It was two years ago today that the Brewers made one of the biggest single-day splurges in recent baseball history, acquiring Christian Yelich from the Marlins for a four-prospect trade package, and also agreeing to sign Lorenzo Cain to a five-year, $80MM contract. (Cain’s deal wasn’t officially finalized until he passed a physical on January 26, 2018.) There surely aren’t any regrets in Milwaukee over that red-letter day, as the Brewers have reached the playoffs in each of the two subsequent seasons. Yelich has been nothing short of spectacular in a Brewers uniform, winning the 2018 NL MVP honors and finishing second in the MVP voting last season. It has been a bit more of a mixed bag for Cain, who enjoyed a tremendous 2018 campaign but then struggled through an injury-riddled 2019, though Cain finally won his first career Gold Glove last year after another outstanding defensive showing in center field.
The latest from around baseball…
- MLB Pipeline unveiled the latest edition of its top 100 prospects list today, with the Rays’ Wander Franco receiving the nod as the game’s top minor leaguer. Franco’s long list of plaudits includes a rare 80 grade for his hitting, the highest possible mark on the 20-80 scouting scale. “If you were to build a hitter from scratch using all of the physical attributes and skills that have come to define great hitters, he’d probably end up looking something like Franco,” details Pipeline’s scouting report on the 18-year-old shortstop. The Rays placed six prospects on the top 100 list, the most of any team. The Dodgers’ Gavin Lux, White Sox outfielder Luis Robert, the Orioles’ Adley Rutschman, and the Padres’ MacKenzie Gore rounded out the rest of the top five. MLB.com’s Jonathan Mayo (who compiled the list along with colleagues Jim Callis and Mike Rosenbaum) details how the list was compiled, the new faces joining the top 100, the prospects from past lists who were omitted from this year’s ranking, and many more details.
- After playing seven different defensive positions in 2019, it looks like the Tigers’ Niko Goodrum is going to focus only on shortstop for the foreseeable future, Chris McCosky of The Detroit News writes. Goodrum came up in the minors as a shortstop, but he expanded his horizons in hopes that versatility would improve his chances of cracking the big leagues. That strategy worked out pretty well for the 28-year-old, who’s coming off a solid pair of seasons after the Tigers signed him to a minor league deal more than two years ago. While that versatility is still an asset, Detroit likes Goodrum best at shortstop at present, especially after an impressive defensive showing over 326 2/3 innings at short in 2019. While it’s tricky to make a definitive judgement based on such a small sample size, Goodrum received high grades over a range of defensive metrics (+3 Defensive Runs Saved, +8.6 UZR/150, and +6 Outs Above Average).
- Could this be Chaim Bloom’s only chance to hire a Red Sox manager? This is one of many points raised by the Boston Globe’s Peter Abraham while speculating about the club’s rather quiet managerial search. With a nod to how quickly the Sox parted ways with former front office heads Ben Cherington and Dave Dombrowski, Abraham writes that “given the lack of job security in his position, Bloom may only get one chance to hire a manager if he doesn’t get this right.” This leads Abraham to wonder if Bloom could make a hire from outside the organization, in order to put some type of personal stamp on a team that otherwise retained much of its front office staff after Dombrowski was fired.
Bloom brings a different style of management than Cherington or Trader Dave. I think he’ll be fine. They just need to rebuild the farm the way he helped the rays do it in Tampa
The best man for the job is the man they fired to bring in Trader Dave! Ben Cherington left the organization with one of the top minor league systems in baseball.
Nope Cherington is not
Cherington refused to part with any minor leaguers, benefitted greatly from the old international rules that once changed hampered DD’s ability to replenish while at the same time work uptown put the best team on the field and made big ticket mistakes. He did deliver though and my point is more to defend DD than a knock on Ben. Both delivered but the organization needs to have more patience with Bloom provided ratings and attendance stay strong. If he brings in a Cash type to play Tampa style ball, he won’t last long even if the team wins another championship. Look no further than DD and Ben and Tampa ball will not sit well with Sox fans regardless of a November win. The game is simply too long/boring and I don’t believe the three batter rule will matter. Limiting the number of mound visits hasn’t done much.
* worked to
Wins = exciting baseball. Rays were totally exciting last year. Sox fans need to take heads out of asses. Fenway is a crap hole. The Trop is better place to watch a game.
Idk what type of baseball u watch but the trop is a dump & a joke of a park. Just ask any of the players around mlb & they will say the same thing.
Are you the fan behind the plate, the home dugout, or the visitor’s dugout?
Stop it. Nobody likes the Trop. Nobody. If a tree fell inside, it wouldn’t be heard. Know why? Because of all the nobodies at the Trop who like it there. (Ok I’m stretching a bit here.)
Ah TB, settle down. Fenway is old and should be replaced, not a dump. On the other hand, the TROP is just a big bag of air and has no atmosphere. Team should be moved to a city that will support it, either Orlando with its millions of visitors and citizens or moved to Vegas. Tampa does not have a draw aside from its occupants.
No, you get your head out your asses before you post again.
Can someone give me like facts and a true argument as to why the Trop is a dump? I know everyone loves to jump on the bandwagon and rag on it but I’ve never heard a true argument with legit points made as to what makes it a dump?
The catwalks make it a joke for one thing. They closed up the top tier seats due to low attendance. It’s located in no mans land. They were looking to play 1/2 their games in Montreal. That should tell you something. Basically the trop has no redeeming qualities.
R u delusional?? Didn’t know dome baseball is better than playing outdoors. Baseball should not be played under a roof!!
It has a roof and catwalks and just isn’t a gorgeous looking park compared I don’t know maybe Kansas City’s park
The turf hurts to play on. It’s concrete underneath. I have connections to a guy who played there for a while. He couldn’t wait to move on. The players hate it.
Rays would thrive in Orlando
Man I knew red sux fans were racist, so I guess it is no surprise that they are also morons. Clamoring that a guy should be fired even if he wins the World Series, wow
@kc38 the only people shouting “baseball should be played outside” have clearly never lived in Florida or understands that everyday in the summer is 100+ degrees, 100% humidity, and rain nearly everyday in August. The Trop isn’t great but it isn’t terrible either. It’s a comfortable 72 degrees for every game, there is never a rainout, and the playoffs last year proved when we pack the house with Rays fans it is an awesome environment. The geographic and logistical issues of where the Trop is located is different from the stadium itself. It beats Fenway in that we don’t have to be around all the loudmouth Boston a-hole fans other than when the Sox are in town. Only thing worse than the Sox are Sox fans.
Disagree TB. Games are too long and with so many commercials, I’ve been catching up the next day more and more as compared to watching live. pitching changes, so many walks, replay challenges are major reasons. Openers and using six pitchers just make the game unwatchable in my view. With the cheating scandal, all video equipment should be banned and a decision on challenging the decision needs to be made in 15 seconds. just everything together and even in 2018, I watched less live.
Well here I’ll let you all in on some Info from a Rays fan who attends many games a year. The closing of the top tier is an attendance issue and does not make the place a dump, the location also does not make the place a dump. Yes the location is bad but being inside the stadium people don’t walk around looking up saying man this place is a dump because of the location lol that’s so senseless, which is directly tied to playing in Montreal which is an attendance reason which again isn’t because inside is a dump. If you know anything about Florida you’d also know a baseball team literally can not play outside, during summer it rains almost every single day and 60% of home games would be canceled or miserable and wet. And now you’re comparing the trop to the Royals stadium which is probably the best looking stadium around so I guess comparing all stadiums to that then most are a dump. If the turf makes it a dump then you might wanna tell Toronto and Miami and Arizona that all their stadiums are a dump as well. And the catwalks if you looked up hoe many times a year a ball actually struck a catwalk you’d feel awfully dumb because it’s less then 5 times a years, yeah it may be annoying for a second but no different than Boston having an insanely tall wall or when Miami’s Park was absolutely huge same with San Francisco or short porch in yankee stadium. It’s all annoying to players because it’s not fair but a lot isn’t fair in baseball, they have spent millions and millions renovating the inside of the Trop and have some awesome technology and it’s very very clean and easy access to everything. Sorry the good old baseball must be played outside to you but times are changing, robot umps and replay and things are different than America’s original past time and sorry id much rather sit in 72 degree A/c than Rain or 100 degree sun or 30 degree snow. I’ll take the Trop over a lot of other ballparks because I don’t think I’m cool following the stupid narrative. Please come up with some good reasons
It feels like you’re watching baseball in a mall. It sterile and institutional feeling. The stadium has no natural light and feels cramped. I’ve been going to games there since it opened and the only redeeming quality anyone can say is it has A/C. Wear more natural cotton and a little sweat isn’t a bad thing.
It feels like you’re on the inside of a microwave
LOL comparing Fenway to the trop to watch a game. I guess this was an attempt at humor, Guess what TB, you failed…
Says one of the three season ticket holders for the Rays.
Real fans watch games from Ferg’s across the street from the Trop.
I agree the Trop is decent and a great place to watch a game. People just jump on the hate because that’s the narrative. While nobody is claiming it’s the best park in baseball, it is a fun place to watch a game. Clean, good food, lots of things to do for families before and after the games, all the centerfield bar areas and outfield standing areas are great.
Never been there but my beef is the catwalks in play. The weird shape of Fenway down both lines and the doorway in left are weird but they don’t cause outs into hits. The catwalks affect games and the architect should have designed the stadium without them.
This is a baseball site… go troll at TMZ
So when the ball hits a speaker in Houston, what then? Houston is a dump and needs a new stadium designed by a different architect? When the ball gets stuck under the ivy at Wrigley, should we require them to have padded walls? Every field has oddities. As someone above astutely noted, it happens maybe 5 times a year in Tampa. This is a site full of stat heads. Someone help me out. Is 5 batted balls out of 81 games statistically significant? How about the noseeum flies in Cleveland that affect the fielders. They turn outs into hits at the same rate as the catwalks do. Do they need to move stadiums in CLE?
Not so sure, but it may not be a bad idea to put the stadium in Kissimmee or a bit west. Then both Orlando and Tampa will be within a very short drive. Orlando has its benefits, but there are some drawbacks too.
I’d love to see them do what Houston did, or maybe Seattle. The blueprints for the new stadium looked really good. Lots of glass and retractable roof
The Rays could be playing half their games in Montreal. Tampa’s fan base sucks. Can’t even support a good team.
Lmao cherington was garbage. Figure it out people. The rays had a stacked farm cuz they were sooo god awful for so many years. It wasn’t cuz of blooms magic. Cherington have so many bad contracts. Rusney Castillo anyone. Dave dombrowski was aggressive some people like in Boston but u can’t always have both people. U want the top notch players and have a top notch farm and win every year and get top prospect picks. I know cherington was never the answer and hopefully people realize that sometimes u have to suffer for x amount of years b4 u can make it back at the top
Add Pablo and Hanley to that. Moving Hanley to a position he never played also, thinking that was the solution. Dombrowski won in-spite of Ben. Glad Cherington is out of Toronto.
For those dissing the Trop….it’s not a great stadium, adequate sightlines but awful location. Have a stadium in Tampa instead of St Petes and you will have a thriving franchise with a strong fanbase.
@kmk the rays were not “god awful”. The rays are top 5 in wins over the past decade you clown. The strength of the rays system is also based on international signings not high picks in the draft (wander Franco says hello). But what do you expect from dumb red sux fans who talk out the pooper
No way, TB right next door to St Pete, fans are not going. Move it to Orlando and the millions of visitors and citizens would be a win, win.
Rays never trade prospects to try and win championships. Their farm will always be ranked near the top.
Also when was the redsox farm ever a top notch product. It seemed like a lot of our untouchable studs turned out to be busts. Where’s Lars Anderson??? We traded rizzo away for whiny Adrian Gonzalez now we stuck with Steve pearce at first. Shut up about dombrowski trading the farm away cuz it’s probably the same person complaining about him not getting the superstar on the free agent list
Let’s see, Mookie, JBJ, Bogaerts, Devers, Benintendi but other than those guys and now Chavis and maybe Dalbec the Sox haven’t developed anyone from their barron minors.
I love this nonsense. Boston has developed their share of every day players but if Kopech turns into a stud, he’ll be the first stud starter outside of Lester the Sox drafted since I believe the 80s. I might be forgetting someone more recent. Help me out folks if I am but in the 80s, the team had Clemons, Hurst, Schilling, O’Jeda and Tudor. Truth is developing the farm has always been a crapshoot but having a farm full of prospects that other teams want allowed then and is more important today to use to trade for what you need. DD did that to perfection in 18. I thank both Sherington and DD for bringing titles to Boston. It’s not as easy as it seems. Ask Friedman in LA and Cashman in NY. I love Cashman’s recent body of work that has kept the Yankees in contention every year but ask an older Sox or Yankee fan who lived through the times before 2004 (Sox) or between 79 and 95 (Yankees); getting close just builds more and more frustration. The Yankees have gone now 10 years and if they don’t get a parade this November, it will get worse. As good a job as Cashman has done, the fans will wonder why they didn’t trade their prospects for that additional stud starter. They could have won @
at least one the last three years had they done so. Now they bought a stud like they did in 09. They win and it’s worth it. They don’t and their stuck in a few years with bloated contracts.
It AMAZES me that Red Sox “fans” don’t understand their own recent history. It wasn’t Cherington that built the farm system, it was Theo Epstein. Ben Cherington was completely clueless as a GM and it goes to show that if you have a large enough payroll any Executive can be successful. Cherington finished in LAST PLACE 3 out of 4 seasons; he missed on 1st rd. picks Brian Johnson and Trey Ball (#7 overall); he signed Mike Napoli and Shane Victorino to negative value contracts (those contracts are on the negative side, despite winning a WS), signed Hanley Ramirez, Pablo Sandoval, AND Rusney Castillo to three of the worst contracts in the last decade (in Castillo’s case, maybe the worst contract of all time), traded ace Jon Lester for a return of Yoenis Cespedes, who they later flipped for Rick Porcello. Think about that for a second: an Ace pitcher moved at the deadline for one season of Rick Porcello, an average starting pitcher. Terrible. Oh yea, he also traded 1.5 seasons of John Lackey for Allen Craig (Lol) and Joe Kelly. Cherington shouldn’t have a prominent job in baseball…
JTM, yes Theo was in charge but Ben was key on that staff. Why does Thei get all the credit and Ben none? Agree on the signees but then give him credit for not trading youngsters that DD would likely have moved. I disagree totally on your negative contract analysis. Some stats can’t be measured using modern methods. The Lester trade worked out beautifully if you start with the premise that ownership was never going to pay him. Porcello won a CY and was a key contributor on the 18 WS winner as was Kelly. You conveniently left out the third trade then where the team got ERod for Andrew Miller. Those trades were so good strategically that a couple of years later Cashman did the same thing to perfection when he moved Chapman and Miller. Finally, why place all the blame for the last place finishes on him? Did he really choose Bobby Valentine? 12 was a transitional year but if you’re going to blame him for 14 and 15, he deserves credit for 13 when they team stole a championship.
Well said
I think it’s time to give varitek a shot managing if he wants the job. I think the guy has a great understanding of running a team for a season
The reality is TB needs a new stadium and they will get one. I don’t think you can compare the Trop to Fenway because Fenway is the oldest stadium in MLB, the same one in which Ted Williams hit!
I’m partial to old stadiums though; maybe renovated, but old. In fact, I’d rather the Yankees still play in their old stadium. Many players have talked about how overwhelming and humbling it was to stand where Ruth, Gehrig, Mantle, and DiMaggio stood.
Again, I think Boston is much better than the Trop but the Rays will get a new stadium and it will be nice.
Plus, as one writer astutely noted, SW Florida must have some sort of enclosure, and A/C in summer is nice!
Bloom will make Cashman call him daddy.
You’reajoke.
He hasn’t done it yet.
Besides, Boston will fire him within a couple of years.
Every Boston GM has owned the overrated Cashman since 2009, yes this is obvious to anyone with half a brain, so???
Yeah keep dreaming. Cashman has outlasted how many Sox GMs now? And every year he produces, at the bare minimum, an above .500 team
Cashman has also outspent everybody without winning it all more than anybody..
how has they worked for the Yankees over the past decade?
In the 16 yrs since the Lux Tax was implememted , Cashman has spent by far the most $$$ (without counting the 350++ MM in tax) for one WS title. Theo/Ben/DD (for far less $$) combined to win four WS titles.
Imagine getting an unlimited budget and at the bare minimum, only getting an above .500 team instead of a World Series or, at bare minimum, an ALCS team.
Let’s be completely honest though, Cashman has been a very good GM which is why he’s been there for so long. Keep in mind he made some amazing moves that turned the Yankees farm system around in one season, thereby ensuring they will be contenders for years to come.
If you notice, the Yankees rarely if ever stack the Red Sox GM, because we don’t care. These attacks wreak of jealousy, but I digress.
Honestly, they’re both good GMs and will both build contending teams, but the Yankees have the distinct advantage, imho. Compare team to team, player to player, and the Yankees are better, hands down.
Let’s be completely honest though, Cashman has been an absolutely horrific GM who should have been putting a WS or ALCS-level team on the field every single single year, and hasn’t.
And all the prospects they traded didn’t amount to much.
Sometimes prospects are just that: prospective future stars or maybe not…..
18 or 19 seems a little young to anoint a kid a top prospect. So much can happen after that.
How many actually make a difference and why? Anybody ever study that? That could be the next big inefficiency…..
He’s THAT good. He should be in the bigs this season, he’s that good. Age is only a number when you’re so gifted.
Franco should have been brought up last year. He’s been ready, only agism and Willy Adames are keeping him down.
I really hate all the “he’s too young” takes about any player, Al Kaline came up at 18 and had a HOF career, all these stupid conservative choices about generational talents “needing” time in the minors is just a big fat lie. Franco is ready now, as is Robert, as is Rustchman.
Best hitter in the Florida state league (huge pitcher friendly league) at 18. Not one of the best, the best hitter. More walks than strikeouts. Only 4% swinging strike rate (2nd best in the entire minors). Switch hitter. Better comparable stats than guys like guerrero, tatis, Ramirez, at the same age and level. All this at SS. He is can’t miss barring injuries. All star floor, HoF ceiling. He is absolutely the top prospect
Franco should have gotten called up in September last year, TB might have a title if he did (no exaggeration).
Give Bloom a chance, sheesh he is doing what the owners want. I hope he does well he’s a brilliant man from what I hear(globe). I really think they maybe waiting to hear bout Coras future, n his bad decisions.
Agree with you re:Bloom. But Cora is gone, the Sox move on. I hope the find someone outside the organization. I’ve always liked Buck’s passion, despite never having talent
Lmao I wouldn’t hold your breath for buck considering the man whines about the Sox every year he was with the whorioles
Like I said about the rays. They got soo much talent cuz of their high draft picks. Remember the devil rays?? It wasn’t cuz of this man bloom. U can’t put all yer eggs in this mans basket. We got too many bad contracts and the Sox bullpen is a disaster
Only one of the rays prospects in the top 100 was a high draft pick, but go off king
Boston is trying to get under the cbt so it will reset. They’ll go after Lindor, Mookie and either them or NYY will bail the Angels out of a couple bad deals for an MLB player and a couple prospects. Pujols, Upton, and Trout.
That Lorenzo Cain contract is looking pretty bad these days. He has some time to right the ship but 80 mil for league average production is tough to stomach.
Adley Rutschman getting top 5 credentials right out of the gate! He must have a pretty rare skill set! Excited for this Franco kid. Although Moncada made all of minor league baseball drool as well and he struggled to find his footing early on. There’s a lot of talent out there, can’t wait to see which guy breaks out that no one is even talking about!
“That Lorenzo Cain contract is looking pretty bad these days.”
Absolute lie, Cain definitely would get a 3/51 deal on the open market if he was a FA right now.
SF, you’re obviously not happy with prospect rankings, but they have TB, Bal leading the pack. The Sox only have 1 and the Yankees have none above 54… anyway, I’m missing where the Yankees have a lockdown on top prospects. So, what’s the actual issue?
I’m asking honestly because it seems like a very contentious topic for you, upon which you write, but I don’t see why.
Anyway, don’t let it bother you, obviously, and much to my dismay, the Yankees don’t have glaring prospects fighting for the top spot.
Pipelines #’s 80-100 felt like the proverbial dart landed on their name when it hit the wall…
honestly id say 60-100 are. lot of guys from 60-80 that you wonder how they jumped so high.
Gotta fill up the list with as many Yankees, Red Sox and Mets scrub phony-prospects as possible! Can’t ever go outside the lines that ESPN tells them which teams to care about, and then EPSN will write articles like “who are these guys?!?!” when it was their job to tell us that from the start, but they were too busy hyping Clarke Schmidt and Andres Gimenez.
Bloom is brilliant
Stop hyping front office losers over players. Every GM is trash until they win a title.
I’m fine with taking time to get the right manager. It will be interesting to see if the Red Sox take a hit on draft picks when they are punished by phony baloney boyfred. That likely will impact their trading strategy. Bloom has an awful lot to deal with right now and he’s being smart about it. I think he has the potential to be really good at his job. He just has to perform some magic awful soon in his tenure. My understanding is that he is a really good team player within an organization. That takes longer than arbitrary decisions but often yields better results. This team is still really good and does not need to rebuild so much as tweak. It’s possible that it will be a pretty major tweak, we’ll have to wait and see.
i cant believe they’re so crazy about Adley to call him the 4th best prospect overall without any proof he can even adjust to the minors yet. plenty more confidant about Mize right now.
Yeah, the #1 pick in the draft who is entering his AGE 23 season that had countless scouts reporting on him, who gave us all massive amounts of in-game examples in a 4 year college career to show how ready-now and generational he is, then he drops a .774 OPS in his first taste of pro ball, which is ridiculous as a defense-first catcher, but you don’t think he is good because he’s not a Yankees or Red Sox prospect that ESPN has hyped constantly, great!
I have to agree with Darkside that they’ve been pushing prospects really high without any real substantiation that they can handle anything at the major or minor league level.
That said, it’s pretty clear why Adley is so high and it’s because of his collegiate performance and the multitude of scouts.
You both have valid points, and quite honestly, they apply equally depending on the prospects. Darkside did specifically reference minor leagues which is not collegiate baseball.
Imagine thinking Adley won’t be an all-star by 2022 though. Just false. He’s abnormally good at baseball.
Boston needs to do two things better: develop pitching and identify undervalued players. The latter is always desirable but essential I. This budget-strapped year.
John Henry and the Red Sox front office covet Tampa’s pitching development. (Ever see the end of Moneyball?) make no mistake that’s the main reason Bloom is here. The Red Sox rarely every develop their own frontline pitchers while Tampa continually churns them out. Boston’s positional players are almost always better than the Rays’ on the whole due in largely to budget, so that’s the easy part now for Bloom after this year.
The Boston front office thinks it has a team that will already challenge for the wildcard, so they want someone adept at tinkering around the edges and identifying undervalued talent just like Bloom has done so far—although the results remain to be seen, of course. Dombrowski was not that guy.
The Dodgers are a good model. Big budget yet adept at identifying undervalued players, heck at identifying talent overall. They are in the perfect situation—to win now and have great core moving forward. They can always plug holes with money.
That’s what the Red Sox are trying to build with Bloom.
I doubt Bloom has the type of autonomy everyone seems to think he has. Henry/Warner/Kennedy got stung letting DD pretty much operate his own serfdom; I think they learned their lesson. Let’s remember that , for all the accolades Theo got when he was brought to Boston, he was pretty much under ownership’s thumb with every move he made. Then Theo really believed it was all about him; so he had to go.
Bloom’s finding it hard, I think. It’s easy when the only metric is to cut payroll; nobody cares if they win or lose in Tampa, it really doesn’t affect the bottom line either way. It’s a bit more complicated in Boston, and Bloom is likely feeling challenged. But either way, he’s going to dance to ownership’s tune.
Bob, do you really think they gave DD full autonomy to sign those large contracts after the 18 championship? I blame ownership on the Sale deal but think about it, this financial crunch was going to happen. Everyone knew from the time JDM was signed, there was a two year window with the expectation that JDM would opt out. I have to remind myself that we also signed Boegarts and that is clearly undervalued already. Team just expected at least another playoff run in 19. Unless the CBA is significantly changed in the upcoming deal, more big market clubs will face this situation. I’d love to at least see a cost of living kicker added to the threshold. Most big market clubs play in high cost of living areas.
Players living in high cost of living areas actually prosper more.
Their agent’s have them buy property that they live in and can then sub-lease if they elect to leave the area in the offseason.
Real Estate in the bigger cities goes up far faster in value, including at a higher percentage, then in mid and small markets. Those players wind up getting back every cent along with a handsome profit if they can stay in an area for more then a year. As for personnel going up and down, the teams work out deals with realtors where the players find temporary housing at a reasonable cost. There are property managers that specialize in renting to temporaries, including airline pilots and stewardess, contract technical people, and others..
Samuel, your argument makes no sense. a player with money can invest anywhere. Also don’t just assume real estate continues to rise. Like any form of investing, some rise, some areas don’t. NYC for example has 6 times more luxury units available than what’s on the market. Big local story recently how there are so many recently built that they will not be marketed until others have sold. Apparently foreign investors have slowed down their buying. This has a trickle down affect on other available units, etc.
Goodrum 2018(109 hits, 48XBH), 2019(105 hits, 44 XBH). If he can get his BA up to .300, he will be one super player.
Goodrum isn’t the only player on the Tigers that would benefit by playing one position. Gardenhire tried to bounce almost everyone around last year. Lugo bounced between 2B and 3B. Harold Castro played 2B, 3B, 1B and CF. Ronnie Rodriguez played 1b, 2b, 3B and SS. Candelario played 1B and 3b. Goodrum played everywhere but P and C. Even Josh Harrison and Jody Mercer were moved around when they were healthy. The pitching staff may benefit from consistent defence as well.
Keep in mind he was continually trying to find players that could consistently produce some offense. Guys like Ronnie would be hot for a few weeks and then get stone cold so they had to be moved out of the lineup for someone else. Assuming they don’t have the endless number of injuries they had last year, there are far fewer positions with that risk so the lineup will be more stable.
Wander Franco might end up being a great hitter, but I hope the so-called “pundits” don’t predict him to win a batting title in his rookie year the way they did for Vlad Junior. Doing that means there is no upside for a player and he can only look like a disappointment. I don’t think Vlad Jr. is a bust by any means, but compared t the expectations his rookie year was at a minimum disappointing. Hopefully Franco doesn’t have to go through that. Although I highly doubt those “pundits” will change anytime soon.
Looie: I don’t think DD had FULL autonomy with those signings, but the Henry gang obviously trusted him a lot; let’s face it, he has a much more developed resume than Bloom. DD (no dumb guy, he) knew that HE wasn’t getting any younger, and likely wanted his 2018 heroes hanging around for a while, at least long enough to cover his own backside.
It probably vacillates a bit; they fall in love with the successful GM, then when said GM poops the bed on a couple of his moves ( which they all do), the love affair ends. It’s tough to disparage the way they do things; they’ve been pretty successful, not only on the field but at the accountant’s office.
By the way, I’m both Looie and Dewey. Had IPad sign in issues and had to create another account. Left the other sign in on my phone. If there’s a duck HOF and a blogging site, I guess I’ll be Huey…
This should be interesting because the team lived last year on the laurels of their 18 championship but ratings really suffered when they stung after 13 which is why they invested so heavily in Panda, Hanley and even Castillo to create a buzz. If the team does trade Mookie, Price and JBJ, I’d love for the to give Castillo a shot in the last year of his deal. To do so, they have to do the above and even then weigh his salary against pitching options that are still out there. He’ll hit for a much higher average but no pop while playing above average just not JBJ or Mookie defense.
My theory is that DD ran into the same issue in Boston that he did in Detroit, the payroll hit a point that the team needed to rebuild/reload for a few years before taking another run. Mr I didn’t want to hear it and neither did Henry so he was let go.
I looked back at the comments from the Yelich deal and it’s something how most didn’t realize how good Yelich actually was. Also, only brucewayne was aware of the fact that the Marlins didn’t get appropriate value in that trade, which turned out to be so one-sided.
I don’t know anyone realized just how good he was. Yelich was good when they traded him, but he’s currently among the best in the game. Great get for Brew Crew.
If Brinson is an all-star when he’s 29, does that mean he’s a failure? Prospect timelines vary.