Finally! Official Hot Stove League thread!

[Pharmabro]

Something I have circled back to is the Jorge Polanco trade.
--https://www.mlbtraderumors.com/2023/12/ ... trade.html

He has been a 115 OPS+ bat who has been played at SS, 2B, DH 3B, (positions listed by # of games played). He has lost out to young break-out Rookies: Royce Lewis and Edouard Julien, and Carlos C. signed to the mega-deal. He is owed 10.5 for 2024 +a 750K buyout of a 2025 12M option. Jorge Polanco's trade calc. is about 9M which was about what Geno's was.

I don't think after the other salary dumps the Twins have any delusions of getting Woo-Gilbert out of this deal. Maybe a pure prospect package

I went with trading them:
Jose C. He was a 2-WAR guy who held his own with a 90 OPS+, and can play anywhere in the infield well enough even SS. He can get stolen bases really well and would be a guy they can option down for the next 2 years while having a really good back-up for infield at the same time. He handles himself well at the plate: he had better than a 12% walk rate and was 26/29 in SBs.

I added a good BP arm with options in Ty Adcock

And then added two more major league depth types in Kuhn, and Mcgo

ANd now all we need is a legit bat for the outfield.

[Seattle or Bust]

Something I have circled back to is the Jorge Polanco trade.
--https://www.mlbtraderumors.com/2023/12/ ... trade.html

He has been a 115 OPS+ bat who has been played at SS, 2B, DH 3B, (positions listed by # of games played). He has lost out to young break-out Rookies: Royce Lewis and Edouard Julien, and Carlos C. signed to the mega-deal. He is owed 10.5 for 2024 +a 750K buyout of a 2025 12M option. Jorge Polanco's trade calc. is about 9M which was about what Geno's was.

I don't think after the other salary dumps the Twins have any delusions of getting Woo-Gilbert out of this deal. Maybe a pure prospect package

I went with trading them:
Jose C. He was a 2-WAR guy who held his own with a 90 OPS+, and can play anywhere in the infield well enough even SS. He can get stolen bases really well and would be a guy they can option down for the next 2 years while having a really good back-up for infield at the same time. He handles himself well at the plate: he had better than a 12% walk rate and was 26/29 in SBs.

I added a good BP arm with options in Ty Adcock

And then added two more major league depth types in Kuhn, and Mcgo

ANd now all we need is a legit bat for the outfield.

While I think Cabby might interest them as a replacement for Polanco... reports are pretty adamant that they want some decent starting pitching in return for him or Kepler. A trade for either likely doesn't get done without Hancock.

Why are you explaining who Cabby is to us lol? Or did you post this on a Twins forum or something?

[Donn Beach]

Giants continue to not quite get it done lol

Dylan Hernández
@dylanohernandez
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Yoshinobu Yamamoto's agent, Joel Wolfe: "He thought that San Francisco really reminded him of Osaka and thought it was a beautiful city. ... If the Dodgers had not been pursuing him, there was a good chance San Francisco could have been his destination

[D-train]

Instead of their characteristic trades, perhaps Jerry Dipoto and Justin Hollander will cap off the offseason by landing their "1-1/2 outfielders" with free agents Joc Pederson and Harrison Bader.

https://baseballsavant.mlb.com/savant-p ... itting-mlb

https://baseballsavant.mlb.com/savant-p ... itting-mlb

Bader is as strong defensively as Pederson is weak while Pederson is as strong offensively as Bader is weak. Bader strikes out at a desired low rate while Pederson is projected with a league-average strikeout rate.

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

https://www.fangraphs.com/players/joc-p ... osition=OF

Each has significant platoon splits with Bader mashing lefties and Pederson raking against righthanders.

FanGraphs projects Pederson with 2024 WAR and wRC+ of 1.7 and 119 in 117 games and Bader with 2024 WAR and wRC+ of 1.7 and 93 in 105 games.

Bader's contract projections include two years, $20 million at MLB Trade Rumors; one year, $8 million at The Athletic; one year, $13 million by FanGraphs columnist Ben Clemens; and two years, $18 million by FanGraphs median crowdsource.

Pederson's contract projections include one year, $12 million by FanGraphs columnist Ben Clemens and two years, $24 million by FanGraphs median crowdsource. MLB Trade Rumors and The Athletic did not provide contract projections for Pederson.

Spotrac's market value feature assigns Bader an average annual salary of $15.2 million and Pederson an average annual salary of $15.8 million:

https://www.spotrac.com/mlb/cincinnati- ... ket-value/

https://www.spotrac.com/mlb/san-francis ... ket-value/

The resulting lineup might not generate excitement:

SS J.P. Crawford (L)
CF Julio Rodriguez (R)
1B Ty France (R)
C Cal Raleigh (S)
DH Mitch Garver (R)
LF Joc Pederson (L) / Harrison Bader (R)
3B Luis Urias (R)
RF Dominic Canzone (L) / Dylan Moore (R)
2B Josh Rojas (L) / Jose Caballero (R)

The Mariners maintain their starting rotation but sign pitchers to minor league contracts for rotation depth.

Lowered expectations may result in less disappointment.

Bader should find a job, but he isn't worth anything close to 15 million.

Is suggesting Bader a troll job or what. Suggesting a severely budget constrained offensively challenged team paying this guy $15M is complete insanity.

bader.JPG (27.09 KiB) Viewed 677 times

[D-train]

Neither one of these guys should be worth approaching 15 million on.

Bader has been below average for years with the bat. I remember another right handed platoon bat that had sucked. Bader's last 2 years 69 OPS+ and an 85. And remember some of that WAR is positional scarcity and I doubt Julio wants to give up center for him. We need bats. And at age 30 betting on a rebound is a little too much repetition on that front: Urias, France, etc.

Peterson is old: 32 next year and I think we would be chasing the dragon on this one.

Instead of buying 2 flawed players for 20-25-30M in salary why don't we pay the freight for a young good bat on the rise. A proven player.

Something about the definition of insanity is doing the same dumb ass decisions thinking this is the year they all come up roses. I liked the Mike Ford move not because you counted on it but because it was a cheap bat that we could store in AAA. It is counting on ABs from LaStella, Cooper, and AJ because you did not see that Moore, and Murphy would not be able to start the year healthy.

Good post. Amazing how many people Jerry has convinced that his idiotic spread the wealth on several flawed old weak rebound candidate platoon options is better than just buy ONE IMPACT BAT.

[GL_Storm]

Instead of their characteristic trades, perhaps Jerry Dipoto and Justin Hollander will cap off the offseason by landing their "1-1/2 outfielders" with free agents Joc Pederson and Harrison Bader.

https://baseballsavant.mlb.com/savant-p ... itting-mlb

https://baseballsavant.mlb.com/savant-p ... itting-mlb

Bader is as strong defensively as Pederson is weak while Pederson is as strong offensively as Bader is weak. Bader strikes out at a desired low rate while Pederson is projected with a league-average strikeout rate.

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

https://www.fangraphs.com/players/joc-p ... osition=OF

Each has significant platoon splits with Bader mashing lefties and Pederson raking against righthanders.

FanGraphs projects Pederson with 2024 WAR and wRC+ of 1.7 and 119 in 117 games and Bader with 2024 WAR and wRC+ of 1.7 and 93 in 105 games.

Bader's contract projections include two years, $20 million at MLB Trade Rumors; one year, $8 million at The Athletic; one year, $13 million by FanGraphs columnist Ben Clemens; and two years, $18 million by FanGraphs median crowdsource.

Pederson's contract projections include one year, $12 million by FanGraphs columnist Ben Clemens and two years, $24 million by FanGraphs median crowdsource. MLB Trade Rumors and The Athletic did not provide contract projections for Pederson.

Spotrac's market value feature assigns Bader an average annual salary of $15.2 million and Pederson an average annual salary of $15.8 million:

https://www.spotrac.com/mlb/cincinnati- ... ket-value/

https://www.spotrac.com/mlb/san-francis ... ket-value/

The resulting lineup might not generate excitement:

SS J.P. Crawford (L)
CF Julio Rodriguez (R)
1B Ty France (R)
C Cal Raleigh (S)
DH Mitch Garver (R)
LF Joc Pederson (L) / Harrison Bader (R)
3B Luis Urias (R)
RF Dominic Canzone (L) / Dylan Moore (R)
2B Josh Rojas (L) / Jose Caballero (R)

The Mariners maintain their starting rotation but sign pitchers to minor league contracts for rotation depth.

Lowered expectations may result in less disappointment.

Bader should find a job, but he isn't worth anything close to 15 million.

Is suggesting Bader a troll job or what. Suggesting a severely budget constrained offensively challenged team paying this guy $15M is complete insanity.

bader.JPG

No team would pay him that. He's a bench player, at best. He's worth maybe $1.5 or something like that.

[D-train]

Was Stanton dumb enough to sign them beyond a 3 year deal? If not then there contracts would expire after this season:

Mariners: Another somewhat speculative situation, as while president of baseball operations Jerry Dipoto and manager Scott Servais signed extensions in September 2021, the exact length of those extensions wasn’t reported. It is probably fair to assume both men are signed beyond 2024, though Servais’ previous two deals were three-year contracts, and 2024 would be his final guaranteed year if the skipper’s latest contract was also a three-year pact.

[Donn Beach]

It is probably fair to assume both men are signed beyond 2024

I agree

[D-train]

It is probably fair to assume both men are signed beyond 2024

I agree

The were hired before the 2016 season then extended mid 2018 then extended again in Sept 2021, why would they go four years after going 3 the first two times?

[Donn Beach]

Because he was given a promotion to president


Franco arrested
https://www.si.com/fannation/mlb/fastba ... n-republic