Hot Stove 2023-2024

i’m not sure the sword points too sharply in the player’s direction unless in this case he left a gray-level deal on the table in order to try and rebuild his value and break the bank. but i do think pitching is so volatile that he could have another subpar season next year, feel like he needs to rebuild his value again, opt in to what is inherently a 1 year overpay for boston, and then be one of the top 15 or whatever SPs in baseball and return value on the deal. there’s just prob no way to get him at value next year unless he gets hurt, but then again if there was no way to sign him in the first place w/o the opt in i get how you’re giving to get. the scenario where this is some disaster is only if he eats innings w/ like a 5+ ERA for two years straight

I think based purely on his pre-divorce/upheaval stats from last year he should be due to be solid if not spectacular and yeah he’s got significant upside if he does at all well next year. I think the pitching free agency market is supposed to have more arms available but let’s be honest: everyone needs arms all the time

damn you’re locked in on his life, salute

fangraphs has him at 2.5 WAR for next year… not exactly sure what the price per WAR calculation is these days but if he lands close to that number i feel like both sides will be pretty happy with this deal

Yeah sorry the double edged sword bit was more like:

If he’s good he will opt out and might leave? Then you’re back looking for an arm.
If he’s bad he’ll stay, sad

Value of the contract isn’t really my concern it’s a total sellers market anyway. Obvs if he shoves that $18m he makes next year looks cheap. Really they need a higher end guy to pair with him and then his place looks a lot clearer.

What!!!!

BREAKING: The Atlanta Braves are acquiring seven-time All-Star Chris Sale in a trade with the Boston Red Sox, sources tell ESPN. Well-regarded infield prospect Vaughn Grissom is the return to Boston, which will send money with Sale, who waived his no-trade clause to join Atlanta

— Jeff Passan (@JeffPassan) December 30, 2023

huh!

The deal: Chris Sale and $17 million to Atlanta for Vaughn Grissom, who has the full 6 years of team control remaining.

— Alex Speier (@alexspeier) December 30, 2023

What am I missing--does Atlanta know something about Sale's health that no one else does? That looks extremely lopsided. (He says confidently, even though I googled Virgil Grissom and got taken to the astronaut.)

Okay, they got $17M too...I don't know how to factor that in; aren't Atlanta's key players all locked up for a few years anyway?

He’s coming off his first healthy offseason in about four years and they’ve been trying to get starters? I’m surprised by it too, but seems like a decent trade for both especially with some of that contract being paid down.

i get it from atlanta’s side their only goal is the title and the high end outcome of a good chris sale run in the postseason would prob exceed 6 years of whatever they can get from grissom who doesn’t really have a spot to play there anyway. great deal for the sox tho

Also, the guy with the highest k/9 rate in history mentoring Spencer Strider 🤤

BA just posted in their trade evaluation, here's their Grissom bit. pic.twitter.com/GC2X4AlVjP

— Red Sox Stats (@redsoxstats) December 30, 2023

i remember they opted to start 2023 with grissom in the minors, despite his solid 2022 season. really feel like they didn't value the guy very much.

xposts

absurd to me that he isn't related to marquis

xp isn’t it just that they don’t have a place for him? He’s blocked

Anthopoulos informed Grissom that Atlanta felt like it needed to trade for a pitcher. Informed of that, Grissom responded, “I can pitch.” Anthopoulos described himself as “incredibly fond” of Grissom, who he views as “a really special kid.”

— Alex Speier (@alexspeier) December 30, 2023

After I posted, I realized how incidental the money is--pocket change, really.

absurd to me that he isn't related to marquis

― mookieproof, Saturday, December 30, 2023 4:06 PM (yesterday)

i just did a bit of furious googling to confirm this wasn't the case too

tbf if he was related to marquis he should be traded to the blue jays

^^

Ah but there is one! he has a son, who’s a pitcher in the minors for the Nats!

What! pt 2

Left-hander Chris Sale and the Atlanta Braves are in agreement on a contract extension. The new deal starts this season and is for two years and $38 million, with an $18 million club option for 2026. Sale's previous deal was for 2024 with an option for 2025.

Essentially, Sale…

— Jeff Passan (@JeffPassan) January 4, 2024

Left-hander Chris Sale and the Atlanta Braves are in agreement on a contract extension. The new deal starts this season and is for two years and $38 million, with an $18 million club option for 2026. Sale's previous deal was for 2024 with an option for 2025.

Essentially, Sale gets $17-18M in new guaranteed money. He was due $27.5M — $17.5M this year, $10M deferred for 15 years — and the team held a $20M option for next year. The present value of his salary this season was in the $20-21M range. In the new deal, the Braves guarantee him $16M this year and $22M next year. Atlanta received $17M from Boston in the deal, so the cash will cover his entire salary this season.

The Braves clearly believe Sale’s performance last season portends well for his future, even as he enters his age-35 season, plus they get an extra year of control.

That seems needlessly spendy. I wonder if Anthopolous is lighting cigars with hundreds now.

I wonder if it was a condition of him lifting his no trade clause

Harrison Bader back in NY

1 year, approx $10 mil https://t.co/9nHMoJhmtg

— Andy Martino (@martinonyc) January 4, 2024

BREAKING: The San Francisco Giants and Seattle Mariners are in agreement on a trade that will send former Cy Young winner Robbie Ray to the Giants for outfielder Mitch Haniger and right-hander Anthony DeSclafani, sources familiar with the deal tell ESPN.

— Jeff Passan (@JeffPassan) January 5, 2024

Super busy at work but just heard about this. The Giants got a steal?

Robbie Ray is coming off Tommy John and he’s out for at least half the season. They did return two bad contracts to the Mariners though.

*taps dipoto is secretly an idiot sign*

He’s such a freak. Managed to extract $6m from SF as well. What a non-move.

Posnanski wrote about Sale today. Paywalled, but here's the gist of it:

I can’t predict the future--but would it surprise me if teams started using their aces once a week, 22 starts a year, in order to protect them for October? Of course not. Would it surprise me if teams started resting their star players 25 or 35 or more games a year to keep them fresh for October? Of course not. Would it surprise me if teams played for 92 wins instead of 100 or 105 or 110, because 92 wins is enough to get you in the playoffs and that’s all that matters anymore?

Of course not.

This is where the game has been going for a while now, sure, but it’s there now. I, personally, am not a huge fan of it--I’ve long been more of a regular-season guy than a playoff guy--but as I’ve written before, I just love baseball, so I’ll go wherever the game takes me. And the game is taking you and me into a new era, I think, one where soon enough 16 teams will make the playoffs, and the regular season will be mostly for entertainment purposes, and there won’t be very many important games played between April and September.

In other words: I suspect that the Braves believe that if Chris Sale gives them two good starts in October and those help the team go on to the World Series, he will be worth every penny.

i mean, i get it, but how are you going to feel in late august when you’re 3 games out of the wild card because two of your guys got hurt a month ago and one of your priciest pitchers has missed five starts because you’re “resting” him? i’m not sure a baseball season lends itself to basketball style load management

He's a little prone to overstatement--I take his general point, especially as applies to Sale. (People said as much here about the deal.)

Part that's missing (that may or may not be true): that Atlanta fans probably consider 2021's 88-win/WS-winner a triumphant year, and 2022/23's 100-win/early-exit teams comparative disasters.

i don’t think his general point is valid and i don’t think managers will be managing that way but i do think you could possibly make an exception for Sale, who appears to be constructed entirely out of tracing paper

You don't think teams more and more view postseason success as a barometer of their year than ever?

You can make an exception for the 2024 Braves as well who will somehow go 120-42 while playing bullpen games every day.

I hear but yeah, this strategy definitely is only viable for very confident super teams and as much as I don’t like it, it seems like it could be a very smart move for these Braves

I understand the logic of that Joe P post but I really don’t think a single team in the league has enough pitching, combined starters and relievers, to do that.

Sale deal is good if healthy but part of the benefit to the Braves is he doesn’t have to be the ace on that team. He can just be (a very valuable) guy!

I agree that his general point only applies to upper echelon teams--somewhere between the top third to the top half--and not those where simply making the playoffs, maybe even being in a race for the playoff, is enough. Even I'm prone to that kind of thinking, and I'm on here regularly saying the playoffs don't determine the best team, that you have to give proper weight to the regular season. But even with that as my mindset, I didn't care that the Jays won 89 games and made the playoffs last year--they made another early exit, so the season felt like a failure. (And will feel like even more of one if they were to repeat that.)

Taking sides: Chris Sale Braves deal vs. Dodgers Tyler Glasnow deal

Kinda nice that the Braves when all in on a high risk high reward pitcher too. Makes me think maybe the Dodgers aren’t being too silly with Glasnow. High high high upside is always worth a punt I guess

The Sale move makes sense in the context you’re saying, as a high risk potentially high reward win now move. It’s not like the kid they traded was some loser - he is going to be a starting player next season.

just too many variables in a very long season to try to game it in the way joe p describes. a few extra losses in april, a few in july, and suddenly you're scrapping for contention. we've seen it happen to the very best teams. and idk even with sale if he's healthy i think you gotta pitch him, who knows how much you'll get out of him, it's like, he might sneeze and break his collarbone

I think the trade was a good move for the reason you stated: may as well trade a valuable asset that will get no use for potentially valuable asset that could get much much use. But I’m not so bullish on that extension, lotta commitment to give an old man with low innings pitched and non-faltering ERA’s the past 3 seasons

Flattering

just too many variables in a very long season to try to game it in the way joe p describes. a few extra losses in april, a few in july, and suddenly you're scrapping for contention. we've seen it happen to the very best teams. and idk even with sale if he's healthy i think you gotta pitch him, who knows how much you'll get out of him, it's like, he might sneeze and break his collarbone

I fully intended to write “two words: Barry Zito” and my diseased brain inserted the year

Also Sale won’t not pitch, like he’s excited to be healthy for the first time in forever, but they might run him for five instead of six in that theory. Like I said l don’t really agree because you never know when injuries/starter meltdowns happen and there’s never been a team with too many innings for arms, but it has a certain logic to it.

Meanwhile, if anyone wants to purchase a Chris Sale rookie card, I'm your one-stop shopping destination--think I bought about five of them when he was at his peak (and they were surprisingly cheap).

Ha. This reminds me TH kindly sent me a box (!) of my first baseball cards in the post a while back and I’ve been thinking about collecting a few favourites. My people may get in touch with your people, clemenza. 😎