Francisco Lindor, Carlos Carrasco Traded to the Mets

[CalBuckeyeRob]

Jose Ramirez will be next to go. They won't be good enough on offense to compete until his trade value is nearly gone. Trade him now for a big return then bite the bullet for a few years.

 

[kriegs]

Maybe know your audience. You aren’t on Twitter. Do better.

The team can't afford star players because the fans aren't supporting the team at games. Sorry if I see irony if some of the same people playing victim to the owner of the team are the same folks 'boycotting' the team as if they deserve the player. You get in what you put in.

 

[CalBuckeyeRob]

The Indians are building a roster that will be perfect for a crowd that maintains social distancing. Easy to spread out 5000 people.

 

[LL3]

I'm not sure if any will have an "insider's" perspective, but I have been wondering if the FO was concerned about Carlos's durability/ability to perform over the course of a full season? This could be a case of them saving loot AND moving a player a bit early, rather than too late. Sad to see him go in any case...

 

[DerekG123]

Goodnight. I was among the most pessimistic about a Lindor/Carrasco return but this was even worse than I thought. A lot worse.

 

[Mott the Hoople]

So we trade Lindor and Cookie, and our OF remains exactly the same.

 

[petes999]

The flaw in your argument, IMO, is that the Betts and Machado trades occurred before COVID-19. The world has since changed and MLB economics have been completely upended, particularly for small market teams.

I understand your point for making trades now .... but, the question is by July, the worst of this COVID should be over and spending a few million by a top market team for a playoff birth should have started to return to the Machado rental return. ... I didn't even bring up Betts; I knew we wouldn't have gotten that at this point of time.

I was starting to think that the Indians might have kept Lindor and Carrasco due to the light return market as we saw with Darvish and Snell. Yet, Dolans are really financially tied as from a financial perspective ... what would the $20 million for Lindor and $12 million for Cookie gotten you down the road?
a) An increase in fan base this summer when they could start drawing crowds ... now come July, we will be talking a Ramirez trade in offseason versus a playoff race

b) An increase in your TV market share -- 2 years out from a deal renewal

Now, I said this elsewhere, from a business sense, if they could have kept there market share up during negotiations, Lindor's $20 million spread over 10 years is really $2 million ($5 million if you could have paid him $30 for 2022 as a one year deal). Now, if they could have locked in new TV deal after 2021, that small change (increase in market share) should have gotten you another $2-$5 million per year at least on a $60+ million per year deal than see your market share crash by 20-30% due to lack of excitement/playoff run and try to maximize your deal on that share drop. Now, this wasn't that realistic as the deal expires after 2022 so Lindor was going to be gone anyway. Yet, to trade your 2nd/3rd best pitcher as well and drop out of any playoff run for sure, it makes the viewer anger and careless even greater. Look at other sports viewership drop during COVID mess ... Indians didn't do so bad comparatively as we were in a playoff run last year. Watch this potential TV deal to start to crater as well. Don't expect the deals signed a few years ago by Tampa and others to provide the extra money we need to sign Bieber and next round of talent long-term. This downward spiral could be the beginning of the end to the Dolans and possibly Cleveland. If you couldn't even afford $60 million .... that means the financial situation is not just tight but dire.

 

[NorthCoastBias]

The Indians are building a roster that will be perfect for a crowd that maintains social distancing. Easy to spread out 5000 people.

This joke would hit a lot harder if this scenario wasn't the case when they were putting a winning product on the field in 2016, 17, 18 and 19.

 

[LL3]

Jose Ramirez will be next to go. They won't be good enough on offense to compete until his trade value is nearly gone. Trade him now for a big return then bite the bullet for a few years.

Is there a big return available in this moment?

 

[Cavsfan1985]

The team can't afford star players because the fans aren't supporting the team at games. Sorry if I see irony if some of the same people playing victim to the owner of the team are the same folks 'boycotting' the team as if they deserve the player. You get in what you put in.

It’s not just that. We are in a smaller market, and also have 2 other Pro Teams. While it sucks to lose them, hard to blame ownership with Covid. From everything I have read it’s not like the current ownership is taking a huge profit, but have taken losses the past few years. It’s hard to see any owners, even the rich one be willing to lose 50M+. If anything it allows us to still be relevant this year, while re-building for 1-2 years out to be competitive. In the MLB our market does not allow us to be a playoff team year in and out because of the unfair balance of payroll and lack of true revenue sharing.

 

[DCTribefan]

I'm not sure if any will have an "insider's" perspective, but I have been wondering if the FO was concerned about Carlos's durability/ability to perform over the course of a full season? This could be a case of them saving loot AND moving a player a bit early, rather than too late. Sad to see him go in any case...

No doubt health concerns weighed heavily in Cookie trade.

 

[BimboColesHair]

Jose isn't going anywhere. Not this season.

 

[petes999]

To follow up on my previous post on TV revenue, think of the TV deal in 2023 will be based on 3 factors

1) Indians TV market share over maybe a 3-year period (and forward looking)

2) Ad revenue that can be generated based on standard market share basis

3) A split of this Market share X add revenue per market share

If your market share drops by 10% because there is no excitement or playoff run come July/August anymore, you will expect your TV deal to drop by 10%

So if Tampa was getting $60 million plus TV deal a few years ago (with no fan base), what would Indians get if they were a playoff team? Now, drop this by 10% at least (being conservative on viewership loss for Lindor alone) that mean at least $6 million loss per year... So for the Dolans to totally tank by trading Cookie as well, shows that they are not thinking about 2030 ... there are serious problems when $50 million after spending $120 million plus a few years ago is too much ....

 

[Obscured By Clouds]

Jose Ramirez will be next to go. They won't be good enough on offense to compete until his trade value is nearly gone. Trade him now for a big return then bite the bullet for a few years.

Trading Jose now would be a massive mistake. It's obvious covid is impacting trade value.

 

[gijimbo]

This return is more than a draft pick.

One more full season of Carrasco and Lindor also has value though. I was just arguing, maybe too much from a fan’s perspective, that I’d give up the difference in value between a draft pick and this return to have one last season with the current core.

That was apparently not an option.