Buttercup

36 minutes ago, ettin said:

So this win now equates us to signing Ohtani now, right? Amirite?!?!? All the spare change in the pocket!!!

It’s not necessarily what was saved but the fact the penalties won’t escalate in year two to three of the deal making the tax hits much harder to swallow. If Ohtani were re-signed the team will surely be going over the limit of it tries to do enough to contend. And it would be hard to go under the tax while Rendon’s contract is still around. Even one year less really helps with the tax escalations. Now, if they stay under the tax this offseason it’s a moot point other than draft considerations. But, if minassian is looking at a three to five year plan this greatly affects that. 

That could be big for this offseasons plan. They would be first time tax payers if they sign Ohtani and go over this season. This has a ripple effect for the next several seasons as the penalties grow if you remain over the level for consecutive years. 

I get the feeling Arte is going to go all in this winter. Didn’t work out well the first time but this could be like the Albert Pujols and CJ Wilson winter meetings. 

2 minutes ago, Stradling said:

So you think he’s a product of pitching in Oakland?  Fair enough. I didn’t like the list of pitchers mentioned. 
A pitcher I think could be traded is Carrasco.  

I feel that Weaver would have had a similar baffling look to his chart. That deception makes everything play up. When you're talking fractions of a second in reaction time a slightly delayed response due to deception is huge. 

44 minutes ago, beatlesrule said:

https://www.mlbtraderumors.com/2022/12/angels-pursued-willson-contreras-prior-to-cardinals-deal.html

Snippet:

We don’t know exactly how much the Angels were willing to spend on Contreras, but something in this vicinity would have gotten them close to luxury tax territory. Assuming the Angels still have that money to spend on other players, it’s a good sign for Angel fans.

I’m in agreement that 11 years is absurd (and the teams know it) but I think the landscape has changed and you can no longer look at the years as much as you can total commitment. 

By tacking on more years teams are significantly reducing the luxury tax they pay on the total contract and therefore narrowing the gap between the cost of a shorter commitment.

I’d say it’s reasonable to think star players will give your team decent production/value for 5-6 years. 

If you offered Xander Boegarts 8 years and 250MM you are putting forth a competitive bid and the cost of getting him is expecting you will pay for 2 bad but hopefully not worthless seasons at the end. But, now your luxury tax number is 6.25MM a year higher and you can tack on another few million to his cost for the tax you’ll pay as a team with a payroll above the limit.  It’s also going to make future contracts more difficult if you ever try to get back under the threshold.

By giving him three extra years you’ve gained the right to him in those declining years as a gamble where he may at least give you some value. It might cost 10MM plus per WAR in the near future and if he’s even a 1 WAR player for those last years it’s not a total loss. But, even if you have to release him you can view those extra 30 - 40MM you spent on him with more years tacked on as a deferred and interest free signing bonus. A bonus which has saved you anywhere from 3-15MM over the course of the 11 years (dependent on how long and which level you run you payroll above the limit) on luxury tax payments. 

We can all agree on the ridiculous lengths to these contracts but obviously the reasons behind them have been well thought out by the Management and Owners. The gamble is they turn out like Pujols and they decline sharply in years 1 or 2. 

And if you think baseball contracts are absurd have you seen Ronaldo’s new soccer contract of around $200MM PER YEAR! 

Ken Rosenthals article today about the crazy spending so far makes this deal look great. Edwin Diaz $102MM vs this deal at $13.5MM. Obviously a different class of reliever but you can use the difference in a lot of helpful ways. That has to be Perry he mentions in this quote. 

“The offseason began with Edwin Díazbecoming the highest-paid reliever in history, agreeing to a five-year, $102 million contract with the Mets. Two other relievers, Robert Suárez (five years, $46 million) and Rafael Montero (three years, $34.5 million) followed with inflated deals. One general manager looking for bullpen help was scrambling to meetings with agents on Sunday night, trying to strike a reasonable two-year deal with a quality reliever, and looking rather harried.”

I remember watching Charlie Hough warming up for a game against the Angels when I was a young. I was convinced they were going to tee off on him. It looked so easy from the stands. 8 innings later with the angels being held hitless I became fascinated with the knuckleball. If I was a Dad I’d be teaching my kid the knuckleball. How many knuckleballers have had Tommy John surgery? 
 

The other memory I had from that game was how Charlie Hough was smoking during his whole warmup and would break after a few pitches to take a couple puffs, throw the cigarette on the ground, throw a few more and then continue puffing away. It’s a different game these days. 

That’s too bad. Could have made Ohtani an even bigger weapon in the postseason. Thanks for the response. 

Pardon me if this has been answered elsewhere. Is it possible to DH your catcher and let your pitcher hit? Say in an important regular season or postseason game you have Ohtani as starting pitcher and hitting but have Pujols or whoever DH for Stassi. Is there a rule that says the DH is only allowed for the pitcher? 

Is Bauer’s agent teasing us here?

From Rachel Luba’s (Trevor Bauer’s agent) Instagram story... using Social Media to draw up interest and speculation no doubt 

I like this move for the simple reason the Angels are better today than yesterday. I’ll keep hope they’re better tomorrow than today...

19 minutes ago, Pablo944 said:

No one here seems to realize that the Angels could trade Joc anytime they want. For all we know they already have another deal lined up. If not, he could be traded for a pitcher during the season. He will not block Adell and the Angels will not trade Adell. 

Also worth considering is the possible qualifying offer Joc could receive at the end of the season. There’s at least some value in that draft pick 

Since a trade hasn’t happened yet I feel the asking prices are sky high. It might be best to sign Wood now and seek a trade during the season. Marsh and other prospects might have gained value at that time as well. More starters are likely to be available once some teams have lost their playoff hopes. 

On 12/18/2019 at 7:41 PM, John Taylor said:

Sorry to hear about this, I wish there could be exemptions for situations like this, but of course the red tape that you (and they) would have to go through would probably not be worth it.

The small mom and pop outfits don’t have the time and resources to fight the obstacles. What the law really does is outsource the work beyond the state. 

This law affected my work. I freelance write for several publications and have had to cut back how many articles I write for them. I would write a weekly column but now that puts me over the limit of full time employment status. These are small family publications that barely squeak by and could never afford the extra costs of having multiple full-time employees. 

Great read for those wanting to see how FanGraphs projects Rendon to produce $270m of value over the life of this contract. Caution, It compares him to similar players and may cause arousal. 
 

https://blogs.fangraphs.com/anthony-rendon-deserves-the-equivalent-of-the-bryce-harper-deal/

Kluber pitched all of 35.2 innings last year to a 5.80 ERA. Don’t we have enough of those 

Ohtani 

I feel like Lindblom could have been a 160 inning 4-4.5 era guy. Or in other words a Bundy type guy. But it’s hard to evaluate Korean guys over the internet. 

Interesting article on the cause of the home run spike. If this is true and seams are lower wouldn’t spin rate by pitchers have been affected?

https://www.espn.com/mlb/story/_/id/28273986/uptick-home-runs-attributed-seam-heights-batting-techniques-not-juiced-balls

How about we DH for Stassi when Ohtani pitches? 

Eppler said they are still working on acquiring a front line starter. But out of all the names mentioned as available in trade or free agency I wouldn’t call any of them “front line”. So who the heck are they talking about? 
The most disappointing part about losing Cole is I think it means losing Marsh (our best trade chip). And are they going to use him to acquire a number 3 because that’s all that’s being made available? I would ask Eppler but he hasn’t been taking my calls

I feel things are about to get real interesting for the Angels. If they grabbed Cole they’d need a catcher and may not have had a lot of resources left for more moves. Now Eppler will have to get more creative. One things certain. They won’t be sitting still.