2019-2020 Phillies Offseason News and Speculation

[Austinfan]

I would not pay Strasburg big money, he's an arm injury waiting to happen.
Same with Wheeler, but you can probably get him on a deal where you won't freak out when his arm falls off.

[flyers19rw]

After the comments made by Braves, Alex Anthopoulos, ownership might want to reconsider the entire free agent situation unless they want to get their brains bashed in with a court fight that they will almost certainly lose.

MLB players union launches investigation into potential free agent collusion...

I can't see the MLBPA sitting back and allowing their members to get low balled this winter.

[zambonir]

The MLBPA has been getting beat by the owners every year. Clark's not the guy who's going to fix this. I don't think there's much to the Anthopolous thing as far as actual collusion.

Like, let's say he called up 10 teams and offered them Julio Teheran. He inevitably would have learned something about those teams needs and intentions and spending plans as they all said no, whether overtly or implied.

What's happening now is almost worse than collusion, if you're the players. GMs are all on the same page about date-based valuation and owners are all on the same page about not paying the CBT. No backroom chats needed.

Meanwhile, an update on our willingness to give up draft picks....

Mark Feinsand on Twitter

[fish]

I would hope that’s just a due-diligence call, because Donaldson makes the least sense for them to give away a pick for at the moment. I’d make him a priority after every last good option to improve the team fell through.

[Austinfan]

The problem for the players is that it's not rational for teams to give big long-term contracts that extend into a players mid-30s. And no muttering about collusion changes that reality.

The change in baseball is simply that teams have enough experience with contracts like Pujols, Fielders, etc. that they know better - look at the Harper deal, those 36-38 years are basically a 3yr/$30M contract tacked onto a 10 year, $300M contract for a 26 year old player. And that ten year could be seen as a 5yr/$175M deal followed by a 5yr/$125M deal.

If you look at the Harper deal that way, then most 31 year old players shouldn't expect as much as that 5yr/$125M.

[phillychuck]

Josh Donaldson is the biggest candidate on the FA market for a collapse or season-ending injury. Do NOT sign him.

[zambonir]

I would agree it's just a due-diligence call. I'm not that worried about Donaldson getting hurt or collapsing right away, but don't see how you can sign him to a longer deal. My guess is he stays in Atlanta (where they don't have to give up the pick). The only way he makes sense for the Phillies if is Moustakas can get three-four years and Donaldson is willing to take another huge one-year deal, thus keeping things more clear for Bohm.

And yes, it's not productive for the MLBPA to complain about the free agent market, it is perfectly rational of the owners to realize paying for past performance or aging players is bad business. But they need to be willing to help fix the imbalance. The union needs to focus on getting their members paid earlier, and achieving free agency earlier. I really don't believe we'll be watching baseball in April of 2022.

[mdougherty12]

I'd be at least a little worried about injury with Donaldson. He played a total of 165 games in 2017 & 2018.

[zambonir]

That's more than I would have guessed. I don't think he's injury "prone," he just had a chronic injury for most of those missed games, and showed he was healthy this past year. Any player his age is going to be a risk but so are the 31 and 32 year-olds (as we learned from signing Cutch instead of Pollock too). Moustakas missed most of 2016 himself. And Harper's always gonna be one diving catch away from missing a half-season.

[andyb]

It is perfectly rational if you are a team with money to sign a star player and assume the last few years of the contract is the cost of doing business. Now baseball is messed up in that they purposely limit the play of younger players more than any professional league. That does create incentives for teams to want younger players if they are better and cheaper.

It does NOT remove the incentive to add older players for money if you have holes in your roster AND the money to pay for them. It is the labor contract providing incentives to sign younger players though measured by a touch of collusion among the owners to limit all pay for things like arbitration.

[andyb]

MLB Rumors had a bunch of teams (though not the Phillies) looking at this Korean pitcher who could be posted:

Gwang-hyun Kim Korean Leagues Statistics & History | Baseball-Reference.com

The thought here is that he is another crafty, command favored pitcher like Ryu (or Keuchel for that matter) that could provide cost-effective mid-rotation innings. Pitchers that keep the ball in the park (and Korea has a lot of offense in their translated stats) can play in any league. For those who say Asian pitchers only go to West Coast teams, the Twins are serious about him.

We need 2 starters. At least one should be left-handed. We should be looking at players like this if we have to balance the big ticket expenditures (like Cole for instance).

[Philsmania]

I see something of a pattern with the Phillies and high-profile international prospects. They go bold and sign a guy but then he bombs and they go back to having cold feet with this market for many years. See the infamous 2002 Koreans, MAG, Jhailyn.

[zambonir]

Posted veteran players are different than younger players though. MAG was the only one in that category really. Pretty much a whole different front office now. Who knows if they ever truly in on Ohtani though he certainly eliminated us quickly if so.

In any case I'm more interested in the Japanese CF.

Reading about the Indians maybe trading Lindor and the A's maybe trading Semien, plus Gregorious being available, makes me wonder if we may yet see the Phillies moving Segura to another position,. Not the first option, surely, but if they do non-tender Cesar, could still be one.

[andyb]

To be fair we have been signing a couple of Asian players a year, seemingly in the 100K to 300K bonus range.

This player I noted was different. It is in the mid-priced free agent market. These are veterans that might sign for $2-$6 million per year that might be undervalued like Ryu was initially. Ryu signed a 6 year/$36 million contract (including bonus) with the Dodgers after 2012. Now this pitcher will sign for less because he is 31. Mike Mikolas is also the same type of pitcher. Mid-career success but does not have lights out stuff so easily could be underpriced.

The downside of course is if the player's skills don't translate and he barely gets out of AAA for a 2 year/$10 deal. IMO it is not a bad risk as you balance the higher priced acquisitions though. Think of him as a Keuchel for one quarter the price but with about a 50% chance of being decent (where Keuchel would be more like 90%).

[allentown]

How disappointed would we be if we came out of this with 2 of the second tier non-compensation guys (from a list of Hamels, Keuchel, Gibson, Ryu)?

I'm okay with several second-tier guys, mainly pitchers and one position player, IF we do this without giving up a draft pick. If we are going to give up our second round pick, then I want a primo FA. One of the very worst things the Phillies have done over the years has been to lose draft picks over guys who were WAAYY less than primo. That's a losing, future-killing proposition and it will kill your budget, because it cuts off the supply of cheap, homegrown contributors. My first choice is still one of the top tier SPs, but the second-tier multiple player approach without losing a pick fits with our multiple holes and shallow farm.

[allentown]

MAG, Jhailyn.

Well, between MAG and Jhailyn was Encarnacion, and is $1 million bonus was large for the time. Frankly, however, the history of these 5 big-$ international guys is strong evidence that we simply lack the scouting/development talent in the org to wisely spend big bonus $. Perhaps we are better off just signing more mid-level and then low-level guys, until we can improve our international scouting. The stars seem to come primarily from the big bonus-$ guys and the Phillies haven't produced a star from international since Carlos Ruiz, so it's not as if we've scored with the multiple-lower-bonus-$ approach, either.

[bigegypt0417]

Phillies will focus on starting pitching at GM meetings

[Austinfan]

Actually, outside of the top 2-3 each year, LA stars seem to be randomly distributed, look at Altuve or Acuna. The worst LA value is probably #3-4 through #20 b/c you're paying a $1+M for a guy with about the same rate of success as the next tier - which isn't surprising given you're projecting 16 year olds.

If you can't identify who is worth $4M, then use that money to sign a portfolio, $1M, a couple $500K, a half dozen $250K, and some $100K guys.

[zambonir]

Jayson Stark on Twitter

Jayson Stark on Twitter

[zambonir]

Contrary to Stark lots of other guys are saying they are pretty interested in Gerrit Cole. Of course the Phillies could just be saying that (privately) without meaning it. Or Boras could be.

Braves have taken Will Smith off the market. As a revenue-sharing team they only lose their third-rounder.

3B market is looking interesting. Would be great if someone (Texas or Toronto) snags Donaldson away from Atlanta and we can still get Moose. But market for Moose might be better than expected.

Also Odorizzi figured he had a high chance of being this year's Keuchel and took his QO, so he can hit free agency again next year without it. But that means one fewer arm in that middle tier between Cole and Cole (Hamels).