Angels on the “verge” of acquiring 3B...

[ukyah]

35 minutes ago, Dtwncbad said:

Machado deal isn't happening but you are missing the point that likely any team interested in trading for Machado now will be asking for a window to get him signed long term before they send half their farm away to get him.

i agree, machado is not coming here. to your second point, i find it difficult to believe on two fronts. firstly, i don't believe a team can throw together the first 350+ million dollar contract overnight, in the middle of the busiest time of year for them. that is a record breaking contract and it takes a lot of time to hammer everything out contractually, not even the dollars and cents part. secondly, marquee players don't sign contracts once they are in their last year before FA, almost ever? they get an extension done two years out or they go to FA.

machado is going to FA, just the same as bryce harper. they are going to get PAAAAAIIIIID, and their reps want that bidding war like they wanted their momma's titty when they were newborn.

[Warfarin]

3 minutes ago, IheartLA said:

If Richards gets hurt again he's gone, this year is a huge question for our pitching. We have so many guys that we just don't know what we are going to get, basically our entire starting rotation.

I also never said Harper..we already have the highest paid OF.

and LOL at Maldonado for $10M, he put up a 1.1 WAR. Suzuki put up 2.7 WAR and got $3.5M. Maldonado was 27th in WAR among catchers, he will get maybe half that.

Cabrera got AAV $31M, Trout $34M, Cano $24M, Stanton $30M. Harper/Machado will not want to be free agents at age 35+, I think they'll prioritize "years" over annual value, kinda like Cano did. Maybe $25M but no way they get 15 years at $35M. And besides I'd rather sign Donaldson for 5 years at $30M, if Kershaw isn't going to resign with the Dodgers his next choice would probably be us since he's so invested in the community/his family. He's not taking less than what Scherzer/Greinke/Price got and I don't think the Dodgers will give him that so I think Arte might pounce. 

Look at the Yankees, they made Stanton work by getting rid of a solid player in Castro , if we got Donaldson/Kershaw and we were near the luxury line like your post suggests, then they would probably flip Calhoun. Our top prospects are all OF's and by this time next year one of them could be in AA knocking on the door like Gleyber Torres is for them.

You make it sound like it's dumb to want to sign elite talent, the dumb thing to do would be to sign a 2 WAR player that has no secondary skills for $18-20M. Are you Moose's real life friend or something?

Richards is probably gone, as he just hasn't proven he can stay healthy at all.  I like him, but the guy just can't stay on the field.  Would be a gigantic risk to sign him to any kind of substantial contract.

I can see Maldonado signing a 2-3 year deal at 10 AAV.  He's a gold glove, elite defensive catcher.  In an analytics-driven era, elite defensive catchers are incredibly valuable.

No one is signing 15 year contracts, I never implied that.  Kershaw can fairly easily sign a 7/210 I imagine, maybe even more.  He's easily going to crack 30mil AAV.  Kershaw is from Texas and has a lot of ties there, so if the Dodgers pass, I can see Texas being a player for him.

Donaldson at 5/30?  I'd be stunned if he signs for something that low.

The Yankees made the Stanton deal work because they have payroll flexibility currently and took advantage of a fire-sale-ing Marlins team.  They got Stanton at 22mil AAV.

Keep in mind, we are currently paying two players at superstar level (Trout and Pujols).  Incidentally, one is the best player in the game, one the worst.  There's only so much payroll room to accommodate guys like that.  If you want to add Kershaw, that'll be another 35mil AAV guy to that list.  And you want to add one more beyond that?  You're going to tie up over 110mil AAV to just 4 guys, one of whom is entirely useless.  

And no, I am not Moose's friend.  I don't think I said anything about signing him in my post...

[IheartLA]

10 minutes ago, Warfarin said:

Versatility is definitely key.  I agree that Cron is probably not long for his roster anymore.  He's a 1B/DH only, and we already have one of those in Pujols.  At least Valbuena and Marte can play both 3B and 1B.  Kinsler plays elite defense at second and can likewise probably fairly easily defend 3B as well.  Whoever our 4th OF ends up being will probably a CF who can capably man the corners too.  The final utility spot, IMO, will be occupied by someone who can cover SS/2B/3B.  Cowart will probably open up in AAA, continue to work on his game, and hopefully earn his way back to the big leagues.

My point was people want Moose because he's left handed and hit 38 homers. Well if you pro rate Cron's at bats he'll hit 30 homers too, adjust for park effects and he's effectively a 1B Moose. Slow, stone hands, bad body, low OBP. Valbuena had a 94 WRC, you can't count on him/pujols/plus the dh. That's potentially 3 black holes, we can easily compete for a WC berth this year. But Valbuena needs to be a bat off the bench or if Pujols is putting up negative WAR again you can put him in. If he's in a platoon with Marte at 3B, Pujols/Cron at 1b/DH that's a huge problem. 

If you get Headley you will move Valbuena to a backup 1b/3b role which is a better look. Big teams like the Astros, Dodgers utilized their bench. We got rid of Maybin and he played a key role for them off the bench/defense. We can't have our entire bench being trash like Featherston/Cowart/Valbuena/Marte all with below 100 WRC. 

[wopphil]

When are we going to sign Darvish?

[IheartLA]

1 minute ago, Warfarin said:

Richards is probably gone, as he just hasn't proven he can stay healthy at all.  I like him, but the guy just can't stay on the field.  Would be a gigantic risk to sign him to any kind of substantial contract.

I can see Maldonado signing a 2-3 year deal at 10 AAV.  He's a gold glove, elite defensive catcher.  In an analytics-driven era, elite defensive catchers are incredibly valuable.

No one is signing 15 year contracts, I never implied that.  Kershaw can fairly easily sign a 7/210 I imagine, maybe even more.  He's easily going to crack 30mil AAV.  Kershaw is from Texas and has a lot of ties there, so if the Dodgers pass, I can see Texas being a player for him.

Donaldson at 5/30?  I'd be stunned if he signs for something that low.

The Yankees made the Stanton deal work because they have payroll flexibility currently and took advantage of a fire-sale-ing Marlins team.  They got Stanton at 22mil AAV.

Keep in mind, we are currently paying two players at superstar level (Trout and Pujols).  Incidentally, one is the best player in the game, one the worst.  There's only so much payroll room to accommodate guys like that.  If you want to add Kershaw, that'll be another 35mil AAV guy to that list.  And you want to add one more beyond that?  You're going to tie up over 110mil AAV to just 4 guys, one of whom is entirely useless.  

And no, I am not Moose's friend.  I don't think I said anything about signing him in my post...

 

I meant Donaldson at $30M a year till age 38. Not $30M total. I was just making the point we had massive payroll flexibility to sign an elite player.

Top 5 according to WAR

3B: Rendon, Bryant, Arenado, Turner, Donaldson

SS: Lindor, Seager, Correa, Cozart, Simmons

2B: Altuve, Ramirez, Dozier, Murphy, Schoop

Almost all the elite infielders play for the top teams. Yet we're supposed to run out 22nd ranked Moose and a 35yr old at 2B AND huge black holes at 1B and potentially DH. We're also 27th at C, even with the outstanding defense.

[rottiesworld]

I wouldn't do many years or money on Kershaw who has shown a lot of problems with his back. We already have pitchers who have injury problems.

[Stradling]

So were top five at SS, probably close to top five in LF, top 1 in CF.  

[Warfarin]

2 minutes ago, IheartLA said:

 

I meant Donaldson at $30M a year till age 38. Not $30M total. I was just making the point we had massive payroll flexibility to sign an elite player.

Top 5 according to WAR

3B: Rendon, Bryant, Arenado, Turner, Donaldson

SS: Lindor, Seager, Correa, Cozart, Simmons

2B: Altuve, Ramirez, Dozier, Murphy, Schoop

Almost all the elite infielders play for the top teams. Yet we're supposed to run out 22nd ranked Moose and a 35yr old at 2B AND huge black holes at 1B and potentially DH. We're also 27th at C, even with the outstanding defense.

Well, we have one of the top SS, so that's a start.

Keep in mind Kinsler was a 5-6 WAR player as recently as 2016.  Yes, it's unlikely that at age 36, he is going to revert back to that, but he's still way better than anyone we had last year.  We are incrementally improving while also not sacrificing any of our gradually improving farm system either.  Eppler is doing a great job of fortifying both the major AND minor league systems.  That's extremely difficult to do.

Moose isn't even on the team currently.  He may not even be a target of Eppler's.  If we sign him, then you can go ahead and bash that, but we haven't made that move.  

I understand your point about elite players, but keep in mind we have the best PLAYER in the game in Trout and one of the top SS.  Eppler inherited a bad situation in terms of both payroll flexibility and a terrible farm system.  Rome wasn't built overnight, and Eppler has been doing his best to build both aspects of the team.  I am very please with the progress so far.

[VariousCrap]

Jeff Fletcher‏Verified account @JeffFletcherOCR 10m10 minutes ago

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Just an educated guess, but I feel like the #Angels aren't going to make any moves that require them to give up any top 15-type prospects or any draft picks. Don't want to lose anything in quest to rebuild farm system. Kinsler basically only cost money. (more)

Jeff Fletcher‏Verified account @JeffFletcherOCR 8m8 minutes ago

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That leaves guys like Todd Frazier, Chase Headley, Eduardo Nunez, Freddy Galvis, Logan Morrison to fill out their infield/bench. Probably not Moustakas (draft pick), definitely not Machado (prospects).

[Chuck]

So we've been on the verge of signing a 3B for how long now?

[Stradling]

Just now, Chuckster70 said:

So we've been on the verge of signing a 3B for how long now?

Ask your little birdie

[Chuck]

1 minute ago, VariousCrap said:

Jeff Fletcher‏Verified account @JeffFletcherOCR 10m10 minutes ago

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Just an educated guess, but I feel like the #Angels aren't going to make any moves that require them to give up any top 15-type prospects or any draft picks. Don't want to lose anything in quest to rebuild farm system. Kinsler basically only cost money. (more)

Jeff Fletcher‏Verified account @JeffFletcherOCR 8m8 minutes ago

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That leaves guys like Todd Frazier, Chase Headley, Eduardo Nunez, Freddy Galvis, Logan Morrison to fill out their infield/bench. Probably not Moustakas (draft pick), definitely not Machado (prospects).

Like @Jeff Fletcher said.. just a guess. 

We've been guessing all winter. 

[Homebrewer]

1 minute ago, Chuckster70 said:

So we've been on the verge of signing a 3B for how long now?

a decade

[Chuck]

Just now, Stradling said:

Ask your little birdie

He's reserved for bigger things. 

[Tyler]

41 minutes ago, Stradling said:

The reason people are forgetting that is because it isn’t true.  

 

GOT HEEEEM

[Homebrewer]

The last decent 3B the Angels had wasn't even a 3B

Figgy.. 

[IheartLA]

8 minutes ago, Warfarin said:

Well, we have one of the top SS, so that's a start.

Keep in mind Kinsler was a 5-6 WAR player as recently as 2016.  Yes, it's unlikely that at age 36, he is going to revert back to that, but he's still way better than anyone we had last year.  We are incrementally improving while also not sacrificing any of our gradually improving farm system either.  Eppler is doing a great job of fortifying both the major AND minor league systems.  That's extremely difficult to do.

Moose isn't even on the team currently.  He may not even be a target of Eppler's.  If we sign him, then you can go ahead and bash that, but we haven't made that move.  

I understand your point about elite players, but keep in mind we have the best PLAYER in the game in Trout and one of the top SS.  Eppler inherited a bad situation in terms of both payroll flexibility and a terrible farm system.  Rome wasn't built overnight, and Eppler has been doing his best to build both aspects of the team.  I am very please with the progress so far.

I think we agree more than we both think, Throwman was the Moose lover now that I'm rereading the posts. He downvoted me because I said I didn't think Moose was a good signing.

The top teams have top five talent at half the positions. And the other are top ten-ish. They also have almost no black holes. We have Trout, Simmons, Upton who are all top 5, Calhoun was top 7ish the two years before last. But We are literally in the bottom ten percentile for DH, 1B, 3B. LF/2B were huge problems but i'm confident in the moves made there. My point is our mindset as an organization should be making our own young talent first, but since we're so behind we can't just sit there and draft for 5 years and wait. So we need to sign the elite talent out there in the intermediate rather than sign guys like Moose/Frazier.  The value of $/WAR goes down as you marginally higher on the WAR table. 

Plus Scioscia/Eppler might not be around after this year, signing Moose would seem like a huge panic buy to win a couple more games now, since they might not be around to sign the better players next year.

[Angelsfan1984]

Just get Nunez on the cheap to platoon with valbuena. Add a closer like reed or one of the top end starters and call it a day 

[Bull58]

2 minutes ago, Angelsfan1984 said:

Just get Nunez on the cheap to platoon with valbuena. Add a closer like reed or one of the top end starters and call it a day 

That's funny, was just outside thinking this same exact thing.

[Warfarin]

3 minutes ago, IheartLA said:

I think we agree more than we both think, Throwman was the Moose lover now that I'm rereading the posts. He downvoted me because I said I didn't think Moose was a good signing.

The top teams have top five talent at half the positions. And the other are top ten-ish. They also have almost no black holes. We have Trout, Simmons, Upton who are all top 5, Calhoun was top 7ish the two years before last. But We are literally in the bottom ten percentile for DH, 1B, 3B. LF/2B were huge problems but i'm confident in the moves made there. My point is our mindset as an organization should be making our own young talent first, but since we're so behind we can't just sit there and draft for 5 years and wait. So we need to sign the elite talent out there in the intermediate rather than sign guys like Moose/Frazier.  The value of $/WAR goes down as you marginally higher on the WAR table. 

Plus Scioscia/Eppler might not be around after this year, signing Moose would seem like a huge panic buy to a couple more games now, since they might not be around to sign the better players next year.

Right, I agree that we can't just keep drafting and waiting.  We are systematically plugging holes and improving.  Comparing a year ago vs now, we have Upton instead of Maybe in LF, Kinsler instead of Espinoza at 2B, and Ohtani (part-time) at DH.  Those are huge upgrades.

I agree on Moose.  I go back and forth on him, but I'd rather hang onto the 2nd round pick and would prefer someone with more plate discipline than he currently offers.  The draw of Moose, IMO, is that we are short on left-handed power, which he definitely does provide.  

[VariousCrap]

This is pretty cool to know:

Evan Woodbery‏Verified account @evanwoodbery

FollowFollow @evanwoodbery

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Al Avila talked to four teams today about Kinsler. All were on his no-trade list. Angels were the only team he would approve.

[IheartLA]

Trout - 1st

Upton - 2nd

Calhoun - 15th (but previous years was top seven-ish)

Simmons - 5th (bbrWAR has him 1st btw)

Maldonado - 27th (I'm putting him with the guaranteed starters since I think he is in their minds b/c of defense and the fact that catcher is treated differently from the other positions). 

So we have:

1b - 26th out of 30

2b - Kinsler (low babip, could bounce back, but getting to age where decline could be a steep cliff) but we were 28th out of 30...

3b - 21st out of 30

DH - Dead last.. 17th out of 17

The three teams that won 100 games had beast up the middle combos:

Lindor/Ramirez

Correa/Altuve

Seager/Taylor (I think they'll move him since they have 6 outfielders)

Nationals, Yankees, Cubs had stacked teams, almost everyone was top ten. Twins have a phenom coming up to play SS with Dozier. It's going to be hard to compete without elite talent. The thing is WE DO have elite talent, but our black holes are SO bad. To have half our lineup being below 100 wrc, 1 WAR is a disgrace.

 

 

[VariousCrap]

11 minutes ago, Angelsfan1984 said:

Just get Nunez on the cheap to platoon with valbuena.

 

I think if the Angels get Nunez, you'd see him take over as full time at 3B.  His ability to lead off with that speed would be hard to not have in the line-up every game.

[Tyler]

8 minutes ago, IheartLA said:

I think we agree more than we both think, Throwman was the Moose lover now that I'm rereading the posts. He downvoted me because I said I didn't think Moose was a good signing.

The top teams have top five talent at half the positions. And the other are top ten-ish. They also have almost no black holes. We have Trout, Simmons, Upton who are all top 5, Calhoun was top 7ish the two years before last. But We are literally in the bottom ten percentile for DH, 1B, 3B. LF/2B were huge problems but i'm confident in the moves made there. My point is our mindset as an organization should be making our own young talent first, but since we're so behind we can't just sit there and draft for 5 years and wait. So we need to sign the elite talent out there in the intermediate rather than sign guys like Moose/Frazier.  The value of $/WAR goes down as you marginally higher on the WAR table. 

Plus Scioscia/Eppler might not be around after this year, signing Moose would seem like a huge panic buy to win a couple more games now, since they might not be around to sign the better players next year.

I think it's important to distinguish Moose is the 2015-2017 player now and not the young, early 20's  prospect anymore. He isn't a .220 hitter.650 OPS guy.. he's grown into a .270, .320ish, .800 ops 3b who is local and supposedly open to a discount. He would be leaving a huge pitchers park so you know his numbers were hamstrung by this fact. 

[Angelsjunky]

Basically Moustakas is....Mark Trumbo. Whoopie. But plays decent 3B, at least.