Flash- bd

Almost Jackson Holliday levels of futility What is with this organization and it's horrible drafting?!? *sarcasm off

Ahem...Gunnar overrated...

From the reports of Means stuff, and the way Wells is pitching, I think Irvin is comfortably in our top 5 starters at the moment.

Manny Machado was worth 7.5 rWAR in his age 22 season, Gunnar 6.2. I'd say he's in okay company and on a decent trajectory. I can understand a little bit more with Rutsch but Gunnar looks to me very much on the superstar track, and I wonder if he won't age a bit better than Machado has (Machado's age 24-27 seasons were relatively average minus his 2015 contract year), or follow a more traditional trajectory.

Is Grayson's FB velocity a bit down? Or is it just the early season colder weather? Haven't seen any 99s that I can remember this season nor many 98s and he's more 95-96...

Mateo, surely, no? I have no idea why Holliday would start tomorrow other than it being his t-shirt / home debut night but I doubt that factors much into decisions...obviously he can come in when Hall comes out.

I think he was quite, quite unlucky yesterday. Between the ump and the homer coming after it, and the other runs coming on pretty soft contact / finding holes...for me he was much better than the stat line suggests.

We haven't done too bad with Bradish and Grayson, it would seem.

With how little Elias has shown me to convince me that he knows what he's doing, I'm definitely going to take this 9 game sample of of 5-4 baseball to start the season as evidence that he doesn't!!

Kremer is systematically underrated around here.

Interesting. That's a clever way to get Mayo and Kjerstad into the lineup.

Is his curve really "not very good"? I always felt it was a pretty good offering and that it was a bit weird how little he employs it, but maybe I'm wrong--that would certainly explain why he hasn't used it as much!

Chayce McDermott could become a factor in this conversation this season, too. Perhaps even Tyler Wells.

Verrryyy early. He had an .666 OPS (appropriate number for a Yankee) in his age 22 season, Gunnar .814, so yeah, you know, SSS effects!

His stuff looked good. For me a very promising first start. He was very good last season with worse stuff for much of the first half before getting injured / fatiguing. We forget that. Through about three months of the season there was an argument Wells was our ace more than Bradish. So excited to see how he does if he can keep this stuff throughout the season.

Soooo true. The non-cherrypicked interview with Holliday is a 100% reasonable take.

Cool to get big Jim's thoughts on it from you, cheers Roy!

Yeah, I agree for the most part. It's really hard to be anything but chuffed with how the organization is at the moment!

This, basically. Losing Hall hurts, IMO. I kinda would've rather seen say, Johnson and Povich go. Or Johnson / Povich and Norby. But who knows if Milwaukee would've accepted that, it might be that they really wanted Hall. In which case, is kinda scary, given Milwaukee's record with pitchers. I'm going to go out on a limb and say that I think we probably lost this trade. 6 years of Hall for 1 of Burnes, I just don't know...and I don't think we have arms the upside of Hall (hopefully this means they really rate McDermott? He's one who might have a similar upside, I guess...besides De Leon who is a long way off, of course). Hopefully this is just Arrieta-itis on my part, but as a big fan of Arrieta who hated to see him go, a pitcher who had similar problems to Hall and a similar upside, I really worry about Milwaukee fixing him and him becoming a top starter. Taking the devil's advocate to my opinion, I can see an analytical approach with Hall saying: between the fluctuations in velocity we've already seen due to injury, the injury issues in general, and the issues already present as a starter even when fully healthy, we're talking a small possibility that it works out for him. I'm guessing that's why they made the trade.

Losing Hall hurts, IMO. I kinda would've rather seen say, Johnson and Povich go. Or Johnson / Povich and Norby. But who knows if Milwaukee would've accepted that, it might be that they really wanted Hall. In which case, is kinda scary, given Milwaukee's record with pitchers.

“Ain't no sense worryin' about the things you got control over, 'cause if you got control over 'em, ain't no sense worryin'. And ain't no sense worryin' about the things you don't got control over, 'cause if you don't got control over 'em, ain't no sense worryin'.”

Very fair points, you've kinda convinced me to come back around and agree that we should acquire a starter. Fair as well, thanks for the explanation!

Absolutely. As with most pitching prospects, injuries are my biggest worry with Hall. That said, his current stuff is certainly still plus, and that's what I focus on. Certainly, further velocity drops in the short-term would really hurt my opinion of him, as it would with anyone. Yeah, no doubt, I definitely take this point, and perhaps even more importantly, it's just such a small sample size so to be almost irrelevant. It's more the overall package + lack of development as a SP that makes me think: "it's too early to not think of this guy as a future starter."* *We've discussed the other relevant questions here a bit (needs of the team, short-term vs. long-term, etc. here so I won't say more on that) Interesting. I like McDermott a lot, but on the face of it here's a pitcher who doesn't have that many less IPs as a starter in the minors given the stipulation I put above (242 or so to 288), and is a college pitcher (so different development trajectory), yet in his last 119 IP has a 5.1 BB/9. I suppose you're referring to the fact that he lowered his BB/9 to 4.3 in those 50.2 innings at Norfolk, which, definitely, is better than what Hall has done in his most recent innings at Norfolk.* Or is there more from a scouting perspective that you're seeing that makes you say this? (Genuine question, in a discussion like this it might sound like I'm making these kind of questions in part in a spirit of provocation or challenging your opinion, but as I say, I say it with genuine deference to people who have far more baseball knowledge than I do and interest in them sharing it with me...internet tone is tricky!) *As I say, I can't help but take a lot of his recent work in the minors with a big grain of salt, due to his lesser stuff after the injury. But you're also right to point out that the two things (injuries and projection) shouldn't necessarily be separated so cleanly as I do.

I think Hall's repertoire, how good he looked with a number of pitches and commanding them to a decent extent (I think the biggest issue here, or critique of my idea, is that I'm probably working off a recency bias / SSS, which is why I totally get why you don't see it my way, but...), and the fact he has had such an interrupted development as a starter (COVID, injuries, lost 2021 to injury, even last season's innings I would really scratch off, as he was without his stuff for the majority of the season due to his injury in spring training), should give us reason to view him as a rather unique case as a 25 year old SP. We're talking about a high school pitcher who has 288 IP as a starter under his belt before last season where he was pitching without his real stuff for most of it. Those 288 IP interrupted by a season lost to COVID, and a major injury. Grayson compiled 334 in a period of a year less. So, I think it would be fair to consider Hall somewhere similar to where Grayson was coming into last season, in his development. I guess, even if you see it my way in that respect, you could make the argument, can we afford a potential development season (but with less innings, as we agree Hall has less ability to maneuver his way through lineups without using as many pitches) like Grayson's last? I don't know. I take your other points about his already established value to our bullpen, too. Probably ultimately comes down to philosophical differences. I tend to want long-term value maximization even at the expense of short-term results. I could be wrong with this philosophical stance--it would probably take a very complicated analysis to parse it all out--but it's the way my mind works.

I know, Tony, I have read your thoughts on Hall. It's not that I disagree with it--hard to disagree with analysis from someone who knows far more about baseball than I do (understatement of the century)--I just have a different view of it, tbh, and feel like not enough credence has been given to how interrupted his development has been as a starter and the room for growth there. Yeah, there's surely a bit of gut feeling / intuition there--orange pixie dust--but hey, it's my (rather useless) opinion and I can't help expressing it! I don't offer my opinion too often and mainly just limit myself to asking questions or being rather positive or trying to offer a bit of 'perspective' from my point of view, as I generally defer to people--you first among them--here who have far more baseball knowledge than myself, but what I can say, I just can't help but have a different opinion / feeling on Hall.