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2023 Cleveland Guardians Season Thread

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KluberSociety said:
2022: 13% K
2023: 25% K

This to me is the bigger red flag that something may be more seriously wrong. That and his atrocious defense.
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The coach V video from the spring training might be instructive. I thought it was posted in this forum but I don’t recall where I viewed it and can’t find it. Nonetheless, the instruction—message—may have been misinterpreted. It currently appears that way.
 
Kiddo said:

Serious, you make the damn lineup every day! Wtf is going on
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Remember that movie from several years ago with Mark Wahlberg, where the plant pollen was making people off themselves? Maybe that's what going on with Terry, only the plant pollen makes him inexplicably write in Ameds name on the lineup card every day. He tries to write 'Arias' or 'Freeman' and it comes out as 'Rosario'.
 
macbdog said:
Remember that movie from several years ago with Mark Wahlberg, where the plant pollen was making people off themselves? Maybe that's what going on with Terry, only the plant pollen makes him inexplicably write in Ameds name on the lineup card every day. He tries to write 'Arias' or 'Freeman' and it comes out as 'Rosario'.
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The Happening.

Saw that with my girlfriend (now wife) and a bunch of friends.

The worst movie I ever saw in theaters.

I'd watch that movie ten times in a row if it got Amed out of this organization.
 
HammerGold said:
People realize this team has played the 3rd easiest schedule in the league right? And they think the team is going to play significantly better against a much tougher schedule? This isn't their year. Trade guys who aren't part of the future and build for the coming years. Team sucks this year.
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Baseball can be funny like that. You just never know.
 
We'd be a better team with Amed in RF and Arias at SS for crying out loud. (Or Gimenez at SS, Freeman at 2B and some platoon in RF.) Rocchio seems a bit error prone yet, Freeman's arm seems a bit weak for SS, though they're both better in the field overall. Amed simply does not belong at SS.

Anecdote time from the golden age of the 4-starter rotation:
In 1982 the Baltimore Orioles broke camp with a rookie named Ripken at 3B, Len Sakata at SS, and Rich Dauer at 2B. By June 30th, they were 38-33-1, a middling team tied for 3rd in the AL East (They had just lost to Rick Sutcliffe's Indians 9-0). On July 1st Earl Weaver played musical chairs, moving Ripken to SS and some combination of Dauer, Sakata, and Glenn Gulliver(?) at 2B and 3B. They finished the season 56-35 to earn the second-best record in MLB (missed the playoffs by 1 game, no wild card), Ripken ROY. Moral of the story? Play your best players where they belong, and move the other guys around to accommodate them.

Now what do you suppose Earl Weaver might do with the 2023 Guardians? (And do you think he'd be starting Zunino?)
 
HammerGold said:
People realize this team has played the 3rd easiest schedule in the league right? And they think the team is going to play significantly better against a much tougher schedule? This isn't their year. Trade guys who aren't part of the future and build for the coming years. Team sucks this year.
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Maybe this infantile logic just isn’t that appealing to others?
 
Benway said:
We'd be a better team with Amed in RF and Arias at SS for crying out loud. (Or Gimenez at SS, Freeman at 2B and some platoon in RF.) Rocchio seems a bit error prone yet, Freeman's arm seems a bit weak for SS, though they're both better in the field overall. Amed simply does not belong at SS.

Anecdote time from the golden age of the 4-starter rotation:
In 1982 the Baltimore Orioles broke camp with a rookie named Ripken at 3B, Len Sakata at SS, and Rich Dauer at 2B. By June 30th, they were 38-33-1, a middling team tied for 3rd in the AL East (They had just lost to Rick Sutcliffe's Indians 9-0). On July 1st Earl Weaver played musical chairs, moving Ripken to SS and some combination of Dauer, Sakata, and Glenn Gulliver(?) at 2B and 3B. They finished the season 56-35 to earn the second-best record in MLB (missed the playoffs by 1 game, no wild card), Ripken ROY. Moral of the story? Play your best players where they belong, and move the other guys around to accommodate them.

Now what do you suppose Earl Weaver might do with the 2023 Guardians? (And do you think he'd be starting Zunino?)
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If you see a Cal Ripken, jr among our prospects, let me know.

At age 19 in AA, his OPS was .859. The next year in AAA, it was .919. Combined in those two years, he hit 48 HR, 9 Triples, and 59 Doubles, while striking out 10.5% of the time.

Sakata was no Amed, either. He was a util MIF that accumulated 3.3 fWAR in eleven seasons.

But the most important thing to notice is that Weaver waited until JULY 1st to make the move. So if you want to know what Weaver would do...based upon your example, he would do the exact same thing as Tito is doing....IF he thought that one of our prospects was the next Ripken, and IF he thought that Amed was merely a Sakata with no track record.

A few other anecdotes:

In 2015 Frankie Lindor was called up to replace a struggling Jose Ramirez on June 14th.

If you see a Frankie Lindor among our SS prospects let me know.

In 2007 the Tribe had Josh Barfield playing 2B, and he was a flop. He was certainly not an Amed Rosario. Down below, a youngster by the name of Asdrubal Cabrera was hitting everything in sight to a tune of an .828 OPS with a K rate of 10.7%.

The Tribe was in a neck and neck pennant race with Detroit. After not pulling off a trade at the deadline, they brought up Droobs on Aug 8th.

We might have a Droobs playing in Columbus.

*****

If you like these anecdotes, notice a few things.

1) The moves were not made in May.
2) The moves did not include replacing a player with Ameds track record of production and leadership.
3) The Cleveland moves involved calling up switch hitting MIFs who were productive, without striking out.

And one more anecdote:

The most reviled athlete to play for Cleveland, until Amed, was Johnny Peralta. He was also nearing free agency. He was finally traded on July 28th, 2010, because we had a sure fire elite former prospect that only needed to play regularly to be an immediate upgrade to Peralta...Andy Marte. Marte played six games in MLB after that season.

Peralta was 28 when he was traded. He went on to resign with Detroit for three years, then three with St Louis, before washing out at age 36. In those six years, he put up 17.6 fWAR. Fans didn't think he was good enough to play for Cleveland, esp at SS, but he was the starting SS for a....

Division champ in 2011.
AL pennant winner in 2012.
Division champ in 2013.
Division champ in 2014.
Division series winner in 2015.
 
Now, I'm not saying that Amed shouldn't be replaced...or won't be replaced. If he continues to not produce, at some point he will...and should.

But now is not the time.

The FO...like most FOs, don't know yet if they have a legitimate shot at making the post season...or if they should switch to next year preparation.

When that time comes, the appropriate decisions will be made.

An Amed that has his best months in June, July, and August gives us the best odds of winning games. An Amed that continues his present woes into the AS break doesnt.

But there are other positional questions that enter into the equation...esp RF. Lets say that Arias produces with the bat with consistency. What happens if he is moved to SS? Brennan hasn't hit at all, even though Tito has protected him vs lefties. Nothing that Oscar is doing in Columbus is reason for optimism. Valera is hurt yet again. Moving a black hole from one position to another is not improvement.

The answer, if a major move is made, is more likely to be Rocchio or the forgotten man, Freeman.
 
I'm glad that we shouldn't call players up unless they're Hall of Famers.

I'm also glad to have learned that because one prospect (Marte) flamed out, we shouldn't give every subsequent prospect a chance... except Lindor, because, umm, you know... reasons... like how he fits @CATS44 's narrative...

Amed holds absolutely zero value to this organization after 2023.

Amed's ENTIRE value was "Well, he's better today than the youth behind him... so you'll win more games by starting him than if you turn things over to the kids right away"

As the resident Amed hater, I even AGREED with that statement. I accepted that Amed was better on opening day than Arias/Rocchio/Freeman would be, and still wanted him gone because that tiny additional value in the short term was worth less than the negative impact he would have long term.

Yet, I was wrong. We all were wrong. That value proposition has been proven false. Amed has been atrocious and we would've won more games if we jettisoned him into the sun before the season began.

Nevermind the fact that every day we play Amed, we hurt our chances in 2024 and beyond. We should be giving the AB's (and defensive reps at SS) to the guys that can help us win--both today and down the line.
 
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