MarlinsLou

11 minutes ago, rmc523 said:

I think that's more a reaction of frustration to the fact you've presented yet another idea they have no intention of doing.

They're going to do nothing......Kim has been saying all along that health and luck were bad last year, so they're going to count on that and do nothing.

So what's the point of having fanship over a team, and especially this team - we just want to sit in a circle and be sad? Should there be no engagement since they're (likely) going to do nothing of merit or kick the can to next year (which they are elite at)? So we all just bail since they are going to do nothing?

Quite frankly, I think April is going to be VERY quiet as winter brings optimism (even if remote), and this may be the high point of the "season" as who is going to watch this product again? At least there is minor hope they do grow up with some moves until spring training.

3 minutes ago, SonOfJack said:

Correct.

Apparently unless I join in on being delusional, I'm not welcome here according to this guy.

Delusional - do you think I have confidence in them? Also, do I shit on your posts constantly? So don't try and play the victim card here. It's beneath you.

1 minute ago, SonOfJack said:

Why are you here and typing 27,000 posts?

55 minutes ago, SilverBullet said:

If we got that and a closer I'd say we had a pretty good offseason but I don't see it happening so oh well.

I think getting those guys alone sucks as mentioned above. Let's assume Turner/Conforto were to cost $25m dollars in payroll. If I'm trying to figure out how best to serve this franchise longterm and Bruce says you have $25m to spend. It's not signing those guys - it's absorption. 

Yankees are in luxury tax hell. Donaldson makes 1/$27.5 then a $6m buyout next year. Hicks makes 1/$10.7, and then $9.7m, $9.7m, and $1m buyout (yikes). Same positions as Turner and Conforto.

IF the Marlins were to absorb $25m of Donaldson and Hicks in 2023 (so Marlins $25m, Yankees $13m) - which is what Turner and Conforto make, Yankees eat Donaldson buyout and half of Hicks here on out (so Marlins have Hicks for $4.5m in 2024 and 2025 and Yankees pay the buyout)..... Donaldson/Hicks have a 3 WAR 2023 projection and Turner/Conforto a 4 WAR projection. Of course, Conforto *could* explode (would he?) so the upside is much better with him, but you didn't just bail the Yankees out of $25m in 2023 here, they are a 2x Luxury tax payor so you've bailed the Yankees out of $37.5m in 2023 and got another $9m off their books eating part of Hicks for a nominal amount in 24/25. That is a lot of money. This is saving the Yankees $50m on those players.

So why not do something like this if our north star is Bruce has $25m to spend.

Yankees - Braxton Garrett, Joey Wendle, and saving $32 million dollars in 2023, and $9-14m dollars in 2024/2025 combined depending on luxury status
Marlins - Donaldson, Hicks, Peraza, Pereira, Throw-in Outside top 20 arm(s)

(The $37.5m number changed because Wendle makes some money. They'd roll out IKF/Wendle at SS, Cabrera/LeMahieu/Wendle at 3B, and wait on Volpe/Sweeney. They could also just sign Swanson and accept luxury hell, but they cleared out all that deadweight money for them so do they care?)

Peraza is very very good and they love him so something notable will have to go back with Garrett. A controlled lefty the Marlins can burn? Sign me up for a longterm SS who looks great. Pereira is 2024 starter and they can slum with Hicks/Sanchez/DLC/Bleday in CF until it happens. Donaldson is likely traded to a contender at the deadline so they'll likely save some money there if he looks good. He could be a good DH contender someone can pick up for nothing. Who cares TBH.

So now you got SS and CF figured out on paper, and basically all of this money sheds off by 2024 as who cares about those limited amounts Hicks makes.

Also, Marlins still have $5m to spend here since I'm hypothetically moving Wendle, so find a bulk reliever to be 6th SP/bullpen for 2023.

Is this a contending team? Fuck no, but this is a lot smarter than some 1 and done Turner/Conforto deals. And yes, this is a kick the can/move the goalpost decision but *this* at least makes sense.

And you still got Pablo to trade so you could jack up the Blue jays for Danny Jansen/Orelvis Martinez/others (now you gain salary with jansen, but lose with Pablo so now you have $8m to spend in 2023).

All of a sudden the team looks like this:

Jansen, Fortes (Stallings can be moved for whatever)
Cooper (With Berry coming)
Jazz (Edwards AAA)
Peraza, Rojas
Donaldson, Berti (with Groshans and AAA and O. Martinez coming after)
DLC, Sanchez (with Bleday in AAA still)
Hicks (with Pereira coming)
Garcia
Soler

Sandy, Luzardo, Cabrera, Rogers, $8m Stop Gap 2023 SP (with Eury, Eder, Meyer, Sixto, AND Fulton coming)
And the bullpen is average at best, but you'd hope a SP trickle down eventually happens here... or just fucking trade Salas/whoever for David Bednar because you don't need 2B/SS/3B as you just got Peraza and O. Martinez who are absolutely massive prospects.

This cost you Pablo, Garrett, Wendle, and absorbing a lot of Donaldson/Hicks.

Now THAT is how you spend $25m. Fuck this Turner/Conforto bullshit. If you're going to be cheap, you MUST be creative. 

Just now, rmc523 said:

The answer should be sign Swanson AND trade for Reynolds, etc.

 

----

 

I mean, they showed us last offseason that they had no problem wasting money on players not worth what they spent.

Yes - and they still COULD do it! Maybe they had to wait for Rodon to get off the board and now the top 5 SP available in the league are Pablo, Rogers, Cabrera, Garrett, and Luzardo, and I don't think that is hyperbole as who wants to give Eovaldi $80m when you could trade some FV50 prospects or two for those guys making peanuts and controlled for 2, 4, 6, 6, and 4 years there.

But Bruce seemingly is that cheap.

1 minute ago, hovertical said:

Even with that they also need Jazz to stay healthy (big IF at this point) and for guys like Avi to return to their career norms and figure out the back end of the bp.

Sure, but also look at the projection - https://www.fangraphs.com/depthcharts.aspx?position=ALL&teamid=20

Sandy, Jazz, dare I say Garcia, Luzardo, Rogers, Cabrera, Rogers, and the bullpen might all be 1+ WAR low. While they are very kind to the catchers, MI/SS, and "team LF who is also playing CF," they are underselling some of the upside here.

It's just very said - a $110m Marlins team would be really good and we could easily project them to the Phillies/Brewers (top 12-15 team in baseball) as the 6th best team in the NL. So they'd have a chance even with Uncle Steve flexing with backup catchers for $15m ala yesterday.

1 minute ago, SonOfJack said:

BECAUSE THEY DO NOT CARE AND/OR DO NOT KNOW WHAT THEY ARE DOING

Why are you yelling, I/we know this

1 hour ago, TaiwanAstros said:

Justin Turner !?

JD Martinez !?

Michael Conforto !?

Given that this team needs a minimum 7-8 WAR influx of talent to contend (i.e. compete with Phillies/Brewers/Giants as last wild card as ATL/NYM-STL-LAD/SD is pretty set IMO), none of this moves the needle.

Just look at the Marlins projection - https://www.fangraphs.com/depthcharts.aspx?position=ALL&teamid=20

So let's say they did sign Turner for 500 PA, Conforto for 550 PA, and they do trade for some other upgrade (Jansen, Rosario, Varsho/Thomas, etc.). This is definitely an offensive improvement over 1600-1700 PA, and those guys might all collectively be 7+ WAR of talent.... but you are losing something as some pitcher must be traded for one of the younger guys on top (-1 WAR at least), and then the Marlins do have competent low end 1-2 WAR players at the positions/PA those would be replacing.... so best case scenario doing "all" of that is the 37 WAR projection might move to 40 WAR if it works out perfect This is STILL 4+ WAR to go to get to Philly/Milwaukee, i.e. if they did this and they could have dropped Correa/Rodon on top and got there. Ship obviously sailed.

So if that is not going to happen, why sign these guys? Effectively, they need to sign Swanson OR trade for Reynolds and Bednar/Brubaker. That'll become some OOMPH production, and then taking on 2-3 of these smaller acquisitions (Turner in both scenarios, Conforto if you did sign Swanson and then trade for an Arizona CF and sign a SP, Jansen, etc.) make sense.

If they are going to half ass it and the whole offseason is Conforto and Turner, why spend as it's just burning money? Unless the idea is there will be more than 1 deadline trade this year?

48 minutes ago, hovertical said:

Take it away @MarlinsLou. 💙

I can just link to the daily depression - https://blogs.fangraphs.com/why-are-teams-issuing-extremely-long-contracts/

We all know this, but Bruce (and 8+ other ownership groups) really have no shot as they don't have enough money. You gotta probably have $2b+ to be competitive moving forward (at least 10 ownership groups do not have this wealth) as the big guys are just going to steam roll you, and then there is Steve on top of that who is a whole different level to steam roll further in this division. 

Mets, Braves, and Nationals have 1st, 3rd, and 6th-8th wealthiest ownership groups and the Phillies are a poor 13th-17th range. Bruce is last or second to last (Reds), and the delta to the Phillies is enormous let alone the others.

So we're just going to keep counting anniversaries from 2003 as it's not going to happen again absent incredible successive drafting/IFA signing and creativity.

1 hour ago, Entendu said:

We should become a Mets board 

I vote for Milwaukee, a little guy who tries and we can take enjoyment if they had not traded Yelich and further extended like Milwaukee did, they'd be fucked. Also because I think some of your *might* want the Cardinals to always lose for reasons unstated.

21 minutes ago, SonOfJack said:

No

Doesn't seem like it.

My guess is they do get a CF (Reynolds, Arizona, etc.), sign some underwhelming 1B/3B type, sign some extremely cheap underwhelming pitching (Bass-$3m type), and then win 79 games and gaslight everyone that we did awesome, we won 10+ games with a sub $90m payroll. I wonder who will be left at that point.

20 minutes ago, SonOfJack said:

I like how the names keep changing as more players drop off the board. Soon enough these players also won't be available. Is there a Plan Z?

No, we're about the end of the road here for the Marlins to become adults. It's getting close to impossible to find 10+ wins this offseason without a CHUNK guy like Rodon/Swanson.

Plan Z would I suppose be give the Pirates a nuclear prospect deal for Reynolds/Bednar and/or Eury is thrown into the mix for Corbin Carroll. While still moving SP for the Arraez/Rosario/Polanco/Jansen kind of guys who are likely available and are clear upgrades, plus then really going to the SP scrapheap and finding many CHEAP Thompson 2021/Bass 2022 contributors to bridge to whatever SP is left in the farm and hope Sandy/the rest can carry them. But now you've hurt 25-29 doing this basically exclusively through the farm and the whole point of free agency is to generate value. So this makes less sense too as you can't do this solely through your own drafting. Even the Rays sign Eflin.

So the final answer, Plan Z is moving the goal post to opening day 2024 and beating your chest with this:

Sandy, Pablo, Rogers, Eury, Luzardo
Cabrera, Meyer, Sixto, Bender, Chargois/Enright/Whoever
Garrett, Eder, Scott/Okert

Could be the best staff in baseball even if they don't hit, so now we rinse/repeat - is Bruce going to spend on bats NOW with a Fortes-X-Jazz-X-Groshans/Berti-DLC/Sanchez-X-Garcia-Soler core and nothing else as Berry/Salas/Cappe are still 1-2 years away? To note, there is no high end CF in next year's free agency class again so this is the definition of insanity.

1 hour ago, hovertical said:

I also worry they're so obsessed with keeping Captain Rojas in there that they'll continue to run him out there almost every day until we'll be wishing he was as "good" as he was this past offseason.

If they fix CF, 1B/3B platoon partner for Cooper/Berti, upgrade Fortes or Stallings, and get another pitcher - SURE. Rojas/Wendle could easily be a competent 2.5-3 WAR scenario over 900+ PA (fangraphs has them 3.6 WAR over 1,000 PA which seems optimistic to me so I'm shaving a "win" here).

So go get Alek Thomas

Actually sign Justin Turner

Figure out some trade for Danny Jansen

Sign a pitcher - and you have budget for Rodon but shit, there are many that work here, and if you didn't lose 2 big ones for Thomas and Jansen here this can even be a good reliever.

Like is that bare minimum plan hard? Or are we going to keep dancing the Cha Cha?

1 hour ago, TaiwanAstros said:

Sherman and Ng not deserve to have a smart fan like @MarlinsLou.

They don't deserve ANY of us.

I checked out 4 months last season, but winter springs optimism. I'll check out again even earlier this year for sure absent real moves.

22 minutes ago, jsprt14 said:

Look at the Mariners for instance...they have not broken the bank in free agency, but have a GM who is relentless.

This is a good example on relentless, but the Mariners are running $120-150m budgets last 5 years (excluding 1 year and covid year).

If Bruce let Kim have Mariners budgets, we'd have Correa, Eflin, Turner/Drury, and be able to trade two current SP + one mega prospect trade to get Reynolds/Arizona CF and a fancy RP on top, plus maybe more. So we can pray for future Mariners budgets too.

8 minutes ago, LordMagnus said:

I love how Lou makes all these long posts about how the team can be competitive, even though he knows deep in his heart the team isn't going to do anything of the sort.  Well I commend you for seemingly doing more work than the front office.

Yea given I won't care Spring training-July 30th if Chargois is the big add, we're in midseason right now.

47 minutes ago, Das Texan said:

Why is Groshans not in any permutation of lineups or trades though?

 

From what I've read and all, there is no reason to believe he wont be part of the picture for 2023. 

For me, it's because they want a "Turner" and kicked the tires on Abreu. They clearly want a corner upgrade, and I see no viable path for Groshans opening day if they do that because Jazz/Berti/Wendle or Rojas/or both for a SS platoon, is a pretty locked in top 4 middle infielders. If they do nothing, it's a Groshans/LeBlanc last infield spot for sure. With Turner/Abreu/Drury/Longoria/Twins blogs say they are poking at Arraez, Groshans is next man up, etc.

Or maybe they put him in CF because they have many brilliant ideas like that

9 minutes ago, SonOfJack said:

That team was just a poorly constructed roster to begin with that was doomed to fail. Don't parrot the Kim Ng crap about being "unlucky". She put together a losing roster and it had a losing record. And now she says they were unlucky so they can "run it back" and try again. Await the "shocking" result of being a crap team again.

EVERY team deals with injuries or poor performances or combos of both. That can't be an excuse.

As I'll keep saying, they were absolutely unlucky to not be a mid/high 70s win team last year with the injuries and pretty crazy 1 run game results, but while that can be true, that obviously is still not enough for what this organization needs to do. Both can be correct, this isn't an either/or like many want to make it.

But if they think this is an 88 win team and they had 20 games of bad luck, they are idiots. I don't perceive their comment as this, but if I am wrong and that's what they think, they are idiots.

7 minutes ago, SonOfJack said:

You obviously haven't accepted it because you are still writing a thesis on what they can do every day.

Grief takes a variety of forms

1 minute ago, SonOfJack said:

This is what they'll do. I look forward to the day you accept that. You have lots of ideas and plans, but they've given you zero reasons to think they'll do it. Time to just accept reality.

I've accepted that? This is complaining?

6 hours ago, TaiwanAstros said:

Thank Giants, @MarlinsLou no more need to waste his time to suggest the cheap ass Sherman to spend big on Correa. 

By the way, congrats @el_gmac, your second team (or first team ?) acquires the player that Marlins would never to sign under cheap ass Sherman. 

Well they *could* still do it. But it'll take a miracle like this. Multiple epic trades and Rodon.

Marlins - Arraez, Jansen, Horowitz (a low-level 1B prospect from Blue Jays throw in)
Twins - Pablo, Rojas (who now makes more sense in a platoon since they don't have Correa), Scott/Okert/Bleier, Simpson/Nardi
Blue Jays - B. Garrett, Kepler

Makes sense for everyone here big time.

Then I'm assuming Swanson is well out of price range/Atlanta resigns as this stage, so Rosario is screaming here. They need outfielders.... so you again need to be insanely creative

Cleveland - R. Laureano, Burdick
Miami - A. Rosario, X. Curry (backend SP prospect ready now from Cleveland)
Athletics - J. Miller, I. Lewis/Morisette, McCambley/Johnson/King, Palacious, Cleveland Comp. Balance Pick

They get outfielders, we get Rosario and some injury replacement innings, and Oakland gets a very large prospect package highlighted with a pretty good arm with Miller and major upside with Lewis. The rest of the things seem like "Oakland" projects for sure. Works all around I think.

So then the Marlins need a center fielder, and since you got Jansen and presumably resigned him, you can trade your catchers. Arizona doesn't have longterm catchers nor good catching prospects in their system, so leverage that as Varsho isn't moving back. Now this may be controversial, but you have to get a CF so fucking go for it.

Arizona - Meyer/Eder/Fulton, Salas/Cappe/Watson, N. Fortes, J. Mack/R. Hernandez, Soriano/Villalobos/etc.
Miami - A. Thomas, Mantiply, Canzone (a low-level 1Bish prospect, and a lefty which they have many of), Throw-In 

Thomas and Mantiply solve CF and another pen arm for now, Canzone along with Horowitz above starts a "hope and prayer" 1B pipeline after Cooper, and the Marlins lose BIG BIG time talent here, but CF depth in baseball is horrible so they must do something. If anything here, maybe the throw-in from Arizona is a bit better and more of a top 10-20 Arizona system guy. Everyone in baseball wants their CF, so they'll have to pay up. But that's OK. Cash in the farm. 

THEN, continuing mental gymnastics, you give Rodon 8/$200 and be done with it, three year opt out after 3/$87 sort of thing and take the bet he opts out at 33 years old and doesn't blow up his arm. This is the Werth acquisition. They have to spend on SOMETHING even if they go super value everywhere else.

So this team is $110m in 2023 and payroll is fine longterm as guys expire, or can be bought out:

C - Jansen, Stallings
1B - Cooper (Arraez)
2B - Jazz
SS - Rosario, Wendle
3B - Arraez, Berti
LF - DLC, Sanchez
CF - A. Thomas
RF - Garcia
DH - Soler
SP - Sandy, Rodon, Luzardo, Cabrera, Rogers
RHP - Floro, Chargois, Enright, Nance
LHP - Mantiply, Bleier, Okert, Castano

Remaining prospects - Eury, Berry, two of Meyer/Eder/Fulton, two of Salas/Cappe/Watson, and then it gets rough as you cleared out the last high end guys and multiple mid-tier ones, but you have guys like Groshans, Sixto, Nasim, Edwards, Mack/Hernandez, Millbrandt, the new guys (Curry, Horowitz, Canzone), and a bunch of reliever types. Not great, but not terrible. And guys like Bleday/Jerar/Bender who are not prospects are controlled with options FWIW. The good news here is, the MLB is insanely club controlled besides 1B/DH so you may not need to tap into the farm much for 1-2 seasons so it organically rebuilds.

I think you can get that team to a 40+ WAR projection and there is some major breakout potential if Sandy/Rodon/Jazz are in fact 6+ WAR players, and guys like Thomas/Luzardo/Cabrera/Rogers are all more than 2+ WAR guys, plus Garcia/Soler not sucking, and Arraez/Rosario/Jansen are in their primes and could chip in some more. Cooper is in a real contract year, etc. It'll give them a chance and that's an 85 win team probably and will need those 1 run game luck/career years to get them a WC berth.

So they *could* do this, but they need to have some confidence, make many bold and definitive moves, sign a Jayson Werth deal, and go for it. It's down to Swanson and Rodon here, and you can do all of that above with Swanson instead and just swap the Cleveland deal for a SP somewhere else.

Or sit around, do nothing, cash checks, and keep moving the goalposts and complain about Steve Cohen and yet do nothing besides sign "smart" AAA players

29 minutes ago, SonOfJack said:

Vegas had them at 76.5 last year so Vegas isn't always right anyway.

Sure, and then Jazz missed half the year, Luzardo/Meyer/Cabrera collectively threw 150 less innings than anticipated, there was a time 4 of their top MI were hurt, no one could have anticipated Garcia/Soler/Aguilar/Stallings were a net-zero even if no one liked those moves you'd expect *something*, etc. etc.

78.5 is pretty fair right now IMO

10 hours ago, Das Texan said:

They are closer to a 100 loss team than a 90 win team tbh. 

I'd say closer to 90, but we're talking a... 76 win over/under with that. Vegas has them 78.5, so I'd take those 2.5 games you're selling here. As mentioned above, it's 75+ right now and Valid is right 80 would be a best case scenario with this team if everything cuts right.

Any way we look at this - they need to add 10 wins to be a wild card contender. That's A LOT of production and doesn't account that if they do get rid of current SP or even Rojas or Wendle (a 1+ WAR guy), that 10 really becomes adding 13-14 wins to get to maybe sneaking in territory. A lot of work to be done.

2 hours ago, SongInTheAir said:

we keep making "rebuilding year" signings, inning eater types, depth pieces...but then the front office keeps trying to say we are planning on competing. Competing for what? The worst record in franchise history? I don't think we'll lose more than 108, but as of right now 100 is definitely looking possible. 

Fangraphs says 79 wins. That may have been before Uncle Steve's salary explosion, but I don't think anything the Braves/Phillies have done change the bottom line. It's probably 75+ as a floor and this team needs to add 10+ wins to be taken seriously. Which seems about right with the pitching staff. If everyone gets hurt again they probably have a repeat season. A lot has to go wrong to get to 100. But they are the Marlins, so a lot sounds about right.

50 minutes ago, rmc523 said:

At this point, who cares about making a mistake.  DO SOMETHINGGG

 

I think this is the philosophy they need to take.

The ripcord is if they suck July 30, 2025/2026, you can just salary dump and blow it out. What's another fire sale, but let's go for it? Fuck Atlanta, Steve, and Philly. Bet on the pitching. Be the Texas Rangers and sign guys a year early to improve morale and CULTURE which is non-existent.