Rates & Barrels - Moves, Moves & More Moves: Carlos Rodón, Carlos Correa & Sean Murphy Relocate

Episode Date: December 19, 2022

Eno and DVR discuss the latest round of moves including Carlos Rodón's six-year pact with the Yankees, Carlos Correa's move to the Bay Area, Dansby Swanson's new deal with the Cubs, a three-team swap that sent Sean Murphy to Atlanta, William Contreras to Milwaukee, and another group of young players to Oakland, and much more.  Rundown 1:18 Carlos Rodón Gives the Yankees Another Ace 9:37 Chris Bassitt to the Blue Jays 12:32 Ross Stripling to the Giants 16:02 Noah Syndergaard to the Dodgers 21:34 Other Pitchers on the Move 26:51 Carlos Correa to the Giants 31:33 Dansby Swanson to the Cubs 40:22 The Three-Team Sean Murphy Trade 52:24 Esteury Ruiz & The A's Return 1:04:23 Oakland's New Pitchers 1:07:10 Andrew Benintendi to the White Sox 1:13:55 Justin Turner & J.D. Martinez Switch Coasts 1:18:24 Joey Gallo to the Twins? Follow Eno on Twitter: @enosarris Follow DVR on Twitter: @DerekVanRiper e-mail: [e-mail] Subscribe to The Athletic at $2/month for the first year: theathletic.com/ratesandbarrels Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

This episode is brought to you by Peloton. Forget the pressure to be crushing your workout on day one. Just start moving with the Peloton Bike, Bike Plus, Tread, Row, Guide, or App. There are thousands of classes and over 50 Peloton instructors ready to support you from the beginning. Remember, doing something is everything. Rent the Peloton Bike or Bike Plus today at onepeloton.ca slash bike slash rentals. All access memberships separate. Terms apply. Welcome to Rates and Barrels. It's Monday, December 19th. Derek Van Ryper here with Eno Saris.

On this episode, we enjoy more player movement. Do you remember how much last December was a struggle to get through the early days of the lockout, knowing that it wasn't going to be a quick resolution, knowing that we weren't going to have big signings and trades and different things to kind of help us along through the final weeks of the year. It was awful. It was so terrible. Good thing we had practice because of COVID. We did. We did. That was the true awful year for content creators. And obviously, it was awful for a bunch of other reasons. But on this episode, we have some big pitcher signings, we have a couple big position player signings,

and we even have a trade, a big trade that went down almost a week ago now. And I'm still not really sure how my favorite team got involved in it, but we'll dig into that in just a little while. I figure we should start on the pitching side of the moves, and we begin today with Carlos Rodon. He goes to the Yankees. It is a six-year, $162 million contract. Good for him, all the injuries he's been through. Now after two seasons, mostly healthy seasons. I say mostly and kind of emphasize that this past season, 2022, was the healthiest Carlos Rodon has ever been as a big league pitcher in terms of a workload. 178 innings was a career high. The skills, though, have been excellent going back to the start of 2021. I know he pops in the pitching model.

So from that perspective, this makes all the sense in the world. But, you know, I was actually a little bit surprised that the Yankees did this, given that they already have Garrett Cole, given that they have Luis Severino there. It didn't seem like frontline starting pitching was necessarily a thing that they would go add. Obviously, this makes them better and it puts them on the short list of teams that have really two aces in terms of stuff at the top of their rotation yeah i think it's something they needed to do i think they were hoping to have done it with frankie montas but i don't know that they felt uh so sure of that after how last season went down and really you know when you're the yankees you're trying to build for october more than almost anything at this point because they have built such a strong team um you know from the bottom up so i think you you just really want him for october and i think what

it might take is some sort of pre sort of of, what do you call it? Like load management, you know? Because if you look at even last year, Rodon, even though he had a great season in terms of putting up so many innings, you know, his stuff did fall off. He started the season sitting clear, comfortably clear of 96. In fact,

you would round it to 97 for much of the first month. Then it was more 95s and 96s throughout the season. And he really ended September. Let me see. Let me average it by month here so I can actually say 94.8, which doesn't sound that bad but it is down from 96.4 in in um in April so I don't know that's uh a tick and a half over the course of the year if I was the Yankees I think I would find a reason for him to uh just take a couple two-week blows through the season uh because I want him throwing 96s and 97s

in October. We think about it a lot more with young pitchers. How are teams going to manage innings around all-star breaks and days off? I think you could imply some similar techniques to someone like Rodan, especially as you mentioned with the Yankees having some aspirations of playing deep into October. And I think the question then comes down to how is their depth now compared to typical Yankees pitching depth one through five. This rotation is probably as good as any in the league right now with Cole and Rodon at the top, Nestor Cortez. They probably get some kind of bounce back from Frankie Montas,

at least that would be the hope. And then there's Luis Severino, who I seem to like more than everybody else. I look at Luis Severino and I'm looking more at the what could go right sort of side of it. I'm looking at it and saying, this could be a year where he actually gets closer to a full workload again. I know there's risk in that, but relative to where he goes in early drafts, I'd really like what I'm seeing right now. Pick 112 in December, just looking at a handful of the draft champions leagues that have been done over the last couple of weeks. I will draft him in that spot all day long. Just by comparison, I think his injury

history is similar in how scary it is to Carlos Rodon. Rodon goes quite a bit earlier. Rodon goes closer to pick 50 overall. It's not an A versus B sort of thing. You could get both. You're kind of looking at them as maybe Rodan is a late SP1 and Severino is more of an SP3. But I think if I'm taking on risk like this, I'm much more likely to take it on in that Severino range than in the fringe top 50 overall range. Yeah, I think I might prefer Severino. Are you saying you prefer Severino at his draft cost versus Rodon at his? Yeah, because of the injury history. It's not at all about concerns with stuff.

I do think one area where I'd be cautious with Rodon, though, is moving into Yankee Stadium. The home run rate's probably going up, especially leaving Oracle Park. But he's had some home run issues earlier in his career when the stuff wasn't as good as it's been over these last two years. But I would not be surprised if similar to what we saw with Garrett Cole, where the home run rate ticks up and the ratios come up a little bit as a result of that. Yeah, it's just interesting that Reno's, uh the shape of his stuff uh over the the course of the season is a little different the Rodon's too I mean uh his three best stuff plus numbers Severino's came in his last five starts his three best uh control location plus numbers came in his

last five starts he really seemed to be uh pe peaking near the end of the season. I think that sort of speaks to your idea that he, you know, had found something and was feeling better. So it's a really good rotation. You know, on top of that, I still like Clark Schmidt, and Domingo Herman is an excellent sort of swing guy if you need to take someone out early of a game. So, you know, they're built to withstand some injury there.

And, you know, they didn't make a big splash at short. And that might be an interesting thing going forward because I think with the Isaiah Cannafaleva idea, they were like, well, we'd rather, let's just focus on defense at short and have someone who has okay offense there. That sort of sounds like Oswaldo Peraza. But, you know, Volpepe their number one prospect uh Anthony Volpe has just spent 999 plate appearances at AAA 500 at AA I don't know how much longer he's got to go

his strikeout rate did spike in AAA so maybe they wanted to see him go back to AAA, conquer that strikeout rate thing, and then he's ready to go. He's the best offensive upside of the Peraza kind of left of Volpe monster that's going to take over short. But he is not what I hear, the best

defensive of the three. So they're going to have that choice, a little bit like what they had with Gleyber Torres, where they kept trying to use Gleyber Torres at short, but eventually he found a better place for himself at second. I don't know what order they're going to try them. I kind of think they're going to try all three shortstops. Fortunately for the Yankees,

they don't exactly have third base lockdown with Josh Donaldson still sitting atop the depth chart. So you can put two of those guys on the left side of the infield if you feel like from a bat perspective that you've got two that you trust that you like every single day as well. So they've got a little bit of flexibility. I would still, if I had to bet on it for 2023 and even for the long-term future, I would still put more stock behind Volpe than the alternatives right now. I just think he's the most well-rounded player of the three. I do think with Cabrera, his versatility has already been on display. They're willing to move him to a bunch of different spots.

That bodes well for his playing time. I think you've expressed some concerns with Peraza that he might not hit enough to stick as an everyday player. I think those are fair concerns to keep in mind too in the early parts of his career. But maybe we've reached that point where the Yankees can go out and now possibly make a trade if they want to get a more established player to help out on the left side of the infield, be that a temporary upgraded shortstop or maybe some kind of Donaldson replacement because trades are actually happening. A few more signings on the pitching side.

Staying in the AL East, Chris Bassett goes to the Blue Jays. I know Rogers Center is not the extreme hitter's park that it had a reputation for being more than a decade ago, but it is a much more difficult environment to pitch in than where Bassett has pitched for most of his big league career, having spent a lot of that time in Oakland and then, of course, time last season with the Mets in Citi Field. So for me, it's a park factors concern that would have me hesitant to go overboard, getting a lot of Chris Bassett on my teams in 2023. But how does he grade out in terms of stuff and how much confidence should we have with him being on another quality team, albeit one in a more difficult place to pitch? One thing that is nice is that the divisional component is a little bit lessened this season.

In fact, instead of 19 games versus the Yankees, he's going to have, I think, 13. So that's six fewer games. Hopefully that means three fewer games in the Yankees, he's going to have, I think, 13. And so that's six fewer games. Hopefully that means three fewer games in the Yankee Stadium. That's a tough place for pitchers. And that also just means fewer games against the Yankees. So some part of that is a little bit mitigated by the changes in the schedule coming up. But there's another part that is interesting to me, which is that he can command his hard stuff pretty well. And I know it doesn't, you know, I want to say hard stuff. You're like, he does not have good velo, but he has decent shape on those pitches, too. And all in all, the sinker is an above average pitch once you factor in stuff and location.

is an above average pitch once you factor in stuff and location. So that makes him a little bit unique because a lot of these older pitchers that are in free agency do not have above average fastballs. Why did Ross Stripling get so little after such a great season? It's because his fastball is pretty bad. So Bassett is on the better end of the fastball spectrum, and the cutter also rates as an above average pitch. And then the last thing is, I know he hasn't struck out on a bunch of guys yet, but his breaking balls rate as above average pitches,

and he doesn't use them that much. So I could see aging actually helping him a little bit where he starts throwing the breaking balls more and getting more whiffs and getting more strikeouts and keeping more balls out of play. And that's going to be something that's going to be important for him as a right-hander with the shift rules changing and against some of the teams he's playing. I think he'll really need to push that strikeout rate back into sort of 25% territory where he had it with Oakland in 2021. Yeah, I'm looking at Bassett versus Stripling

just side by side, looking at their fan graphs pages right now. And it's funny that Bassett is effectively replacing Stripling for the Blue Jays, just given how Stripling became important to that rotation. And Bassett gets an extra year. He gets more money. Stripling ends up with the Giants,

which I think for a guy that has some questions about the quality of his stuff at this stage of his career, it softens the blow, right? It makes it possible to utilize him for those home starts. We do this with just about every Giant starter because they continue to go after guys that are in this group. The downside can still be pretty rough because in the case of Alex Wood last season, I think we were waiting for a bounce back all year that never came. That can happen,

but when you look at Stripling, did he land in one of the best possible spots to the point where we can maybe push another year or two out there that looks more like probably what we saw in 2018 2019 in terms of ratios as opposed to 2022 i mean a 102 whip was easily a career best i think if you're getting a sub 4 era that's fine you're expecting like a 350 360 from stripling in that ballpark but you're probably getting something more like a 115 to 120 whip to go with it, and you're still doing that by avoiding a few of the more dangerous starts on his schedule. I mean, he really found something with the changeup last year. It was his best pitch by Stuff Plus, but also the best it's ever been for him. That really gives him an out pitch.

Before that, he was kind of like a five-pitch guy with no real out pitch. His breaking balls are right around that league average. He commands them all right. But the changeup was really the big moment for him this year. His fastballs have 68 stuff plus, 66, 68. Bassett is at 88-89. So I think that is part of the switch that they wanted to make in Toronto. For Stripling, though, yeah, he lands in a good situation.

I do wonder, you know, you look back on his best strikeout rates, those came in the National League with a DH. So I wonder if we're going to cap him at sort of seven and a half strikeouts per nine if we are you know with the shift rules um i don't know if that's going to come with like a low three zra so i know the steamer projection here is for like a four two era um i don't know change-ups uh can reduce home run rates can reduce babbitts so i think i'll give him something like a 375 era with a one two whip and seven and a half strikeouts per nine yeah that low k rate i think is what drives down the draft day cost and for

good reason other thing i would consider with Ross Stripling too, before you get real aggressive pushing him up based on the excellent ratios from a year ago, 134 in the third innings last year, that's his highest big league total ever. I know for a long time he was sort of an extra guy for the Dodgers, kind of that six starter swing man, so he didn't really have a spot to call his own,

but there's a few things you worry about. One, just straight up durability and then effectiveness as the season rolls along, too. If he takes the ball every fifth day and goes five innings per start, what happens in late August and September? Does the stuff hold up? And given the fastball concerns that you outlined, if he loses anything along the way, how effective can he be? The changeup was the big difference maker. Threw that pitch a lot more in 2022 than he did in the past.

Let's get to Noah Syndergaard. He lands with the Dodgers. And I think there were a few points during this past season when I looked at the pitching plus model and I thought maybe there's something in the underlying numbers that's encouraging with Noah Syndergaard that will make me feel confident about using him. And every time I looked, I did not really find anything that made me feel better about using Noah Cinderguard, but he goes to the Dodgers. I think that alone makes him interesting only because they've had a lot of success taking guys who seemingly have a lot less in terms of stuff than Cinderguard and making them very effective.

He has command. He has a lot of pitches. So what tweaks do you think the dodgers could make and what level do you think you can get cinder guard back to because when i talked to keith law about this on the athletic baseball show last week the big thing with thor was the massive drop in velocity after surgery down four ticks on his fastball really kind of down four ticks across the board can he regain some of the velocity? And even if he doesn't, does he have good enough stuff in command

to come up with a new game plan that can make him a more effective version of the pitcher we just saw with the Angels last season? Yeah, I don't think that track record and research suggests that we should be super hopeful about Noah Syndergaard getting back below. In fact, there are a couple of pieces I can think of that I often cite. Jeff Zimmerman has a piece of research that fastball velocity coming off the IL takes three starts to become meaningful. three starts to become meaningful. That basically, once you see three starts of fastball velocity of a pitcher coming off the IL,

that predicts something like 90% of their fastball velocity the rest of the season. Now, of course, we're talking a little different. Season to season. So he could have a whole offseason where he's working on it. It's true, and it's possible, but I've also seen research that suggests that uh command is the last thing to come back specifically fastball command is the last thing to come back after surgery

and guess what no syndicates fastball command is back so what are we like why are we thinking that there's another level if the thing that's supposed to come back second has already come back you know what i mean like we're the thing that's supposed to come back first hasn't come back but the thing that's come back second is it's already back that means maybe the thing that's coming back first is never coming back so i i think he's just a new player now he's really interesting because he is actually much closer to the ross stripling mold of pitchers than he is to even the chris bassett. Although once you look at this sinker, so the four-seam fastball for Syndergaard was second worst among mostly thrown four-seamers,

like one's thrown more than 200 times. He had a 54 stuff plus. But the changes that he was making in Philadelphia, I think, are the changes he'll make in LA because his sinker has an 88 stuff plus. changes that he was making in philadelphia i think are the changes he'll make in la because his sinker has an 88 stuff plus he's going to turn more into a kind of sinker slider guy uh and i think push uh punch the curveball usage up because he was doing that a little bit late in the season um and maybe find uh some strikeouts in the way that lots of old pitchers have found before, which is

just dial up the breaking ball usage, sneak the sinker in there, and hope to get back to at least seven strikeouts per nine because the projections are not pretty. Yeah, they're not.

I think I'm kind of in though because you see enough ingredients to where it can work. And you think about sink or slider, guys. We were just talking about Chris Bassett. You mentioned the similarities to Russ Stripling. Those guys do it without premium velocity. They do it with a deeper mix of pitches. I think knowing after kind of experiencing it for a year, I don't have the same stuff anymore.

I think Syndergaard can go into it with a better mentality this year. Okay. I'm not blowing it by people anymore. I have to come up with some different game plans. Like the Dodgers can help them along with that. Like you said, we've seen some of these adjustments already in Philadelphia. And that curve ball,

especially as one of those pitches that it it's one that you wonder about. You're like, why, why hasn't he thrown that pitch more? It looks like a really good pitch for him to lean on a lot more heavily. It's his best pitch by Stuff Plus, and he commands it well. Maybe there was some issue. Sometimes when you come back from TJ,

they do tell you not to throw things as much. When we asked him about it, we did a story about his arsenal, and we asked specifically about the curveball, and him and his pitching coach just sort of said arsenal we asked specifically about the curveball and uh him and his pitching coach just sort of said we're working on the slider the slider you know only had a 103 stuff plus you know there are better sliders out there so maybe they were just they said we're working on the slider and the curveball's next um i don't know i don't know if that i don't know where that leaves me i don't i feel like there's a little bit of upside in the breaking balls.

I think he could throw them a lot more than he does. I would throw the slider 30% of the time and the curveball 15% to 20% of the time so that you're almost 50-50 on those. And if that happens, I do think he could get his strikeout rate up. It's the old pitcher trick. LA's going to have as many tricks as they can for him,

and I think that in a draft where I'm drafting him super late, is he going after Stripling? I think he's so far going after Stripling. I think going to the Dodgers is going to nudge him ahead of Stripling, potentially. I would love to get both those guys as my last pitcher, bench pitcher, last two pitchers, because my reasoning is

I think that they would have a lot of matchups where I'd want to play them, and a fair amount of matches where I don't. And if you could almost tandem them, where you're kind of playing them at different times and different weeks, I think you could probably get 200 innings of mid-3s ERA with seven strikeouts per night.

You'd kind of be using two guys to get there, but I think that's what we have to do these days. Yeah, probably around pick 300 for stripling. In a lot of drafts, looking at the earliest that Cinderguard's gone, these are only draft champions leagues I'm looking at. So 300, you're talking SP9, SP8, right? Late, yeah. It's late, for sure.

I guess maybe SP6, SP7. But yeah, that's 6 and 7 and 8. What I want out of those guys is sometimes I want to play them. And they're better than who's going to be on the wire. That's six and seven and eight. What I want out of those guys is sometimes I want to play them, you know, and, and they're better than who's going to be on the wire. And I think that's probably true for both these guys. Yeah, I think so.

Team context definitely would, would nudge them ahead of that group of pitchers, a couple of their names on the move. We've got Michael Lorenzen going to the tiger, Trevor Williams, maybe getting a chance to start for the nationals and Trevor may to the A's. Do you see any of those three guys standing out as particularly interesting for you during the upcoming season?

Lorenzen added a sweeper last year and that was interesting because before he was a guy who just had a lot of pitches that were okay the sweeper is now a legit out pitch 126 stuff plus and he doesn't command it very well it's a tough pitch to command but it's still an above average pitch overall um you know he's gonna have to tweak some stuff to to figure out but he can command his hard stuff fairly well

uh and he's got that sweeper so maybe he's gonna settle into four seamer sinker cutter slider um you know i don't think the changeup is that good even though it throws a lot so with those four pitches i think he has something he can battle lefties and righties with he has uh two pitches that have good action and uh two pitches that are three pitches that he can command. So he's going to be, if he succeeds, he's going to be more of a kitchen sink guy. But he's, you know, he's got that sweeper now. And, you know, isn't there going to be a lot of opportunity in Detroit? I know that they have a lot of starting pitchers in a way, but I think they're going to slot him in in the starting five to start the season at least.

Scooble's coming off of injuries injuries turnbulls coming off of injury uh so you might give him the first chance and uh that's everything you know you know you never know if he gets the first chance and he's healthy for long enough then maybe turnbull or scooble uh you know come back in for somebody else who's hurt. Yeah, they've got a few injured pitchers, as you mentioned. I think that's part of why Lorenzen was appealing to them. It's immediate innings and then maybe some more innings later, depending on how all of those players recover from their various ailments. I look at Lorenzen, I just think if he could fix the control,

he could end up fitting into that stripling bucket he could be one of those guys especially in a more pitcher friendly environment like detroit i think he could actually be somewhat useful but that's the skill that needs to improve before i can trust him that's a big part of why he's even cheaper than some of these other names that we've mentioned so far you're talking about a fringe top 500 pick right now. Yeah, he's a little bit closer to somebody I would use in a DC as just a depth guy, a guy that I pick as a 12th or 13th starting pitcher. Down there where I think he'll get innings. I don't know what kind of innings there will be,

and I need to buy innings. But there's a little bit of that asterisk with that sweeper. Matthew Boyd also changed his changeup last season, and a little bit under the hood. If he can match that changeup with that slider and avoid the home runs like he's really had trouble with, he is perhaps even more interesting than Lorenzen, and he's on the same team.

So both of those guys I would want his depth. If you're talking about NFBC, not much more than a final pitcher that I want to see where he is in the first week, and I may consider dropping in the first couple of weeks if it doesn't look good right away. Both Boyd and Lorenzen for me right now are matchup dependent starters that you could draft at the end of the reserves if you like the first couple of matchups. Otherwise, you're just waiting for an opportunity on the waiver wire to pick them up hopefully on the cheap and you know use them while you like the way things are set up on the schedule whoa what are you listening to this for wait who's talking you know you're

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Now that's music to our ears. Available hot or iced, only at Tim's. Let's get over to some position players. Carlos Correa lands with the Giants. They get their big position player to go with some of the pitching that we talked about, I think, on last week's episode. By then, they had Hanager. They had Sean Minaya. They didn't have Stripling yet, so the pieces are all coming together in San Francisco.

I guess the only real question people would have about Correa going to San Francisco is, will the park and maybe the lineup, too, will the park and lineup bring down his counting stats in a way that makes him less appealing to us, at least in the short term,

because the 2023 Giants probably do not project anywhere close to the 2022 Astros in terms of the quality of the supporting cast he's going to have around him. I think we saw some of that maybe last year with the Twins. 60 RBI is not great, but Correa still managed to be a 3-6-9 top 12 shortstop. That's a starting shortstop in most leagues, and it's a weird shape because he doesn't have give

you stolen bases but it's seagrass if you ask me um and i think this is a team that has improved its lineup and is always going to find a way to have people on base um you know with their mix and match mentality and getting the most out of it. I do think that last year was a bad year, but I don't think it invalidates the work they did the year before completely. So I think his runs scored will be pretty good. I think he'll play near the top of the lineup. I think he could have 90 to 100 runs scored and like 75 to 80 Rbi um next year in san francisco seems like

you know he's projected for close to that i'm you know pushing the run scored a little bit because i believe in you know how they do things and how they're how they put the pieces together there um and then lastly uh you know that park uh we park, we have a diagram here for people who are watching on YouTube. But you can put it together on Savant where you just overlay. I did here the last two seasons of Carlos Correa's balls in play. And then I just changed the park underneath it so that it's San Francisco. It does look like maybe it'll cost him a homer or two near triple's alley um but that he might actually gain some homers over to the right side where it's a little bit shorter in san francisco

uh you do have to take this all with a grain of salt because uh it's cold it's cold in san francisco and balls don't fly as far so the dots won't even be in the same places if you know what i mean it looks right now if you just took all the dots took all even be in the same places if you know what i mean it looks right now if you just took all the dots took all the hits and put him right over it that he would almost gain from the situation there's a lot of gray dots that are past the outfield wall uh that were outs in the in the past but i think what will end up actually happening is some of those balls don't go as far uh but that carlos correa ends up up pretty close to where he's been in the past. 280.

I'm going to give him 280. 25 homers. 90 RBI. 75 RBI. 90 runs scored. 95 runs scored. That's good enough to be a top 10 shortstop next year. It all depends a little bit on the volume, I guess.

It kind of splits the difference between his last season in Houston and his only season in Minnesota. I think I said 2022 Astros. I meant 2021 Astros because that was more of the counting stat ceiling we were looking at. Maybe Minnesota was a perfect place to sort of ease us into the new version of Correa. I think even Minnesota, the injuries they had last year probably

underperformed offensively relative to our initial expectations. And when you look at Correa's slash line, it was 291, 366, 467. That slugging percentage was only down 18 points from where it was in 2021. We know there was a lot going on with the ball between those two seasons also. So not as much of a drop-off as some people might have feared for him leaving Houston. I think your projection seems like it's kind of on point. And I don't think anyone ever looked at Carlos Correa in these last couple of seasons, given the health concerns as well, and said 30 plus homers is a lock. You're drafting him for a low 20s, mid 20s sort of total, and you're getting a good balance.

Does everything but run. sort of total and you're getting a good balance, does everything but run. I think that Corey Seager comp is actually a really good one in terms of the Roto profile that Correa brings to the table at this point. But a nice get for the Giants. We did see Dansby Swanson find a new home as well. The Cubs get involved in the shortstop market. I know we have talked about Dansby Swanson's arm and the future limitations defensively. Maybe by the end of this contract, he's playing somewhere else. But the bottom line

is this is a nice upgrade for the Cubs. It's kind of a similar way to think about Swanson, though, that we just said with Correa does the move away from an elite lineup in this case, which we didn't get a year of Swanson going somewhere else, how much does that hurt him? Because this is a Cubs team that I think could struggle to score runs even though they've made a few moves trying to get better in 2023. Yeah, I mean, it's a bit of a high variance offense, isn't it? I mean, you've got Bellinger out there in center.

You've got, you know, Ian Happ has been a little bit up and down. You're hoping for Seiya Suzuki to kind of take that acclimation that he showed to the next level. You've got Christian Morel and Patrick Wisdom as volatile because of their strikeout rates. And then in Nick Madrigical and Zach McKinstry, you have two backups that can play in different places that have really interesting skill sets,

but really could go either way. I think there's a lot of guys who could go either way here. I love Nico Horner. I think he's going to step forward and hit for more power. I think Seiya Suzuki is going to have a better season this coming year. I like that there's a lot of mix and match to this lineup. You can play Morel in a lot of places, Madrigal, McKinstry. If they put Mastroboni on this team, he plays in a lot of different places.

So they won't have an everyday DH, but they'll have a lot of different lineups over the course of the season. I like putting Tyon and Strowman on that team. And so I think they're generally building towards something interesting, but I don't really see a a star starting pitching like on the level of an ace uh the bullpen still needs a fair amount of work and they're in this offense even even high variance where you don't know it could go either way if bellinger doesn't take that step forward suzuki is only kind of a walks guy and hap starts striking out again and horner doesn't you know take that next step forward uh then swanson's going to be a little bit of a high-priced bobble for this team where he'll fit right in in terms of not being an amazing

offensive piece or defensive piece, but having some variance in either direction. This could be a team that would surprise next year i think that the cardinals are a little bit um gettable in that i think they feasted off on the pirates and and some and the cubs last season and they're going to have less of that feasting uh next season i you know i like that they got wilson contraris but in terms of, they didn't really get better. So I think that I could see the Cardinals dropping back and the Cubs or Brewers taking that division. With the Cubs, it would be a bit more of a surprise, but they're a surprise that happen every year, right?

Couldn't you just sort of squint at this team and be like, oh, if a bunch of these things happen at the same time, then this is going to be a good team? Yeah, I mean, the things that I sort of believe in with this team and be like, if a bunch of these things happen at the same time, then this is going to be a good team. The things that I believe in with this team, Swanson's an upgrade. I think Nico Horner took a quiet, nice step forward that we've talked about a little bit on this show.

They're solid up the middle. Ian Happ's new way of getting to the same result is a better, more sustainable way to be that kind of offensive player. It's less swing and miss. He's always been patient, but I like the way he's made adjustments.

You need a few things to go right. You need Suzuki to be a lot better, which is possible. You need Matt Mervis to come up and hit right away. You need to not have third base turn into a black hole, which it could.

I was wrong about Patrick Wisdom last year. We'll see if I'm still wrong about Patrick Wisdom in 2023. Because I'm not going to change my opinion. Yeah, I'm not moving. And Cody Bellinger, I mean, I kind of, well, not that he's a cub, I want to see it less than I did previously. But I think it'd be fun

if he got back to being the player he was because this time last year, I thought there was a rebound coming. So I could talk myself into the offense exceeding expectations. The way they're projected right now, the run scored per game on fan graphs has the Cubs 3, 4, 8 from the bottom.

So 4.23 runs scored per game by comparison atlanta the lineup that dansby swanson just left number one 4.66 runs scored per game that's a pretty big swing all right so if you if you start looking at swanson and you chip away a few homers and then you start chipping away some runs and rbis he looks like a player that might not be on a lot of my teams this year, and it's more because of supporting cast. If he had returned to Atlanta, if there had just been some way that he went back to the Braves, I might have been in this year at cost.

But I think there are enough question marks about this group that I would err on the side of going well under the marks from a season ago. The other thing that works against Danza B. Swanson for me, just from a projections perspective, he plays all the time. That's great. He's already maxed out the playing time. So he can't push that up to another level. He's already done that. He's played 162 games and 160 games the last two seasons. Yeah. It makes me think of Glenn Colton and Rick Wolf's rule about not drafting big new contracts, which is, they're going to have a tough, there's a lot of, I wonder

what their shortstop plan is for next season with the big four signing like they have. But the reason I think that that thing works where they try not to sign guys who just signed big contracts is not necessarily that I think that there's something about signing a big contract that makes you immediately worse, but just that those big contracts are often signed off of career years. of WRC Plus, his best season overall. In terms of stolen bases, he almost doubled his previous high. Just in terms of even luck stats, quote-unquote, batting average on balls in place, second best full season of his career. Here's a guy who doesn't make great contact, doesn't make great contact, doesn't get on base at a really fabulous rate. And, you know, he has good barrel rates. So I do like that about him. But they're not elite barrel rates. So I kind of see the projections as being right in a lot of ways.

247 average, 250 average with 22 to 25 homers. That part I like. The projections have him for 13 stolen bases, and i'm going to take the under on that um the only qualification is we don't know what the next stolen base environment is going to look like so maybe that helps him kind of stay afloat i actually think maybe one of the best offensive comps for Dansby Swanson right now is now a division mate, someone he will see as a rival. I think it's Willie Adames. I think when I see Dansby Swanson going around pick 70 and then I see Willie Adames going around pick 95, I just think, well, wait a turn or two and get Willie Adames. Because I think they have a lot of the same flaws, a lot of the same strengths.

I think they're both going to play a ton. I think I actually like the way the Brewers' offense is built a little better than the Cubs right now, so I think the supporting stats are slightly better. I think Adamas has better power. Yeah, the fact that Dansby Swanson has a few double-digit steal seasons, that gives you more confidence in that category, but it's not worth a 25-p pick difference for me to have a few extra steals when the offensive profiles are so similar

yeah i think i agree with you on that one i also wonder if dansby swanson's adp falls a little bit though because of all the things we're talking about and if that happens if it ends up being a simple would you rather at the same price then i at least think swanson is much more of a like a reasonably priced player. I think he's still overpriced right now. Yeah. That's where I'm at with Dansby Swanson. Good get for the Cubs, but a little bit complicated because of where people have been drafting him in the early part of this draft season.

Speaking of the Brewers, let's talk about the Sean Murphy trade. We'll talk about the Brewers, let's talk about the Sean Murphy trade. We'll talk about the Brewers aspect of this in just a moment, but Sean Murphy gets traded no longer in Oakland A. He is now a member of the Atlanta Braves. He gets all of the boosts, all the things that we're just taking away from Dansby Swanson. Let's give them all to Sean Murphy. Let's give him the better supporting cast. Let's give him the better home park. We know there's a lot of things Sean Murphy already does well. Playing time might come down a little bit because now he's got Travis Darnot to share some playing time with, but they also could work those guys in as DH options because they haven't locked up the depth chart so much that they can't do it. So

I don't know if I'm going to go with a significant downgrade in plate appearances on Murphy, but it's at least something to be mindful of, depending on other moves that Atlanta makes between now and opening day. So let's start with Murphy first. Value up a little, a lot with the move out of Oakland. Just the park factors alone, I think, really change his power ceiling. Yeah, yeah. really change his power ceiling. Yeah, yeah. I think, you know, if he got the same playing time last year,

he could have had, instead of, you know, 17, 18 homers, he could have had 25. I mean, he really barrels the ball. He's really good that way. You're right that they've got Travis Darnot there. Right now, it's Travis Darnot and Marcel Azuna and Sean Murphy almost in a three-way split there at DH. I don't know. There's something that tells me that either Azuna takes all of those or he takes none of those.

It's like maybe it's a 33% likelihood, but it's not going to end up that way. It's going to either end up he's their their their dh or they frankly you know release him i mean where do you where do you stand on azuna i mean it seems kind of important to murphy's value he's not been an above average hitter since 2020 that year he had a 178 wrc plus but uh that seems uh very very far in the rearview mirror still two years left on his contract but it just seems like atlanta is reaching that point where they're looking more at having the room to do what they want with DH. That's how it feels from the outside, but maybe because there are two years left on the deal, they wait, see what happens in spring training, see what happens in April. By mid-May, maybe that's a decision they decide to make as far as a DFA release sort of situation if he's not hitting. Last year, he hit 230, 270 OBP, 413 slugging for 11% worse than league average. If he does that again, I think they release him because he's not going to give you defensive value.

There are some other situations in terms of his makeup so you know if he's not going to give you the bat then he if he hits for his projections which is a 248 average with a 435 slugging that's supposed to be seven percent better than league average that'll be just good enough for him to keep his job i think because they'll have another year on him he'll be an above average hitter and they'll just be like hey he's our dh yeah i guess just making a call in terms of how it impacts them playing time wise i still think it's more likely he stays on the roster all season and plays a lot than he doesn't based on barrel rates and some of the underlying numbers from last season just my best guess at this point but they still barreled it. It was the second best barrel rate season for his career. It's true.

It's weird that it didn't turn out to as much power, but we also had the dead ball, so I guess that's part of it. The max EVs are still pretty good. He hit a ball 114 last year. Sean Murphy, I had him, I think, previously sitting inside the top 10 among catchers. Does this push him closer to think, previously sitting inside the top 10 among catchers. Does this push him closer to the top five or into the top five? I mean, Real Muto, Will Smith, hard to get near those two guys. I think Adley Rutschman's in that top five for a lot of people.

Dalton Varshow, Wilson Contreras, those guys are all up there. Sal Perez. I mean, maybe you can argue now that Murphy versus Salvador Perez can become a toss-up. It was not a draft day toss-up prior to this move. That's a pretty big jump in terms of where Murphy was going if it ends up being that much of a move. Behind Sal, just because, yes, I would move up his park factors for his situation there, but given our conversation about the other options they have at DH

and the fact that travis dar know is the backup who's a very competent catcher i i don't think he's going to get to 612 plate appearances like he did last year so if you move back uh to more like 500 550 plate appearances you can still have a 25 homer pace and still end up with something that looks a lot like last year which is sort of a 250 average and 19 to 20 homers you know and i don't think that's a top five catcher the reason that this is so great uh of a trade for the braves um is because murphy's a great framer great defensive catcher and uh i think sort of a top three real life catcher but i don't think that necessarily extends to the fantasy side no good fantasy catcher but i would agree because the defensive

value is so high even better in situations that account for i guess score sheet is another place where you can look at sean murphy and value him more like the way major league teams do because Atlanta had catchers already with Travis Darno and William Contreras the Brewers swoop in and get Contreras out of this which is just like how how did they even know this was going down did someone tip them off to these two teams making a deal and the light bulb went off in the Milwaukee front office and they were like wait a, we need a catcher. And these teams have more catchers than they can possibly use, so they're not trading catchers with each other.

They must have just been talking to the Braves about Contreras. Like maybe they had been talking, maybe the Braves reached out and were like, give us one of your starting pitchers for Contreras. And they said no. They said no, but then they knew that the brewers were somewhat interested in was a contrarians you know so okay so the brewers then said we'll give you a story ruiz and atlanta said no we don't he's not that's not our kind of player but we know right right yeah so yeah we'll give you a story reese for was a contrarians and i know. Thanks. But we know somebody who does want Asturi Ruiz.

Fair enough. So the Brewers get involved. They get William Contreras in all this. Asturi Ruiz is a part of the package that Oakland gets back. We'll get to Contreras first because we're talking about catchers. He's now in a better situation for playing time. Victor Caratini is a clear backup sort of catcher. So instead of being

in that split that he was in in Atlanta, now William Contreras gets a chance to be a 450, 500 plate appearance starting catcher. The flaw, I think, in his game is the swing and miss. It depends on whether or not you believe he's going to cut that down. Do you see William Contreras being good enough in his swing decisions to get the K rate lower than it's been to this early point in his big league career. We're talking about a guy that's got 571 played appearances at the big league level, a 28.4% career K rate, but 28 homers.

So big time power. This is an above average offensive player for sure. And on top of all that, the defensive shortcomings that William Contreras might have, I think you can worry less about them in Milwaukee, where Omar Narvaez became a much better defensive catcher during his time there. When the Brewers acquired Omar Narvaez two, three, three winters ago, I think it was, he was one of the worst defensive catchers in baseball by many of the public-facing metrics, and by the time he left, he'd almost flipped his position on the leaderboard. So, and he's young, too.

We're talking about William Contreras. He's going to be 25 years old this weekend. So, there's still reason to believe that aspect of his game can get better. What is the 2023 offensive ceiling for Contreras? Is he actually a better fantasy player than Sean Murphy, given their new situations and how the playing time might play out? Yeah, the projections are pretty much neck and neck between the two. Both have a 250 average

and 20 homers next year. So it could be a take-your-pick situation, but maybe you get a lot more played appearances out of Contreras. In terms of upside, his barrel rate was better than Sean Murphy's, and he hit a ball 115, so he has really good quality of contact. You really hit the nail on the head when you're talking about the swing decisions. It was only 10 games or 10 plate appearances in 2020 but he he swung it almost half the pitches he saw it's out of the zone no bueno uh 2021 down to 31 according to pitch info and then last year uh 28 which i think on pitch info's line is still below average

um i do think he still had below average plate discipline last year when judged by his chase rate. However, given his strikeout rates in the minor leagues and given his

improvement, I could see a little bit of improvement there. I can definitely see it on the framing aspect because the Brewers have long had a little bit of improvement there. I can definitely see it on the framing aspect because the Brewers have long had like a little bit of magic. It goes all the way back to Lucroy. I was talking to Jonathan Lucroy about how he became one of the best framers in the league. And he said the Brewers have an entire catching development situation where they do things that, you know, I even checked back with him when he'd been to other organizations and they do things that other organizations don't do in terms of developing catching framing. So, you know, I do think he could take a step forward there and take a step forward with the contact and the swing decisions and maybe make good on that 275 average that last year was a little bit lucky, but get back to it by improving his peripherals.

So I see an upside here of a guy who could hit 275 with like 27 homers. That might outpace Sean Murphy's upside given the plate appearance differences we'll see. If you look at William Contreras side-by-side with Gary Sanchez for stat cast numbers from last season, barrel rates both over 13%. Sanchez had a slightly better hard hit rate, 49% for him and 46% for William Contreras. But Sanchez's K rate was? Yeah, what do you think the K rates were? 35%. 28.9% for Gary Sanchez.

No way. Yeah, he walked a little less than William Contreras, but I think that's a... And he's still out there. Is he still a free agent? Yeah. Yeah, he's still out there. In a world with universal DH,

I think Gary Sanchez is a lot more interesting. Do you think that the Giants will sign him? Yeah, I do. Yeah. I kind of think that now that I've said think that they've been looking to improve their catching situation they're still under the cap that's an interesting one but I you know I do think that Contreras

Wilson Williams Williams William William William Contreras has a little bit more upside than Sanchez. I mean, he was putting up 20% K rates in the minor leagues. If he can get down to 23-22% Contreras, now we're talking about plus batting average and plus power. Right. I guess I

think about it more for just the good parts of Gary Sanchez's offensive profile. Those are traits that William Contreras has flashed in his brief time in the big leagues. So that makes this a pretty exciting trade. One thing that also makes it really exciting, though, is what they gave up. Because Astero Ruiz is somebody that has created a lot of different opinions, I guess, in the industry. But you can already see that by the fact he's been traded twice before he turned 24. So that means that there were teams on both sides of him already.

So multiple teams have had multiple different reads on this guy so far. so far. And I just I think I'm on the he was overrated and they did really well. The Brewers did really well to trade him for Contreras because I think quality of contact

matters. And so you can see over at Rotowire that Estoril Ruiz had a hard hit rate of 20%. Now you can take his strikeout rate, which is around 18%. This is even in his best season in the minor leagues. He never had a season like he did last season before. In fact, he was walking at sort of 6% and 7% rates

before last season when he just doubled that. And for some reason, it was partially due to hit by pitches. So, leaving that aside, and he just doubled that. And for some reason, it was partially due to hit by pitches. So leaving that aside, here's a guy with questionable play discipline and questionable contact or just average contact rates. He's not Stephen Kwan. If he was Stephen Kwan, then I wouldn't care as much about the quality of contact

because he'd be making contact with elite rate. He does not. So you can take his 18% strikeout rate in the minor leagues. You can take his 18% strikeout rate in the minor leagues, you can take his 20% hard hit rate in the minor leagues, and you can go shopping among the major leaguers and see who's like that. Well, I'll tell you who's like that. Jonathan Scope was like that. Cesar Hernandez was like that. My number one comp, and this is great because this is a guy who's in Rates and Barrels lore. My number one

comp for Estre Riz is Abraham Toro with Elite Speed. And I had a long conversation with somebody on Twitter about whether or not quality of contact matters when you've got a guy who's this fast. And I think, A, for me, quality of contact always matters.

You have to hit the ball hard in today's league. And B, let's say he had Stephen Kwan contact or you could totally believe in like a 15% walk rate, then maybe you could look the other way on some of this. But Abraham Toro is someone we said always had great play discipline, made decent contact, had above average power in the minor leagues. What we didn't know was he was getting away with it with poor quality of contact. Once he got to the big leagues, we saw this guy can't hit it hard.

And I think if this guy can't hit it hard, why do they walk you? You know, yes, with the speed, there's that asterisk. And especially with the way that the game just changed all these rules. It's a chance that Ruiz just gets on and makes things hectic for pitchers. But he has to get on. And with a 20% strikeout rate, that puts a lot of pressure on that walk rate. And there are a couple scouting pieces out there uh like um he's not ralph liftschitz anymore jeff pontus uh was saying uh that his plate this he has a write-up on baseball america he was saying that his plate

was not good like his decisions at the plate were not good so without uh better data on his plate was not good. His decisions at the plate were not good. So without better data on his plate discipline in terms of reach rate and stuff like that, I'm going to be out. As someone who's had to try and console myself that Astero Ruiz would

in fact be a good big leaguer, I had to do it at one point. Otherwise, why did we trade Josh Hader? Right. I also had to talk myself into Robert Gossett being someone the Brewers really liked, and I think that's true, and we'll see how

this all plays out. I thought this was a steal for the Brewers like everybody else did. I was waiting for something else to be included. Lower level pitchers, another outfielder, Joey Weamer, like something. I thought something else was going to be leaving. I thought they had to throw in more.

I'm glad they didn't. I think you could see some similarities to a couple other outfielders from the last 10 years or so. I think Ender Enciarte didn't hit the ball hard, ran well because of his speed. I think especially he was a good defender, better defender in left than in center.

I know there are people that think Ruiz can play center every day. So if the A's are going to throw him out there and kind of move on from Christian Pache, then more power to them. I think from an offensive profile perspective, that means the ceiling in his very best years. Ender Enciarte hit 11 home runs in 2017 and 10 homers in 2018. And he was a fast peak player.

He was good for a few years, like a two to three war sort of player. Get a 4.7 war, his best season in 2016. And he was not good and he was injured from like 2019 onward. Like by his late twenties, he was on his way out. I think that's sort of like the best case scenario you could hope for, for Ruiz. And I think part of the reason why I think that comp works really well is that endurance Yarte also wasn't an extremely patient guy that could walk a lot.

Like we've seen flashes of that from Ruiz where he'd walk a lot in the upper levels of the minor leagues, but the swing decisions mean more when you get to the big leagues. If teams challenge you because they're not afraid of you, you're not going to walk like you did at AAA. I think that's where the comp there holds up. I think another possible

comp is Delano DeShields Jr. Delano DeShields Jr. was more patient everywhere he played in the minor leagues. I think that's where it breaks down just a little bit, but you think about the type of player that DeShields was once he got to the big leagues. It was a ton of value on speed,

not much on homers, and because he wasn't getting on base much, he was stuck in the bottom of the batting order. So maybe you get away with it on a bad rebuilding team where you end up hitting high in the order and you score more runs just because the team around you doesn't have anyone better to play in that spot instead it's a tough way to to get by so i think it can work reasonably well i like that the shields comp a little bit better almost

somewhere in between the shields and ciarte because in ciarte had like a 12 strikeout rate and uh and the shields had a 23 strikeout rate you know and and you know Ruiz is going to end up somewhere in between those two but I do like the comps because between the two of those guys there was one league average season with the bat so you know if it seems like a little bit of a tough return for a top three catcher with three years of team control left. In terms of fantasy, though, both of those guys, I mean, how many fantasy-relevant seasons did those guys turn out? We're talking probably about nine or ten. Yeah, I mean, if you're talking about deep leagues especially, sure.

Because even a part-time guy that gets 20 bags is firmly in the mix for a mono league. So I do think there's some short-term, even mixed-league appeal with Estreiruiz. But he has flaws, and players with those flaws do not tend to age particularly well. They don't tend to hold

everyday roles for very long. But for the next two to three seasons, I wouldn't worry about it i'd look at him as a viable cheap source of speed so long as people don't go over the moon pushing him up way too high because they think he's going to steal 50 plus bases if that happens i'm very much out as a as a bargain source of flawed steals flawed pay flawed steals are still steals yeah because and like he could steal 50 bases, but he also we just had Pache where

I had shares of him in Oakland because I just thought he's just going to play. That can be a tough place to end up. Christian Pache did not just play. He got 260

appearances in an up and down season. He did not just play. They did not just give him center field and say, run with it. So, as much as it looks like Ruiz is going to be in that situation, if he doesn't play well in spring and he doesn't play well in April, it doesn't mean he's just going to get all season. So, you know, there is a risk given his poor batted ball quality I mean you can do something as simple as just looking at the major league leaders

last year on fan graphs go to stat cast go to hard hit rate and then sort by the other way on hard hit rate Tony Kemp Adam Frazier Miguel Rojas JP Crawford,

Cesar Hernandez, IKF. You know? And a lot of those guys make a lot more contact than Ruiz is going to make. Jose Altuve is low in hard hit percentage. What's up with that? 29.5%?

He's so strange because he still has the highest barrel rate of anybody on the bottom of this list, right? You see that? Still has almost like an 8% barrel rate. I think he just is a really opportunistic hitter. He hits things softly sometimes, a lot of times, but when he does get something in his wheelhouse,

he makes sure to hit it for a homer. He hit 28 homers last year. So, he's, I think, optimized for his home park. A little bit like Bregman, where he's like, I'm going to hit this into the Crawford boxes. What if Adam Frazier had

Estrella Ruiz's speed? What would that have done for us? That's what I'm saying. It is interesting to think of Abraham Toro with Ruiz's speed. What is that going to look like? Right, because the A's have nothing to lose. They can give anybody who runs like that unlimited green lights.

The green light is always on. Jorge Mateo? Is that what it looks like? I think Jorge Mateo has that kind of speed. And he has a 32% hard hit rate. He strikes out a little bit more. So Jorge Mateo with a kind of speed. And he has a 32% hard hit rate. He strikes out a little bit more. So Jorge Mateo with a little more contact. Now we're talking dude. Jorge Mateo with a little bit of

contact is going to be a fantasy asset. Because you're talking about 230, 240 with 13 homers and 50 stolen bases next year. I think I should become a used car salesperson. But not in a reputable lot. Not certified pre-owned.

Cars that were fished out of lakes. Yeah, you just heard me trying to sell you on Jorge Mateo. There's got to be a first on this program right here. Jorge Mateo, our long, our whipping boy. The rest of this return, Kyle Muller, Freddie Tarnak, Roy Bersalinis, and then veteran catcher Manny Pena, who will help shepherd along the younger catchers

like Shea Langelier. Shea Langelier is a winner in this trade because now he's going to catch right away and play a ton. I like him too i i think i like him as a person as like a as like i think he's gonna be a good catcher defensively and all that has a really good arm and stuff but um i i don't know about the other part i mean the the barrel ray the max ev are okay chase rate is only okay you know his record of making contact is not great. I think he's going to maybe be one

of these typical catchers that hits 220 with 18 homers. I'm not sure that he has a standout offensive profile. I think compared to a lot of other catchers that hit 220 with that power, he'll play more. That will maybe open up the door

for him to be more valuable from a fantasy perspective. As far as the pitchers go, Muller really had nothing left to prove at AAA. The walk rate did get better this year. Tarnak, I think, is, I don't know, higher ceiling, but also lower floor. I think if you're looking at those guys in terms of their bids to stay in the rotation long term, and then Salinas further away throws really hard, but has some relief questions as well. So what do you make of the pitchers that are coming back to Oakland in this trade? it's a bunch of arms that are interesting in their own different ways all have I think probably front of rotation upside

all I think maybe not likely to reach that upside for different flaws or whatever Muller's flaw is his fastball not only has poor shape but it also really poorly commanded so he's going to have to do something about that

because his best pitch is a change-up by stuff and his best pitch for locating is the curveball. It's a mess. It's a mess. I wonder if there's a sinker in there since he's the change-up guy. He threw the change-up the least out of all of his pitches and it was his best pitch.

It's a mess. I don't know what is going on there. A four-pitch guy that has gotten close to the big leagues, that's apparently what pitching coaches want the most because they think, hey, I can make a couple tweaks here. This guy's almost a big leaguer. If I make a couple tweaks, he can be a big leaguer. Tarnok is a possibility my stats won't catch him right. Because his best pitch is a changeup. And Stuff Plus hates Tarnok.

But we also have 10 pitches, I believe, in the system. Yeah, probably not enough to draw a conclusion. So I'm going to say don't use Stuff Plus to make a decision about Freddie Tarnock. I think think more about what he's doing in the spring, how much they're stretching him out, where he looks destined to play next year. All those things are more important right now than stuff lost for Freddie Tarnock. As a group of pitchers, I see enough interesting stuff there where I'll take those guys. But the Ruiz's, the headpiece, was a little bit rough for me.

So let's be clear. When it comes to shipping internationally, can I provide trade documents electronically? Mm-hmm. The answer is FedEx. Okay. But what about estimating duties and taxes on my shipments? How do I find all the... Also FedEx. Impressive. Is there a regulatory specialist I can ask about? FedEx. Oh. But let's say that... FedEx. What? FedEx. Thanks. No more questions. Always your answer for international shipping. FedEx. Where. No more questions. Always your answer for international shipping.

FedEx, where now meets next. And we'll get into Oakland's rotation more at some point on an upcoming episode because there's a few more moves that we need to get to before we sign off. And I think we're skipping next week, so this will be a long episode anyway, which is fine since it could basically fill the space of two. A few more position players on the move. Andrew Benintendi goes to the White Sox. They had been pretty quiet to this point in the offseason.

It was just Mike Clevenger prior to the Benintendi move. Seems like a really good fit for them. Just a guy that makes contact, draws walks, has some speed, sometimes has power, just doesn't show it consistently. Makes them a lot deeper because I think they were leaning a little too heavily on some late 20s guys that maybe aren't necessarily everyday players prior to this move and of course losing Jose Abreu moving Andrew Vaughn out of that outfield mix they had a clear need so I actually like this in terms of overall fit for Benintendi yeah it is interesting because

Jose Abreu is actually projected to be better than Benintendi next season, and he cost less, and he had a long-time relationship with the city, right? It's like, what are you doing? I think Benintendi has the upside to fit this team better because with Andrew Vaughn, they already had a guy that could play at first or play at DH and was not great defensively in the outfield. So I think Benintendi in the corner outfield is going to be a decent defender. This is a team that didn't walk last year, last in walk rate and chased too much, second to worst chase rate. And Benintendi is going to help him improve in both ways.

So he fits, his skill set fits in ways that they need him to i don't like the contract though because he's only projected to be a slightly above average player next year 2.3 wins by steamer um and i normally wouldn't put the the decimal in there uh but it is sort of important because when you age players when they hit around 30 you normally take a half win off so let's you know next year is his uh age 29 season uh you take uh let's not take a full half win off let's just take 0.3 off so then he's he's going to be predicted to be a league average player in year two that means in year three he's not going to be a league average player and you're still going to be paying him like he's league average player i would say yeah i could see where a five-year deal ends up looking pretty bad for him in the long run i think

my best defense of it is that we saw back in 2018 we saw a guy that was nearly a five war player and i think when you show that kind of ceiling... One of two seasons where he was above average in his career. Well, 2020, he played 14 games. Garbage. Get it out of here. But the other ones, he's always hovering right below two wins. Right below two wins, but always a league average hitter or better.

Yeah. And I still think when you look at the last two seasons, you see a little more hard contact. So maybe there have been some changes there that could propel the offensive profile a little bit longer. He told me at the, at the all-star game that he had changed his approach a little bit to fit, you know, Kansas City.

And you can see a little bit of change in his pull rate and some of his hard hit rates. So it looked like he was really putting a priority on just putting the ball in play and running around and using that big park against itself. Maybe when he goes into Chicago, he goes a little bit more back to his old approach of pulling the ball more and pulling for power uh that would could change

his trajectory in terms of aging because right now uh projection systems just look at his poor power season last year and just uh just bake in a decline but if he could sort of get back to 180 iso 170 iso like he has shown at times um then you know i think that would change maybe my opinion on the deal because uh if you add power and patience that ages pretty well you know that's something you can you can step back and just use your power and patience right now he looks kind of like a speedy contact outfielder. I think he got those extra years, though, in part because he's 28. If he's 30, 31 years old, we're probably talking about a two- to three-year deal. But I think being a little younger made it probably easier for teams to convince themselves they could get a bit more out of him over that longer-term deal.

$15 million a year doesn't ruin – the White Sox have money. They're not a tiny market team. So if they're wrong, it's not going to be the reason they're bad they're going to be bad for other reasons at the end of Andrew Benatendi's contract but they had like they did do weird things like there was a rumor that Liam Hendricks was on the was on the trade block you know

yeah I don't fully understand their direction but hey teams do sometimes run up against you know they i don't fully understand their direction but hey teams do sometimes run up against uh you know they won't get any more money from the owner so if we want to make a move we have to trade some money away i mean this is a team that really should sign john segura like i like that should be their second act right i think it will be yeah it might it might just be because that makes everything better if you put segura at second then you know all those guys lori garcia you know the backup guys at second they can be

backup outfielders and and help there and uh take some pressure off our oscar colas so you know he doesn't have to be the starting guy there it could could be Eloy in right and just a mix and match at DH. Right now, the depth chart has Oscar Colas at first in right field and Rony Gonzalez. Romy? Romy. Romy, Romy, Romy.

Yeah, so I think those are two places they need to improve. But the Ben Attendee signing, I like it a little better once you put it in that perspective. It seems like the Swanson and Ben Attendee deals to me are the ones where

oh, we didn't spend as much as the top guys, and well, you didn't get a top guy. I think the thing that does make the Ben Attendendi deal look bad is that the terms for Jose Abreu were very much favorable for this market. I realize that happened early. Sometimes there's a benefit to making that move early.

That's the part of it that would sting to me if I were a White Sox fan. Be like, wait a minute, we could do that for him, but we couldn't keep Jose Abreu? That's kind of weird. I think we've seen pretty much the last of Eloy Jimenez as a defensive outfielder. I think he's going to be a DH. Then maybe that's the calculus for them on Abreu. We don't want Vaughn and Eloy Jimenez in this lineup, but we don't want them out in the field that much. Yeah, I think that probably was part of their thinking.

Justin Turner lands with the Red Sox, which I think has Red Sox fans wondering if Rafael Devers might be on the move soon. Not because Turner's the long-term solution, but because primarily he plays third base. So you lose J.D. Martinez to the Dodgers, but you bring in Justin Turner. Does this make the Red Sox any better than they were

when they had J.D.? Or is this just kind of a balancing things out sort of move? Oh, man, I don't get it. One thing that Turner does that J.D. Martinez doesn't't do jd martinez's power is to right center and we've seen that opposite field homers are dying and so maybe the red sox thought turner's batted ball spray looks better for our park and for where the ball is right now where you know it's a better it's going to age better than martinez there's a chance that martinez days as a as a plus power hitter are behind him so uh maybe that's that was just the

calculus for them turners we like turner's power better he's going to be our dh instead of martinez wham bam thank you ma'am that all makes sense to me except the general direction of this team is so weird they now have christian arroyo and rob reff snyder at the top of their left field and second base situations they have trevor story going back to short with the now he's gonna have the very weakest arm in baseball at short in a year where the distance from home to first is shorter uh you're you're waiting for the sort of player development machine to to to lock in i mean that's that's got to be the the idea behind the uh behind this that seems to be the idea behind teams like you're seeing Brian Bello and Tanner Hauk as the shining

achievements of the player development system they just let Jeter Downs go so these trades haven't turned into great players for them either it seems a little rudderless for me in Boston you could look at the Red Sox and

maybe say they are the worst team in the AL East right now. The overall long view based on what they have currently on the big league roster, in the system. I think you could make a case for that. Especially if they

end up flipping Devers. If they don't get a great return and flip Devers, yikes. The recent trades leave plenty to be desired flipping Devers. If they don't get a great return and flip Devers, yikes. And the recent trades leave plenty to be desired. Devers is sort of a one-man pull-you-above Baltimore maybe. And Tristan Kassas, I was a little bit unfair to the player development system. Tristan Kassas is going to give them a chance to produce an everyday major leaguer this season. But you've got Gunnar Henderson and Adley Rutschman

in Baltimore. Cassis was a first rounder, man. Your first rounders are supposed to be big league regulars. It's getting closer, man. I don't know if I'm going to give it to you yet, but it's getting closer. In fact, we just had a season where the Orioles did win more games than the Red Sox. I didn't think we were going to get here. I didn't think we'd get here ever,

let alone quickly, but here. That's what's happening. Just to clarify something from earlier, I don't think adding Turner means Devers is gone. I do think it's more of an insurance policy. We can give Devers more rest. I do think it's more of an insurance policy. We can give Devers more rest as the DH and

maybe split the time at third base between those two guys and hopefully have both of them healthy. That's probably the line of thinking that they're going through. But we did just see their last shortstop that they were thinking about extending leave and

their backup shortstop that they were thinking about extending leave and their you know duplicity you know their their their their backup plan trevor story is now their shortstop i guess right so they plan that all along to ask about turner right yeah yeah i mean but you're talking about a very old third baseman at least in the case of story that was a longer term deal where you knew was going to be on the roster for a while. Turner, I think it's an option for a second year, so it's not even a guaranteed second year.

Michael Brantley goes back to Houston. Not entirely surprising. Seems like a pretty good and logical fit there. How about Joey Gallo going to the Twins? I don't think he's come up a lot in our conversations with the new shift rules. Do you think Joey Gall come up a lot in our conversations with the new shift rules. Do you think Joey Gallo becomes a lot more interesting from a fantasy

perspective in the 2023 environment? If you could take Joey Gallo and Luis Arias and just smush them together, it'd be amazing. He'd be a fun player. Yeah, that'd be Mike Trout. Yeah, I don't know.

It's really hard from a fantasy perspective to stomach the batting average he's likely to put up in an OBP league yeah in real life yeah I see it you know it's a little bit like the Cody Ballinger thing where you're just like he's likely to be worth this money you know

and it's not a long-term commitment. Maybe if he turns it around and is really good, then we're in the best seat to sign him to extension. But he's projected for 188 batting average, and I just can't have that on my team. Joey Gallo has basically the same offensive projection as Miguel Sano. Sano has a higher average and a lower OBP. You just lived this with a guy that could really only be first base DH.

Why is this going to be different? What are you doing? And you can at least play the outfield, I guess. But you didn't even need that. You didn at least play the outfielder. But you didn't even need that. You didn't need a corner outfielder. Did you look at the Twins and say they needed to go get someone? I mean, Larnak,

Kirilov, I know they're coming off injuries. Well, Sano's a free agent. Yeah, Sano's gone. They're just replacing him. Right. Why, after going through years of Miguel Sano, do you go out and hand $11 million to Joey Gallo?

Because you just felt like you always needed to have that in your lineup. Oh, man. To be fair, they were early in on barrel rate and have espoused you know higher launch angles than most teams over the course of stat cast so like they really do like barrels and uh this is this is a barrel rate play i know but they they've lived this already the difference of course joey gallo has a lot more defensive value that's the difference so now you've got a guy that has the flaws of Miguel Sano but does have some other strengths that make him a little bit better fit on a big league roster. I'll give them that.

They don't have an obvious DH. There is the question that has been sort of floated around Minnesota, which is do they trade Max Kepler for a starting pitcher if that is on the table anywhere. I could see it because they have Trevor Larnock and Alex

Kirloff currently working backup roles. I think if you made Kirloff more of a starter, that would be okay. I think he's a good pitter. Kepler will benefit some from the new shift rules. He is a lefty pull hitter, but he doesn't hit the ball extremely hard. And some of his low batting averages come from the fact that he really lifts the ball aggressively. He has a very high

launch angle. I don't think he's necessarily going to hit 300 next year. Who's trading for that? Who wants that profile? Who wants a league average corner outfielder? Nobody. Is already saw. And is it one year of a deal? There's a club option for one more year in 2024.

Could be two years. But he'll get you slightly more than Hunter Renfro got you on the free market, right? Or maybe slightly less. Probably less. So that means

if you're trading Max Kepler, it's for a reliever, most likely. And then maybe you make Duran a starter. I don't know. I think Max Kepler's going to stay. And I guess they're going to go with Kyle Farmer to begin the season while they're waiting for Royce Lewis.

Sure. I mean, I like Royce Lewis a lot. So if the plan is basically Royce Lewis? Sure. Yeah, that's, I mean, I like Royce Lewis a lot. So if the plan is basically Royce Lewis once he's healthy, I can get on board with that. I did like the Christian Vasquez addition. I actually thought a team that was more desperate for catching would get him, but the Twins wanted someone to pair with Ryan Jeffers. A whole bunch of catchers moved, by the way. Christian Vasquez to the Twins, Omar Narvaez to the Mets, Mike Zanino to the Guardians, then Austin Hedges to the Pirates. Four catchers, even beyond the catchers that were involved in that trade earlier.

Other moves, by the way, Kevin Kiermaier to the Blue Jays. I think he said he's finally healthy after dealing with the hip for a couple of years. He's finally healthy until he's not. Then Adam Frazier to the Orioles, the aforementioned Adam Frazier. Anything in that group move the needle for you? I was waiting for Adam Frazier to get back to getting all those flight appearances and put together 10 homers with the 10 stolen bases

in the same year. I think he is a deceptively valuable monoligue guy, a guy who will play and I think will put up a decent batting average and will get close to 10 homers and 10 steals. Really not that interesting in most leagues, but in AL only, especially if you can get somebody like that for five bucks it's uh insanely valuable if you translate the 2020 shortened season into a full season's worth of playing time you're looking at 600 plate appearances four straight seasons

for adam frazier so i think that mono league placement is is accurate i mean i think he's just I think that mono league placement is accurate. I mean, I think he's just a solid accumulator for those leagues and might, as the Orioles get better, go from everyday guy to part-time guy, but it's fine. If he's your first bench player, that's a good first bench player. Yeah, I think he's comfortably the starter because they don't really have a great situation at third. Now, Jorge Mateo is currently the big loser on the Fangraph step charts

because they're going to put Gunnar Henderson in at short and Ramon Urias at third, where they also have Jordan Westberg coming up through the system. Mateo is exactly that type that I think plays less and less as the team gets better. But I do think next year is going to be an interesting time because people are going to see that Mateo put up value last year. I have in the auction calculator,

Mateo is the 16th 6, 9, 12, 16th best shortstop last year put up $9 of value in a 12 team league so you know people are going to see that, going to see the steals maybe eyes get large with the new steals rules and

say even if it's 220, 230 he's going to steal 55 bags he's going to be huge for me this is it's kind of like that same thing with Asturi Ruiz which is like okay I get that but he's not that like he did all that and last year was 18 percent worse than league average of the bat so where is he playing uh and if it's not short over Gunnar Henderson, which I don't think it is, unless Gunnar Henderson goes to third, then he's going to be the big loser.

For example, Jorge Mateo versus Ramon Urias. That might be the way it goes. Well, Ramon Urias has been above league average his whole career with the bat. So if you were choosing between two guys at third and one guy had been above league average his whole career with the bat. So if you were choosing between two guys at third and one guy had been above the league average his whole career and the other guy had a, you know, a WRC plus,

it was 20% worse than the league average, maybe all of a sudden Mateo's a backup. Yeah, that 267 OBP last season from Mateo is the biggest hurdle he has to play. I mean, I think the fact that he was a good defender at short certainly helps his case, but it's getting more crowded in Baltimore, and I'm very curious to see how they keep his speed in the lineup. Pick 200, are you in on Jorge Mateo, by the way, for this year?

In a mixed league, like a 15-team mixed league? That's not my type of player. You're sort of in just like 45 minutes ago, but now you're back out on hard hit. I was just trying to sell you. I was just trying to sell you a used car. I didn't believe you. I walked right off that lot.

Eric Hosmer, DFA'd Frank Schwindel headed to Japan, too, if you're tracking some of the very, very bottom-of-the-list first-base options for early drafts. Hosmer's going to latch on somewhere at the league minimum, right? I mean, he's not done. The Padres are paying for the bill, so someone else will bring him in, take a look at least. Nationals, A's?

Oh, my God, A's. Don't do it. Marlins. Garrett Cooper. Angels. Jared Walsh. Cubs. No.

They're going to give it to Mervis. Oh, that'd be horrible for the Mervis crowd. It'd be so bad. Yeah. I don't know. Rockies? Mix them in there? Yeah. I don't think I really see a starting job waiting for him anywhere.

But if he's a bench player, maybe he's okay as a bench player. We'll see. See where he lands. First base bench guys, yeah. No, no. Again, Universal DH helps if player. We'll see. See where he lands. No. No. Again, Universal DH helps if some team believes he can hit enough, but I think that's very questionable at this point in time.

I think that's going to do it for Rates and Barrels for this year, which is amazing. Year 4 in the books. No episode next week. We hope everybody out there has a safe and happy holiday season. You got any beer of the year picks or

any other pearls of wisdom to throw out there on our way out the door? No, just that I really, really appreciate our listeners and it's been a pleasure working with you. I think we've taken rights and barrels

and developed something really fun and cool here. And I really appreciate the community surrounding it and hope everyone has a happy new year. Yeah, right back at you. Love working with you on this show and excited for what 2023 might bring. Appreciate all the listeners out there. Tons

of emails, some of them unfortunately not responded to. Inbox zero before the new year is a possibility. I've got a little bit of time this week. I'm going to try and beat the clock on Friday and get a few responses out there. Ratesandbarrelsattheathletic.com, if you'd like to make that a more difficult task for me, email's always welcome. On Twitter, enos at en Saris. I am at Derek Van Ryper. That's going to do it for this episode of Rates and Barrels. We are back with you in two weeks. Thanks for listening. Bye.