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2023 Cleveland Guardians Season Thread

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Have to disagree.
Not suggesting Cal to the pen is the 1st move but of the 5 current starters, Csl is in the bottom 2 performers (& I am a fan of his).

I don't see Francona moving a veteran inning eater to the pen... Plus he actually is notorious for being stronger in the second half of the season. 11-12 with a 4.25 ERA in the first half and a 20-7 with a 3.21 ERA in thr second half. Hard to put him into the pen with his career numbers. Plus outside of his last start, he's been pretty solid lately. Both Bibee and Allen have struggled when they get past about 80ish pitches while Quantrill is able to go 100+.

Now, Plesac likely won't start again and I believe Morris into the pen, makes a ton more sense right now when he is healthy... So one of Allen/Bibee gets the 5th spot...

That being stated, we will try to find a way to get a bat to help out the roster at the trade deadline, so I would be 100% surprised if one of Allen/Civale is moved...
 
Just like how Bibee wasn't getting called up because he was behind so many others in the sportscoach pecking order?

(I'm not sure we don't see a six man rotation for a bit... or one of the top 6 moved to piggyback Civale/TMac until they're in a groove)

I really hope we start seeing some trades happen. SP logjam, MIF logjam, expensive go-nowhere vets in Amed, Zunino and Bell... the front office has work to do.

Bibee wouldn't have been up, if TMac, Civale and Morris didn't go down and Plesac stinking it up... I mean when you lose essentially your number 2,4 and 6 in your depth chart and number 5 stunk it up. Number 7 struggled and 8 went to the pen, you end up with using guys you wouldn't have normally put out there...
 
Josh Bell is trash. Been garbage for a year now going back to his time with the Padres. What an awful signing. Really devastating for a small market team to waste all that money on a washed scrub.

Front office made all the wrong moves last off season. Blew all their money on Bell and Zunino. Didn't trade Rosario when he had some value. Just terrible decisions
 
Josh Bell is trash. Been garbage for a year now going back to his time with the Padres. What an awful signing. Really devastating for a small market team to waste all that money on a washed scrub.

Front office made all the wrong moves last off season. Blew all their money on Bell and Zunino. Didn't trade Rosario when he had some value. Just terrible decisions

Rosario never had the value you think he had...
 
Rosario never had the value you think he had...
I don’t think he had great value but just get whatever the best offer on the table was. Now you probably can't even get someone to take his salary with how pathetic his defense has been.
 
I don’t think he had great value but just get whatever the best offer on the table was. Now you probably can't even get someone to take his salary with how pathetic his defense has been.

They didn't trade him since they felt he was worth more keeping than trading... That says his trade value right there...
 
They didn't trade him since they felt he was worth more keeping than trading... That says his trade value right there...
Nah you are over thinking it. A avg prospect can usually be had for a major league player like him it’s happened for decades.

If he actually does have a hot June you trade him as soon as someone offers you anything that resembles a guy that could crack the majors someday .
 
Josh Bell is trash. Been garbage for a year now going back to his time with the Padres. What an awful signing. Really devastating for a small market team to waste all that money on a washed scrub.

Front office made all the wrong moves last off season. Blew all their money on Bell and Zunino. Didn't trade Rosario when he had some value. Just terrible decisions
If you are old enough to remember Kieth Hernandez at the old stadium well this is even worse…
 
If they are agressive in making moves you can use this season to set up 2024 properly . Probably not enough hitting in the minors but you still have 2 to 3 guys in aaa who should get more at bats July through September . Give Freeman a couple months of regular at bats and see what he does too.

July through September should be about player development and seeing who shows promise . This is not a World Series contending team so no need to worry about wins the rest of the way.

Rosario Zumino Bell and Straw are just bad right now in different ways . You could live with Straw if he was just one weak link . But in a lineup like this it’s not affordable .

One big concern is Wether this coaching staff is the right fit for developing young hitters. Whatever message they are sending is being tuned out as every single player has regressed from last year.
At some point that has to be adressed if things don’t change this year.

One more thing. Long term this organization has to find a balance between putting all its energy into drafting and developing pitching with drafting and developing hitters with some type of power .
I’m taking about the next 5 to 10 years . Just not impressed with the overall talent minus pitching in the current organization once you get past 2 to 3 decent aaa prospects.
 
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They didn't trade him since they felt he was worth more keeping than trading... That says his trade value right there...

If nobody else wanted him, maybe you shouldn't either? As a "Contender"? With multiple high profile SS on the 40? Maybe?

If you can't sell your trash in your yard sale, do you put it center in your living room just because you didn't get the 2 bucks you asked for? Because that's your argument
 
Last night the Fox crew came up with some interesting numbers.

1. Teams that fail to hit a home run win about 29% of the time. (We saw that last night - the Cardinals hit a home run, the Guardians didn't, and the Guardians lost a game while holding the opponent to two hits for the first time in 36 years).

2. The Guardians have the highest ground ball percentage in baseball (actually they're tied).

I'll add one more - the Guardians have by far the lowest HR/FB ratio, so they not only hit fewer fly balls than any team but one, but a lower percentage of those fly balls make it over the fence than any team.

Yes, Josh Bell has 9 home runs in his last 513 at-bats since hitting two on June 17 of last year. In WAR he ranks 27th of 30 first basemen and 17th of 21 DH's. His ground ball percentage of nearly 61% is the highest of all first basemen and DH's. In fact, the second highest first baseman is at 50.5%, over 10% lower than Bell. It's so frustrating to see a 250-pound 1B/DH with tremendous power who is unable to get a ball into the air.

On those infrequent occasions when he does put some air under the ball his HR/FB ratio ranks 21st of 31 first basemen, so he's mostly popping it up.

Bimbo put out some stats showing a player traded in the off-season from one league to another usually shows a decline in productivity for about half a season before his numbers return to normal. Hopefully that is what is happening with Bell. However, that doesn't explain why he only hit 3 HR's in 177 AB's last year after being traded from one N.L. team to another.
 
Tyler Freeman has only 20 plate appearances with the Guardians, but he is hitting .316. Fangraphs has his line drive percentage at 42.9%; the next highest on the Guardians is Will Brennan at 25.3%. His hard hit percentage of 46.7% is second to Amed (50.0%). His outside the zone swing percentage is 28.6%; only Bell, Straw, and Kwan are lower.

OK, it's a tiny sample, but we're desperate here. He doesn't chase many bad pitches and he hits line drives. I want to see more. Tito says Freeman has been sitting too much. Well, time to do something about it. Gimenez is a mess. He's hitting .194 in May with 3 RBI's in 72 AB's. For the season he's at .176 with RISP. Give him a couple of days off to re-set.
 

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