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How they treat Felix is going to be the interesting story for me. This is the makings of a 90s Braves-style rotation, just with a lot more power.
Seriously. The M's in the mess? This is hot stove!
Cliff Lee beyond 2010
Just guessin' tonight, but hey. It's a baseball chat. Here's more guessin'.
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=== Extension ===
Word is that the Phillies asked Lee about an extension and his agent stood firm at "5, 6 years, Sabathia dollars." Meaning 20-23 mills per.
Remember, though, it's a new league for Lee. And it's a town he had been in for a couple months, and if you've ever been to Philly, it's not the most livable city in America. No offense, but it's easy to imagine that Lee didn't particularly want to play in Philadelphia.
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Roy Halladay does like Philadelphia, and his extension was what, 3 x $20m. With vesting on the 4th, and maybe 5th, years.
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Putting those two things together, with a third thing: Cliff Lee has had a great two years, but his stature in the game is not that of a Roy Halladay. The M's can (try to) use Lackey as a baseline on salary ($15m) and Halladay as a baseline on total value.
Usually Zduriencik has let a player experience the org and the city and the fans, and then opened up negotations. But whether he does that now or later, he's in a pretty good position to talk 4 x $18m or so, 5th year vest. That's an early guess as to what kind of middle ground Lee might offer the M's in a best-case scenario.
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The last offer to Felix, 4/$45 supposedly, was feeble. Now suppose you bump it to 5 years and $18m on the FA years .... $10, $12, $17, $18, $19. That's 5/$78 for Felix and 4/$72 or 5/$90 for Lee.
You ain't going to be spending money on the rest of the rotation. Felix and Lee are making $30m in 2011 and $36m in 2012 ... now you want to count up what Silva, Washburn and Batista were making? About the same, 3 MLB(TM) vets for about what you'd be able to lock in Felix and Lee for.
That's Stars and Scrubs: Cliff Lee and Ryan Rowland-Smith against Carlos Silva and Miguel Batista.
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=== Don't Even Think It ===
Supposing you give Lee a pretty good market contract -- a 5/$100 extension or somesuch -- with the cards close to your vest. You're going to trade Felix.
Out went three of Bavasi's minor leaguers. Your sugar-talk got a commitment from Lee so you paid 50 cents on the dollar.
Out goes Felix, and in come 5 young studs of Zduriencik's choosing.
Wouldn't doubt it. This guy does a real quick makeover. If he weren't 56 he might be positioned for a Pat Gillick career overhauling several different franchises. Just lucky we're the one.
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=== One-Year Rental ===
Everybody keeps assuming that if the M's don't extend Lee, that we get a trade package in July. How often is a GM willing to trade his ace SP in July, if he's leading the division? When was the last time?
If Lee is some kind of One Year Rental Gone Horribly Wrong On The AL, you see how serious the M's are about winning the World Series right now. Today.
Which implies what about the rest of the offseason?
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=== On a Lighter Note ===
The M's payroll cap has always been self-imposed, and has always, IMHO, allowed them considerably more positive cash flow than most other teams take.
They were willing to detonate the budget for Ken Griffey Jr and Alex Rodriguez. I don't rule it out, at all, that The Board has approved a 5-year plan in which Felix and Lee stay here in Seattle, and the budget flexes if Lee says yes.
Be Afraid. Be Very Afraid,
Dr D
Comments
2
But yeah, find a 3rd guy -- Bedard, Morrow, Pineda whoever -- and you really are at that level, right?
Maybe Doogie, Taro?
3
I've seen Sheets mentioned all over the place as a possible fit for the M's, which makes sense again, considering the Milwaukee connection with Jack.
Personally I like Bedar's 10k game packed into the middle of the rotation. Now THAT would be a rotation that invokes pure terror into opposing lineups.
Felix
Lee
Bedar'
Snell
Morrow/RRS/Vargas/Hot Hand
No easy turn through that group. But replacing Bedar' with Sheets probably provides the same general effect.
Ultimately, the offense is in more need of bolstering at this point. But if the available talent doesn't fit, it would be kool to emulate the ol' Dodger Days of shutdown pitching.
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What if Morrow was doing this and outpitching the other guys? Cliff Lee as your #4 in August...
Lurkers: TIC.
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Now we know what Anaheim felt like, when Lackey et al were being backed up by a red-hot Adenhart at the BOR in April. What a difference a year makes.
5
The thing is, didn't the Braves' really only have Maddux/Glavine for most of the run? They had their share of Smoltz and Avery finishing up the trifectas, but behind the Big Two, it was mostly fungible, including Ace of the Year performances by the aforementioned four.
Having a core two can really tilt the division for a long time. It's a good strategy, especially in a 4 team division.
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Looks like Smoltz starred for the Braves from 1992 to 1999, making well over 300 starts in the 1990s...
Maddux landed there with a bang in 1993...
Glavine got good in 1992 and stayed elite through 2002...
true that after Smoltz got hurt in 2000, it was piecemeal after that. Atlanta kept two 300-game winners plus another HOF'er together for 7 consecutive years, which is what makes them unique...
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Your main point though, yeah, you could find any number of teams carried by two great pitchers, such as the Unit and Schilling, that rode two great SP's to fame and fortune. The Hudson-Zito A's, several of the Yankee and a few of the Red Sox rotations...
Atlanta's having three was made them distinctive... the 1995 Braves ran a team ERA of 124+.
The 1993 Braves, who did got a 18-6, 2.94 year from Avery in the #4 spot, went all the way up to 129! They had a below-average offense and won 104 games.
The 1997 Braves did them better: adding Denny Neagle in the #4 spot, he went 20-5, 2.97 and they ran an incredible 131 ERA+. Again their offense was in the 90's and again they won >100 games.
I didn't realize the 1990's Braves ran offenses that ranged from 94-99.
Man, in 1998, Kevin Millwood joined Neagle and the big 3 and *he* went 17-8... 106 victories... the Braves, having 98 offenses and 125 pitching, kept trying to add pitching :- )
7
Ding!
Yes, the Braves did remarkable things with pitching in the 90s. But, go back and look at the team DER during the decade, and you'll see they dominated as much or more DEFENSIVELY than in pitching. This is what happens when an organization RECOGNIZES a competency, and instead of concentrating all their energy on fixing their incompetencies, they concentrate on maximizing their positive.
Yes, they had three young, stellar pitchers to build around. But, they continued bringing in or bringing up random arms for almost 15 years with often-times mind-boggling results. Mazzone got a ton of credit for the results, (and he deserves some credit). But, the REAL "secret" was that the Braves *REFUSED* to relax on defense in order to bolster the offense. Oh, they'd bring in the occasional big bat -- but they targeted them for 1B or RF ... the defensive throw-away positions. And when they weren't happy with the defense up-the-middle, they swapped it out quickly and efficiently -- and ALWAYS with an eye toward maintaining defensive quality.
I personally track the Braves reign ending DIRECTLY to the club electing to de-value its defense during the 2000s. The standard take is the pitching got old and crapped out and they just did a bad job of replacing it. But, as great as those arms were, they were supported by league leading defenses nearly every season. As the DER plunged, so did the Braves' win totals.
From a management standpoint, most orgs, (baseball or not), tend to focus on what they do POORLY, and are constantly directing time, energy and resources to these areas. While this sounds perfectly reasonable, (and I have often noted that building a roster, you want to dump your worst players first) -- there is a COST associated with fixation on the negative. That's time and energy NOT spent on the things that are working -- and NEGLECT can allow those things to crumble.
Yes, you need to address problems. But NOT to the exclusion of the good. The best organizations find ways to not only reward for excellence, but to also make sure everyone in the organization knows what is being rewarded. The impact is to incentivize excellence, instead of glorifying failure -- which is what happens in the worst cases.
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The org knows it's good at judging relief pitchers, developing great team defenses and pasting together line-ups that at least work the count (look at all the guys Z has been adding with P/PA in excess of 3.90). That seems to be what's going on here at the moment...they're trying to cement that with a great rotation.
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That lands heavily to the body. :- )
My question would be, how the decade would have gone if the DER had gone from, say, excellent to average-solid.
10
Look at Lee's BABIP which is above average in 2008 and 2009.
What if his BABIP goes below average with the defense he will have behind him in 2010.
Be afraid ...
11
That even though I was semi-wrong, it brought happy time conversation.
But I think you can also say that the M's have slid down their 2-3-4s to 3-4-5, which may also cause a lot of interesting permutations and outcomes. When RRS-Morrow-Snell are your bottom three, there is a lot of potential there. And with the right balancing, such as the securing Felix and Lee long term, you have a set of guns for the future.
12
Trouble formatting. Will try again later.