Connolly article on pitching

[Just Regular]

1 hour ago, Sports Guy said:

I agree.  I have zero issue with him going position heavy.

But that is also predicated on the idea that ownership will allow him to spend money on pitching and that he will make trades for established pitching.

If these things don’t happen, then the strategy is pretty dumb.  The strategy should then be one that requires more balance.

So....Elias' choices to date are consistent with faith ownership will allow him to spend money and/or the imaginary money of a prospect's future surplus value for established pitching.

My guess in interview is Elias embraced rather than nitpicked what the Astros had done.  Of course other teams won't usually trade young (bargain) pitching they've developed, but in the cases of Verlander and Greinke, it was being the Second Buyer of expensive seasons that no longer fit the small market team's spot on the Win curve, and in Cole's it was benefitting from suboptimal development.

Busted contenders are always going to have some expensive excellent guys on the back half of contracts they don't want to pay anymore.   Or truly hopeless cases like Orioles Bedard, Pirates Cole, Rockies Marquez and hopefully not also Orioles Means.

[Sports Guy]

1 minute ago, RZNJ said:

 

In some regard, I am taking Fangraph and Baseball America's rankings and running with them.   At the same time, I take those rankings with a grain of salt.  We all speculate.  I was just teasing Canofcorn because he speculates more than anyone and he is the one who said that to another poster.

Let's face it, some people will complain about the draft and the farm system.   When the draft and farm system are showing signs of success, then they will complain that the team sucks at the ML level and that when those players graduate that we won't supplement.    If we graduate those guys and then supplment then those same people will complain that we aren't making moves to put the team over the top.    Some people like to complain.   There has been plenty to complain about over the last 38 years with a few exceptions.   For much of that time we were dealing with a dysfunctional organization.   The two-headed GM.   Duquette with 2 hands tied behind his back.   Now, we have a functional organization.  How much money they will spend or not spend in the future, I have no idea.   But for now, I'm enjoying a functional organization (In my opinion it is functional).

I think the organization is a better place than it has been in a while.  But that doesn’t mean that it will translate into ML success.  
 

I don’t know why you get your panties in a bunch that people complain about the ML product.  These are all separate things.  Having a highly ranked MiL system doesn’t guarantee ML success.  It doesn’t guarantee that the team is developing pitching properly.

You can be very optimistic on what is going on down in the minors and pessimistic that it will translate to the majors because, let’s face it, the current set of FACTS that we have to work with say they aren’t doing things properly at this level…and ultimately, the majors are the only level that matters.

[Can_of_corn]

3 minutes ago, Frobby said:

The Aiken pick worked out in the end, but I don’t think Plan A was to not sign their pick and then score big with the 1:2 comp pick they received the following year.   

Sure.

But it beats drafting and signing a guy then never having them play for you because of health issues.

[Sports Guy]

5 minutes ago, Frobby said:

The Aiken pick worked out in the end, but I don’t think Plan A was to not sign their pick and then score big with the 1:2 comp pick they received the following year.   

And the evaluation that Aiken should have been the pick was wrong.  He doesn’t get a pass for that because they turned it into Bregman.

[Can_of_corn]

6 minutes ago, RZNJ said:

 

In some regard, I am taking Fangraph and Baseball America's rankings and running with them.   At the same time, I take those rankings with a grain of salt.  We all speculate.  I was just teasing Canofcorn because he speculates more than anyone and he is the one who said that to another poster.

 

The other poster has a tendency to state things that are speculation as if they are facts.

I try and be careful to not make that mistake.

I don't view the behavior as being the same.

[Can_of_corn]

1 minute ago, Sports Guy said:

And the evaluation that Aiken should have been the pick was wrong.  He doesn’t get a pass for that because they turned it into Bregman.

It wasn't right or wrong.  There was no way you could fault Elias for a decision made with incomplete information.

He was a reasonable pick with the data that was available. 

[Sports Guy]

6 minutes ago, Can_of_corn said:

It wasn't right or wrong.  There was no way you could fault Elias for a decision made with incomplete information.

He was a reasonable pick with the data that was available. 

Well considering they tried to sign him and he ended up being a failure, I think it’s pretty easy to say it was the wrong decision. 
 

They got lucky that he said no to their offer.

[Can_of_corn]

Just now, Sports Guy said:

Well considering they tried to sign him and he ended up being a failure, I think it’s pretty easy to say it was the wrong decision. 
 

They got lucky that he said no to their offer.

I agree that the reports of them upping their offer in an attempt to sign him are troubling.  They should have done like the Mets did with Kumar.

[HowAboutThat]

It might be safe to say that we can’t judge Mike at all on the major league product because he has openly said that he’s not prioritizing wins. 
I don’t think the beats, cowards all, have asked him when he’s going to start prioritizing wins, what needs to happen before he does, or what he will do when he does.

Next year he HAS to promote some meaningful guys, otherwise they will be wasting their prime years on the farm. So maybe the “time to win” decision will be made for him by circumstance.

[NCRaven]

50 minutes ago, Can_of_corn said:

Sure.

But it beats drafting and signing a guy then never having them play for you because of health issues.

I think that you're jumping the gun there.  Young man could still turn out to be a good player.  Wasn't a huge reach and had a totally unpredictable physical condition.

[NCRaven]

38 minutes ago, Can_of_corn said:

I agree that the reports of them upping their offer in an attempt to sign him are troubling.  They should have done like the Mets did with Kumar.

I think that what the Mets did to Rocker was far worse than teams holding back players to control their service time.

[HowAboutThat]

6 minutes ago, NCRaven said:

I think that what the Mets did to Rocker was far worse than teams holding back players to control their service time.

What did the Mets do to Rocker? I know he didn’t sign but I thought it was because they didn’t give him enough money? Was there something else?

edit: I just looked it up, based on the Wikipedia article that I read it doesn’t appear that the Mets did anything wrong.

Edited August 20, 2021 by Philip
Addendum

[Three Run Homer]

2 hours ago, interloper said:

You are way too offended by my joke. Ease up!

It was not a joke, it was a cheap shot.  I would have been pissed off about it too. 

[Three Run Homer]

If anything, Connolly is being over-optimistic.  DL Hall has big upside but also big question marks.  And I'm not so sure we can count on John Means being a number one starter down the road.  He's pitched poorly since coming off the DL.  Maybe his arm isn't 100 percent, or maybe he was more dependent on the sticky stuff than most pitchers.  

I absolutely agree with the critique that Elias has not invested enough draft or international capital in pitching.  Except for maybe Jean Pinto and Raul Rangel, it's hard to find any pitchers worth following in the system below Bowie.  

[interloper]

10 minutes ago, Three Run Homer said:

It was not a joke, it was a cheap shot.  I would have been pissed off about it too. 

And I got a cheap shot in response so I guess that's fair.