Zack Greinke?

[totdprods]

Arizona would love to shed that contract and while he’d be eat up a lot of money, he’d possibly give you similar production and control from what you’d expect of Kluber going forward, for a lot less prospect cost. Perhaps Arizona eats some money, perhaps they take Calhoun, perhaps we get back prospects.

Durable and healthy.

[Blarg]

No.

[eligrba]

[Blarg]

He is owed $35 million a year from age 35-37. Just how much money do you think that is worth if you tie in age regression?

I don't see the Diamondbacks chipping in that much and giving them Calhoun just means the Angels need to spend for a right fielder. I don't think there is any economic solution to validate your trade idea. 

[totdprods]

What if Arizona ate $30m total, threw in Robbie Ray (maybe Jake Lamb?) and the Angels kicked back Calhoun and reasonable prospects (including a name or two we’d cringe on) for the return. 

Basically two good SP and an optionable CIF with big upside for $25m. Pretty hard to beat that on the open market.

By getting Greinke and Ray, it makes it a lot easier for the Angels to non-tender the trio of Shoe, Ramirez, and Trop, saving almost $8m, bringing you to only $17m or that $30m spent. Lamb’s presence and upside allows the Angels to breath a bit on any trades involving Thaiss, Ward, or, less so, one of Jones, Fletcher, Rengifo, be it in this deal or elsewhere. 

With that remaining $13m (which could be more if you dump off Bedrosian, Parker, Alvarez, or Robles), snag someone like Grossman, Marisnick, Jay, or Chisenhall for RF for $3-4m, a cheap catcher like McCann, Phegley, Wolters, or d’Arnaud for $3-4m, and a vet reliever for $6-8m.

Greinke, Skaggs, Ray, Barria, Heaney

Parker, Bedrosian, Robles, Anderson, Pena, Brice, Buttrey, Alvarez, and the FA all in the mix 

SS Simmons, 3B Lamb, CF Trout, DH Ohtani, LF Upton, 1B Pujols, 2B Cozart, C McCann, RF Grossman

Smith, Fletcher, Hermosillo, etc for bench

[Dtwncbad]

I would rather just pay for Corbin.

One easy transaction that is cheaper and he is 6 years younger.

[totdprods]

2 minutes ago, Dtwncbad said:

I would rather just pay for Corbin.

One easy transaction that is cheaper and he is 6 years younger.

So if both cost say, $25m a year, you would prefer Corbin and keeping prospects at 5/$125m vs. 3/$75m and a couple prospects (lets say Suarez, Ward, and a notable low-level or two) for the package of Greinke, Ray, and Lamb?

FWIW, Corbin’s career year last season came with 4.6 WAR and a 137 ERA+ and Greinke posted 4.2 WAR with a 135 ERA+. 

[DMVol]

I might consider it if I felt reasonably good about his health....and if the DBacks would take Calhoun....and if the prospect cost was minimal.....

[TroutField]

If we are eating the Greinke contract they can throw in either Lamb or Ray with no prospects going either way. That contract is awful they would be ecstatic just to get rid of it 

[Dtwncbad]

7 minutes ago, totdprods said:

So if both cost say, $25m a year, you would prefer Corbin and keeping prospects at 5/$125m vs. 3/$75m and a couple prospects (lets say Suarez, Ward, and a notable low-level or two) for the package of Greinke, Ray, and Lamb?

FWIW, Corbin’s career year last season came with 4.6 WAR and a 137 ERA+ and Greinke posted 4.2 WAR with a 135 ERA+. 

Corbin is 6 years younger and he is not getting $25m per year.

I actually doubt he gets a 5 year deal.  5 year deals for pitchers are getting more and more scarce.

My position on this is attached to my prediction that Corbin will get something like 4/88m.  Maybe he gets the 5th year and it ends up 5/110m

Given this opinion, yes I certainly choose 5 years of Corbin over acquiring 3 years of Greinke at a similar overall cost.

By the way, Corbin would be younger than Grienke is now in year 4 and 5 of the deal.

[totdprods]

18 minutes ago, Dtwncbad said:

Corbin is 6 years younger and he is not getting $25m per year.

I actually doubt he gets a 5 year deal.  5 year deals for pitchers are getting more and more scarce.

My position on this is attached to my prediction that Corbin will get something like 4/88m.  Maybe he gets the 5th year and it ends up 5/110m

Given this opinion, yes I certainly choose 5 years of Corbin over acquiring 3 years of Greinke at a similar overall cost.

By the way, Corbin would be younger than Grienke is now in year 4 and 5 of the deal.

I’m going off the ‘expert’ predictions so while I personally agree a 5/125 seems unlikely, $22-$25m annually isn’t out of the question, especially if it’s a deal under 5 years, and I feel it’s at least a good basis for the discussion . And the difference between $22m-$25m isn’t terribly great either.

Corbin would be younger of course, even near the end of the deal, but prior to this year he has never amounted to anything too special. Greinke has been consistently excellent for well over a decade, and while that will burst one day, he hasn’t slowed much, appears to be aging well, and we’d hopefully get at least two years of good production out of him - two years that fall in that Trout window.

My main interest in Greinke is actually behind three other aspects of the deal: 1) who else can we get them to throw in, using shedding Zack money as a catalyst (Ray and Lamb both have enormous upside) 2) shedding Calhoun’s salary and 3) landing immediate frontline pitching help for minimal prospect capital - good for win-now, good for the future. Simply signing Corbin doesn’t bring all three of those to the table.

As stated it depends on how much money Arizona eats and what the prospect cost would actually be. 

Looking at it another way, if Skaggs takes another step, Canning develops, and Ohtani returns next year, your ‘19 rotation could be Ohtani, Skaggs, Greinke, Heaney, Canning, Barria...he’s still eating up a ton of dollars, but that’s a very cheap rotation, one where any Greinke regression might be lessened by the development of others.

Great article on the Athletic the other day by Rosenthal on Greinke. He’d be an amazing mentor for Canning.

[Dtwncbad]

By many accounts the Angels are watching cash flow carefully.  The idea that they will absorb a $34m salary is sort of silly.  You can add all kinds of names Arizona would add to the deal so they would be able to dump the $34m on the Angels but the reality is the Angels do not want to take on a $34m salary for a 35 year old pitcher.

You could add a player worth $10m "for free" and the Angels would still mathematically be taking on $25m per year for a 35 year old pitcher.

No.

[totdprods]

Justin Verlander just had his third-best season at age 35, as well. Hamels, the same age as Greinke, 34, looked dominant as a Cub. Scherzer, one year younger, just had one of his best seasons. Arrieta, Kluber and Price are 32 and still producing. Sabathia, at 37, has maintained above-average production. 

Different situations for all of those pitchers, but I feel Greinke is in a similar class. They’ve all shown extreme durability and consistency while posting great production. Undoubtedly it will come to an end one day, but it’s not totally unrealistic that Greinke can keep at least around #2-3 production for another year or two. 

It’d come down to the $$$ but I don’t think it’s an awful idea.

[totdprods]

7 minutes ago, Dtwncbad said:

By many accounts the Angels are watching cash flow carefully.  The idea that they will absorb a $34m salary is sort of silly.  You can add all kinds of names Arizona would add to the deal so they would be able to dump the $34m on the Angels but the reality is the Angels do not want to take on a $34m salary for a 35 year old pitcher.

You could add a player worth $10m "for free" and the Angels would still mathematically be taking on $25m per year for a 35 year old pitcher.

No.

You’re not wrong. Greinke at $25m each year for 3 years might backfire terribly, it might work out perfectly.

Either way, I think it’s at least an interesting conversation.

[Pancake Bear]

Depends how much money AZ holds onto. His numbers still look pretty good - I’m not sure how much velo he’s lost recently, though. 

[totdprods]

The Greinke portion of the article I referenced:

https://theathletic.com/648425/2018/11/12/rosenthal-greinkes-trade-value-canos-future-in-seattle-yanks-seeking-background-info-on-machado/

“Not only is Greinke creative and skilled enough to adjust to his diminished velocity, but he also remains, in the words of his manager, Torey Lovullo, “an unbelievable competitor.”...“He came in, and I had everything kind of mapped out on a calendar inside my office. It talks about who is going to be projected 7-10-15 days in advance. And it obviously changes very often. He said, ‘Hey, I just want to make sure I’m on the same page with you guys.’ And he mapped it out. He pointed to it and said, ‘I want to pitch here and here, and if I get the chance I’ll pitch on the fourth day if we’re still involved on the final weekend of the season in San Diego.’

“When Zack does that and makes those kinds of statements, you just say OK and listen. Then I asked him, ‘Why?’ I can’t remember all the details. But he said, ‘I don’t want the Dodgers to clinch here (in Arizona). We’re still going to be in it here. And on the last day, obviously, I want to be the guy who is going to step up and win a game to help us go to the playoffs.”

Feel like he’d be a good mentor, especially if he stayed above-average to average.

[bped1981]

If AZ is dead set on getting rid of Greinke, Any chance we trade our bad contract (pujols) with a 10-15 ranked prospect for Greinke?

I dont see AZ getting much if anything in return--this deal would save them about 20m over 3 years and net them something in return?

Both come off the books in 2022...At least the pitcher would be more useful..

 

[totdprods]

1 minute ago, bped1981 said:

If AZ is dead set on getting rid of Greinke, Any chance we trade our bad contract (pujols) with a 10-15 ranked prospect for Greinke?

I dont see AZ getting much if anything in return--this deal would save them about 20m over 3 years and net them something in return?

Both come off the books in 2022...At least the pitcher would be more useful..

Pujols has a no-trade, and even if Arizona subsequently dealt Goldschmidt, I doubt either Albert or Arizona would be interested in at the prospect of playing in ARI.

[Tank]

if free agency doesn't bring us any better starting pitching than we currently have, i'd absolutely call the dbacks about greinke.

he may not be what he once was, but he's easily better than anyone we currently have.

[Jay]

NFW

[Ace-Of-Diamonds]

On 11/12/2018 at 8:40 AM, totdprods said:

Arizona would love to shed that contract and while he’d be eat up a lot of money, he’d possibly give you similar production and control from what you’d expect of Kluber going forward, for a lot less prospect cost. Perhaps Arizona eats some money, perhaps they take Calhoun, perhaps we get back prospects.

Durable and healthy.

He's owed Trout money, at 35 yrs old. No thanks

[Ace-Of-Diamonds]

Trade straight up for Pujols and then OK...

[totdprods]

11 minutes ago, Ace-Of-Diamonds said:

He's owed Trout money, at 35 yrs old. No thanks

Should he be an option, it'd only be if Arizona is eating enough salary to bring him down to the $20m-$25m annual range. And I'd still expect at least one additional perk, such as an interesting player back from ARI, taking on Calhoun's contract, or a very light prospect cost.

I understand that is still extremely high for a pitcher his age, but it'd be for a 3-yr commitment instead of an equal annual money 5-yr commitment for a guy like Keuchel (who allowed a league-leading 211 hits last year) or Corbin, who has basically been a league-average pitcher up until 2018.

[Ace-Of-Diamonds]

8 minutes ago, totdprods said:

Should he be an option, it'd only be if Arizona is eating enough salary to bring him down to the $20m-$25m annual range.

Tough call, I remember last spring; he was complaining about having a tough time getting his velocity up to acceptable levels. I doubt he ever got it back to it's prior level. I would hate to pay him $20M to watch him become a Weaver 2.0...

Edited November 15, 2018 by Ace-Of-Diamonds

[totdprods]

12 minutes ago, Ace-Of-Diamonds said:

Tough call, I remember last spring; he was complaining about having a tough time getting his velocity up to acceptable levels. I doubt he ever got it back to it's prior level. I would hate to pay him 20K to watch him become a Weaver 2.0...

Diminishing velocity is absolutely a concern. Perhaps that keeps his acquisition cost a little lower. Perhaps it ruins him, perhaps he is still sly enough to make it work - he's still posting far above-average numbers consistently. 

No doubt, he will decline. But if you get him for basically the price of a 3/$75m and he gives you one more excellent year, one good year, and maybe the wheels fall off the last year, it's still a win, I'd think. You help the win-now opportunity for the team without mortgaging any future.

Any other frontline SP acquisition is going to come with at least equivalent risk or (a lot) more prospect cost. I just don’t see Keuchel or Corbin being ace-quality pitchers in two or three years.Greinke might not either, but he *might* be cheaper..