Hosmer to Padres?
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http://insider.espn.com/blog/keith-law/insider/post?id=8051
The best-case scenario for the Padres now is that Hosmer hits like he did in 2017 again this year, and either establishes trade value for himself even with the new deal, or at least opts out after 2022 and goes somewhere else for his decline phase. The more likely scenario, unfortunately, is that he repeats his track record, alternating solid years with awful ones, and eventually ends up in the way of a better player, perhaps one of the Padres’ many top outfield prospects who has to shift to first because they have a surplus out on the grass. Even at what appears to be a slight discount in the annual salary, reflective of the industry’s suddenly parsimonious attitude toward free agents, this is just the wrong move for San Diego on too many levels, and a huge, baffling misstep for a front office that has done so many things right in the past 18 months.
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@Kcmatt7 Better get some real pitchers.
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@Fightsongwriter or someone who can actually develop starting pitchers…
Royals main problem is development imo. We develop batters with terrible approaches and pitchers that can’t do anything but throw 98 mph fastballs. At some point we need to ask ourselves what the problem is. Is it drafting or development? Could be a mixture of both.
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@DoubleDD “Royals fans shouldin’g have to endure growing up young stars to the MLB only to watch them be snatched up from the Yankees of the world.”
You must be talking about the days of my youth–before yours–when KC fans had to suffer from the Athletics being a virtual farm team for the Yankees.
So, you think something is new about big money/big city teams having an advantage? You might want to watch the musical Damn Yankees to remind you that there wasn’t any parity back then, either!
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@Buster-1926 So we have 1 first round pick. We then have 2 compensatory picks immediately following the first round. Then a 2nd round pick. It looks as if Moose will not break $50M. So instead of a 1st round compensatory pick , the Royals will receive another pick after the 2nd round. Probably like pick 80.
Still, that brings us to 6 picks out of the first 100ish players. This year’s draft is the most important of Dayton’s life. He needs to hit on at least 3 of these picks. Hopefully he can get 4 of the 6 to pan out in some form or fashion. I would like to see us get 2 position players, a starting pitcher and a solid relief pitcher out of this draft.
The reason this is so important of a draft is because the Royals have hardly any remaining International Signing Bonus money. Only $300k left. So the only thing we can do is continue to sign very young players and develop them ourselves. We couldn’t afford the next big Cuban star or Japanese player that wants to come over because we couldn’t pay them well enough. No way to get an instant starter for cheap basically.
Still, this is a good way to jump start the rebuild. Duffy, Whit, Herrera and Salvy should all probably get shipped off while they have value.
The only player that I would be ok with them holding on to is Duffy, because it is hard to find talented starting LHP. Also the reason he would be so valuable on the trade market…
If we unloaded everyone, and drafted well over the next 3 years, we could be producing a winning product in about 5 or 6 seasons.
- Salvy - Could fetch 3 or 4 solid prospects. His contract is great and he plays a ton of games. Right in his prime. Gold Glover. Should get a great return if we let him go.
- Whit - Could fetch a good starting pitching prospect at the deadline.
- Duffy - Would only trade for a deal similar to what we got for Greinke. Would need 3 guys all but MLB ready players, one of them being a very promising pitching prospect.
- Herrera - Would give up for 1 solid position player.
That would be a potential 8-10 prospects if we went full tank mode. Probably 3-4 of them would be pitchers and we can build from there. I just don’t see any reason to keep these guys who are all 27-28 years old just so we can lose for the next 5 seasons and by the time we have talent at the MLB level again, these guys are in decline on huge contracts. Sell them cheap, get a great return on them, and build a beast of a farm system. I hope the Royals go full tank mode and get the #1 pick 3 years in a row. That is where I am at as a fan now.
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@Kcmatt7
you are killing me!
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@Buster-1926 I hope Ned moves on after this season. Just would hate to see him ruin his Royals legacy by hanging on to the game for too long. Should ask Dayton to be moved into a different role in the front office or something if he wants to still be around the game.
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@Kcmatt7 Are there any beer vendors you think the Royals should keep? jk!
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@mayjay next he’s going to take out Hud and Joel
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Lol sorry guys… I should be more sensitive to the nostalgic. I could have waited until the season started at least haha.
I just don’t want to watch another 30 years of bad baseball while Frank White rambled on just trying to fill air time because the game was 10-2 and we were putting in our 4th reliever already in the 5th inning.
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Well, the Royals went for big and right handed.
http://mlb.nbcsports.com/2018/02/28/royals-sign-lucas-duda/
He is the guy who tried to throw Hosmer out at the plate in the 9th inning of the 5th game, and now he replaces him. Funny connections in this game!
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@mayjay I think we will see him DH a majority of the time. Just don’t understand the signing tbh. If we are going to tank, save the money lol.
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I don’t get what the Royals are doing. They should be rebuilding, but they keep signing veterans that are going to end up blocking younger players. The only thing worse than a bad plan is no plan at all. I fear that’s where the Royals are right now.
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@justanotherfan signing guys with upside to cheap contracts aren’t bad deals. If Duda hits another 18 HRs before the break, he could be flipped for a prospect or two. If some young guy is having a great season at AAA, you can always waive him because he is so cheap or trade him for cash or international player money.
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Now, the real question is…will the organ play The Camptown Races when he comes to bat?
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@justanotherfan I realize I sounded contradictory in my statements after rereading them. I personally wouldn’t have signed Duda. But I do in fact see what the Royals could be doing by signing cheap vets with tradeable upside.
There could be more at play too. I’m sure they don’t want to be mentioned in the MLBPA lawsuit against teams that were inactive in free agency.
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I think it’s smart to be somewhat active, but the Royals aren’t like the Rays in that the Royals have some big contracts on the books right now (Gordon, Kennedy), plus some other homegrown guys with nice extensions (Duffy, Perez). They have a couple of middling prospects at 1B and in the OF, so it doesn’t make sense to sign veterans there IMHO.
I don’t think it made sense to bring back Escobar when one of the top young players in the organization plays the same position. Duda makes a little more sense because the guys that play 1B aren’t as big of prospects, but I didn’t like it because you still need to get guys like Soler, Bonifacio, Dozier, Cuthbert at bats regularly, which means probably using one of them as the DH quite a bit. Duda seems like he may block some of that on days he’s not at first.
Plus, the Royals theme has been defense and athleticism. That’s how they built their championship team. Duda doesn’t check either of those boxes. Escobar does, but he’s been a pretty bad offensive player the last two seasons, and guys tend to fall off defensively as they age. Now, I will grant that maybe the Royals are rebuilding in a different model, but if that is the case, I would have gone younger rather than with older players.
But you are right, maybe there is some tradeable upside for guys like that to get picks to re-stock the system. If that’s the plan for 2018, that makes sense, especially since it is on a one year deal.
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@justanotherfan From what I am seeing, the plan is to TRY to get through this season and next season (2019 season) as a 75 win team. That is when the new TV deal will be finalized. And the Royals have had the best TV ratings in baseball over the past 4 years. Not only that, but the Rays just signed a deal for $82M/season. The Royals should get even more than that with how bad the Rays do on TV. I’m thinking they may seriously get $100M/season. Which would give them about $20M more a year than the Cardinals have from the TV deal. This is the type of money that can change the trajectory of the Royals Franchise. And why it is so important.
But the key to this is not fielding a historically bad baseball team, while also not adding to payroll. So, rolling out young guys just to see if they have what it takes is a poor plan. This is why I think you have seen Escobar get signed back and Duda brought in as some guaranteed pop in the lineup.
The plan is simple, get to 2020 with a shell of a team that doesn’t kill TV ratings. Rebuild the farm system. Once the new TV deal is signed, sell off everyone and start the Tanking process.
If the team is 25 games out of first place at the break however, I think the plan is to just sell off what can be sold and start the rebuild process.
At this point, pray for hot starts the next two seasons that keep TV Ratings high. Who knows, maybe this team can get some mojo. The pitching staff is capable. It really depends on what our position players are going to be able to do. Can Gordo bounce back? Does Salvy take another step? Can Whit repeat? Can Bonifacio learn to hit a curve? Did Soler get himself into a position to play 120+ games this year and really get in a rhythm? Is Cuthbert truly an MLB level player?
No matter what happens though, tell everyone to record every game. Watch everything they can. Go to as many games as possible. Because these next two seasons are amazingly important to the future of the franchise.
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@Kcmatt7 Another factor re Escobar (and Salvy) is keeping enough familiar faces so fans keep tuning in. If it is a wholesale turnover with crappy performance during the rebuild, the fans would leave in droves. Having a few WS winners still there gives everyone a feeling of a link to the past even as the new tide washes most of it away.
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@mayjay Bingo! I also think that is the only reason Whit is still here. Fan favorite. Could have been traded for the moon in the offseason I think.
Don’t look for any rational from signings or trades or not trading guys. Likely, the only rationale right now is getting through 2019 and then taking it from there.
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@Kcmatt7 Come to think of it, it might also be to avoid having to give Ned CPR whenever he looks around.
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This team does have a high-end finish of winning an AL wildcard spot the more I build the lineup. Of course, it would take great years from everyone.
- 2B Whit
- RF - Bonifacio
- LF - Soler
- DH Duda
- C - Salvy
- LF - Gordo
- 3B - Cuthbert
- 1B Dozier
- SS - Escobar
I’m not sure this shakes out, but the important thing is that Gordo, Soler and Duda have big seasons. If Gordo can put up a .270 seasons with 20HRs, Duda can put up .230 with 25 HRs and Soler can put up .250 with 20-25 HRs this team will be able to score. The only problem I see is that this team is SLOW. Terribly, terribly slow.
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Oh geez, I don’t know how many times I made fun of Duda
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@Kcmatt7 CF? I mean, I like 2 left fielders but only pitching fast pitch softball against a totally LH lineup.
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@mayjay lol sorry I meant to put Gordo there but typing LF felt so good.
