Hamilton Noji

cespedes come on down!

Post of the year

Figured I'd make the thread since there's a good amount of rumors and moves going on at the moment.

he must be pumped to play with josh hamilton!

he must be pumped to play with josh hamilton!

he must be pumped to play with josh hamilton!

Pitching
Weaver - 1.09 WHIP
Skaggs - 1.14 WHIP
Richards - 1.16 WHIP
Wilson - 1.16 WHIP
 
Hitting
Trout - 1.076 OPS
Pujols - .920 OPS
 
Not bad, not bad at all.

i don't see why we can't be in contention. baseball is too random. but all in all, we are better than last year, and we have at least the talent on paper to compete.
 
weaver/wilson + garza/santiago/richards/skaggs is a heck of a lot better than hanson/vargas/blanton/williams although vargas was OK for us. 
hamilton/pujols should be better than last year
freese is better than alberto.
aybar/kendrick should be around the same
ianetta should be around the same
trout/conger/calhoun should be better
if ibanez gives us 750OPS that should minimize trumbo's loss
 
green/shuck/romine are decent off the bench.
 
frieri/smith/dlr/burnett is decent.
 
the only really huge question marks i think are
 
1. backend of bullpen (moran, morin, rapuda, jepsen, salas). could be lights out, could be blanton.
2. can santiago+skaggs+richards perform? very good chance at least 2/3 will be quality arms and give you 4/5 level pitching.

HITTERS
 
Pujols, Kendrick, Aybar, Conger, Ianetta, Hamilton, Trout, Shuck, Romine will likely be repeats on the 2014 opening day roster like they were in 2013.  Of those I expect moderate to significant improvement from Pujols, Conger and Hamilton.  Trout, Shuck and Romine should get a little better just on experience alone.  I expect Kendrick, Aybar and Ianetta to equal their performance.
 
Besides that we've swapped out Callaspo for Freese, Boujos for Calhoun, Trumbo for Ibanez and Harris for Green.  Freese is an obvious upgrade, I think Calhoun is an obvious upgrade (if anything because he is more durable), and Green is an obvious upgrade over Harris.  In fact, the only thing that's downgraded is Ibanez from Trumbo, but I don't even think this is that big of a downgrade.
 
I think we've upgraded quite a bit on the offensive side.
 
STARTING PITCHING
 
Weaver and Wilson are the only returning starters from 2013.  I expect both of them to have similar years again.  Richards, Skaggs, Santiago are MAJOR upgrades over Vargas, Hanson and Blanton.  This move might move us +10 wins alone.  Although Vargas was solid, he was out for over half the year, Blanton and Hanson were pretty much as bad as advertised.
 
BULLPEN
 
Frieri and Burnett appear to be the only returning relievers from 2013.  I expect Frieri to be a little better and Burnett (obviously) to be a lot better.  Joe Smith has replaced Scott Downs and DLR has replaced Mark Lowe.  So far, so good - all in all big upgrades.
 
The last three spots on the bullpen from 2013 are Jepsen, Richards and Williams.  Blanton appears to be replacing Williams (downgrade), and a duo among Salas, Kohn, Moran, Morin, Rapada will likely replace Jepsen and Richards.  Basically whoever replaces Jepsen will likely be an upgrade but whoever replaces Richards may not be (Salas, Kohn, Moran, Morin, Rapada).
 
Bullpen has been upgraded, but Blanton is a downgrade, the Jepsen replacement is an upgrade and the Richards upgrade is unknown.
 
So other than replacing Ibanez with Trumbo, replacing Blanton with Williams and the Richards replacement, I think Jerry's done a terrific job.  If we get Tanaka it's superb.