Dave Saltzer

We need to say thank you to Arte for this as much as we praise Eppler. Sure, it's easy to see this as a battle between two GMs, but Arte personally gets involved in these big deals. It's as much about Arte making and living up to his handshakes and agreements, having no debt on the team, and the ability to pay for it, as it was Eppler making the sales pitch. I think that's one of the deciding factors for us--a committed and involved owner who wants to field a championship team. Sure, the results on the field haven't matched our desires, but never underestimate how much Arte wants to win and field a champion. Wow! What great news! Thanks Arte.

Hey, this was a full court press. We need to get back to giving Arte the credit he deserves. We are often too quick to bash him on here, but, he was just as much a part of this as Eppler. We need some praise for him too.

Game changer. Now what do we do with the rest of the offseason?

So, will we be investigated since we aren't San Diego or the Mariners? We were total dark horses on this one.

Holy shit batman!!!! This is Huuuuuggggeeee!!!!!

Where's Piodeportes on this? Don't mess around.

Why not both?

Posting this in here for some discussion . . . Let's assume the sticking point for trading with the Phillies for Hernandez was that they wanted Jam Jones and we wouldn't include him. Would you now trade Jam Jones and Chris Rodriguez to the Phillies for Hernandez and $750 k in international money? The Phillies have $900 k I think left, but can only trade international money in units of $250k. I think I would do that because as much as I believe in Jones, I think we need to solve 2B for a long time. Hernandez does that, establishes a leadoff hitter for us, and gives us solid defense up the middle. That wouldn't be a desperation move, IMHO, because it solves a true need for us with a legitimate solution (not like taking a CFer and putting him at 2B). It shows that we are serious about solving our problems, we're building a solid core that will be stable for years, and would provide much better defense and comparable offense to Seattle. I would think that would send a strong signal to Ohtani.

Okay, I'm going to through it out here for discussion. Let's assume the sticking point for trading with the Phillies for Hernandez was that they wanted Jam Jones and we wouldn't include him. Would you now trade Jam Jones and Chris Rodriguez to the Phillies for Hernandez and $750 k in international money? The Phillies have $900 k I think left, but can only trade international money in units of $250k. I think I would do that because as much as I believe in Jones, I think we need to solve 2B for a long time. Hernandez does that, establishes a leadoff hitter for us, and gives us solid defense up the middle. That wouldn't be a desperation move, IMHO, because it solves a true need for us with a legitimate solution (not like taking a CFer and putting him at 2B). Just posting for discussion.

Yes. After they declared war on us. http://www.legisworks.org/congress/77/publaw-331.pdf

I thought we had to designate where it came from the moment we made the trade. Maybe @Jeff Fletcher could verify that for us. I don't think it would make sense that we could sign someone if we didn't designate and demonstrate that we could sign them within our pool.

As a pitcher, an HR isn't the problem. It really doesn't shake a pitcher's confidence. It happens--it was a mistake pitch that a hitter got lucky on and crushed. They usually can shake of an HR very easily. But . . . a shaky defense? That's a whole different problem. When that happens, a pitcher will invariably pitch tight and will try to overcompensate by trying to strike every batter out. That leads to a much more stressful game for the pitcher, and generally, a worse outcome. Pitchers have to have confidence in the defense of their team to pitch effectively. I don't see how this move helps that. Had Dipoto signed Cain instead of trading for Gordon, that would have made a lot more sense because it would have improved the OF defense. As a pitcher, I would feel more calm and relaxed when giving up a fly ball that Cain would catch it, especially if Cruz is out there as well. If I were trying to impress Ohtani, I would have gone more for a move like that to show him that I'm serious about providing him the best environment in which to pitch and win games.

With 4 of the teams in the race being limited to offers of $300k, I can't see how another $1 million in signing bonus matters. Plus, let's face it, where are more endorsements and commercials made--in LA or Seattle? Wouldn't it be a lot easier to get a lot more endorsements and film a lot more commercials here than in Seattle? Ohtani is far more likely to make more money off of the endorsements than he will off his bonus money.

I see this as more of a desperation move than our move. We matched what Seattle did without sacrificing our team's future. Pearson was entirely expendable because he was blocked by Adell, Jones, Marsh, and even Hermosillo). Trading for a player to take over CF who hasn't played there professionally in years, really gutting your farm, and hurting your on-field play defense as a way to entice a pitcher with cash is a desperation move, IMHO.

If Dipoto were that sure about his offer, organization, and what value it brings to Ohtani, he wouldn't be making these types of desperation moves.

Only 300 times? And you call yourself a fan! C'mon, you gotta check it every 2-3bminutes.

Yes, especially if that means that they don't live up to the hype (so they may have made it to the Majors, but had nowhere near as good a career that they should have had, especially based on the hype). I have also had a couple of real misses on a couple of prospects that I thought would make it or do better than they did. But I don't publish that so much because they are people, often whose family members read this, so I don't really like putting out negatives on here. I have no problem admitting that trying to identify future talent is *REALLY* hard to do and is more of an art than a science and that I am only human. People miss on talent all the times (ahem Mike Trout). Players lives change, and there are so many variables that can happen, that in many ways it is a crapshoot. You know I teach high school, and I see kids go sideways or backwards all the time. Kids I thought would do so much more often don't make it for a variety of reasons that I never could have predicted or foreseen. More importantly, I have no problem admitting that people in the business have far more knowledge and insight about these things than I do. That's why I am usually rather deferential to them and their expertise. As you know how I even pose questions, I am deferential to opinions, even yours. But, that doesn't mean that with my own knowledge and ability to critically read and analyze things that I can't see bias, repetitive information, or lack of insight. Having written these for several years, and, having followed the Minors as well as the Majors for many years, I know how hard it is to keep track of over 600 Major League Players and thousands of Minor League players every year. I've had over 10,000 students as a teacher, and I can't keep track of them all, or remember all of them for all of time. I also know how hard it is to write a list of top-10, 20, 30, or even 50 prospects (like we once did) for 30 different teams. Every team needs to have a player ranked as its #1 even though Team A's #1 might not even be close to Team B's #15. Not all #1 team prospects are the same. But, that's why I do like our list. We have a lot of opinions and try to come with a consensus. My opinion only counts so much, as do several others. I have my biases, as does everyone else who contributes. Hopefully by averaging things out, the biases get cancelled out, and we produce a better list rather than if only one of us produced the list. None of the contributors to this list had the rankings the same, and behind the scenes we've had lots of discussion about players and our ranking choices trying to justify our positions. Like all of us, I hope that all the prospects make it, but, I also know very few of them will, in all likelihood, will. It's a tough industry, where the margins between success and failure are razor thin. Again, I have no problem admitting that I've been wrong, but I do like it when I get it right.

I was the first one pushing both, and had Calhoun ranked as our #3 prospect way before anyone else. That's because I saw them, theirwork ethic, their desire, etc., interviewed them, had them at our Fanfests, etc. AW was on both of them long before anyone in the rest of the prospect ranking world had heard of them.

I'm just wondering if it would come down to a final round of 2-3 where he actually visits the stadium, facilities, etc. You'd think with the way he's handling it now, that there would still be a personal visit. That would still allow the decision to be made before the Winter Meetings . . .

Hey, here's an idea . . . Let's sign ANOTHER Braves prospect today so we can redo the list again. Wouldn't that be fun?

You did a REALLY good job on your series this year @ettin, but then again, you always do. Keep it up!

The Angels have NOT been developing an international presence for so long. That has been one of my biggest criticisms of the FO over the past decade. This is a chance to re-establish ourselves on the international market and improve our farm system at the same time. I'm happy with the two that we have signed so far, and will try and dig into info on the other ones to see if they are worth pursuing. We need to get back to developing talent from all over the world.

A few responses: 1) AW's Top 30 rankings are a collection of opinions from those of us who follow the minor leagues pretty actively and/or have really good contacts and sources on this. Reading any one of our opinions is NOT the AW official position. I would rank Soto as 15th. Check the Top-30 revised prospect thread. 2) These guys are YOUNG! They are high school juniors/seniors. There's a LOT of projection going on here. A LOT can happen between that age and the Major Leagues. For every Mike Trout, well, there's just Mike Trout. The overwhelming majority don't pan out like that or anywhere close to that. 3) None of us have really seen him anywhere near as in depth as we've seen our current prospects. And, we haven't gotten to know him like we've gotten to know our current prospects. So, it obviously will be difficult for us to rank him. Soto didn't have the exposure that Maitan had, so some of the people who help form these lists have to check with many sources, myself included. And then trying to figure out how that all translates into our system is again a difficult problem. 4) All of the guys who do the rankings have their own inherent preferences. I am biased towards proximity to the Majors over potential talent because a lot can happen over the years. I am also partial to looking at the depth at a position versus talent as well (along with many other factors--such as age against competition, etc.) for determining my rankings. Others have their preferences. When we ultimately come out with our published rankings, part of what makes it so much better than so many other rankings is that by getting multiple viewpoints and rankings, and then merging them into one list, we believe that we create a much better overall ranking. 5) Cut Scotty a break on this. He was working out his thoughts in real time on here for everyone, and I commend him for doing so. Would you rather we didn't do that and kept everyone in the dark until we had discussed it elsewhere? Scotty is doing a great job on getting info from his sources and getting it out to everyone and by sharing his thoughts in real time, and getting contradictory opinions, he can use that to go back to his sources to verify or change his opinions. I think in the end, 15th is a very fair and accurate ranking for Soto. I won't complain if it's as high as 12 on our current list, but I wouldn't go much lower, either. That gives us time and ability to move him up if he shows the defense and bat of Simmons or allows us to move him down if he proves to be Baldoquin 2.0.

I think 15 is a good spot for him on our list. Again, I think he can and hope that he does grow from there, but it's really all about how that bat plays up. I don't see, and haven't been told that there's much room for power to develop, so, he needs to be a plus defender and have above average hit tools. What stood out in his debut was his BB:K ratio, and the number of walks that he took as well as the defensive instincts that he showed.

He is that good defensively according to what I know, but it's also going to depend on how the bat develops. I was thinking of slotting him in at 15. He might be better than Fletcher defensively, but he's also a lot further away than him. Since I lean a bit on proximity, I'd put Fletcher above him now, knowing that he could develop and move up in the rankings in the future.