mtutiger

My guess is that they are going to sell, but they are going to attempt to do so in a way that returns ML-ready or close-to-ML ready talent. Easier said than done, but that's why Scott Harris got the contract. I do think it's worth taking a step back and recognizing that Michael Lorenzen, overall, has been a success for this front office... there was a lot of skepticism when they signed him, but one of the things Harris discussed when he was hired was becoming a place where players could go to get better. And that vision largely played out with Lorenzen, which will benefit the team as he will likely will return more at the trade deadline than what one would have expected he might back at the beginning of the season.

It's also not good enough to take players off the table (ie. Colt Keith). For someone like Arenado, I'd have to imagine he'd have to be on the table for the Cards to be interested.

Not that it matters, but I believe this would make the NL West the only "Bally-less" division in baseball, at least at the moment.

It reminded me a lot of a Early 2021/2022 Detroit Tigers game.... just hideous ABs and, not once, did one ever think they would get back into it. Don't want to take anything away from Lorenzen/Holton/Foley, just calling it as I see it.

Yeah, the other guys are a factor here as well for sure.... Overall, I don't think they draft McGonigle if they didn't think they could reel him in. Not too concerned about it yet.

KC hitters ABs suggest that they don't want to be at the ballpark today....

Just bizarre

I do think he deserves some credit for getting the ball rolling on getting new PD people into the system. There was turnover after he left and Harris came in, but a lot of those hires from a couple of years ago (Garko being the most notable one) were retained.

Really need to add Colt Keith to the equation as well...

Really begs the question of, if not Haase, who? His spot on this team is guaranteed at the moment by having the skill of catching. If Donnie Sands were hitting better in AAA, it would be one thing, but I suspect that they feel they can wait him out because he plays the position and the alternatives aren't exactly great either. Overall, I do think that given his issues with fielding coupled with his lack of hitting, he probably needs to stay behind home plate and not be put into the outfield going forward. That was ugly.

Don't read the comments, Exhibit 1 million

It's particularly bad with Tiger writers IMO. Some of that is likely the lack of quality baseball around these parts

What a tragedy. Good Lord

And you can be sure that Donald Trump would make a lot of noise to this effect if they did as well.

The Georgia Supreme Court is probably about as un-Biden a judicial body as you'll find. So probably not the best example.

Jarvy being traded is galaxy brain stuff.... that's not gonna happen, he will opt in, and we have to hope for the best going forward. Or at least hope that the team getting better around him with the addition of some of the younger talent in Toledo or through free agency maybe helps in some way. The situation sucks, but at least Miguel comes off the books this offseason.... they can handle carrying his contract even if the production isn't ideal.

I could be wrong, but the NoLabels thing has big "Howard Schultz" energy. I dont see it happening

Guys like Anderson, who would have projected lower under other circumstances, dont have the leverage in that situation either to demand slot. There's a good chance he makes more even going underslot than he would made otherwise. Which is why teams do it lol

Schrodinger's Joe: Senile and addled, yet engaged enough to push back on his advisors when he thinks they made mistakes.

Lee, Sears and Minton strike me as being underslot guys.... the Day 3 High Schoolers, like Andrew Dunford or Ethan Farris, seem like the challenge to me. Can they cover all those guys plus McGonigle with the money leftover? Ed is probably right that they probably have a good idea of that answer already based on having contracts in place that we don't know about.

They may just be expectation setting in the event that something doesn't work out. I just think if they bring in Anderson for closer to $1 mil versus $1.9 (his slot value), along with the fact that there are probably a couple of other underslot candidates mixed in, they can make up some decent ground in all likelihood. Some of it will depend on what McGonigle gets as well.

I think Max Anderson is probably the key guy.... if he goes a decent amount underslot, I think they can get them all, or nearly all of them anyway.

I would guess that picks 1-2 were both money savers (Clark for 4-slot value, Anderson TBD), so it's definitely possible they freed up enough money to go overslot for Cerkownyk and still have a good shot of signing the rest. Not to mention that they probably will go underslot on a couple other of their picks from Rounds 1-10. Like LG though, it's really fascinating that he got that kinda haul as a 15th Rounder.

For reference

Random observation to add, although it doesn't answer your question: I thought Metzler / Conner were very convincing in their explanations to the press when asked about certain players in their media availability. Which is a bit of a change from Scott Pleis / old regime, which often felt like a used car sales pitch a lot of the time. Some of that may be new regime / recency bias, though it was nice to see this organization try a different approach in the draft. Now we just have to see whether it bears any results.