@FeverPitchGuy May I run my Red Sox picks by you for the Free Agent contest? I have them down for Tanner Scott, Pivetta, Bieber and Kikuchi. Are those not too egregious? Or am I way off base? Thanks bro
Ignorant – I’d be happy to share my thoughts, just please don’t be upset at the ones I get wrong. LOL!
Kikuchi – Good pick, the Sox definitely want a LHSP (they don’t have one now) and he wouldn’t cost them a ton of money or have big payroll teams competing with them
Bieber – I don’t see it, they have enough RHSP comeback candidates.
Scott – Good pick, the BP was a huge issue this year and they need to replace Jansen and maybe Martin too.
Pivetta – This is a much debated situation. My feeling is he will reject the QO. Could the Sox sign him to a multi-year contract? I don’t see it, the new regime couldn’t get him to reach his potential either and I think other teams believing they can fix him will offer more than what the Sox feel comfortable giving him. I think if they wanted to keep him, they would have made the attempt to extend him already.
Thanks FPG, I think I should switch Bieber to a front line starter who will be ready on Day One. I think Breslow is ready to sign someone like that if he can pull the trigger. We are still up in the air about his negotiation skills I think lol.
Not to mention Griffey was a marketing machine, even in SEA, back when that really wasn’t a thing in MLB during that time. He appealed to a whole new fan base and was viral before it was ever a thing. MLB would trade 2 Sotos for a modern-day Griffey.
“That report struck me as interesting, since you’d think after winning a Gold Glove, Bregman would be entrenched at the hot corner. But, offering more versatility isn’t a bad thing, and I have no doubt Bregman would be able to handle 2B easily from a defensive perspective.”
Interesting.
When I read the report of Bergman’s willingness at this point in his career to move to 2B I wondered about that.
3B is a reaction position. There is little ground to cover, doesn’t really back up anyone, crouches down and stares at the catcher as opposed to seeing the ball leave the pitchers hand. 2B however is now being classified as a “middle infielder” position. Since the infield shift was outlawed I’ve noticed the Gleyber Torres’ of the world being replaced by SS’s. With a LH batting and a runner on first that the 1B has to hold on, there’s a tremendous amount of space that a 2B now has to cover….which is why I think more teams are looking to put SS’s there – they cover a lot of ground, have strong arms.
Bregman was originally a SS, got bumped for Carlos Correa. Will be 31 years-old. Be interesting to see if he can play 2B well. I think more teams are realizing that having a terrific fielding 3B is nice, but it’s arguably the least important defensive position on a baseball team – although it is unique and having a Brooks Robinson, Craig Nettles, or Adrián Beltré that can also hit is great.
Up until recently only a few true SS’s played 2B. There have always been guys like Gleyber that’s a buck short of being a SS (the Yankees really screwed him up when they put him there for parts of 2 seasons recently). There were many like him playing 2B just a few years ago:
Jonathan Villar
Max Muncy
DJ LeMahieu
Keston Hiura
Jeff McNeil
Mike Moustakas
Eduardo Escobar
Cavan Biggio
Kolten Wong
Robinson Canó
Starlin Castro
David Fletcher
Adam Frazier
There were others. None of them could play SS regularly. Look at just some of what what we have today. Many are converted SS’s:
Marcus Semien
Andrés Giménez
Ozzie Albies
Jose Altuve
Ha-Seong Kim
Bryson Stott
Brice Turang
Luis García
Point being that MLB teams are looking more for defense at 2B. My theory is that when the shift was used, internal team stats showed how beneficial a quality defensive 2B meant to a team. Slowly teams are getting away from the hitters – i.e. Robinson Cano, Luis Arráez (extreme cases) and moving them to 1B and/or DH.
There is no way one could refer to 2B’s I listed in the first group as “middle infielders”.
People still have this old school mentality that second base is not a defense premium position, also that because a guy can play shortstop, he can handle second.
As a Cub fan, I’ve seen a couple glaring examples of shortstops not being able to handle second, Simmons, arguably one of the best defensive shortstops of all time couldn’t field second base at all. Addison Russel also struggled mightily when trying to convert from short to second base.
Shortstop and second are similar but reads are different, turns are different and second baseman typically have to be better at moving to the right than shortstops do.
Some straight up asinine questions taken during this chat but my favorite dumb-a$$ question was the one about Salas getting called up in 2025. For crying out loud the kid is only 19 what is the freaking rush??? What is wrong with letting the kid get some damn reps in the minors?? Jesus people.
The reason being, he was so incredibly more dominant compared to the competition during a time when MLB was saturated with roided up sluggers.
From 1999-2003 he posted a 228 ERA+ and a 1.95 FIP. No other AL pitcher had posted an ERA+ that high in just a single season since 1914, and no other AL pitcher had posted FIP that low in a single season since 1916.
In 1999 when the LEAGUE ERA was 4.86 ….. Pedro’s ERA was 2.07 …. try finding a bigger gap between Koufax and the NL ERA.
Let’s say you muted somebody on here, would you still get the notification that the muted person gave your post a thumbs up? Enquiring minds want to know. Self esteem & dopamine hits are on the line (not for me of course, asking for a friend.)
Ignorant – I have muted very few people, and I can’t imagine them giving a thumb to someone who muted them. Now if there existed a middle finger version …. then yes, I’d probably get those! LOL
However to answer your question, I believe it’s possible because I DO get notifications that a muted person has replied to someone who replied to me. And it’s annoying, because even if I wanted to read the muted person’s posts …. I can’t, so what’s the point of being notified?
I rarely mute anyone, and I treat it as a suspension. After a few weeks I unmute them. If they continue to annoy, then I’ll mute them permanently. Right now I only have one muted, “Fever Pitch Guy is always right”.
Someone finally asked the question that makes sense for the Cubs, moving Paredes for Shaw, and Mark craps all over it.
I don’t think the Cubs should move either Paredes or Hoerner at the moment but it makes so much more sense to deal Paredes than Nico.
Is Shaw likely to reproduce Nico’s 4 WAR or Paredes 2? Nico’s elite defense or Paredes negative defensive WAR? Nico’s elite bat to ball skills and speed or Paredes’s 20 home runs and 20 doubles?
We all know about Wrigley snuffing out offense last season and we know Paredes was pretty good on the road but you know who else eas very good outside of Wrigley? Nico. .287/.365/.400+ with six of his 7 home runs and 21 of his 31 steals. That is exactly the “growth” that was missing from Nico’s game. Trading him would be the biggest mistake of Hoyers tenor
I was hoping Seattle would trade for Nico but I can see that would be an unpopular move in Chicago. And I don’t think Chicago would be happy with just prospects for Nico.
I don’t know, it seems some Cub fans really think it would be wise to trade Nico to open up second for an unproven prospect with no MLB experience. I don’t see Hoyer doing it though, he values defense and respects Nico’s skill set too much.
The only way I would deal Hoerner is for a front of the rotation starter. He’s a 4 WAR player with two seasons remaining and over 40 million is surplus value.
Tigers need a right handed OF bat and an inning eater… what are the chances the Phillies would deal Nick Castellanos and Taijuan Walker? Both are on 2 year deals. Nick $20M both years and Walker $18M both years.
Phillies probably want to shed some payroll and get better defense in the outfield. Phillies have some good young pitching coming up to take Walker’s spot… Wheeler, Nola, Sanchez, Suarez are holding the top 4 spots. Painter… Abel… Seth Johnson, all could challenge for the number 5 spot. Or, it is Dave Dombrowski… they could go big and sign another top starter (Snell? Fried? Manaea?) or pick up another top bat for RF or LF and move Marsh to RF. Santander? Profar? Teoscar?
It probably wouldn’t cost the Tigers much… in fact they may even be able to squeeze a prospect out of them for taking on so much salary. SS Starlyn Castro? OF Justin Crawford?
Tigers add Nick and Walker and a prospect. Nick becomes the RF/DH right handed bat they seek. Walker was great just recently in 2023. He could rebound.
Do you think it makes sense?
I would imagine the Tigers are trying to improve and I don’t see how those 2 make them better. Not to mention, Nick C was once a Tiger and they won’t revisit that partnership.
I like the idea but the Tigers should aim higher and they aren’t going to want to take on all that salary. This is a move for somebody like the Angels.
@FeverPitchGuy May I run my Red Sox picks by you for the Free Agent contest? I have them down for Tanner Scott, Pivetta, Bieber and Kikuchi. Are those not too egregious? Or am I way off base? Thanks bro
Ignorant – I’d be happy to share my thoughts, just please don’t be upset at the ones I get wrong. LOL!
Kikuchi – Good pick, the Sox definitely want a LHSP (they don’t have one now) and he wouldn’t cost them a ton of money or have big payroll teams competing with them
Bieber – I don’t see it, they have enough RHSP comeback candidates.
Scott – Good pick, the BP was a huge issue this year and they need to replace Jansen and maybe Martin too.
Pivetta – This is a much debated situation. My feeling is he will reject the QO. Could the Sox sign him to a multi-year contract? I don’t see it, the new regime couldn’t get him to reach his potential either and I think other teams believing they can fix him will offer more than what the Sox feel comfortable giving him. I think if they wanted to keep him, they would have made the attempt to extend him already.
Thanks FPG, I think I should switch Bieber to a front line starter who will be ready on Day One. I think Breslow is ready to sign someone like that if he can pull the trigger. We are still up in the air about his negotiation skills I think lol.
Love the answer about Griffey would 150m over what soto gets. 4 consecutive years of 47+HR’S and 134-147 rbi’s.-monsterous!!
Yeah, when I started to read that answer, my first thought was, “what? only $150M? Then I read on…
Not to mention he played good defense in center, not poor defense in right like Soto.
Not to mention Griffey was a marketing machine, even in SEA, back when that really wasn’t a thing in MLB during that time. He appealed to a whole new fan base and was viral before it was ever a thing. MLB would trade 2 Sotos for a modern-day Griffey.
Run – I totally agree! And unlike Soto, Junior looked his age and his smile was infectious.
“That report struck me as interesting, since you’d think after winning a Gold Glove, Bregman would be entrenched at the hot corner. But, offering more versatility isn’t a bad thing, and I have no doubt Bregman would be able to handle 2B easily from a defensive perspective.”
Interesting.
When I read the report of Bergman’s willingness at this point in his career to move to 2B I wondered about that.
3B is a reaction position. There is little ground to cover, doesn’t really back up anyone, crouches down and stares at the catcher as opposed to seeing the ball leave the pitchers hand. 2B however is now being classified as a “middle infielder” position. Since the infield shift was outlawed I’ve noticed the Gleyber Torres’ of the world being replaced by SS’s. With a LH batting and a runner on first that the 1B has to hold on, there’s a tremendous amount of space that a 2B now has to cover….which is why I think more teams are looking to put SS’s there – they cover a lot of ground, have strong arms.
Bregman was originally a SS, got bumped for Carlos Correa. Will be 31 years-old. Be interesting to see if he can play 2B well. I think more teams are realizing that having a terrific fielding 3B is nice, but it’s arguably the least important defensive position on a baseball team – although it is unique and having a Brooks Robinson, Craig Nettles, or Adrián Beltré that can also hit is great.
You make some interesting points, but hasn’t 2b always been classified as middle infield?
truthlemonade;
Yes and no.
Up until recently only a few true SS’s played 2B. There have always been guys like Gleyber that’s a buck short of being a SS (the Yankees really screwed him up when they put him there for parts of 2 seasons recently). There were many like him playing 2B just a few years ago:
Jonathan Villar
Max Muncy
DJ LeMahieu
Keston Hiura
Jeff McNeil
Mike Moustakas
Eduardo Escobar
Cavan Biggio
Kolten Wong
Robinson Canó
Starlin Castro
David Fletcher
Adam Frazier
There were others. None of them could play SS regularly. Look at just some of what what we have today. Many are converted SS’s:
Marcus Semien
Andrés Giménez
Ozzie Albies
Jose Altuve
Ha-Seong Kim
Bryson Stott
Brice Turang
Luis García
Point being that MLB teams are looking more for defense at 2B. My theory is that when the shift was used, internal team stats showed how beneficial a quality defensive 2B meant to a team. Slowly teams are getting away from the hitters – i.e. Robinson Cano, Luis Arráez (extreme cases) and moving them to 1B and/or DH.
There is no way one could refer to 2B’s I listed in the first group as “middle infielders”.
People still have this old school mentality that second base is not a defense premium position, also that because a guy can play shortstop, he can handle second.
As a Cub fan, I’ve seen a couple glaring examples of shortstops not being able to handle second, Simmons, arguably one of the best defensive shortstops of all time couldn’t field second base at all. Addison Russel also struggled mightily when trying to convert from short to second base.
Shortstop and second are similar but reads are different, turns are different and second baseman typically have to be better at moving to the right than shortstops do.
The Michael Jordan comment made me laugh out loud. Good stuff.
Some straight up asinine questions taken during this chat but my favorite dumb-a$$ question was the one about Salas getting called up in 2025. For crying out loud the kid is only 19 what is the freaking rush??? What is wrong with letting the kid get some damn reps in the minors?? Jesus people.
Ignorant – Unfortunately I’ve come to expect the ridiculous questions.
I mean really, asking if BOTH Casas and Abreu is enough for Crochet? They are two established quality MLB players, they are not prospects.
And asking if Dombrowski will make the HOF? Ridiculous question.
Also, assuming there’s no captain on teams just because they don’t wear a “C” on their jersey? SMH
Nolan Gorman for Andrew Vaughn? I know Gorman has warts, but I wouldn’t trade an autographed picture of John Mozeliak for Andrew Vaughn.
Sandy Koufax?
Don – I would definitely take Pedro 1997-2003.
The reason being, he was so incredibly more dominant compared to the competition during a time when MLB was saturated with roided up sluggers.
From 1999-2003 he posted a 228 ERA+ and a 1.95 FIP. No other AL pitcher had posted an ERA+ that high in just a single season since 1914, and no other AL pitcher had posted FIP that low in a single season since 1916.
In 1999 when the LEAGUE ERA was 4.86 ….. Pedro’s ERA was 2.07 …. try finding a bigger gap between Koufax and the NL ERA.
Let’s say you muted somebody on here, would you still get the notification that the muted person gave your post a thumbs up? Enquiring minds want to know. Self esteem & dopamine hits are on the line (not for me of course, asking for a friend.)
I can still give Samuel a thumbs up, but since I don’t read books on line, we may never know what happens…….
Ignorant – I have muted very few people, and I can’t imagine them giving a thumb to someone who muted them. Now if there existed a middle finger version …. then yes, I’d probably get those! LOL
However to answer your question, I believe it’s possible because I DO get notifications that a muted person has replied to someone who replied to me. And it’s annoying, because even if I wanted to read the muted person’s posts …. I can’t, so what’s the point of being notified?
I rarely mute anyone, and I treat it as a suspension. After a few weeks I unmute them. If they continue to annoy, then I’ll mute them permanently. Right now I only have one muted, “Fever Pitch Guy is always right”.
brave – I remember that guy, I muted him too! It was an alt account of his, he moved onto other alts.
I actually cant remember who I muted, but i apparently did to at least one person
Ma – If you ever want to know, you can click on “Update Your Profile” and it shows all the User Names that you’ve muted.
Oh wow, thanks!
Ma – You’re welcome!
And BTW – If someone on your list changes their name on that particular account of theirs, the name on your list changes too.
So if you don’t recognize one of the names on your list, it’s probably because they changed it.
Gotcha… thanks, makes sense bc i didnt recognize either
Someone finally asked the question that makes sense for the Cubs, moving Paredes for Shaw, and Mark craps all over it.
I don’t think the Cubs should move either Paredes or Hoerner at the moment but it makes so much more sense to deal Paredes than Nico.
Is Shaw likely to reproduce Nico’s 4 WAR or Paredes 2? Nico’s elite defense or Paredes negative defensive WAR? Nico’s elite bat to ball skills and speed or Paredes’s 20 home runs and 20 doubles?
We all know about Wrigley snuffing out offense last season and we know Paredes was pretty good on the road but you know who else eas very good outside of Wrigley? Nico. .287/.365/.400+ with six of his 7 home runs and 21 of his 31 steals. That is exactly the “growth” that was missing from Nico’s game. Trading him would be the biggest mistake of Hoyers tenor
I was hoping Seattle would trade for Nico but I can see that would be an unpopular move in Chicago. And I don’t think Chicago would be happy with just prospects for Nico.
I don’t know, it seems some Cub fans really think it would be wise to trade Nico to open up second for an unproven prospect with no MLB experience. I don’t see Hoyer doing it though, he values defense and respects Nico’s skill set too much.
The only way I would deal Hoerner is for a front of the rotation starter. He’s a 4 WAR player with two seasons remaining and over 40 million is surplus value.
Tigers need a right handed OF bat and an inning eater… what are the chances the Phillies would deal Nick Castellanos and Taijuan Walker? Both are on 2 year deals. Nick $20M both years and Walker $18M both years.
Phillies probably want to shed some payroll and get better defense in the outfield. Phillies have some good young pitching coming up to take Walker’s spot… Wheeler, Nola, Sanchez, Suarez are holding the top 4 spots. Painter… Abel… Seth Johnson, all could challenge for the number 5 spot. Or, it is Dave Dombrowski… they could go big and sign another top starter (Snell? Fried? Manaea?) or pick up another top bat for RF or LF and move Marsh to RF. Santander? Profar? Teoscar?
It probably wouldn’t cost the Tigers much… in fact they may even be able to squeeze a prospect out of them for taking on so much salary. SS Starlyn Castro? OF Justin Crawford?
Tigers add Nick and Walker and a prospect. Nick becomes the RF/DH right handed bat they seek. Walker was great just recently in 2023. He could rebound.
Do you think it makes sense?
I would imagine the Tigers are trying to improve and I don’t see how those 2 make them better. Not to mention, Nick C was once a Tiger and they won’t revisit that partnership.
I like the idea but the Tigers should aim higher and they aren’t going to want to take on all that salary. This is a move for somebody like the Angels.