Johnny Cueto

Horsehide Harry said:
Schilling failed his first two starting opportunities, admittedly at a very young age. Then he was moved to the pen where he spent a couple of years and was traded twice before settling in as a starter for Philadelphia. He was a bit of a head case early, which is why teams were so willing to trade him. He really didn't become consistently dominant until he was 29, although he had shown flashes and had to work through some injury.

Kevin Brown finished 6th as ROY as a 24 yo, then had a couple of OK years, then finished 6th for the Cy Young as a 27 yo, then had a couple more ok years, then signed with Florida and became a perennial All Star, MVP and Cy Young threat.

Samardzjia started pitching full time late, was rushed to the ML by the Cubs where he did ok as a reliever early (26 innings) then tanked for two years while he learned how to pitch, then became a solid middle reliever for a year then transitioned to starting at 27. He had two ok years, then an All Star year (essentially equivalent to this years Shelby Miller year) and was traded twice in less than a year as part of two different rebuilding efforts (Cubs, A's) to a bad team in a bad park where he had a pretty bad year.

However, he pitched more innings this year than any Brave, his walk rate was 1 per 9 innings lower than any Brave SP, his K rate was 6.9 per 9 IP, just behind both Miller and Teheran. His K rate was significantly down from previous years by about 1.5 per 9 which is something you would have to look at and his HR given up was up significantly, although the park has something to do with that.

Do I think he's a future HoF? No. However, he does remind me of the type stuff and career trajectory of Brown and Schilling. Will he ever have the success they had? I doubt it. Those 2-4 years at the beginning of his baseball career lost playing football will be hard to overcome. BUT, he doesn't have to be as good as Schilling and Brown ultimately were for a signing this offseason to be successful.

I'm looking for value and opportunity and I see that in Shark.
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I'd say 93 and particularly the playoffs that year was Schillings coming out party.
 
thewupk said:
It's not when he's an elite base runner and defender. Those things have value as well and certainly help teams win.
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Last time I checked, that elite baserunning is a factor included in measuring the fact that he's the 16th best offensive player in the NL (not even baseball).

The Braves finished 13th defensively, even with Maybin in CF, CJ, KJ, Olivera, and Garcia at 3B, and a mix-and-match group in LF.

How about trying to fix the offense first? Shelby Miller lost 16 straight games with an ERA that was below 3.10.
 
thewupk said:
If you could get them for the same price, sure. But that's rarely the case. The 6 WAR player is generally cheaper on a $/WAR standpoint.
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If that "cheaper $/WAR" means you spend $25 million per on one position and wind up with a below replacement-level player at one or two others, isn't that counterproductive???
 
clvclv said:
Last time I checked, that elite baserunning is a factor included in measuring the fact that he's the 16th best offensive player in the NL (not even baseball).

The Braves finished 13th defensively, even with Maybin in CF, CJ, KJ, Olivera, and Garcia at 3B, and a mix-and-match group in LF.

How about trying to fix the offense first? Shelby Miller lost 16 straight games with an ERA that was below 3.10.
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What I'm for is improving the team. I'm not at all dogmatic about whether this will come by finding bats, starting pitchers, relief pitchers, fast players, slow players, guys with power, guys with high OBP, guys with high strikeout rates, guys with low strikeout rates, guys who play particular positions. There are lots of ways to build a winning team. But basically it comes down to finding good players. And avoiding giving too many at bats or innings to guys who should probably be in the minors.

Now I do understand where you are coming from. If you have an area of weakness, it should be easier to make an improvement there. At the same time, you have to look at the market. In some off-seasons, it is easier to acquire a particular kind of player. Most of all we have to be pragmatic and opportunistic.

But if there were a great young all-around player who can generate 5 WAR per year on a fairly consistent basis that was available at a good price (say 25m/year), I would not hesitate to sign him even if he were only "the 16th best offensive player in the NL."
 
clvclv said:
Last time I checked, that elite baserunning is a factor included in measuring the fact that he's the 16th best offensive player in the NL (not even baseball).

The Braves finished 13th defensively, even with Maybin in CF, CJ, KJ, Olivera, and Garcia at 3B, and a mix-and-match group in LF.

How about trying to fix the offense first? Shelby Miller lost 16 straight games with an ERA that was below 3.10.
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We were average defensively because of one man, Tron. If not for him we would have been pretty bad.

Look at our guys with 500+ innings SLashes will be DRS/UZR. WIth the exception of C which doesn't have an UZR value.

SImmons - 25/17.3
Douchebag - -8
Peterson - -1/2.1
Freeman - 3/4.4
Maybin - -16/-7.2
Markakis - -6/-3.7

WHen you compare that to what we had last year.

Tron - 28/15.5
Heyward - 32/24.1
Gattis - -4
Melvin - -7/-2.0
LaStella - -4/-2.1
Johnson - -13/-3.6
Justin - 0/-0.9
Freeman - -7/1.0

So we went from 2 studs and a few mehs and one true dud. To 1 stud, most mehs, a bad (Markakis) and a true dud. Which is why in 2014 we weren't 13th in defense, we were 6th.

If we replace Markakis with Jason and have CB play full time. We're likely a top 5 defensive team.
 
sturg33 said:
does wRC account for baserunning?
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No. Well aside from the stretching aspect of hitting and potentially forcing errors. But Fangraphs has a rating which takes wRC normalizes it for park etc. and add baserunning to it to make a cumulative offensive value. Which puts him at 13th in the NL, FWIW.
 
zitothebrave said:
No. Well aside from the stretching aspect of hitting and potentially forcing errors. But Fangraphs has a rating which takes wRC normalizes it for park etc. and add baserunning to it to make a cumulative offensive value. Which puts him at 13th in the NL, FWIW.
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Then apparently it doesn't describe the 16th or 13th or whatever ranked offensive player someone is, correct?

Again, pick a stat and make it say what you want - paying Jason Heyward $25 million a year is nuts IMO if you're hoping he's going to make your offense markedly better - particularly when you can acquire TWO players that are as good offensively that same amount of money.

You guys have the formulas - project how many more runs the Braves would score with Heyward in RF, Markakis in LF, and the rest of the players we already have in place compared to what you'd (presumably - if the game was played on your spreadsheet) score if you added Zobrist and Wieters, Gordon and Wieters, Fowler and Wieters, whatever.

Again, we all understand everybody loves Jason - most of those against paying that much for him love him too - just admit it. You *itched all year about "fixing this historically bad offense". Jason Heyward simply won't. So then you change it and say "yeah, but he's such a better player because of his defense". Defense wasn't the problem. Pitching wasn't the problem, *ell, the Manager wasn't even the problem.

Blowing $25 million/year on Jason Heyward would be crazy if you want to make the Braves better unless payroll is going to grow exponentially. I'd love to have him back because I really enjoy watching him play too, but I'd much rather the team get better.
 
sturg33 said:
does wRC account for baserunning?
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Wait - you mean you used that stat to anoint Heyward the 16th best offensive player in the NL and you don't know whether that takes into account whether or not he's a good baserunner???

Hmmmmmmm.
 
clvclv said:
Blowing $25 million/year on Jason Heyward would be crazy if you want to make the Braves better unless payroll is going to grow exponentially. I'd love to have him back because I really enjoy watching him play too, but I'd much rather the team get better.
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Why would adding a player who makes this tyeam better be crazy? Our payroll is going to go up a lot. I think we'll regularly be in the 120-140 range. We're building up for the new stadium first though.

Imagine this team if you would

CF - Smith
3B - Olivera
RF - Jason
1B - Freddie
2B - Peterson
LF - Markakis
SS - Simmons
C - Bethancourt

The only flaw to that team is our best hitters are lefties and can't hit in order. But the advantage is that most pitchers in baseball aren't left handed.
 
clvclv said:
Wait - you mean you used that stat to anoint Heyward the 16th best offensive player in the NL and you don't know whether that takes into account whether or not he's a good baserunner???

Hmmmmmmm.
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No... I knew it didn't take it into account... But after you made smug post about it being factored into the 16th best player... I wanted to make sure. Thanks to zito for clarifying.

You can continue to be wrong about Heyward... We've all gotten used to it.
 
clvclv said:
Then apparently it doesn't describe the 16th or 13th or whatever ranked offensive player someone is, correct?

Again, pick a stat and make it say what you want - paying Jason Heyward $25 million a year is nuts IMO if you're hoping he's going to make your offense markedly better - particularly when you can acquire TWO players that are as good offensively that same amount of money.

You guys have the formulas - project how many more runs the Braves would score with Heyward in RF, Markakis in LF, and the rest of the players we already have in place compared to what you'd (presumably - if the game was played on your spreadsheet) score if you added Zobrist and Wieters, Gordon and Wieters, Fowler and Wieters, whatever.

Again, we all understand everybody loves Jason - most of those against paying that much for him love him too - just admit it. You *itched all year about "fixing this historically bad offense". Jason Heyward simply won't. So then you change it and say "yeah, but he's such a better player because of his defense". Defense wasn't the problem. Pitching wasn't the problem, *ell, the Manager wasn't even the problem.

Blowing $25 million/year on Jason Heyward would be crazy if you want to make the Braves better unless payroll is going to grow exponentially. I'd love to have him back because I really enjoy watching him play too, but I'd much rather the team get better.
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You're not getting Weiters and Gordon (or any of those combos) for $25M...
 
Another "Sign Heyward" thread. Who'd have ever guessed? :HeywardWut:

Can't wait for him to sign with another team, not named the Braves, just to stop this up once and for all.
 
sturg33 said:
No... I knew it didn't take it into account... But after you made smug post about it being factored into the 16th best player... I wanted to make sure. Thanks to zito for clarifying.

You can continue to be wrong about Heyward... We've all gotten used to it.
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But since you "knew"...thanks zito!!!
 
zitothebrave said:
Why would adding a player who makes this tyeam better be crazy? Our payroll is going to go up a lot. I think we'll regularly be in the 120-140 range. We're building up for the new stadium first though.

Imagine this team if you would

CF - Smith
3B - Olivera
RF - Jason
1B - Freddie
2B - Peterson
LF - Markakis
SS - Simmons
C - Bethancourt

The only flaw to that team is our best hitters are lefties and can't hit in order. But the advantage is that most pitchers in baseball aren't left handed.
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But, but, but...all we keep hearing about is how bad those players are offensively. Adding Heyward is suddenly going to change that???

But, but, but...everybody says payroll ISN'T going up a lot. If it is, why not sign Greinke, Wieters, AND Heyward? .
 
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