Finally! Official Hot Stove League thread!

[Seattle or Bust]

So insane that the Cards would rather sign FAs than trade good hitters for pitchers like everyone said they will...

Eh... not sure how thrilled I'd be handing $10 million to a sumo wrestler with an ERA over 5.00 last season.

The Cardinals are probably pretty stupid if they don't trade their hitting depth for some pitching tbh.

I am not saying Lynn is great or even good, but it is a sign they might just fill their rotation with FAs. If you are cool with Marco as a 5th starter you should be fine with Lynn. He was a lot better with the Dodgers than Marco was with us last season.

Cardinals scored 719 runs, 39 less than the M's in 2023. Not sure if they should be shipping good bats with that offense but we shall see.

4.36 ERA w. a 6.16 FIP is no beuno. He got pretty f'n lucky.

I'm not thrilled with Marco being the 5th starter. It simply is what it is.

Both are bad contracts.

[D-train]

Yeah the Cards are historically a very good org. Their fans can't be have with that. They probably won't be happy if they trade one of two of the 3 800+ OPS bats they have either....

[Donn Beach]

Dodgers sign Ricky vanaaco, those damn cheap bp signings

This is not to assert the Dodgers aren't ready to make splashes left and right in free agency or the trade market. They've eternally been linked to Shohei Ohtani, Corbin Burnes and Willy Adames. Yoshinobu Yamamoto, Blake Snell and Aaron Nola recently joined that conversation. Something big is aligning for LA.

But the Vanasco signing represents what's held the Dodgers back under the Friedman era. It's a cheap low-risk, high-reward move accompanied by high expectations. It's right in line with every single bounce-back injury signing Friedman's made to try and improve the bullpen.

[Seattle or Bust]

Yeah the Cards are historically a very good org. Their fans can't be have with that. They probably won't be happy if they trade one of two of the 3 800+ OPS bats they have either....

I'm sort of under the impression that most GM's these days could give a flying fuck the the fans think. See Dipoto. Lets say he does care, STL fans probably care a lot more that their starting staff was 19th in fWAR and no longer has Montgomery who contributed about 3 fWAR to their terrible 14 overall fWAR.

My guess is that they make one more splash in free agency w. a pitcher... whether that's Montgomery, Snell, etc... and then they also go out and trade for a young, controlled starter with some of their hitting depth.

They have $40 million tied up in 3 mediocre to bad starters as it sits and have 0 pitching depth in the farm. I doubt the answer is to sign 2x more big starters to huge cash and have $100+ million tied up in a bunch of old pitchers.

[Big_Maple]

Except the team isn't losing. It won 88 games this year, 4 more than the D-Backs who lost 4 straight to end the season and still won the 3rd wild card in the NL.

Fair enough. But a target of 54% is exactly shooting for the stars. By my math, you only win slightly more games than you lose. And you'll never win the division, much less a wild card in the AL west. The Rangers are now the de facto team to beat. The Astros still have a better team than we do. And if the Angels get stupid spendy this offseason, they could pull ahead of us. So yeah, the owners can sit in their luxury boxes watching their team perform at the level they've paid for.

Sometimes the game doesn't work in your favor. The M's are in the toughest division in baseball. In a couple seasons TEX and HOU will be realigned out of the west.

Meh. Yes, it's tough. But the AL East is the toughest division in baseball. But I would not object to rearranging the divisions in baseball.

[Seattle or Bust]

Except the team isn't losing. It won 88 games this year, 4 more than the D-Backs who lost 4 straight to end the season and still won the 3rd wild card in the NL.

Fair enough. But a target of 54% is exactly shooting for the stars. By my math, you only win slightly more games than you lose. And you'll never win the division, much less a wild card in the AL west. The Rangers are now the de facto team to beat. The Astros still have a better team than we do. And if the Angels get stupid spendy this offseason, they could pull ahead of us. So yeah, the owners can sit in their luxury boxes watching their team perform at the level they've paid for.

Sometimes the game doesn't work in your favor. The M's are in the toughest division in baseball. In a couple seasons TEX and HOU will be realigned out of the west.

Meh. Yes, it's tough. But the AL East is the toughest division in baseball. But I would not object to rearranging the divisions in baseball.

It's not realistic in the AL or AL West to think the M's winning 84-88 games will propel them to a World Series.

I really hope people do not start comparing the M's to the Diamondbacks who had like a 5% run.

[Donn Beach]

That's the sort of trade ammo the cards have

Throughout the offseason, there is going to be plenty of chatter about what the club will do. Rumors already have been swirling about the organization's top free agent targets. While free agency will be the easiest option to add to the roster, St. Louis will be busy in the trade market and Nolan Gorman, Tommy Edman, Brendan Donovan, and Alec Burleson all have garnered some interest, according to the St. Louis Post-Dispatch's Derrick Goold.

[D-train]

That's the sort of trade ammo the cards have

Throughout the offseason, there is going to be plenty of chatter about what the club will do. Rumors already have been swirling about the organization's top free agent targets. While free agency will be the easiest option to add to the roster, St. Louis will be busy in the trade market and Nolan Gorman, Tommy Edman, Brendan Donovan, and Alec Burleson all have garnered some interest, according to the St. Louis Post-Dispatch's Derrick Goold.

They gave Burleson 347 PAs to put up a .691 OPS and -0.8 WAR as a 1B Corner OF and DH. Seems weird for a team with a surplus of bats.

[Donn Beach]

Developing a rookie

The advanced statistics adore his offensive production. Based upon how hard, how often, and at what angle he hits the ball, Burleson had the widest gap on the team between his batting average and what modeling would expect it to be. His expected batting average and slugging percentage were much higher in the expected world. Those just won’t appear on his baseball card.

They will, however, appear in the Cardinals’ decisions for 2024.

“I like having Burleson, and I like his at-bats,” Marmol said. “He’s a guy who, as he continues to understand the strike zone and control the strike zone, I think we’re going to see even better numbers from him. You can sit there and say, ‘Why are you so excited about this guy?’ I think when you start looking under the hood of what he’s capable of doing – the style of pitching he gets to – it’s actually an impressive bat. You give that another full season, and I think you have a really good left-handed bat off the bench. … I like having Burly. I think we have a really good hitter on our hands.”

[D-train]

Developing a rookie

The advanced statistics adore his offensive production. Based upon how hard, how often, and at what angle he hits the ball, Burleson had the widest gap on the team between his batting average and what modeling would expect it to be. His expected batting average and slugging percentage were much higher in the expected world. Those just won’t appear on his baseball card.

They will, however, appear in the Cardinals’ decisions for 2024.

“I like having Burleson, and I like his at-bats,” Marmol said. “He’s a guy who, as he continues to understand the strike zone and control the strike zone, I think we’re going to see even better numbers from him. You can sit there and say, ‘Why are you so excited about this guy?’ I think when you start looking under the hood of what he’s capable of doing – the style of pitching he gets to – it’s actually an impressive bat. You give that another full season, and I think you have a really good left-handed bat off the bench. … I like having Burly. I think we have a really good hitter on our hands.”

He had very good AAA stats but we all know how little that means...Guessing if we trade with them he is our guy though....Oh wait. He is a LH bat so disqualified....