Saturday, March 21, 2020
Hot Stove League Review: Dodgers
The Dodgers are coming off their 7'th consecutive NL West division championship(and 31'st consecutive failure to win the World Series). Thus they came into the Hot Stove League season looking for a game-changing addition which would make them prohibitive favorites to win it all in 2020. They may have accomplished that by adding one of the top 5 players in all of baseball(for just one season), but gave up a lot in a blockbuster trade. They seemed to have another big trade set up with the Angels that fell through. We'll take a look at that one too. Here's the summary:
Free Agents Lost: Rich Hill(LHP), Hyun-Jin Ryu(LHP), Russell Martin(C), Jedd Gyorko(IF), David Freese(IF).
Free Agents Signed: Blake Treinen(RHP), Jimmy Nelson(RHP), Alex Wood(LHP).
Trades: 1. Acquired Mookie Betts(OF) and David Price(LHP) from the Red Sox for Alex Verdugo(OF), Connor Wong(C) and Jeter Downs(SS). 2. Sent Kenta Maeda(RHP) and Jair Camargo(C) to the Twins for Brusdar Graterol(RHP) and Luke Raley(OF). Graterol was originally supposed to be flipped to the Red Sox but failed their physical(he's had widely reported injury issues). The Dodgers ended up keeping him and sending Downs and Wong to the Red Sox instead. The Dodgers also had another trade set up with the Angels which did not involve any players exchanged in the first two trades but was apparently contingent on them. The trade was Joc Pederson(OF), Ross Stripling(RHP) and Andy Pages(OF) for Luis Rengifo(IF) and an unnamed prospect. This trade was delayed while the Dodgers and Red Sox ironed out their trade. Angels owner, Artie Moreno, reportedly became disgusted with the delay and cancelled the trade. This is a curious development as the trade appeared to be much more favorable for the Angels, unless the unnamed prospect was Jo Adell, in which case, the Dodgers were stupid to not remove the contingency part of the trade and just complete it. Got all that?
Arbitration(Non-tendered- lost): Yimi Garcia(RHP).
Arbitration(Signed/Avoided): Scott Alexander(LHP), Austin Barnes(C), Cody Bellinger(OF), Enrique Hernandez(UT), Julio Urias(LHP), Ross Striping(RHP), Corey Seager(SS), Max Muncy(2B/1B- 3 year contract), Chris Taylor(OF- 2 year contract).
Arbitration(player won): Pedro Baez(RHP).
Summary: The addition of Betts gives the Dodgers a crazy good lineup with even crazier good positional depth. The losses of Ryu and Maeda are significant. The rotation has a lot question marks after Kershaw(who is suddenly a bit of a question mark himself) and Walker Buehler probably should be considered the ace of the staff now. Price is coming off an injury plagued season but seemed healthy in spring training. He can be a solid #3 if he stays healthy. Urias can be a star if he stays healthy. The bullpen needed more depth with Kenley Jansen possibly on the downside of his career. Treinen is coming off a down season and has to bounce back. Graterol might eventually be a Closer, but has an injury history of his own and is only on the roster because he failed his physical with the Red Sox. But maybe the Dodgers don't need more than average pitching with their positional strength. They can also add a pitcher in a midseason trade(they still have Joc Pederson and Ross Stripling as potential trade chips).
Looking ahead, the Dodgers have some age creeping up on them, especially on the pitching side, Betts is a free agent at the end of the season and their farm system is not what it was a couple of years ago. Their "window" may be down to 1 year and they need to hope the pitching doesn't implode.
Grade B.
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I love your posts Dr. B and appreciate all your hard work but there is really only one thing I can think about right now and it is whether or not we are even going to have a season. It seems inevitable that at best there will only be time to play half the season or less and at first that can be really depressing. The alternative however is to not have a season at all which I am hoping is avoided at all costs. The more I think about it the more I feel like this could provide MLB with an incredible opportunity to do something crazy with an already lost season and somehow salvage something out of nothing.
ReplyDeleteI have a couple of ideas for what they could do to give us meaningful baseball this year and quite possibly create some interest in fans across the world and at home who have nothing else to watch for the next 6 months. Here are a few ideas and I would love to hear your thoughts and maybe a post on what could be done to save this season.
- Round Robin Tournament with one game at home and one game away against every team in the MLB. If they can't start playing games in front of fans until August then make it a round robin where you play every team twice to determine playoffs. Condense the entire season into 2 months of the greatest tournament ever played in professional sports.
- Play baseball without fans and under quarantine. Test all players and quarantine them throughout the season and have them play in front of cameras and no fans. Players are tested after each game and minor leaguers go through testing before getting called up. Maybe allow for a minor league camp of 10-15 players from each team to pull from each month.
- Turn the MLB into a reality TV show. Hear me out on this one, MLB has been dying to find young fans and ways to shorten the season. Play this season with no fans but record the games and show them in 1 hour edited blocks every night. Sunday night could be live for the entire game with highlights from throughout the week and national commentary. Highlight the stars and make them the center of the show and use this as an opportunity to build a fanbase. Hire people from "Hard Knocks", "The Ultimate Fighter", and any other reality show makers who are begging for work right now and let them turn this season into the biggest reality TV show ever made.
Desperate times call for desperate measures and no matter how insensitive it might be right now, MLB should be looking at this as an opportunity. As a fan I am desperately hoping to have baseball this year and would be willing to watch a debauchery of our national pastime in the form of a reality TV show if it meant I got to see baseball this year and it sparked interest in the sport.
I fully understand that even thinking about playing baseball during a time like this possibly makes me a horrible person. I am willing to live with that at this point and will be willing to do a lot more in a few weeks after being locked inside with the wife and kids and NO SPORTS!!!!!! Sorry, hehemm. This is going to be really hard for everyone and at some point we have to be human beings and live our lives. Baseball is a huge part of a lot of our lives that is missing right now.