Jorge Lopez traded to Twins for pitching prospects (edit)

[tntoriole]

8 minutes ago, deward said:

It's possible, for sure. Povich is fine, but I found Elias to be a bit too rigid in his thinking this year. He didn't plan on this team winning, and he wasn't willing to bend on his plan when they started surprising everyone. I can appreciate someone having a vision and sticking to their guns on it, but you have to be able to react to opportunities. I would have liked to see him be a bit more aggressive in trying to seize an unexpected moment. Not mortgage the future type aggressive, but also not knocking the pins out from under the strongest part of the team and doing nothing to offset it but add Brett Phillips. I know everyone hopes that the team becomes a year in/year out contender, but playoff spots have been so scarce for this franchise that I don't like seeing one be allowed to pass by without any real attempt being made to chase it down from Elias.

As bad of a state as this organization was in, what you see as Elias “rigidity” has been essential imho.  And yes that may involve not getting off track to marginally improve to try and get a 3rd wildcard spot.  I am completely fine with his judgements and it is that type of thing that can set rebuilds back (which are still not guaranteed in any way for 2023 )  

[Frobby]

25 minutes ago, deward said:

It's possible, for sure. Povich is fine, but I found Elias to be a bit too rigid in his thinking this year. He didn't plan on this team winning, and he wasn't willing to bend on his plan when they started surprising everyone. I can appreciate someone having a vision and sticking to their guns on it, but you have to be able to react to opportunities. I would have liked to see him be a bit more aggressive in trying to seize an unexpected moment. Not mortgage the future type aggressive, but also not knocking the pins out from under the strongest part of the team and doing nothing to offset it but add Brett Phillips. I know everyone hopes that the team becomes a year in/year out contender, but playoff spots have been so scarce for this franchise that I don't like seeing one be allowed to pass by without any real attempt being made to chase it down from Elias.

I’m fine with what he did.   There’s no guarantee that any moves he might have made would have squeaked us into the playoffs. He strengthened the team for the long run and that was more important.   Now I just want him to follow through and strengthen our chances of being a true contender in 2023.   

[deward]

1 minute ago, Frobby said:

I’m fine with what he did.   There’s no guarantee that any moves he might have made would have squeaked us into the playoffs. He strengthened the team for the long run and that was more important.   Now I just want him to follow through and strengthen our chances of being a true contender in 2023.   

There's also no guarantee that the guy who put up a 6.94 ERA in his first AA exposure ever helps the big league club. It was a gamble either way; he might not have strengthened the club at all.

[Sports Guy]

You can debate this all day long..what isn’t up for debate is that Elias didn’t value winning this year over what he felt was the long term good of the franchise.

These were ego driven decisions, without question.

Whether or not they pay off remains to be seen but there are way too many assumptions in birdland with regards to future postseason births and that includes the front office imo.

Edited October 12, 2022 by Sports Guy

[Redskins Rick]

3 minutes ago, Sports Guy said:

You can debate this all day long..what isn’t up for debate is that Elias didn’t value winning this year over what he felt was the long term good of the franchise.

These were ego driven decisions, without question.

Whether or not they pay off remains to be seen but there is way too many assumptions in birdland with regards to future postseason births and that includes the front office imo.

I think the main problem here.

The lack of any information about what the ownership feels the direction should be, and what kind of lease does Elias have to pull the trigger on deals.

So far, its been waiver wire, low end trades, and draft picks.

The team has improved, but to take it to the next level, they have to expand on their options.

Im not talking about being silly and spending 200 million a year in payroll either.

 

[deward]

21 minutes ago, tntoriole said:

As bad of a state as this organization was in, what you see as Elias “rigidity” has been essential imho.  And yes that may involve not getting off track to marginally improve to try and get a 3rd wildcard spot.  I am completely fine with his judgements and it is that type of thing that can set rebuilds back (which are still not guaranteed in any way for 2023 )  

I don't think the return for Lopez is going to turn out to be a difference maker in the long term prospects of the franchise. I also don't think this franchise has any business turning its collective nose up at a wild card spot. We haven't been nearly good enough over the past 40 years to be that snobby. Like I said, I wasn't looking for Elias to mortgage the future, I just wanted him to answer the door when opportunity was knocking.

[maybenxtyr]

13 minutes ago, Sports Guy said:

You can debate this all day long..what isn’t up for debate is that Elias didn’t value winning this year over what he felt was the long term good of the franchise.

These were ego driven decisions, without question.

Whether or not they pay off remains to be seen but there is way too many assumptions in birdland with regards to future postseason births and that includes the front office imo.

Obviously there's a whole winter to get through, but I'd expect some regression without significant upgrades to the ML team.

 

We as fans may be wishing for this opportunity to have done things differently.

[DrinkinWithFermi]

26 minutes ago, deward said:

the guy who put up a 6.94 ERA in his first AA exposure

...in 23.1 IP 

[Tony-OH]

21 minutes ago, Sports Guy said:

You can debate this all day long..what isn’t up for debate is that Elias didn’t value winning this year over what he felt was the long term good of the franchise.

These were ego driven decisions, without question.

Whether or not they pay off remains to be seen but there are way too many assumptions in birdland with regards to future postseason births and that includes the front office imo.

The red part is absolutely correct and the trading of Lopez and Mancini for prospects showed what he thought at the deadline.

Personally, I agree with him and when you see lineups late in the year with Aguilar, Odor and Chirinos and McKenna in them, you have to admit, this team was not ready to be a real contender.

Now we can discuss back and forth on whether keeping Mancini and Lopez would have made the team better down the stretch, but when I look at prospects in the system, I see three guys from those trades that will be in that top 30. 

That means he added depth into the system which should help him trade for more major league ready players. 

Whether he can do that or not effectively is the part that we don't know about Elias.

[LookinUp]

13 minutes ago, maybenxtyr said:

Obviously there's a whole winter to get through, but I'd expect some regression without significant upgrades to the ML team.

 

We as fans may be wishing for this opportunity to have done things differently.

I generally agree with this, but think it's mostly in the realm of pitching.

For hitters, only Santander and Mateo had career years. Everyone else was as expected or somewhat worse. We should have upgrades coming from within even if we don't bring in a FA bat or two.

On pitching, it's anyone's guess. A full year with Rodriguez and Hall should mitigate regression by some of the many candidates to regress. I do think we'll need to infuse the rotation with more talent though. Can we really expect Voth, Kremer, Bradish, Bautista, Perez and Wells to have years like this year? It's unlikely they all do, that's for sure, so pitching remains a risk for this team in 2023 w/o additions.

[Sports Guy]

7 minutes ago, Tony-OH said:

The red part is absolutely correct and the trading of Lopez and Mancini for prospects showed what he thought at the deadline.

Personally, I agree with him and when you see lineups late in the year with Aguilar, Odor and Chirinos and McKenna in them, you have to admit, this team was not ready to be a real contender.

Now we can discuss back and forth on whether keeping Mancini and Lopez would have made the team better down the stretch, but when I look at prospects in the system, I see three guys from those trades that will be in that top 30. 

That means he added depth into the system which should help him trade for more major league ready players. 

Whether he can do that or not effectively is the part that we don't know about Elias.

Yea but why were those players in play late in the season?  Because that’s what they chose to do.  They waited longer than needed for Gunnar. They didn’t play Vavra and Stowers enough.  They dealt Mancini.

They also didn’t make moves at the deadline.  They claimed they tried. We don’t know what they tried to do or how hard they tried, we just know they failed.

If they valued winning now, they don’t do these things.  

[DEOriolesfan]

9 minutes ago, Sports Guy said:

Yea but why were those players in play late in the season?  Because that’s what they chose to do.  They waited longer than needed for Gunnar. They didn’t play Vavra and Stowers enough.  They dealt Mancini.

They also didn’t make moves at the deadline.  They claimed they tried. We don’t know what they tried to do or how hard they tried, we just know they failed.

If they valued winning now, they don’t do these things.  

I think that last sentence is unfair. At the end of the day, this roster was good enough for 4th place in the division. We can argue about how tough it is in the AL East compared to other divisions but that gets us nowhere. 

Elias is trying to build us into perennial contender. You don't do that by making short-sided moves that may get into the playoffs as the 2nd or 3rd WC team. You can't sell the farm to add a player or 2 when you are multiple players away. 

Mancini was a FA to be at the end of the season. Lopez's value was never gonna be higher. 

Sometimes the moves that make the most sense are also the toughest. 

 

[Sports Guy]

13 minutes ago, DEOriolesfan said:

I think that last sentence is unfair. At the end of the day, this roster was good enough for 4th place in the division. We can argue about how tough it is in the AL East compared to other divisions but that gets us nowhere. 

Elias is trying to build us into perennial contender. You don't do that by making short-sided moves that may get into the playoffs as the 2nd or 3rd WC team. You can't sell the farm to add a player or 2 when you are multiple players away. 

Mancini was a FA to be at the end of the season. Lopez's value was never gonna be higher. 

Sometimes the moves that make the most sense are also the toughest. 

 

Elias has already built the foundation.  It’s there to win long term And if he keeps doing what he’s doing, he will keep building that foundation.

Now it’s time to add to it. He easily could have added to the team without destroying the future of the organization.  
 

He easily could have had Gunnar up sooner.

Maybe the team wasn’t good enough.  But late in the season, they were within 4 games and that was after a terrible few week stretch at the worst time.  If that doesn’t happen, maybe they catch TB?  Who knows.

All I know is Elias didn’t care if it happened or not and I have an issue with that.

[tntoriole]

53 minutes ago, deward said:

I don't think the return for Lopez is going to turn out to be a difference maker in the long term prospects of the franchise. I also don't think this franchise has any business turning its collective nose up at a wild card spot. We haven't been nearly good enough over the past 40 years to be that snobby. Like I said, I wasn't looking for Elias to mortgage the future, I just wanted him to answer the door when opportunity was knocking.

Finding the line between “mortgage the future” and “answer the door” is what they pay the big bucks for I guess lol.  I don’t think Elias had any of the ideas you mention “turning up one’s nose”.. etc ..and he has much more analytical and plan information  than you or I do .. I think he believes genuinely in his plan and process and his decisions flow from that. One man’s “rigid” is another man’s “disciplined”. Lol 

[Tony-OH]

58 minutes ago, Sports Guy said:

Yea but why were those players in play late in the season?  Because that’s what they chose to do.  They waited longer than needed for Gunnar. They didn’t play Vavra and Stowers enough.  They dealt Mancini.

They also didn’t make moves at the deadline.  They claimed they tried. We don’t know what they tried to do or how hard they tried, we just know they failed.

If they valued winning now, they don’t do these things.  

I'm not sure we disagree here and in fact, Elias basically said this year was about winning but not about contending. The fact that we ended up contending so late was icing on the cake for Elias. At least that's how I read his moves and statements.

As I'm sure you know, I had issues on how they used Stowers particularly, but you can make a case for Vavra too. 

But I'll be honest, I was completely fine with trading both Lopez and Mancini. Mancini freed up the DH spot and Lopez allowed Bautista to close. On top of it, we gained 3 top 30 prospects out of the deal and one (Povich) has some real upside as a legitimate left-hander starter for this team in the future.