News/Rumors

I am sure I am the minority here, but I'm kinda excited to see what Price brings to the table. Yeah, Price has been hurt the last few seasons, but sitting out last season might have been a blessing in disguise. I am hoping that sitting out last season gave his body a chance to truly heal. Also being the 4th or 5th starter will lessen the expectation. If MGT can get his 2018 stats - 170+ innings, 3.58 era, and a whip of 1.14 from the #4 slot I will be thrilled!!

 

Also wouldn't hurt to see Seager play the SS position well for the 1st time since like 2017. That's what gets lost in all the injury talk. That he just doesn't play the position very well. The arm doesn't look the same for starters. But reasonable stance nonetheless

If there was the option to pay Seager to play 1B for LAD for the next 10 years I'd be behind that 110%. Sign me up tomorrow. Definitely not a case of just wanting Seager gone for me. They should be willing to pay for good players in their prime....they obviously are. Just make sure these players are playing the right positions out here. As we used to say a bunch here " spend wisely ". And I don't know how wise it is to lock Seager in at SS. They'll probably consider Javy Baez as a replacement too if the Cubs don't lock him up, but Lindor likely 1st. Report out today says the Mets plan to start extension talks with Lindor pretty soon. Guess we'll find out soon if Lindor wants to lock into the NYM clown show

 

• Dodgers have hired Dontrelle Willis as a special assistant for player development.

• Sounds like Josiah "JoJo" Gray is getting a lot of love in the early going of camp though the team seems non-committal at the idea that we will see him at the MLB level this year. One thing that has happened is that the staff has gotten a bit overloaded with big league ready talent. Our AAA rotation appears to be May, Gonsolin, Gray, White and Jimmy Nelson at current with a potential need for a 6 man if the planets align and nobody comes out of ST hurt. On the surface, that would probably be a rotation good enough to win the NL Central.

• Speaking of impressive young pitchers, Michael Grove was one of the better parts of yesterday's opener. Showing a fluid motion, solid pitch mix and locating everything well. He was one of the talks of camp last year prior to the shut down as the next best pitching prospect in the org. He doesn't sound like Buehler 2.0 as some had dubbed him post signing, but there is some feeling in the org that he could blow up this year none the less. Looking at our AA rotation, that too is gonna be overloaded with a projection of Jackson, Grove, Pepiot, Uceta and Carrillo. All of these loaded staffs and we are still going to need to seat Miller, Knack, Lewis, Williams and Ortiz. The amount of starting pitching depth in the org right now is next level.

• Word is that Keibert Ruiz still has not made it to camp. No word on whether he has made it stateside, but once he does he will need to quarantine for 2 weeks.

 

Never seen Grove throw before yesterday. Love that smooth delivery.

 

DH is coming to the NL soon enough so Muncy wouldn't be displaced. And if he is so be it. He was terrible last season. Stepped it up in the post but so did Joc and Joc's gone. Muncy can go too if Seager needs 1B

Should add that if Seager does a .950 OPS over a full MLB calendar it'll mark the 1st time he's ever done it. The 1st time Seager did over .950 he did it in 2015 when he came up for like 30 games. He seems to be the king of the 30-50 game stretch. His best mark over a full calendar is about .880 and that was 2016. Rooting for him but it's clearly a stretch that he'll power through a traditional slate

 

And wouldn't sleep on the possibility of actually landing Lindor either. Safe to say precedence is pretty well set now when it comes to FO offseason aggression and their willingness to upgrade. If the Mets don't handle their business I see LAD at the front of the line because it's just smart business

Also wouldn't sleep on the Trevor Bauer addition potentially aiding LAD in a Lindor chase. Lindor vouched for Bauer and did his part to try and get him over to the Mets but it's the lightweight Mets. Former Tribe buddies may find themselves in a similar situation next offseason with Bauer potentially doing his part to help the FO pull Lindor over to LAD. At the very least we should hope that guys like Lindor and Javy Baez stay uncommitted so that LAD will have some leverage over Boras/Seager and can get a reasonable extension done at some point. Cheap or not, having Lux around isn't really enough leverage over Boras/Seager

 

Sounds racist.

 

Dontrelle Willis ??? Holy shit.
I sure hope he has nothing to do with their physical development...he was a career ending shoe-in with that stupid motion of his.
A disaster lying in wait...someone in the FO must owe him money or some shit.
Vinegar Bend Mizell.

 

Eh, his issue was overuse. Dude averaged 211 innings per year for the first 5 years of his MLB career while averaging roughly 100 pitches per start... and that includes multiple stinkers per season that brought the average down to around the 100 pitch mark. McKeon and Girardi did him dirty.

 

Probably right...but that silly motion contributed to his breakdown, for sure.
It's all water under the bridge, and hopefully nothing of his mechanics gets imparted to our younger pitchers.