Would you offer Hays or Mountcastle a long term deal now?

[weams]

23 minutes ago, Philip said:

 

So now isn’t the time to be signing anybody long-term. Or worrying about service time.

I agree with this. 

[thezeroes]

What is the best way to have a 40 man roster constructed?? 

You would probably not want more than 5/6 players becoming free agents every year.  These are the slots needed to protect Rule 5 players and to acquire players of need  that are not in your system.

You would need at least 15 to 20 players with minor league options. 14 at the minimum to get to 26 player limit with out designating good players.

You should have at least three Veteran Players for stability on the roster.  Players that are Mentors to the youth, coaches on the field, know the ropes and needs of a long season.

So the remaining players would be those with  three to six years of service time.  This is the group that will either become free agents or get signed to be the veteran presences in the club house.  The Forty man should have at least five players changed every year with the occasional outlier of seven to ten players changed.

These are my thoughts on the roster construction feel free to state yours.

 

[thezeroes]

40 minutes ago, thezeroes said:

What is the best way to have a 40 man roster constructed?? 

You would probably not want more than 5/6 players becoming free agents every year.  These are the slots needed to protect Rule 5 players and to acquire players of need  that are not in your system.

You would need at least 15 to 20 players with minor league options. 14 at the minimum to get to 26 player limit with out designating good players.

You should have at least three Veteran Players for stability on the roster.  Players that are Mentors to the youth, coaches on the field, know the ropes and needs of a long season.

So the remaining players would be those with  three to six years of service time.  This is the group that will either become free agents or get signed to be the veteran presences in the club house.  The Forty man should have at least five players changed every year with the occasional outlier of seven to ten players changed.

These are my thoughts on the roster construction feel free to state yours.

 

The reason to post this roster construction in this thread is there seems to be a disconnect from fans of teams and how rosters need to be constructed. If you were to allow four rookies with Zero service time to start the season from day one you may end up with them all being Super Twos.  Now with that happening you loose one free year of non arbitration.  If you have four players all get Super Two status your salaries for these players will take a tremendous leap one year early.  Then by year four of arbitration you can end up spending an extra $20 to $30 million in salaries on these four players.  This is assuming these are elite or upper level players.  This would put a stress on the budget earlier than expected and also would probably make these players trade candidates  to keep the rosters budget in check.  This is why service time gets manipulated and you seldom see four rookies out of spring training.

[HowAboutThat]

@thezeroes

 I cannot comment on most of what you said, except that it seems logical to me. We need a conveyor belt. It doesn’t matter what we have on the 40 man, as long as every person on the 40 man, whether an old veteran or a new rookie, has someone behind him to replace him. If our SS is coming up on his arbitration years, for instance, we need a near-ready replacement so we can trade the arbitration guy if we choose

That’s what Mike is trying to do, establish a path long and wide. I’m not worried about getting worthwhile assets, I think it’s going to happen. I’m worried about holding them too long, I’m worried about having a surplus and doing nothing about it, or having a shortage and dealing with it poorly.

[Scalious]

17 minutes ago, Philip said:

@thezeroes

 I cannot comment on most of what you said, except that it seems logical to me. We need a conveyor belt. It doesn’t matter what we have on the 40 man, as long as every person on the 40 man, whether an old veteran or a new rookie, has someone behind him to replace him. If our SS is coming up on his arbitration years, for instance, we need a near-ready replacement so we can trade the arbitration guy if we choose

That’s what Mike is trying to do, establish a path long and wide. I’m not worried about getting worthwhile assets, I think it’s going to happen. I’m worried about holding them too long, I’m worried about having a surplus and doing nothing about it, or having a shortage and dealing with it poorly.

My opinion is simply you don't want to get too carried away with trying to trade away players in their prime. Then it becomes of game of only getting 3/4 years of production, instead of 6. That player might put out the most WAR in year 5/6..and that next batch of prospects odds of being as valuable? Debatable since value is not linear.

You also need to know when to stack your odds in the short term. Because of how difficult it is to win a game with 29 other participants.

Since FA usually has decent viabe 1B/DH/LF fits every year. Progressive Organizations do at times flip their own 1B/DH Corner OF types for the next batch of prospects before FA. Even when trying to win. A quality SS? Not so much for non re-builders..

Or if the corner IF/OF is a really special bat. Braves never traded away Freddie Freeman despite doing a whole re-build. Can you say that was the unwise choice? To keep Freeman, making over 20M per?

Edited December 28, 2019 by Scalious

[Frobby]

14 hours ago, Philip said:

I don’t understand comments like this. 2027 is 7years away. We’ going to keep acquiring players: the guys we have as prospects now, are going to be replaced by guys who are better and cheaper, or as good and cheaper. Who cares about having Diaz in 7 years? Unless he’s incredible, which is by no means assured, we will have multiple guys who are better than he is( or at least as good as he is, as well as younger and cheaper) or the foundation Mike is laying now will have failed.

If we don’t have a handful of players in, say, 2023, who are better than our best right now, Something has gone wrong.

So now isn’t the time to be signing anybody long-term. Or worrying about service time.

I couldn’t disagree more with this statement.    First, the chances are very good that someone who debuts in 2021 will still be on the team and a significant contributor in 2027.    Whether he is one of the 3-4 best players on the team is beside the point.    You’d rather have him under control than not.  

Have someone who is as good or better, and cheaper, coming up through your system?    Fine, then trade Diaz before 2027.   But you’re going to get more for him in a trade if he’s under control for a year longer.   Don’t you think Mancini would be worth more in a trade right now if he was under control for 4 years instead of 3?   Or that Bundy would have been worth more if he’d been under control for 3 years instead of 2?

Finally, I think you overrate the ability of even a top farm system to generate new players of starter quality.    Even a really good system only generates 1-2 such players a year.    So having the ability to keep those guys for an extra year is important unless there’s a compelling reason not to, which there isn’t when the team is non-competitive.   

 

[Scalious]

32 minutes ago, Frobby said:

I couldn’t disagree more with this statement.    First, the chances are very good that someone who debuts in 2021 will still be on the team and a significant contributor in 2027.    Whether he is one of the 3-4 best players on the team is beside the point.    You’d rather have him under control than not.  

Have someone who is as good or better, and cheaper, coming up through your system?    Fine, then trade Diaz before 2027.   But you’re going to get more for him in a trade if he’s under control for a year longer.   Don’t you think Mancini would be worth more in a trade right now if he was under control for 4 years instead of 3?   Or that Bundy would have been worth more if he’d been under control for 3 years instead of 2?

Finally, I think you overrate the ability of even a top farm system to generate new players of starter quality.    Even a really good system only generates 1-2 such players a year.    So having the ability to keep those guys for an extra year is important unless there’s a compelling reason not to, which there isn’t when the team is non-competitive.   

 

Trading away good players with 2 years of control seems to be the sweet spot. Rentals don't get a ton and what you can get for 3 or 4 might not be properly compensated.

Trading away right before arb 1 or at arb 1 would be the sweet spot for mid-level types. Just from observation over the years.

[thezeroes]

The timeline of players to develop is different for each individual.  To make BLANKET statements on player that have yet to see one day on a MLB Ball Club seems to be a bit premature IMO.

 

[Can_of_corn]

2 hours ago, Frobby said:

I couldn’t disagree more with this statement.    First, the chances are very good that someone who debuts in 2021 will still be on the team and a significant contributor in 2027.    Whether he is one of the 3-4 best players on the team is beside the point.    You’d rather have him under control than not.  

Have someone who is as good or better, and cheaper, coming up through your system?    Fine, then trade Diaz before 2027.   But you’re going to get more for him in a trade if he’s under control for a year longer.   Don’t you think Mancini would be worth more in a trade right now if he was under control for 4 years instead of 3?   Or that Bundy would have been worth more if he’d been under control for 3 years instead of 2?

Finally, I think you overrate the ability of even a top farm system to generate new players of starter quality.    Even a really good system only generates 1-2 such players a year.    So having the ability to keep those guys for an extra year is important unless there’s a compelling reason not to, which there isn’t when the team is non-competitive.   

 

I am thinking that the odds of anyone being on the same team they debuted on six years later is poor.

[Luke-OH]

I hadn’t replied to this, but I’d probably say no to both at this point. 

Here is my thought process, the point of locking guys up on these early extensions is to either 

1) create a more valuable asset/add team control to a player you couldn’t afford in free agency

2) create cost certainty

There are occasions to do both, but the Orioles are only in an advantageous position to do #1.

Cost certainty is more important to a team that’s in a competitive window and trying to keep salary at a feasible level in order to be able to not dump salary or add pieces as necessary. The Orioles aren’t there yet. Cost certainty isn’t a big deal when the payroll is this low. 

Both of these players don’t qualify for #1 IMO, sure there is a possibility they are that good, but that’s not the realistic outcome. They seem more like supporting everyday players than a core. 

If I was to give that deal to one of them, it’d be Mountcastle rather than Hays. Two reasons, first Mountcastle will probably hit free agency at a younger age. Second, he will probably put up more gaudy counting stats which will make him the more expensive player in arbitration.

[Luke-OH]

Also, for Mountcastle, if you think his median outcome is Nick Castellanos, he made 20.6M over his 6 years of team control. There is probably some inflation, but regardless, 6/24 isn’t much if any of a discount. The 2 - 12M team options are valuable but are they worth the risk and commitment to a player who hasn’t seen MLB pitching yet, not really IMO.

[Can_of_corn]

22 minutes ago, Luke-OH said:

Also, for Mountcastle, if you think his median outcome is Nick Castellanos, he made 20.6M over his 6 years of team control. There is probably some inflation, but regardless, 6/24 isn’t much if any of a discount. The 2 - 12M team options are valuable but are they worth the risk and commitment to a player who hasn’t seen MLB pitching yet, not really IMO.

This is why I haven't voted.  I'm in favor of locking guys up but the numbers Frobby have thrown out don't support paying these two guys this much.  Not enough reward over going year to year.

Unless of course you have a very good idea of what the next CBA is going to bring.

[Frobby]

2 hours ago, Can_of_corn said:

I am thinking that the odds of anyone being on the same team they debuted on six years later is poor.

My statement was unclear.    What I was trying to say is that the odds are that there will be someone who debuts on the 2021 team who will still be here in 2027.     Not that the odds were in favor of any one specific player doing so.    

[Frobby]

2 minutes ago, Can_of_corn said:

This is why I haven't voted.  I'm in favor of locking guys up but the numbers Frobby have thrown out don't support paying these two guys this much.  Not enough reward over going year to year.

Unless of course you have a very good idea of what the next CBA is going to bring.

I mostly picked those numbers because they were very similar to what Kingery and Lowe got, and they were somewhat similarly rated prospects to Hays and Mountcastle (though Hays’ best ratings were two years ago).     I agree this might be worth considering if the numbers were a bit more favorable to the O’s.    But overall, I think teams don’t lose much leverage by waiting at least one full season before trying to sign guys up.    

[HowAboutThat]

10 hours ago, Frobby said:

I  couldn’t disagree more with this statement.    First, the chances are very good that someone who debuts in 2021 will still be on the team and a significant contributor in 2027.    Whether he is one of the 3-4 best players on the team is beside the point.    You’d rather have him under control than not.  

Have someone who is as good or better, and cheaper, coming up through your system?    Fine, then trade Diaz before 2027.   But you’re going to get more for him in a trade if he’s under control for a year longer.   Don’t you think Mancini would be worth more in a trade right now if he was under control for 4 years instead of 3?   Or that Bundy would have been worth more if he’d been under control for 3 years instead of 2?

Finally, I think you overrate the ability of even a top farm system to generate new players of starter quality.    Even a really good system only generates 1-2 such players a year.    So having the ability to keep those guys for an extra year is important unless there’s a compelling reason not to, which there isn’t when the team is non-competitive.   

 

That is very much up in the air, because our farm system was so barren for so long we have very few top tier prospects.

someone who debuts in 2021 and accrues meaningful value by 2027 should be traded. Actually someone who debuts in 2021 will be a free agent before 2027, but shuffling the years around, someone who debuts in 2021 will almost certainly be replaceable by someone better around the time he hits arbitration.

It is always better to have more control, but the difference should not be a reason to keep a guy in the minors who is ready now. I doubt Mancini will bring appreciably more, and Diaz with 3 remaining won’t bring appreciably more than Diaz with 2 remaining unless he turns out to be really outstanding, which remains to be seen(I’m not saying it won’t happen, I’m just saying that it is not a foregone conclusion.)

 Finally you are exactly right about how even the best farm systems don’t necessarily create a regular source of quality replacements( That’s why I’m very interested in what Houston does between now and April and in the coming season, after losing some very significant pieces.) But that just reinforces how bad our system was and how thin our prospects are right now, even with the improvements. 

But Anticipating needs is Mike’s job, and was one of the most frustrating things about Dan.  The reason we have such a lopsided roster right now is because of really bad planning, but Mike is all set to right the ship, and is setting up a very good foundation, so it is reasonable to expect that future moves will be made to anticipate needs, and our own improved analysis will produce better players than we have now.

Finally, by casting a very wide net, Mike is increasing the probability of being able to fill close anticipated needs, or have as it to trade to obtain them.

And lastly, I haven’t checked, but I think only what, one person remains from our 2014 team? Davis? As bad as the team is now, I think it highly unlikely that even the best player we have now, or the best player we have coming up this season, will be around in five years.