The Long, Slow March of the Damned: Jays/Orioles, April 13-16

[Schad]

Desperate times call for desperate measures. Normally we lose any series thread I start (mostly because the only time I start series threads is when this board is so apathetic that no one else does), but if even HangTime can't coax wins against the Brewers, it's time for a shakeup:

Game 1, Thursday:

Baltimore starter: Kevin Gausman. A scrub who'll look like Nolan Ryan.
Jays starter: the guy who gave up 5 runs in a third of an inning.


Game 2, Friday:

Baltimore starter: Wade Miley. The perfect Orioles pitcher...gave up seven walks in his first start. No runs. Winnery ****.
Jays starter: Aaron Sanchez, who'll go seven strong and pick up a loss.


Game 3, Saturday:

Baltimore starter: TBD. Our record against unnamed pitchers has to be terrible.
Jays starter: Marco Estrada. ERA is 5.74 through two starts; that's, like, a week worth of runs for the Jays.


Game 4, Sunday:

Baltimore starter: Dylan Bundy. Already dominated us once.
Jays starter: JA Happ. Will probably be MLB's first 30 loss pitcher.


Series analysis: doooooooooooooomed.

[s e n s i]

god not **** TBD again. the task here is simple: don't be 1-11 after a dozen games. try and steal game 2 and move to an honorable 2-10

also **** baltimore so much

[JaysRule15]

Will Martin get his average up to .100?
Will Bautista get his SLG to .200?
Will Smoak sustain his 33% K rate?

Find out on the next episode of Blue Jays baseball.

[SharoneWright]

So, is the 2018 draft particularly strong?

[Schad]

So, is the 2018 draft particularly strong?

Very strong where it counts: in names. Perfect Game's #1 ranked prospect is a right-handed pitcher named Kumar Rocker. I'm just going to go ahead and assume that isn't John's son.

[Skin Blues]

So, is the 2018 draft particularly strong?

Very strong where it counts: in names. Perfect Game's #1 ranked prospect is a right-handed pitcher named Kumar Rocker. I'm just going to go ahead and assume that isn't John's son.

John loves brown people, I'm sure he'd have no problem naming his son after an Indian movie character.

[-MetA4-]

Very strong where it counts: in names. Perfect Game's #1 ranked prospect is a right-handed pitcher named Kumar Rocker. I'm just going to go ahead and assume that isn't John's son.

Kumar Rocker is the son of 1988 Outland and Lombardi Award winner Tracy Rocker from the Auburn Tigers. Rocker was the DL coach of the Tennessee Titans as well as several college teams (Auburn, Georgia, Ole Miss, Arkansas).

[-MetA4-]

The 2018 draft also features Brady Singer who we failed to sign two years ago in the 2nd round

[Mehar]

Will Martin get his average up to .100?
Will Bautista get his SLG to .200?
Will Smoak sustain his 33% K rate?

Find out on the next episode of Blue Jays baseball.

I am confident Martin and Bautista will come around. However- i see Smoak sustaining his rate. My major complaint of Shapiro and Atkins is that i for the life of me- do not understand the rush to lock up Smoak for 4.25 M a year over two years.

On the open market, i doubt he would have gotten more than 1 M as a backup. With the 4.25 M paid to Smoak, and the 6 M given to Pierce, i said it before- but they should have used that 10 M more wisely to target an everyday player in LF and 1st Base through trade or free agency. Not sure what Atkins and Shapiro were drinking when they handed Smoak that contract.

[Skin Blues]

Will Martin get his average up to .100?
Will Bautista get his SLG to .200?
Will Smoak sustain his 33% K rate?

Find out on the next episode of Blue Jays baseball.

I am confident Martin and Bautista will come around. However- i see Smoak sustaining his rate. My major complaint of Shapiro and Atkins is that i for the life of me- do not understand the rush to lock up Smoak for 4.25 M a year over two years.

On the open market, i doubt he would have gotten more than 1 M as a backup. With the 4.25 M paid to Smoak, and the 6 M given to Pierce, i said it before-but they should have used that 10 M more wisely to target an everyday player in LF and 1st Base through trade or free agency. Not sure what Atkins and Shapiro were drinking when they handed Smoak that contract.

Not saying the Smoak contract was a good idea, but it's not as terrible as it seems. He was a 104 wRC+ hitter in his 1.5 years as a Blue Jay, spanning almost a full season's worth of PAs, at the time he signed last July. For perspective, that's the same wRC+ Kendrys Morales has put up last season. Point being, Smoak was a legitimately useful player. The "rush" to lock him up was that if he merely continued at the same pace he'd been at since being acquired (a pace he had maintained for 2 separate seasons in Seattle), then he'd have been much more expensive than $8M/2. It was a gamble, one that obviously didn't work out too well considering his 59 wRC+ since the extension. But consider what his market value would be at two seasons of a 104 wRC+, compared to Kendrys Morales' 107 wRC+. Morales has a better track record but Smoak was only 29 and a former blue chip prospect. So not the $33M, but something like the $12M Moss/Pearce/Joyce got seems reasonable. Unfortunately he completely tanked, far worse than anything he'd ever done before, almost immediately after signing the extension.

[phillipmike]

Will Martin get his average up to .100?
Will Bautista get his SLG to .200?
Will Smoak sustain his 33% K rate?

Find out on the next episode of Blue Jays baseball.

I am confident Martin and Bautista will come around. However- i see Smoak sustaining his rate. My major complaint of Shapiro and Atkins is that i for the life of me- do not understand the rush to lock up Smoak for 4.25 M a year over two years.

On the open market, i doubt he would have gotten more than 1 M as a backup. With the 4.25 M paid to Smoak, and the 6 M given to Pierce, i said it before- but they should have used that 10 M more wisely to target an everyday player in LF and 1st Base through trade or free agency. Not sure what Atkins and Shapiro were drinking when they handed Smoak that contract.

Its all about context at the time. I am not defending the deal as i would cut Smoak today but at the time the deal was "fair market" value.

You do but they clearly made a mistake and misread the market but again no one knew that the market would tank.

At the time Smoak signed (July 16th - can assume negotiations started well before that when his numbers were better) he was the 2nd lowest guaranteed deal for a 1B when looking at 2017 salaries. He is no Edwin or Jose but at the time Edwin didnt want to negotiate in season and Jose wanted 150M. So in all likelihood the FO thought they were losing their starting RF, 1B, LF and DH in Jose, Smoak, Saunders, and Edwin - Colabello was gone by then. 4.25M for an insurance policy wasnt bad and at worst he is a bench player making 4.25M. Average 1B was making 7.8M.

Read on Twitter

Average MLB salary was 4.35M and for a veteran it was 9.9M.

Read on Twitter

Smoak was less than the average MLB player, and well under the average for a veteran and 1B.

1B 2017 Salaries;

http://www.spotrac.com/mlb/rankings/...Team/1st-base/

Only Jaso, Alonso, Thames, Carter, Adams, Morrison, Lind and Bird are cheaper. Belt signed an extension and is making 8.8M next season. Alonso, Thames, Carter, Morrison, Adams and Lind all signed after Smoak's extension and when the market plummeted. Plus Adams, Alonso and Bird were pre-arb or arb deals.

So only Jaso counts when trying to compare the deal. When Smoak was signed the Jays were paying him to be the 2nd lowest paying 1B in the league for 2017 (4.25M) - 2nd to Jaso (4M). Jaso came off a 0.9 WAR season and got 8M over 2 years (4M per). Smoak was coming off a 1.3 WAR season in 2015 and had wRC+ 101 on the day he signed (cumulative 105 wRC+ since he put on a Jays jersey)... He had a line of 256/.360/.424 on June 17th and 20 games later he only started 11 of those games after being the starter at 1st. He dropped off for sure after that finishing with a wRC+ of 90.

It was a questionable contract at the time because no one really liked him (fans and media but i suspect management and the coaches did) but now the deal looks worse now all things considering (market plummeting, Edwin gone, he is likely a starter, better players getting less deals). But at the time he was signed he was the 2nd lowest paid 1B for 2017 to Jaso. In retrospect Thames, Carter, Morrison and Lind look better. But Thames wasnt a slam dunk to come back to the Majors and if he did does he want a bench role with the Jays? Carter wasnt going to be a free agent as he had another year of control plus he is right handed - Jays wanted lefties. So only Morrison and Lind were pending FAs at the time Smoak signed. There were rumors about the Jays moving off of Lind for clubhouse issues. So it leaves Morrison... i would take Morrison over Smoak any day but the options werent as clear as they were on July 16, 2016 as they were when free agency opened and certainly not now.

[JaysRule15]

Ever since their Cleveland days, this management team's philosophy has been to lock up players for a lower cost before they hit FA. There are advantages and disadvantages to this. You can save money by preventing your player from going into FA and avoiding a bidding war, but at the same time, you have to offer an extension to the player without completely knowing what you have in him or being able to confidently predict his future trajectory.

In Smoak, this early extension strategy ended up backfiring. But on the bright side, at least this was only $9 million in sunk cost. Teams overpay FAs all the time and end up regretting it (Anyone remember AA overpaying Maicer Izturis?). Considering that a $9 million deal is this management team's biggest blunder so far, I'll take it all day long.

Let's hope that with their philosophy, this group can lock up our young core (Osuna, Stroman, Travis, Sanchez) for decent deals before they hit FA. Although it's looking doubtful with Sanchez.

[So_Fresh]

**** all of you who want to trade our talent for prospects! I don't want another 5 year rebuild. I don't know if I 'll be alive by then.

The Jays are sweeping this series.

[So_Fresh]

LF E. Carrera (L)
RF Jose Bautista (R)
DH Josh Donaldson (R)
1B Kendrys Morales (S)
SS Troy Tulowitzki (R)
C Russell Martin (R)
CF Kevin Pillar (R)
3B Darwin Barney (R)

[Kinger95]

Is an ERA of 135.0 very good??

[dagger]

**** all of you who want to trade our talent for prospects! I don't want another 5 year rebuild. I don't know if I 'll be alive by then.

The Jays are sweeping this series.

I hope they do sweep the series, but the rebuild is coming as surely as the Army of the Dead. It was foretold as soon as Anthopoulos assembled a roster of key players who would have to be paid megabucks into their thirties. All of this was discussed in depth when the 2015 trades were made. It was never going to be a large window. A large window would have been created if Noah Syndergaard was a Jay to go along with Stroman and Sanchez.

[pingpongrac]

How is that not overturned?!

[vaff87]

20 minutes to review the call ... and they still get it wrong.

[Natural11]

Why is Martin still hitting 6th? Come on...

[Lateral Quicks]

Why didn't Gibby start Martin for Liriano's first start again?