Official 2022-23 Offseason Hot Stove Thread

[Tank]

are they any rumors out there about juan soto yet? haven't heard a peep about him at all.

[Stradling]

2 minutes ago, Tank said:

are they any rumors out there about juan soto yet? haven't heard a peep about him at all.

He isn’t a free agent until next year. 

[Tank]

18 minutes ago, Stradling said:

He isn’t a free agent until next year. 

[Angels 1961]

52 minutes ago, Angelsfan1984 said:

I’d rather play rengifo than andrus. No reason to make lateral moves.

So Rengifo and Fletcher as MI. If no big-name SS signing?

 

 

[mmc]

 

[beatlesrule]

47 minutes ago, mmc said:

 

[mmc]

 

[Erstad Grit]

15 hours ago, beatlesrule said:

smooth signing 

[BTH]

18 hours ago, Angelsfan1984 said:

I’d rather play rengifo than andrus. No reason to make lateral moves.

It’s not a lateral move… it improves your depth.

Would you rather have 400 PA’s from Andrus or 400 PA’s from Velazquez, Stefanic, and some AAA depth guy the Angels end up signing to a minor league deal?

I’ll take 400 PA’s from the guy who had a 105 wRC+ and 3.5 fWAR last year than a bunch of guys with a 50 wRC+

Edited November 26, 2022 by Trendon

[Angelsfan1984]

35 minutes ago, Trendon said:

It’s not a lateral move… it improves your depth.

Would you rather have 400 PA’s from Andrus or 400 PA’s from Velazquez, Stefanic, and some AAA depth guy the Angels end up signing to a minor league deal?

I’ll take 400 PA’s from the guy who had a 105 wRC+ and 3.5 fWAR last year than a bunch of guys with a 50 wRC+

I don’t think andrus moves the needle enough to justify spending money. Those funds are better allocated elsewhere. I’ll take rengifo, fletcher, Soto, squid…with improvements on other positions. 

now if they go the route of a bigger trade or top fa then sign me up.

[Stradling]

21 minutes ago, Angelsfan1984 said:

I don’t think andrus moves the needle enough to justify spending money. Those funds are better allocated elsewhere. I’ll take rengifo, fletcher, Soto, squid…with improvements on other positions. 

now if they go the route of a bigger trade or top fa then sign me up.

But what position gives you that upgrade?  

[BTH]

23 minutes ago, Angelsfan1984 said:

I don’t think andrus moves the needle enough to justify spending money. Those funds are better allocated elsewhere. I’ll take rengifo, fletcher, Soto, squid…with improvements on other positions. 

now if they go the route of a bigger trade or top fa then sign me up.

That’s a different discussion, and I can agree with that.

The cost for Andrus can likely be better utilized elsewhere.

I was just saying that, in a vacuum, I’d rather have Andrus than no Andrus.

[Angelsfan1984]

38 minutes ago, Stradling said:

But what position gives you that upgrade?  

Catcher, bp, sp. 

Let’s say they have 10m to work with….3-4 on another catcher and 6-7 on bp or sp 

[Warfarin]

58 minutes ago, Trendon said:

That’s a different discussion, and I can agree with that.

The cost for Andrus can likely be better utilized elsewhere.

I was just saying that, in a vacuum, I’d rather have Andrus than no Andrus.

I think that is the issue though - we aren't operating in a vacuum, and money spent in one area impacts money spent in another area.  We are feeling that in terms of how much money Rendon is costing us, and the fact that we had to essentially spend another 10mil on top of that just to ensure we have a suitable backup for him.  We are spending roughly 45mil of payroll to ensure we have adequate production out of our third baseman.

So I guess the question is, assuming fairly limited resources moving forward (10-15mil?  nobody knows, we can only guess), how can we best utilize the remaining financial resources to maximize our potential win return?

In terms of the SS route, it's probably not particularly possible (via free agency), with that financial limitation, to achieve that much of a return.  The only real way, IMO, would be to swing a trade for a SS.  In that sense, we'd be using some prospect currency, but not actual financial resources.  I think this is the route we ultimately go in.  I don't think there is a worthwhile SS option in the free agency market that we can afford.

For the other positions mentioned by @Angelsfan1984, we can probably improve catcher fairly easily with a decent backup catcher at a low cost.  A backup catcher ends up playing around 40% of the games/innings, so that is something that is a worthwhile investment IMO given it will probably cost 2-3mil for the year.   We can probably also spread some money across some low cost reliever options and hope a few pan out.  

[Stradling]

33 minutes ago, Angelsfan1984 said:

Catcher, bp, sp. 

Let’s say they have 10m to work with….3-4 on another catcher and 6-7 on bp or sp 

But the catcher is at best splitting time with Stassi, so what value does 80 games of catcher get you, 1 win?  Relief pitching is a total crapshoot in free agency. And then you get to starters, if you have $10 million to spend total you are looking at Lorenzon type.  So give me Andrus over any of those other scenarios. 

[BTH]

16 minutes ago, Warfarin said:

For the other positions mentioned by @Angelsfan1984, we can probably improve catcher fairly easily with a decent backup catcher at a low cost.  A backup catcher ends up playing around 40% of the games/innings, so that is something that is a worthwhile investment IMO given it will probably cost 2-3mil for the year.   We can probably also spread some money across some low cost reliever options and hope a few pan out.  

I think they explore the SS trade market, but they ultimately go this route.

[Warfarin]

7 minutes ago, Stradling said:

But the catcher is at best splitting time with Stassi, so what value does 80 games of catcher get you, 1 win?  Relief pitching is a total crapshoot in free agency. And then you get to starters, if you have $10 million to spend total you are looking at Lorenzon type.  So give me Andrus over any of those other scenarios. 

Probably considerably more than that.  A lot of metrics struggle to assess the true value of a catcher, because it is difficult to assess a catcher's impact in terms of pitching outcomes.  How much of a strong pitching performance should be credited to the pitcher vs the catcher?  It is difficult to say.

That said, I would look at perhaps the best run organization in the sport - the Dodgers.  They seem to greatly prioritize drafting catchers high in the draft and pumping out solid catching prospect after solid catching prospect.  They seem to prioritize it above all else.  The Braves, Minasian's former team, seem to also place tremendous emphasis on it as well too.

Just based on that, I would guess that a backup catcher, who starts probably 40% of the time, can have a tremendous impact the success of a team.  It is hard for commercially available statistics to assess that, again because it is likely difficult to assess how much of a pitching outcome a catcher is directly responsible for.

[Stradling]

2 minutes ago, Warfarin said:

Probably considerably more than that.  A lot of metrics struggle to assess the true value of a catcher, because it is difficult to assess a catcher's impact in terms of pitching outcomes.  How much of a strong pitching performance should be credited to the pitcher vs the catcher?  It is difficult to say.

That said, I would look at perhaps the best run organization in the sport - the Dodgers.  They seem to greatly prioritize drafting catchers high in the draft and pumping out solid catching prospect after solid catching prospect.  They seem to prioritize it above all else.  The Braves, Minasian's former team, seem to also place tremendous emphasis on it as well too.

Just based on that, I would guess that a backup catcher, who starts probably 40% of the time, can have a tremendous impact the success of a team.  It is hard for commercially available statistics to assess that, again because it is likely difficult to assess how much of a pitching outcome a catcher is directly responsible for.

Ok but we are still talking about a back up catcher in that $3 million range. Those guys aren’t getting you multiple wins in 80 games. 

[Warfarin]

6 minutes ago, Trendon said:

I think they explore the SS trade market, but they ultimately go this route.

Right, it's rather possible.  It probably also explains why they drafted Neto and fast-tracked his development.  SS is one of the most difficult positions to fill, and it is enormously expensive to fill it on the open market (via FA or trades).  Drafting and developing SSs is incredibly important, along with catching talent.  We fortunately swung a trade for a solid catching prospect, and have another one in the pipeline (albeit who is probably about 3-4 years away).  We might just have to accept cobbling together a suboptimal plan at SS for another year or so, but hopefully either Neto can continue to develop quickly, or Soto continues to surprise and becomes a pretty decent starting SS.

[BTH]

19 minutes ago, Warfarin said:

So I guess the question is, assuming fairly limited resources moving forward (10-15mil?  nobody knows, we can only guess), how can we best utilize the remaining financial resources to maximize our potential win return?

With those resources, I’d aim to:

- Add a LHH OF to be the “4th OF.” Someone like Naquin, Ortega, or Gamel. ($1-$2M)

- Add a backup C with a good defensive reputation that could be cut cheaply if O’Hoppe is ready. Someone like Maile or Pérez. ($1-$1.5M)

- Add a couple of RP’s. One more established (Rogers, Estevéz, Martin, or Lugo for $8-$10M) less established (Castro, Reyes, Rosenthal, Young, or Wisler for $1-2M)

[BTH]

2 minutes ago, Warfarin said:

Right, it's rather possible.  It probably also explains why they drafted Neto and fast-tracked his development.  SS is one of the most difficult positions to fill, and it is enormously expensive to fill it on the open market (via FA or trades).  Drafting and developing SSs is incredibly important, along with catching talent.  We fortunately swung a trade for a solid catching prospect, and have another one in the pipeline (albeit who is probably about 3-4 years away).  We might just have to accept cobbling together a suboptimal plan at SS for another year or so, but hopefully either Neto can continue to develop quickly, or Soto continues to surprise and becomes a pretty decent starting SS.

I actually think Fletcher can be a top 15 SS in MLB if he can take some more walks and continue his steady defense at SS.

[Warfarin]

Just now, Stradling said:

Ok but we are still talking about a back up catcher in that $3 million range. Those guys aren’t getting you multiple wins in 80 games. 

They could.  Again - I am not sure how great Fangraphs, or any other commercially available metric is at assessing catching value.  I do think a solid backup catcher probably is worth 1-2 wins.  Suzuki appeared to be below replacement value, so if you combine those factors together, it would seem rather possible to generate a rather solid return at a reasonable cost.  

Backup catcher is probably a fairly low hanging fruit that can generate a solid return, IMO.

[Warfarin]

3 minutes ago, Trendon said:

With those resources, I’d aim to:

- Add a LHH OF to be the “4th OF.” Someone like Naquin, Ortega, or Gamel. ($1-$2M)

- Add a backup C with a good defensive reputation that could be cut cheaply if O’Hoppe is ready. Someone like Maile or Pérez. ($1-$1.5M)

- Add a couple of RP’s. One more established (Rogers, Estevéz, Martin, or Lugo for $8-$10M) less established (Castro, Reyes, Rosenthal, Young, or Wisler for $1-2M)

That's a solid plan.  I'm all for pushing both Adell and Moniak into AAA and having them earmarked as callups, rather than guys who will make the opening day roster.  That's a cheap upgrade and easily obtained.

Agree on backup catcher.  I am guessing the FO will for sure go this route, given Minasian's pedigree and the emphasis on catching talent.  Thaiss likely doesn't profile as a good defensive catcher.

I like the idea of Chris Martin as a target.  Minasian knows him from his ATL days and he appeared to significantly improve after the Dodgers slightly adjusted his pitch mix.  

[Stradling]

7 minutes ago, Trendon said:

I actually think Fletcher can be a top 15 SS in MLB if he can take some more walks and continue his steady defense at SS.

Yes and Rendon can be a top 5 third baseman if healthy, Trout will be the MVP if healthy, Walsh will be really good if he returns to 2021 performance.  With Fletcher it’s not just health it’s approach. 

[Angelsfan1984]

You have to figure that stassi plays let’s say half the games….strong possibility he plays less. In half those games, how bad is he offensively. I’d honestly pursue someone to make stassi the backup. There’s no depth behind him other than wallach (who isn’t very good) I’d like to have ohoppe spend the year getting seasoned and bringing him up in September. 
 

jusr my opinion obviously, but SS isn’t as devoid of talent as catcher.