is this going to be Shields/Santana/Davis/Guthrie/Chen. Or maybe Hoch or Luis Mendoza in the fifth spot. Is that a World Series caliber rotation? Hell no. But it's decent enough to compete in the AL Central. The Royals are better than the White Sox, Indians and Twins today for sure. There's a pretty good chance they'll be in the hunt in September. That's exciting if you're from KC.

This deal was probably horrible, and it's really going to suck in 2015 when Shields leaves and Myers is an east coast superstar. But I'm looking forward to 2013 a lot more now, so at least there's that.
Click to expand...
wow already to step 5. Congrats.
 
D

darkside31337

Tomodachi wa Mahou
Don't want to be the guy to shit on the Royals WS parade but if you're banking on Ervin Santana and Jeremy Guthrie then you're still basically fucked.
 
C

clemenx

Banned
I lost it when you listed Santana as #2 as a positive. Sorry Duane.

To be fair. If Paulino and Duffy come back from TJ unharmed it can be a good rotation.
 
BFIB

BFIB

Member
Can't wait for the Royals to trade Shields to the BoSox at the trade deadline.

How is Dayton Moore still the GM?
 
Duane Cunningham

Duane Cunningham

Member
Well, here's what it's like. Your home entertainment system's audio has just been tv speakers. And one of them kind of cuts out sometimes. So you go buy an entry level Home Theatre in a Box 5.1 system, figuring you'll slowly switch out speakers here and there in the future. But in the meantime, you have an okay system that an audiophile would scoff at, but for you it sounds great, because you didn't have one at all before.

Okay, shitty metaphor.
 
BFIB

BFIB

Member
Duane Cunningham said:
Well, here's what it's like. Your home entertainment system's audio has just been tv speakers. And one of them kind of cuts out sometimes. So you go buy an entry level Home Theatre in a Box 5.1 system, figuring you'll slowly switch out speakers here and there in the future. But in the meantime, you have an okay system that an audiophile would scoff at, but for you it sounds great, because you didn't have one at all before.

Okay, shitty metaphor.
Click to expand...

That actually sums up KC in a nutshell.
 
C

clemenx

Banned
No. Baseball insiders are obviously in the wrong here. Myers is the next Pujols and Shields' arm will explode in spring training.

Feels refreshing reading those measured opinions, though I wonder if any of them really want to join the internet hyperbole on the inside, lol.
 
Z

Zep

Banned
Ruben needs to offer 5yrs to Hamilton and move this along. Add a 6th year option while you're at it, who gives a shit.
 
R

RobotHaus

Unconfirmed Member
I'm getting this sneaking suspicion that this trade might have something hidden to it. It seems so one sided that there has to be a catch to this. There are too many people agreeing on this for it to seem correct by baseball standards.
 
B

bjb

Banned
Shields has logged a ton of innings in recent years. I could see him falling apart just as easily as Myers not becoming a star.
 
L

Lambtron

Unconfirmed Member
bjb said:
Shields has logged a ton of innings in recent years. I could see him falling apart just as easily as Myers not becoming a star.
Click to expand...
I don't know, he's a solid pitcher but I never saw him as an elite, top of the rotation talent. I'd hesitate giving up any/many of the Twins' top prospects for a Shields. Especially since it's not like Shields is the difference between the playoffs and not. It's a shitty division, they have a shot. But everything is going to have to break right for them to get over .500. Same would've been true without Shields.
 
J

jman2050

Member
This Royals trade is somehow funnier the day after.

EDIT - All four of those prospects can bust and it still would be a break-even trade at worst.
 
N

Ninja Scooter

Member
Even if Shields has a great (by his standards) season, is that enough to single handedly lift the Royals? I think we can all agree that even at his best, he's not Justin Verlander or King Felix. To trade a top 5 prospect so that you can go from 72 wins to 78 wins (hypothetically) is stupid and short sighted. This 2nd wild card is already making teams do dumb shit.
 
BFIB

BFIB

Member
Ninja Scooter said:
Even if Shields has a great (by his standards) season, is that enough to single handedly lift the Royals? I think we can all agree that even at his best, he's not Justin Verlander or King Felix. To trade a top 5 prospect so that you can go from 72 wins to 78 wins (hypothetically) is stupid and short sighted. This 2nd wild card is already making teams do dumb shit.
Click to expand...

The Royals have been doing dumb shit for quite some time.
 
Duane Cunningham

Duane Cunningham

Member
Ninja Scooter said:
Even if Shields has a great (by his standards) season, is that enough to single handedly lift the Royals? I think we can all agree that even at his best, he's not Justin Verlander or King Felix. To trade a top 5 prospect so that you can go from 72 wins to 78 wins (hypothetically) is stupid and short sighted. This 2nd wild card is already making teams do dumb shit.
Click to expand...

No, but the Royals slightly under performed last year anyway based on some NASTY injuries. I think they were good for 78-80 wins this year anyway without this trade. The Tigers won the division with only 88. I personally think the switch between the 2012 rotation (Hochevar/Chen/Jonathan Sanchez/TBD/TBD) and this rotation is worth a good 8 wins at least. That puts them in contention. No it wouldn't cut it in the Beast, but it does in the AL Central.

And nobody is under any illusion that the 2nd place AL Central team will compete in the WC race.

jman2050 said:
This Royals trade is somehow funnier the day after.

EDIT - All four of those prospects can bust and it still would be a break-even trade at worst.
Click to expand...

Ha! How? Yes yes, the Royals suck etc. I get it. But seriously, if Will Myers is a bust, how is this a possibly "break even"? The Royals are better today than they were yesterday. That's a fact. The only question is whether they overpaid.
 
D

darkside31337

Tomodachi wa Mahou
Duane Cunningham said:
Ha! How? Yes yes, the Royals suck etc. I get it. But seriously, if Will Myers is a bust, how is this a possibly "break even"? The Royals are better today than they were yesterday. That's a fact. The only question is whether they overpaid.
Click to expand...

I don't agree with that. Not for 2013.

Royals spent more than 30 million this offseason in 2013 payroll on Santana + Hochevar + Chen + Davis + Guthrie. That is terrible. It's really terrible when the opening day payroll is going to roughly be about 70 million.

Their opening day RF will still be Jeff Franoceur and not Wil Myers. They could still have Myers and could have still massively upgraded the rotation. They chose to spend 12 million dollars on Ervin Santana. They are going to spend about 9 million between Hochevar and Chen combined. That is fucking brutal.

At the end of the day Dayton's biggest failings was his complete ineptitude at developing starting pitching. They are paying out of their ass for marginal pitching on a team that is capped pretty damn low for payroll. If the idea was to overpay some pitchers now just for respectability on a major league level then he could have done that without mortgaging pieces of the future.
 
L

Lambtron

Unconfirmed Member
darkside31337 said:
If the idea was to overpay some pitchers now just for respectability on a major league level then he could have done that without mortgaging pieces of the future.
Click to expand...
Given the budget they're working with, who would they sign? The signings in the past you can't change. I mean, with who is on the market now. Give $36 million to Dumpster? As a fan of a team who is very pitching starved, and had a GM burn through all the team's trade chips in 4 years with nothing to show for it, the market out there sucks. I'd love the Twins to go sign someone like Sanchez, but I wouldn't give him $75 million. Shit, he'll probably get more. I'd be fine if they signed someone like Blanton on a one year, $3 million deal, but he got $15 million from the Angels. The contracts are guaranteed, and while revenues are increasing greatly, it's concentrated on a handful of teams. It's harder to invest that money in the draft & international free agency now, too. So I mean, yeah the trade sucks a lot, but his options are pretty limited.
 
J

jman2050

Member
Duane Cunningham said:
Ha! How? Yes yes, the Royals suck etc. I get it. But seriously, if Will Myers is a bust, how is this a possibly "break even"? The Royals are better today than they were yesterday. That's a fact. The only question is whether they overpaid.
Click to expand...

Because there's no value in getting better unless you get good enough to make the playoffs.

Dave Cameron (and I don't even like the guy!) put it as succinctly as one possibly could: The Royals mortgaged their future to be mediocre in 2013.
 
L

Little Green Yoda

Member
CygnusXS said:
Fun.
Click to expand...
If Greinke has pitched well enough in 2013-15 in order to opt out, he probably lived up to his $76 million contract over 3 years. Letting him go somewhere else for his decline years would be a blessing in disguise. Then again, if the Dodgers are truly Yankees West, they'd extend him with another $100 million contract :lol.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.

Similar threads

CNET hands on with the PS5 Pro
2 3 4 5
200
15K
Katatonic replied
  • Locked
MLB Playoffs 2019 |OT| Juiciest Balls Since 2001
Sports 2 3 4 5
240
20K
GreatnessRD replied
MLB The Show 19 | OT | Baseball is the most important thing in the world, but MLB The Show is pretty good, too.
|OT| 2 3
119
10K
Fox Mulder replied
MLB Regular Season 2018 OT – I believe in the Church of Baseball
2 3 4
153
15K
Schattenjäger replied
MLB Post Season |OT| BYOB
2 3 4
178
11K
Musky_Cheese replied
Top Bottom