MLB Regular Season 2018

[Kelric]

Yeah, I'm getting a little nervous about the team that plays in Wrigley North.

I expect them to move Braun or Santana for pitching in the near future.

Not sure how much they'll get for Braun, given his baggage. Plus, he's 34 and under contract for $19M for two more years. Add in that he has 10-5 trade veto rights, and there's a pretty limited market for him.

I don't expect Braun to move for those reasons, plus the 'face of the franchise' thing. He was still an above average hitter last year and the depth of their OF would allow them to platoon him or relegate him to bench duty if necessary. I'm particularly interested to see if Travis Shaw can repeat his performance at third base for them. A lot of Sox fans feel they gave up too quickly on him even though he admittedly struggled in 2016. His OPS+ was 90, but his bWAR was 2.24, which is the highest at 3B for the Sox since Youkilis in 2011.

[pr0ner]

Yeah, I'm getting a little nervous about the team that plays in Wrigley North.

I expect them to move Braun or Santana for pitching in the near future.

Not sure how much they'll get for Braun, given his baggage. Plus, he's 34 and under contract for $19M for two more years. Add in that he has 10-5 trade veto rights, and there's a pretty limited market for him.

Braun's age and contracts are certainly anchors. But I can't imagine they will leave a talented player like Santana or Braun wired to the bench most days.

[Inverarity]

The Mets are now a Neil Walker signing away from bringing back the same team as last year. The same 70 win team, one year older (and without Duda). Truly brilliant work in the ineptness of it all.

[Lorini]

(Looks nervously at revamped Giants team). We have one decent outfielder, Puig. Looks like we may tank a bit this season as we await 2018 free agency.

[naednek]

(Looks nervously at revamped Giants team). We have one decent outfielder, Puig. Looks like we may tank a bit this season as we await 2018 free agency.

2018 =even year

Now we just need to shore up the bullpen

[Isgrimnur]

Bye bye, Chief Wahoo:

The Cleveland Indians will stop using the Chief Wahoo logo on their uniforms beginning in 2019, according to Major League Baseball, which said the popular symbol was no longer appropriate for use on the field.
...
[O]ver the past year the commissioner of baseball, Rob Manfred, has pressured Paul Dolan, Cleveland’s chairman and chief executive, to make a change.

Citing a goal of diversity and inclusion, Manfred said in a statement provided to The New York Times that the Indians organization “ultimately agreed with my position that the logo is no longer appropriate for on-field use in Major League Baseball, and I appreciate Mr. Dolan’s acknowledgment that removing it from the on-field uniform by the start of the 2019 season is the right course.”
...
Cleveland has been edging away from the logo in recent years and has used it less frequently, but beginning in 2019 it will not be seen at all on the team’s uniforms, or on banners and signs in Progressive Field, the team’s stadium. Consumers will still be able to purchase items with the logo on them at the team’s souvenir shops in the stadium and at retail outlets in the northern Ohio market, but those items will not be available for sale on M.L.B.’s website.
...
Although the Indians will stop using the logo on their uniforms, they will not relinquish the trademark and still will be able to profit off sales of merchandise bearing the logo at the stadium and in the Cleveland area. But by maintaining the trademark, the team, with the supervision of M.L.B., retains control of the proliferation of the logo. If it relinquished the trademark, or announced an intention to never claim its protections, another party could legally assume control of it and use the logo in other ways.
...
The Indians team name itself is supposedly derived from Louis Sockalexis, a member of the Penobscot nation in Maine, who played for a different Cleveland team in the National League from 1897-1899.

[Isgrimnur]

[Lorini]

What do you guys think of all the rumbling regarding the unsigned free agents? My suspicion is that they are looking for long term deals and I think those are gone for good. Most teams now use analytics and the analytics say long term deals are bad, not to mention Greinke in AZ.

[ImLawBoy]

My suspicion is that the best teams are already near the the luxury tax limit, and they don't want to go over, so they're being cautious. Meanwhile, any team that doesn't have a realistic shot isn't willing to spend big on free agents, because they're all trying to follow the Cubs/Astros bottom-out-before-you-rocket-to-success path.

[pr0ner]

It's pretty amazing that Lorenzo Cain has signed the biggest deal of the offseason so far (5 years, $80 mil).

There's a lot of factors at play here - teams tanking (hello Miami and Pittsburgh), teams trying to get under the luxury tax (hello LA Dodgers and NY Yankees), an increase in analytics leading teams to be smarter with their money, and 2019's impending free agent bonanza (Bryce Harper, Manny Machado, Josh Donaldson, Craig Kimbrel, Charlie Blackmon, Daniel Murphy, Andrew Miller, Brian Dozier, and Andrew McCutchen will all be available, with Clayton Kershaw, David Price, and Elvis Andrus being possibilities if they opt out).

In any other year, JD Martinez, Yu Darvish, Jake Arrieta, and Eric Hosmer would definitely all be signed for big bucks. But there really is a perfect storm of events preventing that this season. That the MLBPA is dropping overtures about labor strife is not really a good sign in view of what's really going on.

[LordMortis]

What do you guys think of all the rumbling regarding the unsigned free agents? My suspicion is that they are looking for long term deals and I think those are gone for good. Most teams now use analytics and the analytics say long term deals are bad, not to mention Greinke in AZ.

I dunno about analytics but I think long term deals with veterans are bad, as is overpaying unproven assets. I don't think it's so bad to sign long term deals with young players for smaller contracts but I think arbitration outweighs that, so I'ma guessin that that as an owner, I wouldn't be letting my GM sign many long term deals at all for any player that is not 1)proven, 2) still on the upswing, and 3) a face of the franchise. For instance, as a Tiger fan, Id'a never resigned Verlander (though I'm impressed they could let him go) or Cabrera to a long term deal. I'da never signed Upton and I'da never resigned Victor Martinez.

[Scuzz]

It's pretty amazing that Lorenzo Cain has signed the biggest deal of the offseason so far (5 years, $80 mil).

There's a lot of factors at play here - teams tanking (hello Miami and Pittsburgh), teams trying to get under the luxury tax (hello LA Dodgers and NY Yankees), an increase in analytics leading teams to be smarter with their money, and 2019's impending free agent bonanza (Bryce Harper, Manny Machado, Josh Donaldson, Craig Kimbrel, Charlie Blackmon, Daniel Murphy, Andrew Miller, Brian Dozier, and Andrew McCutchen will all be available, with Clayton Kershaw, David Price, and Elvis Andrus being possibilities if they opt out).

In any other year, JD Martinez, Yu Darvish, Jake Arrieta, and Eric Hosmer would definitely all be signed for big bucks. But there really is a perfect storm of events preventing that this season. That the MLBPA is dropping overtures about labor strife is not really a good sign in view of what's really going on.

The thing is that of those four guys Martinez and Hosmer may be nice additions but they are coming off basically 1-2 nice years, Darvish was not very good last year and Arrieta was not nearly as good as two years ago. Why would you offer them long term big money deals.

Cain originally wanted much more than he got. None of this years "big" free agents are really guys you have to have.

So I went to MLB.com to check on their last three years..

Arrieta 2015 22-6 1.77 229 inn
2016 18-8 3.10 197
2017 14-10 3.53 168

Darvish 2015 injured
2016 7-5 3.41 100
2017 10-12 3.86 186

Hosmer 2015 .297 18 93
2016 .266 25 104
2017 .318 25 94

Martinez 2015 .282 28 68
2016 .307 22 39
2017 .302 45 104

[Lorini]

Would you sign any of those guys to 5 year contracts? Probably not.

[Scuzz]

Would you sign any of those guys to 5 year contracts? Probably not.

Hosmer is probably the best bet but he also plays a position that is probably easiest to replace.

[pr0ner]

Would you sign any of those guys to 5 year contracts? Probably not.

To add to this, Hosmer, Martinez, and Darvish are all sitting on 5+ year, 9+ figure contract offers (Hosmer has TWO of them). That they haven't signed one of them as of yet is on them and their agents.

[Lorini]

That's the thing, apparently they are being made offers but since they don't like the offers then it's collusion. I don't know that there's a way to tell if that's really true. Now if they weren't getting any offers at all or really bullshit ones ($500K a year Arieta??) then that'd be one thing but turning down some of the rumored offers seems like an entitlement problem to me.

[Kelric]

Would you sign any of those guys to 5 year contracts? Probably not.

Hosmer is probably the best bet but he also plays a position that is probably easiest to replace.

Not that he is a particularly good bet. For his career:

2011: .293/.334/.465 118 OPS+
2012: .232/.304/.359 81
2013: .302/.353/.448 118
2014: .270/.318/.398 99
2015: .297/.363/.459 122
2016: .266/.328/.433 102
2017: .318/.385/.498 132

He is all over the map and plays his next season at age 28. His highs should still be solid in years 3/4/5 of a contract, but how low might his lows go?

[ImLawBoy]

That's the thing, apparently they are being made offers but since they don't like the offers then it's collusion. I don't know that there's a way to tell if that's really true. Now if they weren't getting any offers at all or really bullshit ones ($500K a year Arieta??) then that'd be one thing but turning down some of the rumored offers seems like an entitlement problem to me.

I think there's been collusion in the past, but I agree that it doesn't really feel like that's the case here. I think that explanations we've gone over in this thread are much simpler and more logical than collusion. It'll be interesting to see where this year's crop of free agents finally end up, and then to see if the owners start breaking open their vaults to pay for next year's bumper crop.

[The Meal]

I think there's been collusion in the past,

Yes

[Exodor]

Hosmer is probably the best bet but he also plays a position that is probably easiest to replace.

Not that he is a particularly good bet. For his career:

2011: .293/.334/.465 118 OPS+
2012: .232/.304/.359 81
2013: .302/.353/.448 118
2014: .270/.318/.398 99
2015: .297/.363/.459 122
2016: .266/.328/.433 102
2017: .318/.385/.498 132

He is all over the map and plays his next season at age 28. His highs should still be solid in years 3/4/5 of a contract, but how low might his lows go?

Hosmer is kind of maddening. He'll go through these cold streaks where it seems all he does is ground out to second base over and over.

Someone is going to overpay for his services - I just hope it's not KC.

[Kelric]

I'm more interested in Moustakas' situation. He'll be 29 next year, has hit above league average for three years in a row, and seems to be about average at 3rd. There is NO chatter about him it seems.

[pr0ner]

Darvish to the Cubs. 6 years, $126 million (possible to hit $150 million with performance incentives).

Also:

[naednek]

<snicker>

[Jaymann]

Darvish to the Cubs. 6 years, $126 million (possible to hit $150 million with performance incentives).

Also:

He dreaded going up against the Padres that many times per season.

[Lorini]

Hopefully the Cubs can do something about him tipping his pitches, just sayin'

[ImLawBoy]

Hopefully the Cubs can do something about him tipping his pitches, just sayin'

Well, the hope is that he'll have better teammates and coaches who will catch these things and correct them before they end up costing the World Series.

[Lorini]

Hopefully the Cubs can do something about him tipping his pitches, just sayin'

Well, the hope is that he'll have better teammates and coaches who will catch these things and correct them before they end up costing the World Series.

In our defense, I'll say that the pitch tipping didn't happen until the WS. Don't know why though.

[ImLawBoy]

Hopefully the Cubs can do something about him tipping his pitches, just sayin'

Well, the hope is that he'll have better teammates and coaches who will catch these things and correct them before they end up costing the World Series.

In our defense, I'll say that the pitch tipping didn't happen until the WS. Don't know why though.

Well, he was obviously not tipping his pitches against the Cubs in the NLCS! (Or if he was, the Cubs weren't noticing it to take advantage of it, which kind of undercuts my previous post!)

[El Guapo]

[Jaymann]

I think it is a combination of smarter management, analytics, and a dearth of top tier players in this year's pool. Could be a problem at the next collective bargaining negotiations.

[Scuzz]

I think having a team like Houston win it all after Kansas City had a nice run demonstrates that buying expensive free agents isn't the only way to win. When the Giants won they really didn't go the expensive free agency route either.

[Jeff V]

I think it is a combination of smarter management, analytics, and a dearth of top tier players in this year's pool. Could be a problem at the next collective bargaining negotiations.

When is the current contract up? If it's fairly soon, it could be a sign of management digging it's trenches. Also, it seems that more and more teams might be using Theo Epstein's playbook and not signing expensive FAs during rebuilding years. This could be a sign that a lot of clubs consider 2018 to be such a year for them.

[Lorini]

I think having a team like Houston win it all after Kansas City had a nice run demonstrates that buying expensive free agents isn't the only way to win. When the Giants won they really didn't go the expensive free agency route either.

But then the Giants super tanked without the free agents which is why they got into the trade market.

[Scuzz]

Well, the Giants were based on pitching and with injuries and failure that just went south last year. They traded for McCutcheon. I think they did sign Longoria though.

But trading for talent is the classic way to add a piece.

[Isgrimnur]

Royals

The Kansas City Royals are taking a stand against pornography. The team hosted a seminar for minor-league players last week with the assistance of anti-porn group "Fight the New Drug."

"Fight the New Drug" co-founder Clay Olsen spoke to the players at spring training in Surprise, Ariz., and the non-profit organization posted photos to Instagram of players attending the workshop. “We’re inspired that they’re stepping up to the plate,” the post read. "Fight the New Drug" describes itself as a group focused on “raising awareness on (porn’s) harmful effects using only science, facts, and personal accounts.” The group states that it is not religiously affiliated.

Royals vice president of communications and broadcasting Mike Swanson told USA TODAY Sports by phone that the seminar was mainly for "impressionable" minor-league players, and that the pornography discussion was just one part of the off-the-field education the team provides to players. Swanson added that general manager Dayton Moore is passionate about the issue, and the goal is for players to be zeroed in on their performance for games.

Moore has previously expressed concerns about pornography addiction. Last August, days after pitcher Danny Duffy was cited for DUI, Moore discussed "leadership" activities the club provided to players.

[Exodor]

Royals

The Kansas City Royals are taking a stand against pornography. The team hosted a seminar for minor-league players last week with the assistance of anti-porn group "Fight the New Drug."

Ugh. So embarrassed to be a Royals fan.

[Exodor]

In positive Royals news, they re-signed Moustakas for 1 year and $6.5M (well, it's one year at $5.5M with a second option year that comes with a $1M buyout).

Before free agency Moose turned down the qualifying offer which would have earned him ~$17M this year.


Whoops.


At least we have a third baseman for next year, now.

[Octavious]

Arrieta to the Phillies. I don't understand this move at all on either side. The Phillies aren't going to contend and I'm sure Jake could have gotten a contract like he got on a team that will contend. Shrug...

[ImLawBoy]

I was reading that in an NL with only three projected dominant teams (Dodgers, Cubs, Nats), some feel the Phillies now have a real shot at the wildcard.

[pr0ner]

I was reading that in an NL with only three projected dominant teams (Dodgers, Cubs, Nats), some feel the Phillies now have a real shot at the wildcard.

Yeah, the Phillies could surprise people this year and I am sure feel like they are a year of development out of Hoskins/Williams/Altherr/Kingery from being a contender in 2019. Arrieta moves that timetable up a bit.