Rates & Barrels - Scherzer to Texas, Lance Lynn to LA & More Bats to Anaheim

Episode Date: July 31, 2023

Eno and DVR discuss a busy three-day stretch in the final weekend before the Trade Deadline as Max Scherzer was flipped to the Rangers, Lance Lynn joins the Dodgers' rotation, and the Angels add two more bats.  Rundown 0:38 Max Scherzer to the Rangers 3:34 Luisangel Acuña Heads to the Mets; Ozzie Albies Comps 13:06 The Value in Knowing 'Why' Things Do/Don't Work 17:11 A Pitch Mix Question; Lance Lynn to the Dodgers 25:48 Will Justin Verlander Get Traded Too? 33:33 Jordan Montgomery & Chris Stratton to the Rangers 40:31 Jordan Hicks to the Blue Jays 42:33 Randal Grichuk & C.J. Cron Traded Back to Angels 51:39 The Royals Trade Nicky Lopez to Atlanta 55:06 A JP Sears Question Follow Eno on Twitter: @enosarris Follow DVR on Twitter: @DerekVanRiper e-mail: [e-mail] Subscribe to the Rates & Barrels YouTube channel: https://www.youtube.com/c/RatesBarrels Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

Welcome to Rates and Barrels. It is Monday, July 31st. Derek Van Ryper here with Eno Saris on this episode. We recap a busy weekend in trades. I think it was after we signed up on friday that the dodgers added a starting pitcher with lance lynn a lot more happened in the days since then so we'll break it all down from a fantasy perspective got a few mailbag questions to squeeze in at the end of the episode as well but you know let's just go for it right off the jump max scherzer is now a member of the te Rangers, and because the Mets are the Mets under Steve Cohen, it was an unusual deal in that they're eating a lot of money, which will actually save them money, as Ken Rosenthal wrote about for The Athletic. Luis Angel Acuna was the player going back to the Mets as part of the deal, which really is the result of their willingness to eat money.

But more importantly, Max Scherzer, year two with the Mets, was not going nearly as well as year one. There was a clear need in Texas to upgrade that rotation once Jacob deGrom went down. We've talked about how injury tolerant they were building that group of starters. So what should we expect from Max Scherzer with the move to Texas over these final two plus months yeah I wrote it up for the athletic and one of the things that I noticed was that you know his stuff is down on his fastball he's got a nine-year low in fastball velo uh career low in fastball spin you know uh the slider velo's down you know just basically uh the kind of stuff that stuff captures it and it's you know it's all down a little bit the thing that i also noticed though

is he has five pitches that are near average or better uh by stuff plus he's always been a guy that's outperformed his stuff plus a little bit with his moxie or his pitchability uh pitchability plus moxie plus through the charts and um you know uh he's still by our projections a top 15 uh guy by most projections still a really like a a an upper half number one i don't know if i can use the a word anymore that's the he's right on the cusp between like is he an ace or is he a you know top 15 pitcher uh everyone's got their own definition of ace and i don't want to really want to wade in those waters but i would say that he is the rangers ace now and uh i think it was a good deal acuna i don't think has the batted ball strength to be a star. So I see him a little bit more like their father, Ronald Acuna Sr.,

who never really hit for a lot of power. And maybe Luisa Angel Acuna can outdo his father because he has a little bit more defensive value than his father did. His father was an outfielder that just stole a lot of bases and didn't really hit for enough power to be a major league outfielder. I think Acuna may have some trouble, you know, becoming a star, like I said, but people have mentioned Ozzie Albies as a possible outcome. I think Albies had a little bit more power than him in the minors, though. I'm going to check that real quick quick what do you think of louis and

hell i like the the comp to albies i think albies just barely predated the quality of contact numbers in the minor leagues that we like to look at right now i wonder given how young albies was for every level he played at which has been the case for acuna as well but albies is even younger i would guess we would have been a little underwhelmed by some of those numbers as well because the in-game power wasn't really there. I mean, Albies in 2016 spent time at AA and AAA, hit six home runs in 138 games. That probably didn't come with great exit VLO numbers. But you're right.

I think age is a part of it because you know even when he got to the big leagues and we got those numbers that we like he had he had bad ones like three percent barrel rate in his rookie year 107 max ev did not you know portend a guy who'd hit 30 homers in the future right and albies didn't even do the 30 homer thing in in the rabbit ball year he did in 2021 so it's just been growth for albies you know like he's been in the league as long as he's has and he's 26 and he's gone from a three percent barrel rate to a nine percent barrel rate he's gone from a 107 max ev to a 111 max ev so you know whatever akunya's doing now uh he's 21 and he's holding his own in in in double a actually a 121 wrc plus is really translates to like a 150 given his age so uh yeah

i mean it's a it's a good prospect and uh he plays a premium position and he may end up uh just being the shortstop if they have to move lindor over it's not obvious to me they have to move lindor over yet but you know brandon crawford isford is the only really recent shortstop that played shortstop past 33. So it may just turn out that Acuna is the heir to shortstop in New York. Lindor turns 30 in November. So even if that isn't a move that happens next season, it might not be that far down the road. And remember, he is signed through 2031. So at some point during that contract, Lindor will no longer be a shortstop. And the best defensive alignment for the Mets does not really include McNeil at second, I don't think.

So if Acuna comes up and takes second from McNeil, that's a possibility too. I don't really know what to make of Jeff McNeil as a player anymore. And his future. Yeah, where does he go? Unusual story, a guy that picked up baseball late and then you're the rabbit ball, popped the 23 home runs, has not come close to that level of home run output in the time since, but puts a ton of balls in play.

The funny thing about jeff mcneil is that he has to do one more thing to be fantasy relevant and he's not going to start stealing bases at age 32 next year right so i wonder if jeff mcneil ends up being more of a utility guy on the 2024 mets and less of a everyday sort of player right he's pacing out for 600 plate appearances this year. I would project the under on that if I had to just guess today based on what the roster is likely to become between now and next season. Yeah, and there's a little bit of a platoon risk.

This year he's been really, really poor against lefties. For his career, he's been above average, but that includes all of his good years, and he's much below where he is against righties so a little bit of platoon risk there for jeff mcneil and then the defensive numbers you know the fangraphs ones are decent but my eye test does not go with that what are the outs above average on him because fangraphs has him as above average but i i haven't i haven't thought that when i've watched him.

Here we go. Yeah, okay. Still likes him. So, you know, at least a couple more years at second base. I think he's the primary guy at second base again next year, but I do think that some of the weakness against lefties maybe drops in the order against lefties. Maybe

they have someone else that comes in and plays against lefties. Yeah, I mean, I guess once acuna is ready then they can revisit mcneil's situation and that could be by this time next year potentially i mean like it could be that's how acuna could break in is is you know the defensive replacement everywhere and uh starts against lefties and you know so it could if if there is a story where Acuna breaks in to the big leagues next year, that's basically his first taste, I bet. Circling back to Scherzer for a moment, if you were in the position of the GMs that have acquired pitching so far

and you had your choice of Scherzer versus Giolito for the rest of the season, I think based on where you said you've got Scherzer projected the rest of the way, he would be the preference, right? He is the guy that you trust more the rest of the way of those two? Yeah, 100%. Yeah, we talked about the Angels' schedule being really difficult too. We'll get to a few trades that they made. I guess the one worrisome thing about Max Scherzer

has been the shape of his home run issue this year. Max Scherzer has been the shape of his home run issue this year. He has allowed four home runs in 41 and a third at home and 19 home runs in 66 and a third on the road. Yeah, this is the worst home run rate we've ever seen for Max Scherzer in the big leagues by a pretty healthy margin. And when you consider how pitcher friendly city field is and how much that split is playing into this, that would be one pretty major concern for him.

We've seen this ballpark, this new ballpark in Arlington now for a few years. So I guess we have to look at that and say how much, how much of a park downgrade is it at home for Scherzer making half of his starts in Arlington now? Yeah, I mean, the three-year factors, which... Have they been playing there for three years, Globe Life? Yes, they have. I think they opened in 2020, if I remember correctly. It's fine overall. A 101 park factor that overall puts them

12th, 13th, 14th in there somewhere. But by home run park factor, it has a 108 and that puts them in the back end of the top 10. And just to put that up against the Mets, the Mets have a 94 home run park factor and 19th. And I bet you if I put the three-year rolling off it's more aggressive than that.

Let me see here. The Mets... Where are they? Why don't I see them? Oh, three-year rolling park factor. Oh, it actually has it as a place that's giving up home runs this year. But I trust the three-year-old impact factor. Oh, it actually has it as a place that's giving up home runs this year. But I trust the three-year better. So he's going from basically 19th to 10th.

So yeah, more home run risk. What's really interesting too, when you look at some of the results on individual pitches for Scherzer, he throws that cutter almost exclusively to lefties that's getting fantastic results it's so it's so surprising that the damage is mostly coming on four seamers and sliders yeah he throws a slider 17.5 percent of the time he doesn't throw it to lefties nine home runs allowed on the slider so far this year so that pitch has been a problem for him when he misses with it yeah uh but you you this is something i talked to clark schmidt

about in my piece that published friday is like you know some of what clark schmidt has done to get better has been to throw pitches you wouldn't necessarily normally throw to lefties he's been throwing more sinkers and more sweepers to lefties this year a little bit as the season has gone on. And he said, I know that the numbers say I shouldn't do that, but if I don't do that, then I'm just cutter curve against lefties, and then I'm predictable. And I don't know that my cutter is so good that it can escape that.

So you might think, you know, why is Scherzer throwing these, you know, the slider to lefties? And that's interesting also is that Brooks says he's not throwing his slider to lefties this year. Says he's throwing his curve to lefties. I wonder which one is the one that you're saying is getting beat up.

No, the slider, he's not throwing to lefties at all. The curve, he is throwing to lefties. Oh, I thought you were saying the slider is getting beat up by lefties. No, no. I think it's weird that he's only throwing that slider to righties and even throwing it just the same handed hitters. It's been a big time problem pitch for the long ball. Yeah.

Yeah. And I wonder, I mean, I have to say it. The spin has something to do with this. You know, it's not, you know, I don't think that he's been egregious this year. And this is funny because this year he's been popped for spin stuff. I think it's more like if you look over the history of his career, there's years where he threw, he had a lot more spin. You know what I mean? And so i think that has affected his breaking ball and his foreseeing the most and lefties i'm looking just at lefties right now

lefties hitting 322 489 with a 167 iso and four homers off that foreseeing they have three three homers off the curve i think if the slider was any better he could throw the slider sometimes to lefties just to keep them from identifying the curve really quickly and knowing what it was. You know what I mean? Yeah. I think this is pretty interesting because it actually connects to a mailbag question we received recently. So I'm going to mix that in right here. The question is around how effective velocity impacts different pitches. This question came from Tim. Tim writes, I think a prime example of what I'm getting at is how Eno is always telling righties to stop throwing sweepers to

lefties. I was thinking about why sweepers would be so much worse. And I have a theory that it's because when a righty throws a sweeper to a lefty, the sweeper is actually breaking in and picking up effective velocity, which takes away the element of the hitter being out in front. When I think about this more generally, I think it makes sense. so any non-fastball that is picking up effective velocity breaking it on the hitter or thrown to a higher part of the zone will perform much worse than if it was somewhere on the ev scale of neutral to losing velocity that seems in line with high inside off speed getting hammered more generally what do you think the value is in knowing why something works or doesn't work as opposed to just knowing whether it works, right? By results, we know we can look at pitch numbers and say, oh, this pitch is a bad idea. How important is it to

understand the reasoning why something does not work well or why something does work well? Yeah. One thing that's weird is that we haven't been able to really nail down effective velocity. I know that there are some real proponents of it and they have their research that has shown it, but I've also seen other research that almost, I'm afraid to use the word here, but debunks it. And so, but at the same time,

I wouldn't say that I believe that effective velocity doesn't exist because the way i understand it is it's about your eyes and about how you are perceiving pitches and especially how you are perceiving pitches against each other um and so i just think that you know when a righty's throwing a sweeper to a lefty the lefty can see that pitch forever you know what i mean it's just a pitch that you know is coming along the outside and and breaking towards them and is not fast it's 85 you know so in terms of raw velocity so i think they can just see that pitch forever i do think it's really important to know why that uh that isn't a good pitch because if you know that it's because they can see it forever

then you throw more backdoor sweepers right front door back backdoor you throw more backdoor sweepers right because you take advantage of the fact that they can see it forever and you throw this front door uh sweeper and you say that's going to look like a ball for you forever right and i'm going to take the fact that you don't want to swing at this uh and use it against you if that's why you don't like why lefties can hit sweepers because they can see them forever then i'm going to throw you a backdoor one that you can't see coming or that you can't see you don't think it's going to be a slider a strike so i'm going to i'm going to take advantage of that's why you don't like it. If it's because it then looks so different than other pitches,

if lefties can spot sweepers because they can spot the release point better, then it has to be, can I throw my sweeper with a different release point? Can I modify that? Or can I throw another pitch from the same release point as my sweeper that does something different? You know what I mean? So I think it's really important to know why something doesn't work and uh you know there are a few reasons in terms of how the pitch looks for the first you know 10 feet of trajectory how the what the release point looks like what your mechanics look like and then how the pitch

looks like over its whole trajectory and all those things kind of come together to to to so so maybe for clark schmidt just throwing the sweeper sometimes backdooring it sometimes keeping in the back of the their heads um you know i i think that uh that just gives you know him a chance to to give them another look maybe it maybe it pairs well the sinker sinker sinker sweeper is the is the sinker slider that we you know used to know and love in the 80s or whatever um so maybe it's just effective enough and enough to just make batters have to think about something else you know that's another aspect of pitch mix yeah and we had a pitch mix specific question as well from henry so we might as well get this in right now too. Henry writes, I'm not speaking directly about rates and barrels,

but I feel like there's a lot of general talk in baseball about pitchers adjusting their pitch mix, improving for a stretch, and then being deemed fixed, excluding changes to the individual pitchers themselves, like their movement profile. I'm hesitant to believe that simply scrapping a pitch to increase the usage in your arsenal of another really changes your long-term true ability going forward. I can see how it drastically improves short-term results, but isn't that still the same true talent pitcher? Perhaps it's a maximization of skills, but I'm struggling to believe that will lead to major improvements. Is that not a perfect transition to the next picture we need to talk about?

Pretty much, yeah. Is that not a perfect transition to the next picture we need to talk about? Pretty much, yeah. So, Lance Lynn. I was reading this to you before this cast started. Lance Lynn, new Dodger, has this line against righties. It might surprise you. 208-284-368. He's been whooping righties this year, so you know it's coming.

Lefties this year have hit Lance Lynn 338, 401, 636. That's like an MVP season for every lefty. That's like a show A line, dude. Oh, my God. It's so bad. So, you know, why did the Dodgers acquire him? Well, you can actually see that Lance Lynn has been changing his pitch mix in the last few games. It's led

to more strikeouts and fewer walks, and yet a high ERA because they're still slugging him. And what he's done is he's thrown more cutters, fewer four seams, and more curves against lefties. And that makes sense because the curve against lefties has a 250 batting average with 350 slugging so far. He's thrown 55 of them all year, it says on Brooks. The four seam has a 380-804 slugging against lefties but so i think two things are about to

happen you know the dodgers are going to get a lot of credit for something that lynn was already doing maybe they exaggerate a little bit even more and and and maybe throw even more curves um and even fewer four seams and and the change up has a 520 batting average against lefties like maybe they turf that change up and they're like you are cutter curve and i want to see a lot of curves and i want to use the four seam as more of a surprise pitch and that's what uh this question i think is getting at is there is a relationship with how much you know teams see a pitch and how much they prepare for it how much they think about it, what they try to look for when they're in the AB. And so there are players out there with bad four seams, pitchers out there with bad four seams that sneak them by,

use them just enough, use them in two-strike counts, use them way above the zone and never in the zone, and get something out of their four seams despite a poor uh stuff plus or poor shape on it but it does i think in the long term make me think well you're still a bad four seam guy you know kyle bradish is like this a little bit you know i don't know maybe he's pushed that four seam far enough to where it's usable but you know bradish is is playing the hide of four seam game right he's like that foreseeing far enough to where it's usable. But, you know, Bradish is playing the hide-a-foreseeing game, right? He's like, oh, curve, cutter, curve, cutter.

There's a little bit of foreseeing. You know, it's like, and that's, you know, that can work in stretches. But, you know, what do you think of him long-term is still an open question. And I think what's going to happen with Lynn is he's going to have a better stretch against lefties with the Dodgers. And also, what did you say his schedule was? Oh, his schedule is great. So his Dodgers debut comes at home against Oakland. It's a two-start week this week.

His second turn comes at San Diego. And the next week, he gets the Rockies back at Dodger Stadium. So two out of those three are layups at home. Yeah. So two out of those three are layups at home. Yeah. And I don't know, like, you know, Lynn, his cutter does register as above average by stuff plus, but he's throwing it so much now that yes, against lefties has a three, four, seven, six, nine, four slugging that even the cutter, the one we're telling him to throw more of is is being beat so i think there's is a real problem here which is that his stuff has especially on the foreseam has just dropped to the point where he's looking for

weapons against lefties and i think in a short stretch he can you know do things that people don't expect like throw 33 curves against lefties you know where they're just like what the hell this is lance lynn again right you know the guy who throws like eight different fastballs and never throws a secondaries right and so you can surprise people but in the long run will he be any different than what you think of as an older lance lynn should be you go back like 10 years and that's when he was throwing his curveball a little more he was throwing it 10 of the time back in 2013 he threw it it 10% of the time back in 2013. He threw it 17.9% of the time back in 2012 and 22.2% of the time all the way back in 2011. But it's been a very long time since he's thrown that pitch, even 10% of the time. So that would be a pretty big change. The question sort

of drives back to the, wouldn't there be diminishing returns on that? Because as you alluded to earlier, the scouting report changes. You start to see it and say, okay, we're looking for this now, this combination, this situation. Here's what he's going to do that's different than before. So it works for three starts or six starts. It's hard to even know what is the shelf life of each adjustment, how each adjustment might even be different

based on the quality of the other pitches. So you throwing a curveball 30 30 of the time to lefties versus lynn doing it might be different than some other pitcher doing it so there's there's all that where you have to you have to look at the rest of the package and still kind of adjust based on that not just on one significant change. Yeah. And, you know, even, you know, our standard peripherals that we use, Sierra, K minus BB, like, you know, some of these other models, like they say he's fine. 391 Sierra, 27 minus eight, you know, strikeouts minus walks. Like they say he's fine and he should be better going forward.

But those numbers don't see the granularity of like he has a real problem against lefties right sierra doesn't know that sierra just sees the strikeouts and the walks and the ground balls or whatever um so uh i would say that you know at 36 years old you know we're gonna see a bounce for Lynn, and it may be of the unsavory pet variety. Unsavory pet variety. That's just a gruesome term, really. Yeah, it is. There's a chance that Lance Lynn is just glue to get them through the rest of the regular season.

And then by the time the playoffs roll around, they hide them or at least don't use them as a starter because they're relying so heavily on Bobby Miller and Machin right now. You know, Rios has been banged up at times this year. Kershaw's hurt right now. So it's more just how do we manage the next two months? And then it doesn't really matter what happens to Lance Lynn so much in October as long as the rest of the rotation is healthy enough and fresh enough to take those starts. Yeah, I think you're going in a playoff series, you're going Kershaw, Urias, and you've got enough innings on Miller. Yeah, Miller.

Yeah, I think those are your first three. And Lynn as a righty coming in, you know, in the fourth inning, if Urias is shaky or whatever, like that, that's actually an interesting combo. Yeah, you could throw him. Well, you could throw him behind either one of Kershaw or Urias, right? Kershaw gets hurt, leaves a game early. Urias gets hurt, leaves a game early or struggling.

Throw him in that way. Make him your long guy in the postseason. And the Dodgers have been linked to Justin Verlander, which sort of drives us back to the Scherzer part of this conversation too Verlander hasn't looked like typical Verlander not a surprise he's 40 years old the K's are down the walks are up rest of season projection from the bats like a 388 ERA and a 115 whip which is fine that's more like a giolito projection maybe even a tick better in both of those ratios are you buying verlander right now as being at least as impactful as scherzer or possibly more impactful ensures that the results have been better than

the underlying numbers say they should be to this point is there a tweak that verlander could make to become more effective the rest of the way, be that staying with the Mets or going somewhere else? I don't know why his strikeout rate isn't quite there. His fastball has also lost stuff and stuff plus and is slightly below average now, the foreseam. But overall, he's kept more uh uh stuff than than max frizer and i do think he has one last uh one last that's sounds sort of uh gruesome but

i think he has another trick in his in his in his pocket which is he's throwing a slider 27 percent of the time he's thrown it as much as 38% of the time. So, I think he could throw more sliders and get more whiffs. I do know that sliders are being hit harder this year, and that's part of why he's, I think it's part of why he's throwing other pitches. He's definitely someone who keeps up on trends like that, and so he's throwing more fastballs in counts that he used to throw sliders. But just overall, I think the stuff is there to maybe do some change-ups

and do some of those short-term alterations that can get better results. But generally, I still believe in him as an ace. And I think if I knew they were both healthy, I'd have them a little bit ahead of Max Scherzer. And I do think it would be a good move for the Dodgers. What I just don't know for the Mets is, I think Max Scherzer has been the only real surprise so far in this trade deadline.

Because I thought they would keep you know a lot of their their team together the new york mets would and you know try to be competitive again next year and you know scherzer's the first guy that really had years of team control am i right yeah mostly rentals otherwise and so you know i so what does that mean does that mean you know everything's open or does that mean that was our one way of saving like sort of 40 million dollars and that's the 40 million dollars we're going to try and throw at otani you know and you know if we are going to try and get otani next year we better have verlander and sanga at the top of our rotation because then you can say to him no we've still got a great team and verlander sanga otani is still a great one two three and uh we kept the rest of the team together you know what i mean

uh if you trade verlander then you're like come to our team we've got Kodai Senga yeah it's not it's not an easy sell I mean it's not an easy sell I realize that they'll still have Lindor they'll still have Francisco Alvarez sign Alonso to Beatty Alonso like they've got a good core group of hitters but if you don't have enough in the rotation, if you're chasing pitching, I think the trap the Mets could run into is they could just be a more expensive version of the Angels. We've talked

in the 3-0 show about the similarities between the franchises. The difference is, I believe that Steve Cohen will do all the things Artie Moreno has always failed to do as far as building a robust farm system, right? Spending on scouting and tech and all that stuff. I've seen the types of people they're hiring. That's going to happen.

That's going to happen. I think the hardest part about getting Shohei Otani to go to the Mets is it's not in place yet. They're not quite there yet. So you have to be compelling enough in the not so distant future to entice him to go there. Because if he wants to win and he's got a few other offers, if it's Dodgers versus Mets versus Yankees, that's kind of an easy choice if you're trying to win right now. And you don't want to wait a year or two or three for all the pieces that come together unless the Mets can spend their way out of it next offseason,

which they unfortunately for them could not do this offseason. So I don't know. I think there is a pretty good chance that Verlander gets moved too, because I think seeing Scherzer go, he's kind of having these thoughts of how good are we really going to be next year? I think that's a fair question to ask. Yeah. There's a piece of Tim Britton where he's thinking about his future publicly. If you're 40, how many more seasons do you realistically have? He seems like he wants to pitch forever.

Verlander does, but I don't know. There's more pressure on winning right now. Yeah, I don't know. The other thing that's uh slightly interesting is that the dodgers uh you know when i was doing the pay i was doing the trade me show you a tani game for effectively wild um one of the things that i didn't talk about because i was keeping it for a follow-up phone call if I was going to get one, is that the Dodgers right now are at $251 million for the luxury tax. The next apron is $253 million. The penalties do get increasingly sharp.

do get increasingly sharp. And I think the difference between 233 and 253 is something like, it's like a 25% tax on the 233 people, and then it's like a 60% tax on the 253 people. And a 60% tax when you go over, I don't know. So the other hand is, right now, without arbitration salaries,

they only have 99 million on the team next year. They lose as free agents. Clayton Kershaw? Is that a good thing or a bad thing? You're going to replace him with Otani. It doesn't make that much of a difference. It matters because he's still good. But I think you just say...

Otani wants you to sign Kershaw. Your entire fan base wants you to sign Kershaw. Everybody, your entire fan base wants you to sign Kershaw. I think Kershaw has the standing offer for a one-year deal with the Dodgers until he decides he's done pitching. I think it's almost like a 3-in-60 that he is probably on the table at all times. So I would give him another... I'd put that $20 million back on. Enrique Hernandez is gone. I don't think they're not giving him $10 million. on. Enrique Hernandez is gone. I don't think they're not giving him $10 million.

JD Martinez is gone. He's been a useful player for them. David Peralta is gone. Shelby Miller, Jimmy Nelson. Julio Urias is a free agent. So their rotation next year is Bobby Miller-led? Tony Gonsolin and Bobby Miller at the top. Right.

I think that's where everybody says they're going to get Shohei. It's going to happen. He's going to the Dodgers. He's not going to the Mets. Just thinking about the luxury tax. They probably, at $98 million, can sign Clayton Kershaw, can pay for all their arbitration, can sign another starter,

and Stein Shohei, and just be back up to 230. They're in actually okay financial state. I think they may have to go up one more tier in the tax. I think so, to make all the pieces fit. Well, 60% tax on that stuff, that's a fair amount of coin. So it wasn't just Max Scherzer added by the Rangers.

They also picked up Jordan Montgomery and Chris Stratton for the bullpen in a trade with the Cardinals. So part of the need for Texas's rotation grew with the recent velocity dip of Nathan Evaldi we've been worried about this with the workload that he was taking on in the first half and we saw the velo dip last year we saw a dip earlier this season it made all the sense in the world to go out and get two starters what do you think about Jordan Montgomery getting moved for the second summer

in a row and what are your expectations for him over these final two months? He's fine. He's a guy that throws a fair amount of pitches, commands them well, no pitch. You know what? Sometimes I see this as, in basketball, when you have five players on the court,

if you have one of those players cannot play defense, the other team is just going to pick on that one player over and over again. And when I look at Montgomery's core pitches, I don't see the one you pick on. You know what I mean? They're all pretty good. None of them is amazing, but they're all pretty good. And he mixes them around.

And so I think he's like a 3-4. It's interesting. He was traded away from the Yankees when they were headed for the playoffs. So the Yankees last year, despite you know a three ERA and and whatever would look like uh just similar to what he's doing now decided that he was not a playoff starter um and so that makes him more of a four or five I think he's performed well again this year but how different is he than the guy who the Yankees decided was a 4'5"? I'm not sure he's that different.

I think he's maybe a 3'4". He just kept doing it, I guess. I think if you got to the postseason and you're missing one of Evaldi, I might have said elbow before. It's a forearm strain, and he may be back. They called it good elbow pain. Good elbow pain was the description. Yeah, right. That's not a thing.

If you're down to Scherzer, John Gray, and then Montgomery is probably there. Are you feeling better in a playoff game? He'll be a playoff starter for them. Unless he evolves and comes back. I think he's their

fourth best starter at best and i think more likely than not if andrew heaney's healthy you'd prefer to throw heaney over him but the difference would be jordan montgomery versus martin perez or jordan montgomery versus dane dunning right yeah if you lack depth one of those guys was going to have to start and now i think they're in a slightly better spot. We've seen in the longer series, the seven-game series, that even just having a fourth starter that's decent is a bit of an upgrade because you'll be facing teams that might do a bullpen game in the playoffs in the fourth game.

You know what I mean? So just having somebody that can go three before you get into that bullpen, that helps in a seven-game series. Yeah, a number four that you actually trust a little bit is pretty nice to have. Now, between Stratton, the previous trade they made for Aroldis Chapman,

how much have they upgraded this bullpen so far this season? Is this an average A bullpen so far this season like is this a an average a bullpen now i mean if you assume will smith is part of the the a bullpen to smith chapman stratton spores i know is someone that has popped in the model for most of the season how does that really stack up to other playoff caliber rotations the rangers might not be done they don't seem like they're worried about getting to that first threshold of the luxury tax they're're spending like a big market team again, and they're clearly looking at this season as a big part of their window to possibly do some damage in October.

I like the addition of Stratton because I think with Chapman, I really like Spores, and then you know will smith becomes more of a sort of a crafty lefty in the bullpen as opposed to someone that you you know need to depend on for saves in fact i was really worried that you know they might mochi kind of falls in love with guys like this you know the jeremy is it jeremy affelt yeah jeremy affelt lefty out of the pen right for him in those in those uh in those uh championships you know i was worried that he might fall in love with him and uh what i've seen is yes will smith still gets saved chances but so does chapman

you know and sabores despite not being in bocce's circle of trust earlier in the season, has entered that circle of trust. And once you are in the circle of trust for Bochy, I think he is willing to mix things around. And so I'm not saying necessarily that Stratton will get save chances, but I think he may have a week or so to enter that circle of trust. And then once he's in there, they've got four or five good relievers. I might not be surprised if they add another though.

No, I think they are getting at least one more reliever. Yeah. And maybe, maybe one more bat because the, the platooning they're doing in left field, you can move Durant all around a lot. So you can upgrade.

Seager is our deadline actually. Yeah, you could do that. I wonder how much that Jonah Heim injury is going to linger. It's at least a couple of weeks. move Durant around a lot. So you can upgrade. Seager is our deadlight accident. Yeah, you could do that. I wonder how much that Jonah Heim injury is going to linger. It's at least a couple of weeks, that wrist injury. I think surgery is at least a possibility. They said there was probability. It's just that in two weeks,

they're going to ask him if he can play through pain the rest of the way. So they're going to try that. They have Garver. That's a downgrade, I think, defensively, but offensively it's not too terrible. But playing Garver at catcher more does open up DH a little bit. I guess right now, I think that's not a problem if Seager's coming back soon, and then you just play Duran, Grossman.

And, you know, you pretty much play Duran, Grossman, and left, and DH. Rental catcher, yes. You could have gone to all of the Rangers. Is that possible? Yeah, you could have one more. Or just a DH and put Garver at catcher most days. Yeah, it is a big defensive downgrade, though, because Jonah Heim is a fantastic defender.

So we'll see what else the Rangers do between now and the 6 o'clock Eastern deadline on Tuesday. By the way, we're going to have a live stream on the Athletic Baseball Show's YouTube page. So be sure to check that out. We will go live right when the deadline hits at 6 o'clock, probably going for about an hour or so. An early week 3-0 show and a live live one too, which makes it even more fun. Jordan Hicks is now a member of the Blue Jays with Jordan Romano down right now with some back inflammation. Hicks could still get a few saves between now and the time Romano returns.

I think once Romano is back, Hicks loses a lot of his value in leagues that don't reward holds. Yeah, and it's hard to tell how long Romano's going to be out because they've definitely already sort of MRI'd him right after the All-Star break. They've checked him up, and it was like he thought he could go, and then he couldn't. So I don't think this will be a long one.

It's a 15-day injured list. I think it'll be the 15 days. That's my guess. So you've still got two more weeks of Hicks' closer. I think Romano comes back and takes most of those safe job opportunities when he comes back. Hicks is a really good pitcher, though. It was a really good move for them, I think.

Pushes everybody down a rung when Romano's back good replacement for Romano in the short term Swanson I love Tim Maze is okay how much do I love Yemi Garcia and Trevor Richards and Genesis Cabrera I don't know but with Pearson in there

it's still a top line bullpen yeah you like the Jays bullpen as constructed better than theline bullpen. Yeah, you like the Jays' bullpen as constructed better than the Rangers' bullpen right now? Yeah. Yeah, I do. I think that's where I'm at as well. I think there's just a little more at the top,

a little more depth that I trust. If you start getting those fifth and sixth options, I think that's where things can get pretty dicey for the Rangers. But again, they might actually be able to address that here in the next, well, 30 hours or so. Relevant comparison too, because if the Rangers had the Astros record, they'd be tied with the Blue Jays for the second wildcard.

And the Astros are a game back. Those teams can't seem to get away from each other, can they? Yeah. So the Blue Jays, comparing the Blue Jays and Rangers is what they're doing in Texas right now. How about this trade?

The Angels brought back two guys that debuted for them years ago, Randall Gritchick and C.J. Crone, getting both in a swap with the Rockies. The Angels, I think, when we talked about them on the 3-0 show, you highlighted the limited mathematical impact of the first trade, even though they didn't give up a ton in terms of of doing more. You add Gritchick, you add Krohn. Unfortunately, Taylor Ward suffered what could be a season-ending injury over the weekend.

He got hit in the face with a pitch. Yeah, straight to the 60th AIL. It looked like a very scary situation. I mean, maybe we'll see him again in late September. Just all the best to him after a really, really gruesome injury over the weekend. But the difficulty of the schedule for the Angels is something that we talked about after that 3-0 show episode. It's legitimately one of the tougher schedules to get through between now and the end of the regular season.

If you add two more quality bats to this lineup, eventually you get Trout back in the equation. We've talked about that might not be that long. And the problem for this Angels team has frequently been depth. So now they're starting to address that because they've already added these two guys, Krohn and Gritchick, after previously going out and getting Eduardo Escobar and Mike Moustakis. So what else do the Angels need? Since they're pushing chips in, there's a reasonable assumption that they're still not done, that there's going to be at least one, maybe two other small trades made before the deadline tomorrow. Where else can they get a significant lift?

I think maybe another reliever would make sense. It wasn't a great bullpen to begin with. And maybe by getting a reliever that's not a closer, they can continue what i like i actually like about these uh these secondary moves they've done they haven't cost much they uh they do not they don't make as a huge impact in terms of war and stuff but if you think about their lineup now um i think that you know just putting a representative group of average type players around uh otani and trout makes it a good lineup you know

um and so you've got instead of mike moustakas who's projected to have a 399 slugging the rest of the way, you've got CJ Krohn with a 456 at first base. And instead of Mickey Moniak, who's projected to have a 285 OBP the rest of the way, you have Randall Gritchuk, who matches him in slugging and has a 308 projected OBP in left field. And so you kind of look at each position they're pretty representative uh at each position now I don't think uh anything really stands out um I don't think I mean grindall there as a rental might make sense you know because the last place where you could really upgrade the offense, at least, would be at catcher. Right. And Logan Ohavi could be back from that labrum, which would be nice if he's the guy he was before he got hurt. I think that's a little bit of a leap coming off of that injury as quickly as he's coming off of it.

But yeah, it's another place where I could see Grondahl making some sense. You know, Mickey Moniak is doing it right now now playing at a level that we really haven't seen him reach over a third of a season before right this is one of his most successful runs as a pro it's a 155 wrc plus with a 30 k rate and a 3.4 walk rate so 426 babbitt dude i mean there's there's i'm sure that some of getting richick was betting you know was assuring themselves against regression from oniac right and i think you you can see it in the splits even though he's only seen lefties geez a couple dozen three dozen times this season he's doing it against righties so making sure he stays a platoon guy that's really important to making sure that he can sustain something.

Even 70% of what he's done so far is still valuable to them. He's a guy who went 1-1 in a draft before. It's not like there's no talent there, but there are still flaws he's working through as a first-time prolonged stretch in the big leagues is playing out here. But the Crone addition is a nice one, and Gritchick is solid as kind of your third or fourth outfielder, the way he'll be used as part of this rotation.

There are some losers here, though, in these trades, I feel like, at least from a family standpoint. Who are some of the big losers? I think C.J. Crone becomes a platoon player when Brandon Drury comes back. I think Brandon Drury lost out a little bit and has become, through these trades, maybe a versus lefties only guy. Maybe I think Moustakis could play a little less, potentially. It's almost going to be who's playing well. Yeah, there's that.

That's, I think that just the general risk is now they've got options at every place so and they need to win every game so they may start making decisions just being like uh you know you're oh for your last 15 sorry dude you know and mike mistock is projected so poorly that um you know yeah i could see him just being uh keeping the seat warm uh you warm until Rendon is back and then maybe not even playing at all. Rendon is just killing me, man. I thought that was one of the easiest bounce-back layup good values

of the last few seasons, and it has not been anything close to that. How did he get the lone bruise? Did he get hit? It's awful. I think so. The batted ball quality has just disappeared. Yeah. He still makes contact and puts together good at bats. It reminds me a little bit of Winker where

there's still the walk the BB and K is okay but just the quality of impact on the ball is gone and that just screams to me injury but with Rendon you're not even sure which injury to blame anymore right

yeah it could be multiples that could be part of why things are so bad but then coming back from multiple injuries that have caused you to fall off this much, I can't continue to back that, unfortunately. But you can't even bet on Mike Moustakas and against Anthony Rendon because there's still Eduardo Escobar and Bram Drury.

This is starting to become more of a good problem for the Angels to have. Right. I mean, yes, they've put together options at every position, but I think it makes it hard. Like, who do you think starts every game? I think if he's healthy, Neto. And Trout.

Neto, Trout, and Otani. Maybe Renfro. They can't platoon at every spot, so maybe Renfro's in there every day. Yeah, I think you play Renfro every day. I think that's the right approach as well. In terms of rest of season projected

Woba, the best are Tani, Trout, Rendon, Renfro, Krohn. Krohn is interesting. I guess he could just play every day. I think I'm more worried about Moustakis and Escobar

and Renifo as guys that were playing a lot, especially once Drury comes back. It gets a little more crowded. 100%. And Adele's window seems closed. And I think Trey Cabbage, who I was looking at maybe picking up in some leagues, I'm glad I didn't.

Yeah, Cabbage has the Matt Wallner profile with more swing and miss, but also some speed. So it's pretty intriguing. I wonder if they make another deal if Cabbage is someone that gets flipped, if they add in the reliever. It's not crazy because Trey Cabbage is older than people think. Yeah, he's 26 already. So if you're a team that's not contending.

You're not necessarily a huge asset for the organization, especially with those K rates. Trey Cabbage for Trevor May, who says no. Oh, well, not the A's. God, Trey Cabbage is so an A. Oh, my God, they would love it. They'd throw in whatever else you want. You want Tony Camp too?

They don't need any more infielders still. Can you get two relievers for Trey Cabbage? You want Paul Blackburn too? Just for Trey Cabbage? I feel like that's a great deal. I don't know, but he just lines up with guys that the A's love. A little bit too old, a little bit too many strikeouts. Let's see what happens.

How many times have they picked that guy up? Is there a better floor in the Royals infield for anybody with Nicky Lopez getting traded to the Braves? They get Taylor Hearn back. I think Hearn's just a reliever, kind of an extra arm for Kansas City. I just want to say, I hate that deal so much. I cannot tell you how much I hate that deal. Taylor Hearn was available.

I think he was DFA. The Braves bought him with money. And I'm not saying that Nicky Lopez is great, but Nicky Lopez has proven a certain level of production as a position player. There's no way I would ever make this trade as a team. It's wild because of

defense. I mean, Nicky Lopez had a good year at the plate too in 2021, even though it comes with no power. Nicky Lopez had a six-war season in 2021. Yeah. I don't think you could just give a player like that away. Nikki Lopez had a six-war season in 2021. Yeah. Yeah. I don't think you could just give a player like that away.

For a reliever? For a team? Where are the Royals going that they need? Yes. Serenity now. I know he's been bad this year, but you'd be better off as a Royals organization with rolling the dice again next year, playing him some at the beginning of the year, hoping you get some of that, even if it's just Babbitt magic.

He had a.347 Babbitt the year the Sixth War. Get some Babbitt magic, have him look like a league average middle infielder, and wait for a shortstop to get hurt on a playoff team. Bam. Now you're in a better position. You're going something better than taylor hearn back anyway yeah sorry taylor i we're not being i'm not trying to be rude to taylor um no i i think uh michael massey has been playing better recently and uh michael garcia uh i think those two are maybe everyday guys now. You want to see how good they are the rest of the season.

You want to see if they're your starter next season. I think you just start them every day. Yeah, I liked Massey coming into the season. If you look back at what he's done more recently, we're getting a little better production from him going back to, I don't know, if you go back to like mid-May, you could see a guy that has kind of 20-ish home run power. The slash line is still not great, but he doesn't strike out a ton.

So still some reasons to believe that he could put it together with a longer runway of playing time in Kansas City. It's been about a full season's worth of plate appearances where he's been okay, but not really great. He's really, I mean, he's pushed that barrel rate back up i mean last year he was a fascinating guy because he had a an average max ev but uh an above average barrel rate beginning this season i saw no barrels i said oh god i got this one wrong he's pushed the max ev up and he's got a 9.3 percent barrel rate again so he actually does have power uh i know a 137 iso this year and a 133 last year doesn't really speak to that there's some interaction i think with the park there

but he he does not have zero power um yeah so he is an interesting guy to me i i wonder if you know there's been you know he said something you know, I tried to pull a little less and he had like a bunch of a couple of homers in a couple of days or something. And, you know, he does pull 54% of the time. So there could be some sort of tweak there that could get a little bit more out of him. One more question here before we go, unless we get some breaking news. But this one came from Brandon. Brandon was wondering if we could take a moment to discuss what's going on with J.P. Sears. Some games he has strikeout stuff, others it seems to disappear. Wondering what Eno's numbers say about him. Ratios have been decent and he's been a useful play in quality starts leagues, but still makes me nervous more than he should. So what are your thoughts on Sears now that we've got two thirds of a season now in the books for him at the big league level in Oakland? It's not a lot of velo ups and downs.

So I think that's a good sign. It's not like we're watching him get injured or fatigued or whatever. He's managed to stay 93-plus most days. So that's not it. What I'd have noticed is some oscillation in the vertical movement on his slider. So I haven't yet talked to him about this, but I wouldn't be surprised if he's trying to throw two sliders because he has a bit of a sweeper action. And in some games, he has a lot of sweep. In some games, he doesn't. I don't know if that's atmospheric or mechanical

or if he is indeed throwing two sliders. The reason I would think that he might throw two sliders is he has a fastball. He has a change that's not really good enough to throw against same-handed guys. So against lefties, he's forcing change. You don't really want to throw the sweeper to lefties. Against lefties, he's forcing change. You don't really want to throw a sweeper to lefties. Against righties,

he's forcing a sweeper. You don't really want to throw a league average changeup to righties, I don't think. So throwing a gyro slider or a cutter, there's some flashes of cutter on Brooks, I think would

be a good idea, and I wouldn't be surprised if I talked to him right now. He's like, yes, I'm throwing um i think would be a good idea and i wouldn't be surprised if i talked to him right now if he's like yes i'm throwing a gyro slider and a sweeper and if that's the case then i would say uh maybe familiarity with these new two pitches uh some sometimes he's executing these uh both of his sliders and the other team hasn't prepared for them and then he he what he kind of has a good game other teams uh prepare well for him and uh have you know know he's doing this and uh maybe he struggles with the execution of the new pitch so uh what is he where is he done badly uh houston doing you know knowing that he's throwing two sliders doesn't surprise me going into colorado and throwing a sweeper and a gyro slider and them

not being prepared for them wouldn't surprise me so uh five runs allowed to houston and one run allowed in colorado uh may fit the narrative i'm spinning here yeah the whip's been outstanding overall the weird thing is the k rates down a little bit here so far in the second half i think if you look at the various splits jp sears has been more effective against righties than lefties very odd for a left-handed pitcher to have that but anything can happen over one season his era is more than a half run lower outside of oakland wouldn't have expected that he gives up homers everywhere actually gives up more homers by home run rate at home. Also kind of strange. So there's some stuff here.

I think the home run rate speaks to how small his arsenal can get against strong hitters on the left and the right. You know what I mean? Like what I was talking about. So adding that new pitch could help him stay off the barrel a little bit and keep them from key holding him too much so um i'm i'm excited to talk to him about that i also just generally think of him very you know in a in a just close your eyes and what do you think of jp sears i think he's a credible

major league starter in a great home park that's not going to get you wins he's not maybe a huge uh uh keeper asset because he's already 27, but he's also probably undervalued by most people. Yeah, just useful enough in a lot of leagues to use at least more than half the time. You can use him for most of his home starts. Despite those splits, I would expect those to level out over time, but you can pick your spots with him on the road, and he'll end up being better than some of the other options you're looking at at the back of your

lineup each and every week. That is going to do it for this episode of rates and barrels. Got a question for a future episode. Send those our way. Rates and barrels at gmail.com is the best way to get those in on Twitter. He knows that, you know, Sarah's I'm at Derek van Riper,

no breaking news just now, which means as I hit the stop button on this episode, someone's getting great news. Yeah, that's usually how it works. It's that time of year. So what do you expect? But $2 a month gets you in the door at the athletic.com slash rates and barrels.

Gets you all the trade deadline coverage, rest of season, fantasy baseball coverage, fantasy football, women's world cup, everything you want all for one low price. We are back with you on Tuesday. Thanks for listening