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Brian,
Do you believe MLBTR?
March 13: Major League Baseball and the MLB Players Association have reached an agreement on a series of changes regarding roster construction, per both Ken Rosenthal of The Athletic (subscription required) and Jeff Passan of ESPN. While it seems that this wave of agreed-upon changes will not technically impact actual in-game rules, the two sides have agreed to make July 31 a hard deadline for the completion of trades, thus doing away with the convoluted August waiver system. That change will go into effect for the 2019 season, and beginning in 2020, the standard roster size will expand from 25 to 26 (with a 13-pitcher maximum).
Rosters will expand from 25 to 26 players in 2020. A team can carry a maximum of 13 pitchers on its 26-man roster.
Personally as a Padre exec I would not have done this deal.
Indications are Preller is on the hot seat and needs to win now. Especially after the Myers/Hosmer/Machado contracts.
The same reason people want him traded is why he may not be tradeable – at least for any value.
My question is why another team would want him at this point.
I am not sure why the Cardinals need to get any “value” for him. They gave up cash (probably not much) to acquire him. The analysis should strictly be:
Is value (Jose Martinez) > value (roster spot)?
I can really only see two bad contract swaps out there for Fowler right now, given a trade for David Price or Ian Kennedy seem out of the question: Jeff Samardzija and Nathan Eovaldi.
A trade for Eovaldi could look like:
Fowler + Munoz + Ponce de Leon = Eovaldi + Josh Taylor + Thad Ward
Eovaldi makes $17 million for three years, Fowler makes $16.5 million for two years. For taking on the extra year of Eovaldi, the Cardinals upgrade their bullpen and acquire a good pitching prospect.
Boston gets help in that they have a more expensive option in the outfield than JBJ, however the Fowler acquisition means they can trade JBJ strictly for prospects, allowing his entire projected $11 million to come off the books, and giving them a couple of million dollars worth of breathing room to reset their salary cap (more if they don’t tender a few marginal pieces). They would probably move either Benitendi or Betts to CF and Fowler to the vacated corner spot.
The key to making this deal work is the secondary pieces the Cardinals send. Yairo Munoz can replace Brock Holt, which saves the Red Sox $3 million in salary compared to last year. Ponce de Leon can replace Eovaldi in the rotation, saving them $16.5 million. This is offset by the projected $5.5 million increase from JBJ to Fowler.
For taking on the extra year of Eovaldi and filling the roster with cost-controlled options that allow a luxury tax reset, the Cardinals would ask for Josh Taylor, a left-handed relief pitcher who pitched to a 3.04 ERA and 1.18 WHIP last year. They could also ask for Thad Ward, the Red Sox #8 prospect, who pitched to 2.14 ERA and 1.16 WHIP across A and A+ last year.
This also has the advantage of removing one person from the 40 man roster of the Cardinals so they can sign a backup catcher, and we trade two substandard fielders to open up playing time for better defensive players (assuming Fowler replaced by Arozorena/O’Neill and Munoz replace by Sosa).
One note on Eovaldi: He has a career 4.07 ERA in the NL vs 4.52 in the AL.
Right now, Jose Martinez to Cleveland seems like a good landing spot for him, since Carlos Santana prefers to play 1B than to DH.
I would be happy if the Cardinals were able to trade him for international cap space and relief from his salary (to open up playing time for the outfielders that can actually play in the outfield).
If they are going to try to package him for Logan Allen, I would think they would have to include at least Oviedo or Woodford going back.
While it would be nice to get Brad Hand as well, I think that would require an overpay in terms of prospects to get him at this point. Cleveland might want to hold onto him until the trade deadline to see where they are in the standings. Right now, they look to be the best team in the AL Central since Minnesota lost so many players.
The Cardinals ownership made roughly $6.4 million by making it to the second round of the playoffs this year (imputing from the $9.7 million the players made on 60% of gate revenue).
They should be willing to invest that $6.4 million to trade away Fowler to give them the best chances of making the playoffs the next two years.
As for Fowler to the Angels, I don’t see it. They released Kole Calhoun because they didn’t want to pay him $13 million, given they expect Adell to take over RF. Calhoun > Fowler. The Cardinals would probably have to eat $8-10 million per year to make him somewhat palatable to the Angels, and I don’t think they will eat that much money.
Has a Dexter Fowler for Ian Kennedy trade been discussed?
They both make an identical $16.5 million this coming year.
Since this is Kennedy’s final year in KC, the Cardinals could give them back Jose Martinez to function as their cost-controlled DH. Maybe also pay $500k of Fowler’s salary this year and $8 million next year.
Or send them back prospects like Adolis Garcia + Ramon Urias.
Here’s a Korean LHP that probably wouldn’t break the bank
The way I see it, Brett Cecil at this point is an opportunity cost decision.
He is taking up a roster spot, and the roster is now full, which means that Cardinals cannot add any upgrades without trading somebody away. Historically, the Cardinals front office doesn’t make a lot of trades.
The arguments for keeping Cecil on the roster are:
1. The Cardinals have insurance on him, and will be able to recover roughly $5 million if he doesn’t play in 2020. Since they are (claiming to be) stretched out financially, this appears to be the prime motivation for keeping him.
2. Perhaps he can return to form, and it’s like buying a lottery ticket without paying any additional moneyThe arguments against are:
1. You could have protected one more guy from the Rule 5 draft, and his expected value over six years of team control is greater than $5 million
2. If you have an open roster spot, you can claim someone in the Rule 5 draft, and his expected value is greater than $5 million over six years of team control
3. With the extra roster spot, you can sign a free agent that might help you win more games than Cecil will. What are the prices going to be on Alex Wood and Arodys Vizcaino? What if Dallas Keuchel will sign for $10 million? What is the probability a free agent signing in the Cardinals price range will outperform Brett Cecil?I will add that his career 4.29 ERA and 1.357 WHIP do not excite me, and his performance in the first year of his contract was vastly overstated, because he allowed more than 44% of inherited runners to score.
But since this thread is for dreams and ideas even if there little chance of ever happening, I will state that the one big move staring the Cardinals in the face is Mookie Betts. It has all the makings of a classic Cardinal move for talent. This is how we have acquired big stars in the past many many times.
You have been the most vocal about the Cardinals having no payroll capacity. They can’t even afford a $15 million starting pitcher, so why could they afford a $27 million outfielder?
Assuming we can send back Fowler, Jose Martinez and Dominic Leone (which would probably require we send back both Norman and Carlson), that would still increase the Cardinals payroll by $7 million.
The Cardinals have been very clear they don’t want rentals.
Yet,
On the other end, the Cardinals jumped at the chance to acquire an impact right-handed bat despite having no guarantees he’d wear red for more than a year. Based on their experience with prior rentals like Matt Holliday and Mark McGwire, who ended up committing long-term, the Cards believed they had a chance of retaining Goldschmidt beyond 2019, and indeed they struck a five-year, $130 million extension in spring training.
“When you do a trade like that, you make the trade assuming he’s going to be a one-year rental, because otherwise, you’re setting yourself up to make a bad decision trying to justify the trade that only works if he stays around five or six years,” said Cardinals GM Mike Girsch. “We were hopeful. We’ve had good success with one-year rentals who have come to St. Louis, enjoyed the environment we have, the fan base, the full stadium and everything else, and signed here. We’ve had success doing that over the last 20 years and were hopeful that would happen again. But you’ve got to make the trade assuming it’s a standalone, and if you’re not comfortable with it as a standalone, then we wouldn’t have done it.”
On the other hand, I’d love to see the quote of Fowler “whining about getting benched.”
The quote above makes it seem as though you had no knowledge of Fowler EVER complaining about getting benched. Now, you are saying you wanted something more recent.
This year, Dexter Fowler played in 150 out of 162 regular season games, so when was he benched (besides the very last game of the playoffs after going 2-32)? Your argument that you were looking for more recent complaints lacks credbility both in how it was stated and based on Fowler’s playing time this year.
In a year the Cardinals have stated they are not going to add to payroll, the least they can do is improve the team by removing somebody who believes he should be starting when he has a .576 OPS half-way through the season. Trading Fowler is addition by subtraction.
There are a lot of comments on this board about how Harrison Bader deserved to be benched with a .680 OPS this year. At least Bader offers lights-out defense. The same cannot be said of Fowler.
I also thought a trade with the Mets would be in order if the Mets are unable to get JBJ…
Maybe we could trade Tyler O’Neill or Lane Thomas for Adrian Hernandez + Stephen Gonsalves???
In terms of a bad contract swap, they could trade Fowler for Jeurys Familia. That would actually save the Cardinals about $5 million this year…
The question is, what were the alternatives, particularly down the stretch. Bader and O’Neill both have yet to see a low breaking pitch out of the zone that they didn’t like.
Dexter Fowler was 2 for 33 in the playoffs, Harrison Bader was 2 for 12.
I agree, it is not the absolute amount they spend, but how they maximize resources.
If you are going to sign “franchise icon” contracts or throw away money on past-their-prime free agents, then you shouldn’t artifically say “we have the 6th hightest payroll in baseball,” so therefore, we are done.
If you are going to impose an artificial payroll constraint, then you have to adopt a ruthless mindset to make it work, like the A’s and Rays. That means no more “franchise icon” contracts, no more “we hope this reliever with a 4+ ERA last year will rebound and we are going to give him $7 million per year” and no more Dexter Fowler panic contracts because they have a hole in the organization.
Well, at least we know that IF Ozuna were to accept the QO, the Cardinals would do everything possible to trade Fowler…
He is good but he hasn’t even won the starting assignment at any 1 position.
I haven’t seen anything from the Cardinals in the last 4-5 years that indicates a rookie can “win” a job from a player making $10 million or more…
Shildt sat Carpenter some but he continued to play Fowler daily when Fowler couldn`t hit a barn.
It seems to me, that Carpenter took himself out of the lineup to try to figure out what was wrong with his swing because he knew he was hurting the team, whereas Fowler whines about getting benched when he has an OPS of .576.
The only evidence I have supporting this is that when the Cardinals plated 10 runs in the first against Atlanta, Carpenter admitted that it was he who took himself out of the game to put Bader’s elite defense into the game.
P.S. Eating Carpenter’s and Fowler’s salaries would cost a lot more than $6-10 MM.
I don’t think there is any chance of them eating any of Carpenter’s salary. His contract was a “franchise icon” contract. Fowler’s was a panic move at a time the Cardinals had no outfield depth. My comment about eating $6-10 million was specifically about eating part of Fowler’s contract to make him appealing in a trade.
The Athletic’s Mark Saxon reports that Cardinals owner Bill DeWitt Jr. confirmed in Tuesday’s end-of-season news conference that the Redbirds’ 2020 payroll will remain at roughly the same amount (approximately $162 million) that it was in ’19.
Looks like even gscottar overestimated this front office.
Boston wants to get under the salary cap, and now that JD Martinez is staying put, their best way to do that is to trade David Price.
Maybe a Price for Fowler deal? Boston could then trade either JBJ or Fowler to save more money…
Price’s injuries were related to a cyst on his wrist…And pitching in the NL East is more difficult than the NL Central.
Thanks for looking up the stats, Brian.
Tyler O’Neill has less than 300 plate appearances across two seasons. To your point, maybe he needs to spend a little more time on yoga and pilates and a little less time in the weight room, but he should not be blocked by Dexter Fowler nor Jose Martinez.
As for Bader, I will draw a comparison to another elite defensive player in the first three years in St. Louis.
Player A:
1st year: 32 games, 59 AB, .153/.194/.169/.363, 1 double
2nd year: 113 games, 402 AB, .249/.292/.388/.680, 14 doubles, 3 triples, 12 HR
3rd year: 150 games, 557 AB, .262/.321/.386/.707, 28 doubles, 4 triples, 11 HRPlayer B:
1st year: 32 games, 85 AB, .235/.283/.376/.659, 3 doubles, 3HR
2nd year: 138 games, 379 AB, .264/.334/.422/.756, 20 doubles, 2 triples, 12 HR
3rd year: 128 games, 347 AB, .205/.314/.366/.680, 14 doubles, 3 triples, 12 HRBased on the first three years of production, which player would you rather have?
Player A is Kolten Wong and Player B is Harrison Bader.
