Finally! Official Hot Stove League thread!

[Donn Beach]

What's wrong with it? If they had to keep Teo on the roster that would be the extent of their off season. They aren't allocating $20 mil for Teo to play right field and then bring in another significant piece to play right field on top of it

LOL....umm Teo could play left or, here is a shocker, DH. We don't have enough bats and there is no way we will have enough bats after this off season. And remember this happens only if Teo accepts the QO which is doubtful

Agreed, the only way Dipoto is ever going to be successful doing the rotating DH thing he loves so much is if he creates that type of depth.

And the reality of the situation is Dipoto is never spending $20 mil on a dh.

[harmony]

Would anyone trade Marco Gonzales and Taylor Trammell to the White Sox for Eloy Jimenez and lefty reliever Garrett Crochet?

Baseball Trade Values calls it an even trade highlighted by the negative values of Gonzales, Jimenez and Crochet.

https://www.baseballtradevalues.com/trades/146753

Gonzales and Jimenez have similar contracts through 2024. Gonzales has a 2024 salary of $12 million with a $15 million club option (and no buyout) for 2025. Jimenez has a 2024 salary of $13 million with a $3 million buyout of a 2025 team option for $16.5 million, and a $3 million buyout of a 2026 team option for $18.5 million. In other words, Jimenez is guaranteed $16 million.

This season the 31-year-old Gonzales posted 0.6 fWAR in 10 starts before being shut down while Jimenez, who turns 27 years old this month, posted 0.4 fWAR in 120 games. FanGraphs projects Gonzales with a 2024 WAR of 0.4 in 21 starts and Jimenez with 2.1 WAR in 141 games.

Roster Resource currently lists Touki Toussaint, Jesse Scholtens and Nick Nastrini as the No. 3, No. 4 and No. 5 White Sox starters behind Dylan Cease and Michael Kopech.

A buy-low candidate with flaws, Jimenez posted a 19 percent strikeout rate this year in stark contrast with this year's 31 percent strikeout rate from Teoscar Hernandez. Seattle executive Jerry Dipoto reportedly is looking for a righthanded contact hitter.

Crochet is a hard-throwing, but wild, lefthander who is projected to earn $900,000 next year in his first arbitration season. Trammell's salary remains at the league minimum.

The White Sox should be wary of Gonzales and his shoulder issues but perhaps the Sox are prepared to move on from Jimenez. And the Mariners could acquire a big-bat lottery ticket without surrendering Logan Gilbert, Bryce Miller or Bryan Woo.

https://www.fangraphs.com/players/marco ... position=P

https://www.fangraphs.com/players/taylo ... osition=OF

https://www.fangraphs.com/players/eloy- ... tion=DH/OF

https://www.fangraphs.com/players/garre ... position=P

[Donn Beach]

Off hand Crochet would seem to have too much possible value to be a toss in like that. His numbers may not look like much but man, 11th overall pick in 2020, rushed to the majors without playing in the minors. 22nd player to go straight to the majors. Think Dipoto be intrigued to get his hands on him

[Seattle or Bust]

Shannon Drayer says that the answer for the M's is to lean more into starting pitching because she doesn't believe the M's will get the bats they need in f/a or trades.

States that upgrading at DH would be nice given their woes while she spent all last off season defending their shit moves and lauding their strategy at DH.

But ultimately thinks that it would smart to sign a starter more than anything and put Woo or Miller in AAA for development purposes...

Jesus. Fucking. Christ.

[Donn Beach]

Crochet had TJ surgery in 2022. Crochet could be a nice pickup

[harmony]

Crochet had TJ surgery in 2022. Crochet could be a nice pickup

It's surprising that Baseball Trade Values assigns Garrett Crochet a negative $300,000 value when the lefthander is projected to earn only $900,000 next year in his first arbitration season.

[Pharmabro]

Would anyone trade Marco Gonzales and Taylor Trammell to the White Sox for Eloy Jimenez and lefty reliever Garrett Crochet?

Baseball Trade Values calls it an even trade highlighted by the negative values of Gonzales, Jimenez and Crochet.

https://www.baseballtradevalues.com/trades/146753

Gonzales and Jimenez have similar contracts through 2024. Gonzales has a 2024 salary of $12 million with a $15 million club option (and no buyout) for 2025. Jimenez has a 2024 salary of $13 million with a $3 million buyout of a 2025 team option for $16.5 million, and a $3 million buyout of a 2026 team option for $18.5 million. In other words, Jimenez is guaranteed $16 million.

This season the 31-year-old Gonzales posted 0.6 fWAR in 10 starts before being shut down while Jimenez, who turns 27 years old this month, posted 0.4 fWAR in 120 games. FanGraphs projects Gonzales with a 2024 WAR of 0.4 in 21 starts and Jimenez with 2.1 WAR in 141 games.

Roster Resource currently lists Touki Toussaint, Jesse Scholtens and Nick Nastrini as the No. 3, No. 4 and No. 5 White Sox starters behind Dylan Cease and Michael Kopech.

A buy-low candidate with flaws, Jimenez posted a 19 percent strikeout rate this year in stark contrast with this year's 31 percent strikeout rate from Teoscar Hernandez. Seattle executive Jerry Dipoto reportedly is looking for a righthanded contact hitter.

Crochet is a hard-throwing, but wild, lefthander who is projected to earn $900,000 next year in his first arbitration season. Trammell's salary remains at the league minimum.

The White Sox should be wary of Gonzales and his shoulder issues but perhaps the Sox are prepared to move on from Jimenez. And the Mariners could acquire a big-bat lottery ticket without surrendering Logan Gilbert, Bryce Miller or Bryan Woo.

https://www.fangraphs.com/players/marco ... position=P

https://www.fangraphs.com/players/taylo ... osition=OF

https://www.fangraphs.com/players/eloy- ... tion=DH/OF

https://www.fangraphs.com/players/garre ... position=P

That is pretty darn creative. That is a sneaky good idea. Eloy was a 141 OPS+ guy in 22, and back in 2020 he was a 139 OPS+ bat. But in his 5th season he played in at least 120 games for 1st time since his rookie year. He has two club options 16.5 then 18.5M with 3M buyouts. And he is still just going into his age 27 season. I would be willing to move some pretty good prospect for him. Not the top 7 or 8, but guys like Axel S, Jimmy Joyce, Deloach, Michael M., Dollard, Walter Ford,
A-Rod, etc. Eloy would give you a pretty good bet to rebound as far as the bat goes. But like Paxton, and Haniger it looks like he is not the best bet to get 5-6 hundred ABs in a year.

[Pharmabro]

I know we talked about him in previous years but what about a trade for the Giants
Wilmer Flores He plays 1B, 2B, 3B and DH.
2023 .284 .355 .509 .863 136 OPS+ in 126 games.

Since 2016 he has not had a season under 100 OPS+. He is owed 6.5 M in 2024 with a 3.5M player option or a 8.5M club option for 2025.

The Giants were a 79-win club in 2023 with the Padres, LAD, and D-Backs all over their heads. They need to do a rebuild.

Flores does not strike out a lot throwing out his 27-game rookie year his K-rate has been between 9.8% and 17.1%. Meanwhile although his career walk rate has only been 6.9%, but he has been at least 9% the last three years in a row. He is a player on the ascent at age 31. The last 3 years in a row he either tied or set new career highs in HR's. And that .509 slugging is his career high.
I could talk myself into going with Flores, Harmony's trade for Eloy J. and then either a trade for one of the Cards guys, or better yet sign Ohtani, or Cody B.

If I needed a higher return, I could make the headliner that 2024 comp Rd. pick 6.2 M value vs Marlow.

Anyhow, what do you think about Wilmer F. being the 2nd or third best bat you bring in.

[Pharmabro]

I just tried to take a nap and I couldn't even sleep thinking about what a f-ing idiot Jerry is. So once again he is going to limit himself only to RH Bats for no good reason other than he is happy with the young LH Bats so no Bellinger, no Gorman and about 50% fewer options because he is happy with these three young LH Bats. This nonsense is exactly how we ended up with Pollock. Holy shit Jerry is brain dead.


lhb.JPG

I could maybe understand it if he was including Cal as a LH dominate SH, and somehow, JP's break-out year and looping those two with Marlow and JK being around a 110 OPS+, and Rojas being at a 103 OPS+ after coming over.

But, I am not liking the combination of Colby P. being right about the not offering Teo a Q.O.
Everbody in the world can see that Teo had a .600 OPS at T-mobile and a .800 something OPS on the road. He is projected to get a 4 for 80-million-dollar deal and is not the same as Mitch Haniger who might have taken the QO. But Teo was certainly going to get you a comp Picl which is a nice bonus we could have had a match to this year's (3) 1st rounders because we already have 2 between our pick and comp round A that I see listed in trade values calc.

At the end of the day that move just re-enforces what has to be a growing awareness that Mariner's owner John Stanton thinks of the MLB team as "Any other business" and keeps waiting for hat-in-hand FA's to walk up begging and that has not happened and will not happen any time soon. Cheap!

[GL_Storm]

What's the story with Tim Anderson and his shitty season? He's been injured right?