Wait 'Til Who Knows When (Certainly not 2021!) ... (Winter 20-21 Off-Season Realism)

[allentown]

$4 million, so a little more than Moore.

Since I'm making this comment, he will surprise with an excellent year, but wow! This looks like a horrible signing. The only redeeming feature is a pronounced rise in K-rate last season. But his last good ERA was 5 seasons ago and the reason is clear: his HR rate went from 1 per 10 IP, to 1 per 5 IP, to 1 per 4 IP, and last season to an incredible 1 per 3 IP. Is he set to give up a HR every other IP this season? We're giving a roster spot and $4 million for this? Yikes!

[andyb]

There is probably some bias against liking the signing because he has had a boring 4th starter type career and never had the flashy stuff that Moore had when he was a top prospect. I have an open mind here. Not super excited to lose another 40-man arm (Quezada?), but he is the type of "not too old" player that could easily turn in what we kind of were looking for when we scouted Anibal Sanchez.

I assume Dombrowski has the freedom to walk away from players on mid-level contracts like this if they don't perform. With Anderson and Moore and Nova they definitely have added arms that can plausibly help the team compared to the AAAA arms we have/had in AAA (De Los Santos, Irvin, Jones, etc.). This does not mean those arms are useless (especially Jones though to me he is better suited for the bullpen), it just means their chance of success is likely lower than this group.

[David_Criss]

Certainly willing to give DD some rope here. I am on record as saying that having VV and Howard as no. 4 and 5 is a horrible idea and that Howard needs some AAA time. Now the Phillies have spent $7 million on Moore and Anderson. We are rolling the dice on these two, too. Is Moore over his injuries and able to return to 2016? If we remove 2020 from Anderson, I suspect we'd all be a lot more excited about this signing.

Nova is here, too. Could $7 million gotten one of or a combo of a Paxton, Walker, Hamels, Odorizzi, Teheran or even Sanchez?

Again I am giving DD some rope and trusting him. At the very least this moves VV to the pen where he belongs and gives Howard a little more seasoning time. If they do great and the team stinks, he has two cheap trade chips and VV and Howard move back. If they stink it up, I can't imagine they'd be any worse than VV.

Are the Phillies done adding starters? Is there a bigger trade coming and this is surplus?

[andyb]

At the very least this moves VV to the pen where he belongs and gives Howard a little more seasoning time.

This is where I also am wondering if these moves could be counterproductive. Stuff-wise Howard and VV are better than Moore and Anderson at this point. Are we pushing them aside to give lesser pitchers opportunity? Or is there going to be fair competition and the best pitcher wins? I hope for the latter.

On those 2 specifically, Howard does need to show he can stay healthy and his body can handle high velocity over time. We don't know that he can't though and he has the best starter mix of all 4 pitchers here. Do we limit him to 100 innings when we really should see if he can go 160-180?

With Velazquez he has never trained as a reliever so we don't really know if he would be better in that role. So far his velocity has not played up in the short inning role, though as I said, maybe it would if he trained for it. I will say that he was better last year when he used all of his pitches. In 2019 they had him throwing fastball primarily and then one offspeed pitch. His changeup returned last year and the different look/speed helped everything else. Are we making him a lesser pitcher if we simplify his repetoire?

I love depth. I just hope they give everyone chances.

[andyb]

Pitchers and catchers in 2 weeks. And in no surprise, the Phillies want fans in the stands. It is Florida after all.

https://twitter.com/JClarkNBCS/status/1356993240650706945

[Austinfan]

Look at it this way, if you spread $8M or so over 4 guys with ML track records who aren't that far away from having success, or give one guy a 1yr/$8M contract to be your 4th starter.

Smyly, 1yr/$11M
Kluber, 1yr/$11M
Quintana, 1yr/$8M
Wainwright, 1yr/$8M
Happ, 1yr/$8M
Richards, 2yr/$14M
Lester, 1yr/$5M
Archer, 1yr/$6.5M
DeSciafani, 1yr/$6M
Perez, 1yr/$5M
Urena, 1yr$3.25M
Chatwood, 1yr/$3M
Rodon, 1 yr/$3M

Nova, 1yr/$1.5M
Moore, 1yr/$3M
Anderson, 1yr/$4M

[andyb]

The multiple option strategy ties up roster spots so it is not a 2 guys versus 1 for $7 million question effectively. Conceptually, if rosters were unlimited, the more prospects the better. In practice though one has to say that someone making $8 million plus someone like Cole Irvin might have a better chance of producing than Anderson and Moore combined.

The Latin American strategy needs to change also. When there is a fixed budget, one probably wants more players with a good chance to be a prospect rather than a bunch of $10K signings. There are different strategies. One $2 million player versus 4 $500K players for instance, but the bulk of a team's money really needs to be targeted towards getting their top 5-10 signings right and after that it does not really matter that much. Organizations that used to have 300 prospects will now need to get by with 200-225 total.

[Austinfan]

Baseball has had a weird development philosophy of just let 'em play and sort themselves out.
If you have hundreds of prospects, kinda hard to give them individual coaching and monitoring.
If you get rid of a hundred marginal prospects with little chance of getting to AA ball, much less the majors, you can focus your resources on the 150 or so left with an outside shot at success.

The multiple option strategy only ties up roster spots if you're so deep that you have to cut legitimate players, letting Irvin go has no impact, he had a couple shots and aged out. And if your roster is that talented, you're not pursuing the multiple FA option.

[andyb]

From last year Fangraphs had this on Chase Anderson:

Chase Anderson Brings An Improved Cutter to the Blue Jays

[el-pietro]

I'm whelmed. andyb touched on this but I think VV may be underrated by Phllies fans/media. Sort of a familiarity breeds contempt thing.

I think Phillies fans have three main issues with Velasquez.
1) he hasn't lived up to the potential he promised, specifically the 16 strikeout game. Theres this hope with every start that he may unlock something and become an Ace.
2). Hes very inconsistent. He can look very competent one start, with 2 or fewer runs after 5/6 innings but then go and put the Phillies in a 5 run hole by the third inning in the next.
3). He is slow. He almost always throws a lot of pitches, and when hes not on top of his game the games can be a slog to watch. In 2020 he threw 4.22 pitches per plate appearance which would have been top 5 among qualified starters. For reference though Anderson threw 4.23 PPA. Fangraphs no longer tracks time between pitches but from 2017 to 2019 Vinny had a pace of 26 seconds, third highest among starters. Nola was at 25.4 for reference and he was 7th highest.
Pace Leaderboard

If you ignore those issues and just look at his season long outcomes in relation to Moore, Anderson and other back of the rotation starters then I think he compares favourably. In 2020 he has a better ERA than Anderson by more than a a run and a half and better FIP by 2 runs. Their xFIP was basically identical. Moore hasn't pitched a significant number of innings in the majors since 2018 and VVs 2020 was a run or more better in ERA, FIP and xFIP. 2020 wasn't exactly a banner year for Vinny in terms of raw ERA either, though his FIP and xFIP were both slightly better than his career averages.

Howard obviously has the highest upside, but we don't have a lot of major league innings to compare him on and I'm kinda ruling him out for the start of the season mentally for the time being. He doesn't have a history of a lot of innings and I can't see them throwing him out expecting 150+ innings. So they may sit him down and try and get him ready for the second half. Or maybe I'm talking out of my ass.

Ultimately I see Moore and Anderson as depth options. The Phillies don't have a lot of starting depth that you would be very confident about. Adding these two gives us 8 starting pitchers who you can expect to be within range of major league average for a 4/5 starter. They can send Howard to the minors or EST and wait for an opening either through performance or injury, and let the other three fight for the 5th spot, sending the two losers to the pen.

The issue is that they are spending 11m for Velasquez, Anderson and Moore. Is that the best use of those resources? Could they have put all that money together for one higher profile/more reliable starter. If you had arms in the minors you were more confident about then maybe you could, but I don't see the likes of Falter, Medina, Morales and Suarez as being sure things, even to give you 5 or 6 solid, or slightly below average starts in a row in case of injury.

In terms of projections for 2021 ZIPS thinks they are all similar enough in terms of ERA and FIP, with VV, Anderson and Howard having an ERA between 4.5 and 5.0 and FIP between 4.45 and 5.15. ZIPS thinks Moore is a tad worse, ERA of 5.66 and FIP of 5.38. ZIPS does like VV better in terms of WAR though, with a projection of 1.9 compared to 0.9 for Anderson and Howard and 0.5 for Moore.

[Philsmania]

I would like to see how Velasquez does as a reliever when his role is defined for him to be a reliever. He has pitched in relief in the past but always after he has struggled in the rotation and always for a brief period in an effort to "straighten himself out" or his time in the bullpen was brief because an injury to another starter forced him back into the rotation. He hasn't succeeded as a reliever but he has never had the chance to get acclimated to a relief role either. Put him in the bullpen at the start of spring training, allow him to get used to the role (instead of being switched there on the fly) and see how he does.

[Taudawg]

For 2021, my preference is having many strong-upside players on one year deals. The NL East is going to be tough go, and the Phillies could play well and still find themselves in 4th or 5th place. Having a bunch a quality players on one year deals is the quickest way to flip and fix the farm system should that be the case come late July.

[zambonir]

I feel like any of these guys could be relievers, Howard, Moore and Anderson included, though you're probably not paying $4 million to Anderson for that. I think we do have to consider that Fuld is serious about the 6-man/tandem scenarios though. And unfortunately, odds are, we'll need that 6th or 7th starter sooner than later in any case.

Otherwise, I wonder if more teams will take advantage of the ability to cut guys loose before spring training ends, especially given how ruthless things are getting.

They could still trade Vince I guess.

Also, maybe Howard just spends the year as a reliever/tandem guy. Or works up to it. I still don't think you want to pick a lousy reliever over him for the last roster spot, or stick him in extended spring training. If he doesn't nail down a spot and hasn't wound up being used in tandems/relief, maybe he goes to Lehigh once the season starts there to get back on turn/stretched-out.

[allentown]

Also, maybe Howard just spends the year as a reliever/tandem guy. Or works up to it. I still don't think you want to pick a lousy reliever over him for the last roster spot, or stick him in extended spring training.

I also want Howard, if healthy, on the 26-man active MLB roster. I also want him to start the season in the rotation. It is important that the Phillies do well in the first half of the season, because if they've done well, then they can add a pitcher before the trade deadline. I don't think Howard can reach 150 IP, so get them in early, when they still matter, and when we can still bring in a replacement as he needs to be shut down. i agree with the others that Howard has the best stuff of the end of the rotation guys we have.

I'm still not sold on Anderson. Even with his improved cutter, he stank in 2020 and his HR rate was beyond dreadful. Yes, it was a shortened season, but Anderson has been going downhill in HR-rate allowed for years, and it hasn't been a slow decline, with his HR rate tripling. CBP isn't a hard park in which to hit HRs, so it's an issue for any Phillies pitcher not to be able to limit HRs to a reasonable rate.

[zambonir]

I think we really are going to see the 6-man or tandem. And with a tandem, it's really just semantics. If you give a guy a scheduled 2-3 inning outing paired with a starter wouldn't he also be available out of the pen 1 other day? And if you have a reliever who is meant to give you a 2-3 inning outing, how important is it to pre-plan, vs. just using him on whichever day the starter gets an early hook?

Of course it all falls apart on the days when one of your best starters can't go five, or your 6th starter or one end of a tandem can't even go two.

Howard can still come to spring training and win a job, I think. Unfortunately these moves are as much about fearing he might be back on the DL than thinking he's not ready or will be healthy but innings-limited.

We certainly need the Phillies to be a team that gets good value out of buying low, the question is, can they get the performances?

[David_Criss]

Two 40-man spots still need to be cleared for Anderson and Gregorious. Options are Dohy, Quezada, Llovera. Any chance Dominguez would slip through or do they hold onto him until he can go on the 60-day for Rondon or Nova if they were to make the team? Since they haven’t been announced and all this “depth” has been added, I smell a trade coming.

You can field a pretty decent team or two with all the remaining free agents right now. It looks like Moore, Anderson, Suarez, Velasguez, Nova and Howard are the arms competing for 4th and 5th slots. Yet, Cahill, Porcello, Leake, Walker, Odorizzi, Paxton, Hamels and Teheran are still out there. Any of them better options than what is available now? El-pietro is so right. They are spending $11 million on three lottery tickets in VV, Anderson and Moore. That could have landed a Happ or another potential 3rd/4th starter.

Rondon is the possible NRI I can see making the team. Alvarez, Jeffress, Kela and Bedrosian are still out there if they want to add another middle reliever. Is Bradley/Neris the closer or do they look at Yates or Rosenthal?

The only two bench options right now are Kingery/Haseley and then Chatam/Quinn. I’d love to see Villar, but I bet he wants a starting job with the Pirates or someone. I like Miller more than Gonzalez. Do they look at Moreland or Holt?

For DH if they want a left handed bat its Bruce or Moreland. If they want a right handed bat its: Cespedes, Encarncion or Choo.

Yes the roster is filling up, but upgrades are still available.

[andyb]

Only need 1 spot as the roster is at 39.

40-Man Roster

We made 3 moves last week (Irvin, Hamilton and Holder) and only filled 2 of the spots so far (Realmuto and Moore).

[zambonir]

I'd say the Phillies have already spent a lot more money than I expected a week ago. Didi forced them to pony up an extra $3 million (as they presumably could have had Simmons for $11) and yeah, now they have spent $7 million on two guys instead of $8 million on one. But they need the bodies. The lack of AAA depth - perceived as a strength in the past but none of those guy delivered - definitely hurts.

These moves also increase the bullpen options because now Suarez and even Rosso (previously said to be intended for the AAA rotation) are in the mix and Jones ending up there still does seem inevitable.

[andyb]

We are also getting close to the start of Spring Training. I believe the 60-man move for Seranthony could be done on 2/17 which is the first day pitchers and catchers report.

I am guessing they need to do the Anderson move now, but they could try to finesse the next move if needed to be done as camp opens.

[el-pietro]

Gelb on exactly this topic. Dombrowski prioritising SP depth over a single higher quality starter unlike the strategy of the last few years.

Phillies have options at back of rotation after new regime's push: An early look

Looking at the roster today you'd have to say its pretty much identical to the one put together by Klentak. If there's more success it'll be down to luck, or work around the margins. Im not sure if I would prefer 11-14 million on someone like Odorizzi or the current situation, injuries are a concern especially after the shortened season last year. I dont think Moore or Anderson are all that good but are they better than the likes of Vargas and Smyly in 2019? Or Privett etc