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It was reported that Harris had a very high ask on Flaherty, even with the Dodgers, and settled for Lirzano and Sweeney. But I'm still not quite following your objection to this. Does this mean he should simply have asked for Lirzano and Sweeney last week so he could be done with it? As for the wait-for-development approach: I'm not sure what else our options are. We can't trade our way to an immediate winner because we don't have the prospect capital to liquidate for that. We can't free agent our way to an immediate winner until players actively want to play for and in Detroit. We can't waiver wire or MiLB free agent our way to a winner because there's not enough talent to be gleaned from those wires. That leaves the development process to build a winner. Unless I'm missing something here that you're seeing?

They happen to have one of those at 35th and S. Ashland, just a couple miles from that ballpark. That's pretty local.

One thing I'd like to see Harris do in the next 12 months is secure at least one fire-breathing back-of-the-bullpen guy, whether via trade, waivers, Rule 5 pickup, MiLB contract, or development. That is one component without which you cannot win the 2025 game.

How would you approach team-building differently than you suspect Harris is doing?

If I had to bet a dollar on this proposition, I would take the over on Harris sees something in the kid that suggests his hit tool can be improved.

This is totally fair and we all do the same thing: make devastating judgments about the performance of high-level strategic baseball professional based on incomplete and imperfect information. What could be more fun as an engaged, analytical fan? 😁 But I want to ask you about the bold-faced part. You say Harris has a strategy of overasking and waiting until the end of the deadline to make moves that you don't like. This almost suggests that you would prefer he take lesser deals earlier in the deadline period. I'm not sure that's what you're trying to put across, so can you spool out for me what you mean by this to help me understand your thinking here?

Probably because he never got the offer I proposed a few dozen pages ago that Greg Pappas laughed off.

What part of “that ridiculous” do you not understand?? 😉

Or perhaps Madden, too. And Faedo, who is proving he is not a major league starter, may get a few nods to chow innings for us. I'm thinking it’s going to be all about warm bodies for the rest of this season. I’m doubtful they’ll try to stretch Brieske. He hasn’t thrown more than three innings since Avila days, when he was perfectly awful doing so.

It will be pitchers we believe we can get the clock ticking on without any real future consequence, exactly as with Sammons and Montero, which is why—and I know you didn’t say this, but others have—Jobe has no chance to come up this year.

OTOH, TBF, Liranzo is not a finished major league product.

That’s really what it comes down to: out was a combination of key guys underperforming horribly and guys getting banged up. If Tork and Baez, and maybe Meadows and definitely Manning, had stayed true to their projections, and Carpenter and Mize and (later) Olson had been able to stay on the field, we might have won 84 games this season. But even with everything falling apart, we have been, and still are, within shouting distance of .500. So we may not be a top contender for a ring next year, but we may not be as far, far away as fans might think.

I am totally with you on Harris and the progress he is making in our system, which was all but leveled by TFGM and so is going to take some time to actually build up. It just amuses me how people think we absolutely should be in the playoffs RIGHT ****ING NOW because it’s been ten years already, and obviously I’m sympathetic to that because I lived through all his, too, but when you calm down and think rationally about it, you can see that’s basically lashing out. I’m not sure Avila actually enjoyed lottery tickets as much as he didn’t know how to put the right kind of work into assessing prospects. For all the lip service he paid for Caesar, he either couldn’t, or wouldn’t, put anything along those lines in place to help him do his job. He took the lottery tickets because, as in the 80’s, that’s all he ever thought prospects even were.

I think maybe Liranzo is a little more than just an insurance policy for Tork. Harris might be putting Tork on notice, which, honestly, Tork might not mind because he might be eager to move on to somewhere else for new start. Seems like a non-analytics organization like the White Sox or Angels or Rockies or Nationals might be a good fit for him.

Who was demanding Jackson Holliday for Jack Flaherty?

I’ll bid him Godspeed and everything as he walks out the door, but now that he’s on another team, I really don’t care so much how he does anymore. He’s just another pitcher like all the other pitchers on other teams now. I’m focused on Liranzo and Sweeney now.

Is Lirzano going to take over for Tork? Thayron Liranzo TLDR A below-average arm stands in the way of Liranzo catching. He might have enough power to profile at first if he can't. Full Report Liranzo still has too much to clean up on defense for us to feel comfortable stuffing him on the Top 100. When he can actually get a throw to the bag off, his Patrick Bailey-style sidearm release works ok, but he so often botches or fumbles his exchange that he doesn't give himself a chance to get the runner. Liranzo mostly utilizes a traditional crouch when receiving and is a below-average framer and ball-blocker. Both those skills are more tenable and within the range of big league viability than his arm, but at Liranzo's size and age, it's no guarantee they'll stay that way. There is huge switch-hitting power here — Liranzo hit 24 bombs in the Cal League, hit a ball 114 mph, and had a 48% hard-hit rate last year. He can hit for power from the left side even when he isn't taking his best swing, and he's dangerous from the right side even though he uses super conservative footwork, generating everything with a shift in his weight and the strength of his hands. Liranzo doesn't have great feel for the barrel, which is typical for a young a switch-hitter, let alone one of atypical size. His 65% contact rate is below the threshold of any 2023 big league first baseman (Bryce Harper's was at 68%, the next lowest was 72%), so there's substantial Quad-A risk here if Liranzo can't catch. Whether or not he stays back there is the difference between Cal Raleigh and M.J. Melendez from a production standpoint. Arm strength is perhaps a little less teachable than other issues young catchers often need to fix, which is worrisome in this case. He has a little more minor league experience than some of the other prospects who present a combination of extreme ceiling and risk, and Liranzo's high-end outcomes are driving his placement here.

D'OH!

What the hell is happening? Who is fcking up the report on the return for Flaherty? Or are we getting all four guys?

Whoops! Fangraphs 2024 Updated rankings now has Cartaya at #13 in the system and on a downward trend. https://www.fangraphs.com/prospects/the-board/2024-in-season-prospect-list?org=lad Kendall George ranks #30 here. Looks less than whelming at first glance.

Interesting haul. Cartaya is the prize. Pipeline has him at #7 in the system but not a Top 100; fangraphs has him at #3 but that was back on March 1. here is the writeup there: 3. Diego Cartaya, C Video Signed: July 2nd Period, 2018 from Venezuela (LAD) Age 22.5 Height 6′ 3″ Weight 219 Bat / Thr R / R FV 50 Tool Grades (Present/Future) Hit Raw Power Game Power Run Fielding Throw 30/35 50/60 40/55 40/30 40/55 55 After he slashed a disappointing .189/.278/.379 at Double-A Tulsa, Cartaya won FanGraphs’ 2023 Resolve-Testing Catcher of the Year award, a honor previously bestowed upon Bo Naylor, Henry Davis and MJ Melendez. Some of the underlying hit tool issues that Cartaya performed in spite of during previous seasons became untenable in 2023, as upper-level opposing pitchers executed to the locations he struggles to cover, which are copious. This is nothing new — Cartaya has had elevated strikeout rates in the lower minors (26% or more) since 2021, and hit tool risk has been a part of his profile the entire time. It will continue to be, but if Cartaya can get to enough of his power and continue to develop on defense (more on that in a second), then he’s still likely to clear the low offensive bar at catcher. The physical punishment inherent in catchers’ duties can have a pretty serious impact on how they perform on offense for long stretches of time. Cartaya’s bat looked unusually slow in 2023 and his max exit velocity declined three ticks from the previous season; his issues were not as simple as him having a low BABIP (although he did at .216). The exit velo decline could point to some underlying malady, or at least is an indication that Cartaya wasn’t in peak physical form last year. He had multiple injury issues in prior seasons (mostly back and hamstring). At age 22, it’s fair to conclude that he’s not in physical decline, and that whatever his 2023 issue, it might be remedied or healed with an offseason of rest. If anything, broad-shouldered, 22-year-old hitters who are built like castle drawbridges, as Cartaya is, tend to merit more projection into their mid-20s. Cartaya still has developing to do on defense, but he’s a pretty good bet to remain a catcher. His receiving and ball-blocking are still below average (common for a 22-year-old, but it’s frustrating that Cartaya has been treading water in this regard), and too often he fumbles the baseball during his exchange, but his raw arm strength is very good and he has the big, durable frame typical of a primary catcher. He is no longer on the expressway to Chavez Ravine like it seemed he was a year ago, but Cartaya is still a high-ceiling catching prospect who stands a chance to be an impact regular. One of Cartaya’s option years has now passed. Will Smith is entrenched ahead of him, and fellow catching prospects Dalton Rushing and Thayron Liranzo put themselves in the medium-term 40-man mix with great 2023 seasons. It’s very important for Cartaya to rebound in 2024 so he can enter his final option year as a viable big league option. You could point to any of the Dodgers’ good catching prospects as candidates for trade, and Smith’s presence increases the likelihood that any of them begins their career as a backup, which is especially true for Cartaya because he’s already on the 40-man roster. We’re not totally ignoring Cartaya’s 2023 flop, but our instincts here are to avoid overcorrection and continue to project Cartaya as a long-term primary catcher.

Is it the same package they offered us for Eduardo last year? Is Flaherty going to exercise a phantom no-trade clause?

OTOH ...

The pundits are beginning to throw in the towel.

I'm knocked out by the idea that games lasted 2-1/2 to 3 hours back then. Given how quickly hitters put pitchers' pitches into play, that must have entailed a hell of a lot of dawdling.