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IT's Offseason Blueprint

IndianaTwin

Entry posted by IndianaTwin in Rosters ·

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The idea of taking a shot at an offseason plan is always a fun one. Here's my attempt. As best as I could, I used the arbitration projections cited elsewhere. I also used the free agent projections at MLBTradeRumors as starting points. And I had the advantage of being able to include the Urshela and Farmer moves and other action that's happened to date. 

 

First, the sunk costs – options that didn’t get picked up: Bundy $1M, Archer $.75M and Sano $2.75M for a total cost of $4.5M

Next is the rotation guys already on the roster – Gray $11.825M, Ryan $1M, Mahle $7.2M, Maeda $3.125M, Paddack $2.4M, Dobnak $1.5M, Winder $0.75M, Ober $0.75M, for a total cost of $28.5M. I’m willing to run with this group of eight, knowing I’ve got Woods Richardson, Varland, Enlow, Balazovic, Henriquez and Enlow in St. Paul. I’ll also grab a couple Aaron Sanchez/Dereck Rodriguez-types on minor league contracts to see if I can catch lightning in a bottle.  

Relievers on the roster – Duran $0.725M, Thielbar $2.4M, Lopez $3.7, Moran $0.725M, Jax $0.75M, Alcala $0.8M, for a total cost of $9.1M. The close reader will note the absence of Pagan. I’m actually not that averse to keeping him around, but I’m going to take advantage of the rumor mill that says multiple teams expressed interest. Stay tuned.

Catcher – Jeffers at $1.3M. We’ll need more, obviously. Stay tuned.

Infield – The mixture of Miranda (1b/3b) $0.75M, Farmer (ss/3b) $5.9M, Arraez (1b/2b) $5M, Polanco (2b) $7.5M and Gordon (2b/ss) $0.75M gets us a base-level infield at $19.9M, with Lewis and Lee waiting in the wings. You might wanna stay tuned, however.

Outfield – The mix of Buxton $15.143, Kepler $8.5M, Larnach $1M, Kirilloff $1M, Celestino $0.725, Wallner $0.725M and Cave $0.8M gives flexibility at $27.893M. I think Kepler will bounce back and at least one of the Larnach/Kirilloff/Wallner trio will fully blossom. Consider as well that Gordon and even Lewis or Lee could fit into this picture as well.

And that gives us a total cost of $91.193M so far, with just the need for a catcher, bullpen depth and miscellaneous other improvements. There's really no one on this list that can't DH, so I'm assuming people will rotate through that spot.

We’ll start with catcher. The Blue Jays are operating from a position of depth with Alejandro Kirk, mega-prospect Gabriel Moreno and still-young Danny Jansen. It’s also a team that is seeking bullpen depth, so I’m going to offer Pagan for Jansen. It may take a prospect to add to the mix, but I’m comfortable that it won’t need to be a highly ranked guy, so I’ll plug in Jansen at $3.7M, bringing us to $94.893M.

I’m still needing bullpen depth, but I’ll first address the elephant in the room – miscellaneous improvements. I give Correa a raise to $35.5M per year for the next four years, with an opt out, followed by two years at $32M with another opt out, followed by two years at $30M. That’s a guarantee of $266M over eight years, but it's front-loaded for him and gives him the ability to opt out after his age 31 and 33 seasons, both ages when he’s still young enough to get a six- or four-year deal. With his $35.5M for 2023, our total is $130.393M as we head to the bullpen.

I’ve always had a thing for David Robertson, and he proved me right this year. He’s served as a closer and as a setup guy in the past, and I offer him the 2/$16M MLBTR suggests. I’m generally skeptical of big contracts to relievers, but seeing Kenley Jansen at 2/$26M is too good to pass up.

That pushes the budget up to $151.393, but I’ll have a bit of savings in that I’ve got dollar figures attached to 30 guys. Though all 30 guys will see MLB time at some point, several of them won’t get the total listed here, since they’ll spend some time in the minors. I figure that’ll save a couple million.

And as it turns out, I’ve got a March birthday, and the bosses give me a birthday present. On MLBTRs list, they’ve got dollar values assigned to nine relievers, with an annual salaries of $4.5M at the bottom. In their list of “honorable mention,” they’ve got Michael Fulmer, Craig Kimbrel, Seth Lugo, Matt Moore and Matt Strahm. If any of them don’t get a major league deal, I give them a minor league contract with opt-out dates and an incentive-based contract.

And the birthday present gets even better – to me, the most conspicuous name that’s missing from MLTTR's article is Aroldis Chapman. Seeing him unsigned, I give him a $3M guarantee with incentives and look forward to him slamming the door in Game 7 of the ALCS at Yankee Stadium.

Chapman’s $3M balances the bit of savings that’s in guys who’ve been optioned, and leaves me with a budget of just over $150M, but when the higher-ups think about adding Chapman, Jansen, Robertson and a veteran on a minor league contract to a bullpen that already has Duran, Jax, Lopez, Thielbar, Alcala and Moran, they say “Go for it” and give me a $300 bonus gift certificate to spend in the team store.

But alas, that’s still not enough to get one of the new jerseys. I liked the old ones better anyway.   

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Karbo

You can take Cave off your list as he was claimed I think. I like a lot of your blueprint, though I would be concerned that they don't have the long relief (2-3 innings every 2-3 days) to get through the short starts of 5 or less innings.

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IndianaTwin
On 11/24/2022 at 10:31 AM, Karbo said:

You can take Cave off your list as he was claimed I think. I like a lot of your blueprint, though I would be concerned that they don't have the long relief (2-3 innings every 2-3 days) to get through the short starts of 5 or less innings.

Thanks. I knew, but missed that. Guess that frees up a little to make sure Chapman fits!

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IndianaTwin
3 hours ago, milkytoast said:

That you think the Blue Jays would be remotely interested in a Jansen/Pagan swap is baffling. hahahaha

I’m going off the word on the street that says teams have expressed interest in Pagan, along with assuming there would need to be some level of prospect inclusion. 

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milkytoast
20 minutes ago, IndianaTwin said:

I’m going off the word on the street that says teams have expressed interest in Pagan, along with assuming there would need to be some level of prospect inclusion. 

Teams expressed interest in taking on Pagan's contract for a minimal prospect, but it doesn't mean he has a lot of trade value. Jansen is a highly sought after player and would take a lot to trade for. 

 

This is a good resource to see how players' trade values compare. https://www.baseballtradevalues.com/trade-simulator/ A fair trade would be Royce Lewis for Jansen or Jose Miranda for Jansen. They list Pagan as having 0 trade value, which is pretty close to true.

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DocBauer

Just a note on your finances...if I'm understanding you, and didn't miss something...you are including the $4.5M for Sano, Archer, and Bundy? Those buyouts actually count towards the 2022 season. That gives you another $4.5M to play with on your budget.

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IndianaTwin
On 11/25/2022 at 11:49 AM, milkytoast said:

Teams expressed interest in taking on Pagan's contract for a minimal prospect, but it doesn't mean he has a lot of trade value. Jansen is a highly sought after player and would take a lot to trade for. 

 

This is a good resource to see how players' trade values compare. https://www.baseballtradevalues.com/trade-simulator/ A fair trade would be Royce Lewis for Jansen or Jose Miranda for Jansen. They list Pagan as having 0 trade value, which is pretty close to true.

There are a number of guys, including Pagan, who have no contract information other than the years of control. I see that on other teams as well, and all of them seem to be people who are in the arbitration window. It's not all people in the arbitration window, but there's enough of them that I read it as "incomplete." 

And I know that being a catcher has value, but it's hard for me to believe that two years of Jansen is worth six years of Lewis or Miranda. 

image.png

 

I was also basing my comment off this tweet. It's a tweet, so who knows what "far more interest" means, but it suggests that he's seen as having at least some value. I should have been more clear in my original post in saying that it would take more than Pagan, but I'd like to think his inclusion would soften the prospect inclusion need. 

image.png.e3dc6adf985b699eda650bfd43e7a260.png

 

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IndianaTwin
On 11/25/2022 at 3:50 PM, DocBauer said:

Just a note on your finances...if I'm understanding you, and didn't miss something...you are including the $4.5M for Sano, Archer, and Bundy? Those buyouts actually count towards the 2022 season. That gives you another $4.5M to play with on your budget.

You did read me correctly, and apparently I've misunderstood that part.

With your understanding, plus the $800k from my mistakenly including Cave, I'm adding Fulmer to the bullpen as well. 

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IndianaTwin
On 11/24/2022 at 10:31 AM, Karbo said:

You can take Cave off your list as he was claimed I think. I like a lot of your blueprint, though I would be concerned that they don't have the long relief (2-3 innings every 2-3 days) to get through the short starts of 5 or less innings.

I thought of the fact that I hadn't identified someone as a longer relief guy. However, I do think that last year's shorter starts were an injury-based aberration, based on prior years' starter usage patterns when the Twins were more or less at league average. 

I also considered several other factors. First, I think the overall rotation will be stronger than a year ago, so there will be fewer really short starts. Second, they don't have an Archer in the mix, which was a guaranteed start of no more than five and often just four innings. The possible exception is Maeda. However, if he's indeed not up to a normal starter's workload, he's someone who does actually have the experience of being a several-inning guy in the bullpen. Third, my bullpen has a lot of experience, including guys who are more used to going on back-to-back days than last year's bullpen was. Finally, with the overall strength of this bullpen, they can afford to shift a guy like Jax to being a two-inning guy on occasion. With this year's experience, they couldn't do that, since they couldn't afford to use him up for a couple days. 

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milkytoast

I agree the trade simulator is not a perfect tool, but it gives a good starting point to look at. And yes, the price for well-performing veteran players with multiple years of service time left is very steep! I personally wouldn't trade Lewis or Miranda for Jansen either, but that is in the realm of what it would cost. That's why more likely, it would take multiple lower-level guys to add up to that value. 

 

Idk if you have The Athletic access or not, but there was an article where different beat reporters made hypothetical offers for the Blue Jays catchers and Gleeman suggested Kepler, Balazovic and Sands and it was shot down because there wasn't anything in the package that was high enough quality. https://theathletic.com/3924479/2022/11/24/blue-jays-trade-catching/ I think if you do that trade but switch Kepler with Larnach, then that's closer to what it would take.

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insagt1

Cave is now the Orioles problem. He will end up in Norfolk as an emergency callup probably. They must have seen some value because the O's are on the upswing

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