Let's say Dave Dombrowski becomes the next Angels GM

[angelsnationtalk]

It's Monday. The day after the 2020 season has ended and the Angels miss the playoffs again for the 6th straight year. Arte Moreno moves on from Billy Eppler and has plans to hire Dave "trade the farm" Dombrowski. 
Let's say this motto sticks and he sells everyone for the "win now" attitude. 
 

Again, this is all hypotheticals, but say there's some MAJOR shakeups....
Does Adell get traded?
Does Ohtani get traded?

Who gets traded and for what return and who does Dave go after in the free agent market? 

[Angel]

This team needs no new starting position players, in fact we really only need bullpen help and 1 quality SP, that requires not needing to hire Dombrowski.  Arte might be able to save money this offseason for once, think about that for a minute.  Things actually look bright for next season and I'm excited to see them surprise the league.  Maddon seems to be far more effective than he was the first few months, same with Callaway.  This core of players is good and very talented, and I think moving anymore position players around will hurt our chances next season.  A lot of these guys are just now honed in to Maddon's style of play and having to retrain someone in the field will set us back.

[Blarg]

6 minutes ago, angelsnationtalk said:

Again, this is all hypotheticals, but say there's some MAJOR shakeups....
Does Adell get traded?
Does Ohtani get traded?

Who gets traded and for what return and who does Dave go after in the free agent market? 

No

No

Any trade that takes place in the off season will probably involve players you don't know are in the minor leagues.

Garret Richards is a free agent and his age says short term contract at a reasonable rate. Tonight his fastball touched 97 mph out of the bullpen. He could be a starter or a closer at this point. 

[Claude]

They should hire Dombroski to be the Angels Baseball President of Baseball Operations and keep Eppler as his GM.  

[Blarg]

You should quit copying my posts. 

[Angel]

31 minutes ago, Blarg said:

No

No

Any trade that takes place in the off season will probably involve players you don't know are in the minor leagues.

Garret Richards is a free agent and his age says short term contract at a reasonable rate. Tonight his fastball touched 97 mph out of the bullpen. He could be a starter or a closer at this point. 

Richards to the pen, reunite him with Trout, happy feels all around.

[Angel]

Man, Richards really could've been a Cole type of starter but he was a mental case.  He did show frustration in a quick shot of the pen today.

[Lou]

Richards was never going to be a Cole.

Ever. 

[Warfarin]

9 hours ago, angelsnationtalk said:

It's Monday. The day after the 2020 season has ended and the Angels miss the playoffs again for the 6th straight year. Arte Moreno moves on from Billy Eppler and has plans to hire Dave "trade the farm" Dombrowski. 
Let's say this motto sticks and he sells everyone for the "win now" attitude. 
 

Again, this is all hypotheticals, but say there's some MAJOR shakeups....
Does Adell get traded?
Does Ohtani get traded?

Who gets traded and for what return and who does Dave go after in the free agent market? 

Trading players after poor seasons is a terrible idea.  Why sell low?

Instead, we should do this:

1.  Sign a FA SP (Bauer, Gausman, etc)

2.  Look for interesting relievers - not Hendricks, but guys who are cheap but have potential and could benefit from working with Callaway

3.  Most importantly - invest in expanding BOTH the FO and coaching staff.  Provide both your major leaguers and minor leaguers with additional support and analysis.  Building our infrastructure, both in terms of analytics and traditional scouting, is what will really ultimately make the biggest difference for us 

[gotbeer]

9 hours ago, Angel said:

Man, Richards really could've been a Cole type of starter but he was a mental case.  He did show frustration in a quick shot of the pen today.

My first impression this morning was, I didn't know Calhoun pitched.  But yeah that's about right.

[eligrba]

2 hours ago, Lou said:

Richards was never going to be a Cole.

Ever. 

But he could be a diamond someday!!

https://youtu.be/5oEp5avgEqQ

[Mark68]

Please tell me I'm not the only one opposed to hiring Dumbrowski...

 

Trading our farm for "win-now" mode is kinda how we got here.

[Stradling]

22 minutes ago, Mark68 said:

Please tell me I'm not the only one opposed to hiring Dumbrowski...

 

Trading our farm for "win-now" mode is kinda how we got here.

Search @Inside Pitch run down of Dombrowski. 

 

[Inside Pitch]

12 minutes ago, Stradling said:

Search @Inside Pitch run down of Dombrowski. 

To be clear -- that's not my preference but, he's not the guy people are trying to paint him as or rather, anyone that thinks he's another JD just isnt aware of how much building he's done.   But if they do go with the traditional type of GM, he's a hard one to beat.

[T.G.]

It's time to hire Jerry West.

[floplag]

At this point with the articles damning Arte I wonder why any quality GM would take the spot.
Unless Arte backs off completely you wont see a Dombrowski or even another Eppler. 

[Docwaukee]

if they do get Dombrowski and he trades away the farm and adds payroll, then it will, 100%, have been a directive from Arte to do so.  However, I don't think Dombrowski is going to take a job where he is on pure marching orders from Arte.  He's gonna want full operational autonomy.  He'll likely evaluate the team from the top down and determine the best course of action.  Of course he'll know that this wouldn't be like when he walked into boston.  The base roster isn't as good.  The farm system isn't as good.  There likely isn't as much payroll flexibility.  

He's going to take a methodical approach like he's done everywhere else he's been.  

Might I also remind everyone that pretty much the first thing that Eppler did when he walked through the door was to trade for Simmons.  

[Inside Pitch]

51 minutes ago, True Grich said:

It's time to hire Jerry West.

Dude..  if only he was a MLB GM..  that guy is a witch

[Stradling]

47 minutes ago, floplag said:

At this point with the articles damning Arte I wonder why any quality GM would take the spot.
Unless Arte backs off completely you wont see a Dombrowski or even another Eppler. 

Of course you will.  There are only so many jobs at the highest level.  You have Mike Trout.  You have Rendon.  You have Albert coming off the books.  You have an owner that is willing to spend.  Oh and you have the fact that GMs have a level of self confidence that allows them to see past an owners involvement. 

[Angel]

12 hours ago, Mark68 said:

Please tell me I'm not the only one opposed to hiring Dumbrowski...

 

Trading our farm for "win-now" mode is kinda how we got here.

Read my post?

[Second Base]

I think Dombrowski would be make his mark on the roster like any GM would and should.

Stoneman was hired in 99, but his mark on the team was ultimately that core of Erstad, Anderson, Salmon, Glaus and Eckstein, and then signing Vladdy. The way he operated was to build a strong farm, don't do anything to take away from that, and grab large sums of inning eating pitchers. He left his mark.

Man I miss the early 2000's. 

Reagins is brought in and from the get go, he wants up the middle talent. He tried it with GMJ and it didn't work, so he brought in Hunter which worked quite well. And like him or not, Reagins was at least partially responsible for Kendrick, Aybar, Morales and Napoli as the player development coordinator before taking the GM job. And he also oversaw the 2009 draft, which is likely the single greatest collection of picks in team history. Reagins approach was mostly to wait out the market to find value.

Dipoto comes in, and immediately he starts spending Arte's money, starts trading anything not nailed to the floor, completely ignores international markets, and drafts a bunch of low ceiling collegiate pitchers. The end result is a bloated payroll and decimated farm system. But that's what his approach was, and every GM needs that autonomy.

Eppler is hired and he's big into run prevention/defense, so he gets Simmons. He also loves velocity and spin rate and is able to bring in a constant stream of relievers that breakout. He loves drafting exceptional athletes and gambling big, and for the most part it pays off. Tons of potential on the farm. But he fails at drafting pitchers to the worst degree and his free agent expenditures have been embarrassingly bad. Still, he'll be remembered for Ohtani, Simmons, the Trout extension, Adell, and Canning. 

If Dombrowski is hired, my guess is he will trade upside that isn't immediately impacting the major league team and get the Angels to the playoffs. So he'd trade Brandon Marsh and Jordyn Adams for a solid Dan Haren-type that pitches at it near the front of the rotation. And he'd probably sign someone like Bauer. And despite not being responsible for getting him, if Ohtani got healthy, he'd have an ace there too. But long run, he'd probably hurt the organization like Dipoto did. The only difference between is he'd have a lot more success than Jerry did before getting canned.

[Angel]

What's good is we don't need a GM with a 160 IQ this off-season, just sign a reliable 2 or 3 starter or go with what we have in Ohtani filling the Teheran gap, and sign/trade for a starter if Ohtani doesn't pan out early in the season (Ohtani is still capable of being a dominant starter, reliable at least).  And obtain a closer-style reliable bullpen arm or two that are recommended by Callaway, Richards would be a nice surprise.  We could save A LOT of money this off-season and get a half-decent draft pick.  The best news is the upside that we wouldn't have had if we tanked like the Red Sux.  Things are looking up like never before actually.

[Warfarin]

5 hours ago, Angel said:

What's good is we don't need a GM with a 160 IQ this off-season, just sign a reliable 2 or 3 starter or go with what we have in Ohtani filling the Teheran gap, and sign/trade for a starter if Ohtani doesn't pan out early in the season (Ohtani is still capable of being a dominant starter, reliable at least).  And obtain a closer-style reliable bullpen arm or two that are recommended by Callaway, Richards would be a nice surprise.  We could save A LOT of money this off-season and get a half-decent draft pick.  The best news is the upside that we wouldn't have had if we tanked like the Red Sux.  Things are looking up like never before actually.

Yeah - while this recent run disappoints those who wanted a top overall pick, baseball isn't the NBA or NFL in that none of those top picks are guarantees to be great.

The strong finish we've had has been great in that it's shown we actually have internal solutions for positions in which we thought we had none.  Walsh has shown that he can likely be our 1B moving forward.  Ward looks like he'll be a good stopgap in RF until Adell or Marsh is truly ready, and a solid utility player thereafter.  Bundy has been a great find and looks like a very solid SP3 with SP2 potential.  Canning's last start was very encouraging.  Mayers has been an amazing find, if his arm doesn't fall off from the recent overuse.  Barria, Pena, Andriese, Sandoval (as a reliever), etc..

We've actually seen good production from our young players to wrap up the season, and it's reasonable to think that they can, at least to a reasonable degree, continue their production.  Having continuity from the coaching staff, which they will assuredly have this offseason, should help them more, too.

[totdprods]

Dombrowski is smart, experienced, and skilled enough to realize that this team has a really, really good baseline to work with. And a farm that, especially with a year off, would be far undervalued. I do not think he would scorch earth things this winter. I would expect a major trade involving one big name - maybe Marsh, sure maybe Adell - but likelier with some guys that are redundant like Rengifo or far away, like Adams, Vera, etc., meaning, I don’t think there’s a flurry of farm-destroying moves happening, at least yet. Midseason or next winter, once he gets a better sense of what we have both to trade and to keep for the big league club, then perhaps more moves start to happen. But the team could also be playing well on the strength of those prospects - in that case, he won’t have to burn down the farm to win. He can give it a year or two, let Pujols and Upton come off the books, draft and develop, and start trading away come late ‘22 or ‘23 should the Angels still be floundering. That will be the start of our next little ‘window’ of win-now before Trout starts getting actually ‘old’ and guys like Ohtani, Fletcher, Barria, Stassi, Walsh start going through arb, getting closer to FA, etc.

[DMVol]

1 hour ago, totdprods said:

Dombrowski is smart, experienced, and skilled enough to realize that this team has a really, really good baseline to work with. And a farm that, especially with a year off, would be far undervalued. I do not think he would scorch earth things this winter. I would expect a major trade involving one big name - maybe Marsh, sure maybe Adell - but likelier with some guys that are redundant like Rengifo or far away, like Adams, Vera, etc., meaning, I don’t think there’s a flurry of farm-destroying moves happening, at least yet. Midseason or next winter, once he gets a better sense of what we have both to trade and to keep for the big league club, then perhaps more moves start to happen. But the team could also be playing well on the strength of those prospects - in that case, he won’t have to burn down the farm to win. He can give it a year or two, let Pujols and Upton come off the books, draft and develop, and start trading away come late ‘22 or ‘23 should the Angels still be floundering. That will be the start of our next little ‘window’ of win-now before Trout starts getting actually ‘old’ and guys like Ohtani, Fletcher, Barria, Stassi, Walsh start going through arb, getting closer to FA, etc.

^^^  I don't think it is a given, as some seem to think, that Dombrowski guts the farm in a scorched earth win now approach.  Most importantly, he may not have the budget to do it.  Unless Arte changes course, we have too much on the books to bring in a significant amount of big, new contracts...there will be limits to what Dombromski could do unless Arte is willing to blow past the luxury tax...if there are limits, then Dombrowski will need to get creative.....and trading away our best prospects wouldn't work, if it adds a lot of payroll (the usual result of trading away prospects).....It won't be easy, if that is the scenario, but honestly, I'd rather have Dombromski with those limits than Eppler....