2024 Guardians Spring Training Thread

[AZ_]

The Chinese knock-offs will end up better than the authentics.

They already are.

Truly, this is what some players have said.

 

[33Y0]

 

[Otsego Mar]

Yawn

I want Tito back, the Indians back, the old rules pre-sillyness back, and the 95 roster back.

 

[Wham with the Right Hand]

From Zach Meisel on the Guardians trade blunders:

They dealt an unknown prospect, Junior Caminero, for Tobias Myers, a pitcher who never made it to Cleveland. Caminero is now a consensus Top-5 prospect in the sport who debuted for the Rays last summer at the age of 20...They dealt Yainer Diaz, a power-hitting catcher who finished fifth in the AL Rookie of the Year balloting last season, to the Astros for Myles Straw. They bailed too soon on Nolan Jones and Will Benson, who thrived in Colorado and Cincinnati, respectively, while Will Brennan and Oscar Gonzalez floundered in Cleveland in their place.

These are well-documented mistakes. The point isn’t to rehash the front office’s recent (and, on balance, uncharacteristic) missteps. It’s to wonder what they’ve learned.

“It would be to be more patient,” Antonetti said Thursday, “and make sure we’re providing more runway with some of those guys.”

That means no repeat of previous free-agent follies after both Mike Zunino and Josh Bell flopped. Their reticence to participate in free agency was never actually about their TV deal hanging in bankruptcy purgatory. They knew they would receive a decent chunk of revenue one way or another. Now that it’s settled, Antonetti admitted Thursday the disinterest in external acquisitions has more to do with not wanting to block their young players and not wanting to delay getting an answer on their own prospects.

“The bigger question,” Antonetti said, “is the opportunity cost of allocating either innings or at-bats to other people when we have a really young roster that we think has a chance to develop into a good major-league team. If we sign someone and commit to giving that person 500-550 plate appearances, that’s 500-550 plate appearances we can’t give to other players. We feel like our major-league team and development system is at a point where some of those guys, we need to provide opportunities for. Now, in 2022, that worked well and those guys came together and helped fuel a contending team. Last year, we made choices to allocate some of those at-bats to veterans and, in retrospect, maybe we would have been better served giving some of those at-bats to younger guys.”

So mostly sitting out free agency wasn't so much about the financial uncertainty as it was about saving at-bats for the guys they've been developing instead of wasting them on the next Josh Bell or Mike Zunino. Looking back the Guardians figure they'd be in better shape today if they had passed on Bell and Zunino and given Jones and Benson a "longer runway". They're right.

So now guys like Florial (who's out of options), Arias, Rocchio, Freeman, Manzardo, Brennan, and maybe later on Brito, Tena, Rodriguez, DDLS, and Noel will get some runway. It's going to make this a very interesting season.

 

[Melancholy Jaques]

Yawn

I want Tito back, the Indians back, the old rules pre-sillyness back, and the 95 roster back.

While I would certainly like to be 40 again, we cannot live in the past. That 95 batting lineup was a once in a lifetime thing.

 

[Otsego Mar]

While I would certainly like to be 40 again, we cannot live in the past. That 95 batting lineup was a once in a lifetime thing.

Indeed. The only time is now, and now we have to complain about our apparent crappy jerseys.

 

[BMAN]

Yawn

I want Tito back, the Indians back, the old rules pre-sillyness back, and the 95 roster back.

Yawn

 

[Otsego Mar]

Yawn

I'm sorry.

Please, let us continue complaining about our wardrobe like high school children.

 

[Wham with the Right Hand]

I'm sorry.

Please, let us continue complaining about our wardrobe like high school children.

It's not like WE have to wear them, just the players. And if I was making a big league income I wouldn't care if I had to play naked like the ancient Olympics. Just don't expect any head first slides.

Once we start seeing some box scores everybody will forget about the uniforms.

 

[sportscoach]

It's not like WE have to wear them, just the players. And if I was making a big league income I wouldn't care if I had to play naked like the ancient Olympics. Just don't expect any head first slides.

Once we start seeing some box scores everybody will forget about the uniforms.

Their complaint is essentially they went from really nice uniforms to, I can find better in the thrift store... Honestly they look like the ones we get in the giveaways...

So at work if you were told their are changing the uniforms, which were actually still good and good looking to something super cheap looking and thin, you would complain too...

MLB needs to fix this... If the players complain, the fans aren't going to likely try to buy those one then...

 

[eChameleon]

 

[CalBuckeyeRob]

From Zach Meisel on the Guardians trade blunders:

They dealt an unknown prospect, Junior Caminero, for Tobias Myers, a pitcher who never made it to Cleveland. Caminero is now a consensus Top-5 prospect in the sport who debuted for the Rays last summer at the age of 20...They dealt Yainer Diaz, a power-hitting catcher who finished fifth in the AL Rookie of the Year balloting last season, to the Astros for Myles Straw. They bailed too soon on Nolan Jones and Will Benson, who thrived in Colorado and Cincinnati, respectively, while Will Brennan and Oscar Gonzalez floundered in Cleveland in their place.

These are well-documented mistakes. The point isn’t to rehash the front office’s recent (and, on balance, uncharacteristic) missteps. It’s to wonder what they’ve learned.

“It would be to be more patient,” Antonetti said Thursday, “and make sure we’re providing more runway with some of those guys.”

That means no repeat of previous free-agent follies after both Mike Zunino and Josh Bell flopped. Their reticence to participate in free agency was never actually about their TV deal hanging in bankruptcy purgatory. They knew they would receive a decent chunk of revenue one way or another. Now that it’s settled, Antonetti admitted Thursday the disinterest in external acquisitions has more to do with not wanting to block their young players and not wanting to delay getting an answer on their own prospects.

“The bigger question,” Antonetti said, “is the opportunity cost of allocating either innings or at-bats to other people when we have a really young roster that we think has a chance to develop into a good major-league team. If we sign someone and commit to giving that person 500-550 plate appearances, that’s 500-550 plate appearances we can’t give to other players. We feel like our major-league team and development system is at a point where some of those guys, we need to provide opportunities for. Now, in 2022, that worked well and those guys came together and helped fuel a contending team. Last year, we made choices to allocate some of those at-bats to veterans and, in retrospect, maybe we would have been better served giving some of those at-bats to younger guys.”

So mostly sitting out free agency wasn't so much about the financial uncertainty as it was about saving at-bats for the guys they've been developing instead of wasting them on the next Josh Bell or Mike Zunino. Looking back the Guardians figure they'd be in better shape today if they had passed on Bell and Zunino and given Jones and Benson a "longer runway". They're right.

So now guys like Florial (who's out of options), Arias, Rocchio, Freeman, Manzardo, Brennan, and maybe later on Brito, Tena, Rodriguez, DDLS, and Noel will get some runway. It's going to make this a very interesting season.

Good lesson if true. When you have a bunch of major league ready prospects, you need to find ways to play them to let them decide their own fate on your team.

The Caminero trade was horrific. Caminero at age 17 in the Dominican Summer League hit 9 HRs. The rest of the team hit 9 HRs combined. He led the entire league in HRs. Had a ,380 OBA. and .534 slugging. No way you trade that for Myers. You wonder if their success at fixing some broken pitchers let their ego get in the way of common sense.

 

[Huber.]

LOVE my new Fanatics jersey. Always great products

 

[33Y0]

From Zach Meisel on the Guardians trade blunders:

They dealt an unknown prospect, Junior Caminero, for Tobias Myers, a pitcher who never made it to Cleveland. Caminero is now a consensus Top-5 prospect in the sport who debuted for the Rays last summer at the age of 20...They dealt Yainer Diaz, a power-hitting catcher who finished fifth in the AL Rookie of the Year balloting last season, to the Astros for Myles Straw. They bailed too soon on Nolan Jones and Will Benson, who thrived in Colorado and Cincinnati, respectively, while Will Brennan and Oscar Gonzalez floundered in Cleveland in their place.

These are well-documented mistakes. The point isn’t to rehash the front office’s recent (and, on balance, uncharacteristic) missteps. It’s to wonder what they’ve learned.

“It would be to be more patient,” Antonetti said Thursday, “and make sure we’re providing more runway with some of those guys.”

That means no repeat of previous free-agent follies after both Mike Zunino and Josh Bell flopped. Their reticence to participate in free agency was never actually about their TV deal hanging in bankruptcy purgatory. They knew they would receive a decent chunk of revenue one way or another. Now that it’s settled, Antonetti admitted Thursday the disinterest in external acquisitions has more to do with not wanting to block their young players and not wanting to delay getting an answer on their own prospects.

“The bigger question,” Antonetti said, “is the opportunity cost of allocating either innings or at-bats to other people when we have a really young roster that we think has a chance to develop into a good major-league team. If we sign someone and commit to giving that person 500-550 plate appearances, that’s 500-550 plate appearances we can’t give to other players. We feel like our major-league team and development system is at a point where some of those guys, we need to provide opportunities for. Now, in 2022, that worked well and those guys came together and helped fuel a contending team. Last year, we made choices to allocate some of those at-bats to veterans and, in retrospect, maybe we would have been better served giving some of those at-bats to younger guys.”

So mostly sitting out free agency wasn't so much about the financial uncertainty as it was about saving at-bats for the guys they've been developing instead of wasting them on the next Josh Bell or Mike Zunino. Looking back the Guardians figure they'd be in better shape today if they had passed on Bell and Zunino and given Jones and Benson a "longer runway". They're right.

So now guys like Florial (who's out of options), Arias, Rocchio, Freeman, Manzardo, Brennan, and maybe later on Brito, Tena, Rodriguez, DDLS, and Noel will get some runway. It's going to make this a very interesting season.

Sorry, but I'm going to call total bull shit on this. If this is true, I don't want to see any type of service time manipulation. Put the best players on the field. Period.

 

[Wham with the Right Hand]

Sorry, but I'm going to call total bull shit on this. If this is true, I don't want to see any type of service time manipulation. Put the best players on the field. Period.

It has nothing to do with service time manipulation. The Guardians feel they gave up on Will Benson and Nolan Jones too soon ("not enough runway"). They signed Josh Bell and gave him 347 AB's before trading him. That's 347 AB's that could have gone to Benson or Jones, and if Benson, for example, had gotten those at-bats he might have hit .275/.863 for us last year like he did for the Reds and we would have a 25-year-old right or center fielder with power, speed, and defense right now which is exactly what we need.

Service time manipulation involves keeping players in the minors LONGER than necessary to push their free agency farther into the future. They signed Zunino last year when Bo Naylor was ready for the majors and delayed his arrival, even though he was better than Zunino. I don't know if service time manipulation was involved in that one or whether they just didn't want to rush Bo to the bigs before he was ready and set him up for failure.

I can't blame the Guardians too much because the year before they won the division, swept the Rays, and took the Yankees to five games with the youngest team in the majors and no long ball. The thinking was that for 2023 they needed more power and a little more veteran leadership to push them to the next level, hence Bell and Zunino were acquired and Benson and Jones were traded. The Guardians don't want to repeat those mistakes, so they didn't pursue another Bell or Zunino this year. They're going to roll with the young guys and find out who can play. Give them more "runway" than they gave Jones and Benson. And Junior Caminero.

We still might salvage the Jones trade because Brito is looking really good. So far the prospect we got for Benson has been mostly injured, but he was a second round pick so there must be some potential there.