Tanking vs. whatever it is the Sox are doing

[John Marzano Olympic Hero]

Top 10 picks are way more likely to be slam dunks than all of the rest of the picks.

You are talking about anecdotes. I am talking about team building. A team with 5 top 5 picks in consecutive years is much more likely to have more talent than a team with 5 picks between 20 and 25. If you don't agree with that, that's fine but there's nothing more to discuss.

If I am building (or rebuilding a team), I go with the former but YMMV.

There are three avenues needed to build a team (not in order):

1. Draft
2. Trades
3. Free agency

Saying that you're just going to use one of the avenues instead of all three is foolish, no matter if it's just sucking ass for five years and drafting in the top five or if it's spending like a poet on pay day and buying every available free agent every year. You need a balanced attack to building a team. Aside from Process-driven teams (like the Astros and Orioles) the more successful teams do all three. Crapping out and building solely (or mostly) through the draft is a good way to keep sucking. The draft isn't 100%, and like I showed you, 2/3's of the picks of 11 seasons are actually pretty bad.

 

[JM3]

The fact that the Devers thing surprised people says everything one needs to know about the lack of understanding of the plan.

When a team has enough cost-controlled talent ready to contribute, large contracts for good players aren't anchors weighing down the team but tentpoles helping it reach a higher level.

Prospects & organizational depth is a #s game combined with a scouting & development game. The more legitimate people you bring into the building, the better you are at selecting those people who come into the building, & the better you are at developing them, the more cost-controlled talent you're going to get.

In terms of #s, picking at the top of reach round can help because you have more $ to spend & can pick your players a bit earlier each round. But it's certainly not the only thing that can increase your #s.

Another main thing is whether you're trading for prospects or trading away prospects. The Red Sox haven't been fully tanking, but they've also gone out of their way to keep all of their top prospects & to acquire more when given the opportunity.

If we were in a different market would that part of the churn have been more aggressive? Probably.

The Red Sox have also gone out of their way to keep their books clean for the future. They have a ton of $ they can spend in free agency over the next couple years, & should not have that many holes they need to fill because they have cost-controlled talent ready to go in most roles.

C Wong/McGuire
1B Casas
2B Arroyo/Valdez
SS Story/Chang
3B Devers
OF Yoshida/Verdugo/Duran/Refsnyder

SP Sale/Whitlock/Bello/Houck/Crawford/Winck/Drohan/Pivetta

RP Jansen/Martin/Schreiber/Mills/Bernadino/Kelly

With a # of other young guys on the horizon.

All of those guys combined should put them about $60m+ under the 1st tax threshold, with very few real holes & not a lot of guys who are impending free agents after next year (I believe the entire list is Sale/Verdugo/Arroyo/Jansen/Martin/Pivetta). & they also have this as a reset year so they should be blowing by the tax threshold if the right players are available.

They've basically gotten to a similar point as they would have if they tanked the last few years, although obviously with a few less future balls in the hopper, & at least provided some fun moments over these years.

I hope they make offers to guys like Paxton that they would be comfortable extending them at, & then, barring some miraculous surge in the next month, I would like them to trade every single expiring contract they have for whatever they can get in terms of future assets. If the other team wants them to pay the salary for better prospects? Great, we're still under the tax & can afford it.

That means definitely Duvall, probably Turner, definitely Hernandez if anyone wants him, definitely Kluber if anyone wants him (although I hear Whitlock credits him with some of his success), & Paxton if you don't extend him.

I would also be willing to move Jansen for the right package because I think he's going to continue sliding in efficacy but that's neither here nor there.

I guess I've kind of got off topic. Basically - tank is optimal for gathering assets, but what they've actually been doing is pretty close, while putting a more entertaining product on the field, so I think this is fine.

 

[wade boggs chicken dinner]

There are three avenues needed to build a team (not in order):

1. Draft
2. Trades
3. Free agency

Saying that you're just going to use one of the avenues instead of all three is foolish, no matter if it's just sucking ass for five years and drafting in the top five or if it's spending like a poet on pay day and buying every available free agent every year. You need a balanced attack to building a team. Aside from Process-driven teams (like the Astros and Orioles) the more successful teams do all three. Crapping out and building solely (or mostly) through the draft is a good way to keep sucking. The draft isn't 100%, and like I showed you, 2/3's of the picks of 11 seasons are actually pretty bad.

No one is saying that tanking teams do not use other methods of obtaining talent. Tanking teams absolutely use trades and waiver wire pickups to find players other teams have given up on and getting excess value out of them (BAL has some success doing this). I mean that's one of the luxuries of tanking - teams can play anyone and losing is beneficial. Tanking teams also spend a lot of money in the IFA market but that's even more of a crapshoot because most every MLB club is doing the same thing.

Trying to summarize my argument, yYou can either agree or disagree with this statement: the single most controllable way a team has to obtain a young, cost-controlled talent that will produce the excess WAR needed to contend for championship is to draft in the top 5 multiple years in a row.

If you agree with that, everything else follows.

If you don't agree with that statement, well that's fine but I don't really see the counterargument. Yes there are other ways to do it but none of them are controllable like losing. Unfortunately for us fans, losing is pretty controllable.

 

[Farty Barrett]

No point tanking if we cannot develop any of the picks into quality talent. Relying on high draft pedigree is dicey. I want this team to learn how to improve its pitching development personnel.

Watching the Red Sox lose is part of me. The Front Office needs to do better.

But of the two options here, I say thread the needle. Tanking is just so boring. And it’s taking the fans for granted.

Summers are long. Give us a team worth rooting for. Not an organizational long term projection worth rooting for.

 

[astrozombie]

It's hard to keep track, but I dont get the sense that people who are saying the former are also saying the latter.
There are *reasons* why, in hindsight that those seasons went the way they did. (mostly surrounding the answers to the "if these things break right" questions). But it seems clear that this is the 3rd season of that sort of approach -- Bloom's approach -- at the major league level, while he tries to better the system below. Some categorically dont like that type of approach; some think it's failing. But I think the number of people here who seriously give him credit for one and not blame for the other is pretty small. And vice-versa. ("he was just lucky in 2021; 2022 revealed his true suck"). That's kind of non-sensical.

A number of Bloom defenses include "they did well in 2021". Not all of them, but more than 0. Personally, I think that is an outlier season and good (and bad) luck happens all the times to teams, though poorly constructed teams get hit harder and better ones can overcome it. But it does seem like "what about 2021?" is always used as evidence that Bloom has some kind of secret sauce that can work. I suspect that's because 3 seasons in last place in the division and 1 incredibly lucky run to the ALCS where everything went right sounds less than ideal as we build towards the magical 2025 season.

 

[jezza1918]

A number of Bloom defenses include "they did well in 2021". Not all of them, but more than 0. Personally, I think that is an outlier season and good (and bad) luck happens all the times to teams, though poorly constructed teams get hit harder and better ones can overcome it. But it does seem like "what about 2021?" is always used as evidence that Bloom has some kind of secret sauce that can work. I suspect that's because 3 seasons in last place in the division and 1 incredibly lucky run to the ALCS where everything went right sounds less than ideal as we build towards the magical 2025 season.

It’s not a bloom defense so much it is a defense of the thread the needle process. Outright tanking you won’t get that kind of season. I don’t give him too much credit for 2021, and it’s probably the reason I don’t give too much blame for the other seasons. I believe the process he was put in charge of undertaking was a multi year process that hopefully we see the benefits of very soon. So over the next few seasons is when i personally would start to give him more credit, or blame, depending on team success

 

[streeter88]

Need a Time Machine… but honestly that is why the tanking strategy seems flawed to me. If we are asked to hold out for a future season when all the pieces will be in place, how long do we put our enthusiasm on freeze? And what do we do with the seasons between now and then where the ebb exceeds the flow?

 

[Sandy Leon Trotsky]

What are the Cubs doing?

 

[Archer1979]

It’s not a bloom defense so much it is a defense of the thread the needle process. Outright tanking you won’t get that kind of season. I don’t give him too much credit for 2021, and it’s probably the reason I don’t give too much blame for the other seasons. I believe the process he was put in charge of undertaking was a multi year process that hopefully we see the benefits of very soon. So over the next few seasons is when i personally would start to give him more credit, or blame, depending on team success

He could take some credit from 2021, and in a way, it actually hurts since it raised so many expectations for last year. What gets overlooked when 2021 is brought up is that the Sox ultimately needed to win two out of three (although they didn't know that at the time) against a putrid Washington Nationals team to make the playoffs and even then needed a comeback win in the last three innings of the last game to retain home field advantage in the one game play-in. I loved the 2021 post-season since it came out of nowhere, but they were the prototypical team that got hot at just the right time. But it really did raise the bar for 2022 since every team is supposed to get better in the off-season.

 

[astrozombie]

He could take some credit from 2021, and in a way, it actually hurts since it raised so many expectations for last year. What gets overlooked when 2021 is brought up is that the Sox ultimately needed to win two out of three (although they didn't know that at the time) against a putrid Washington Nationals team to make the playoffs and even then needed a comeback win in the last three innings of the last game to retain home field advantage in the one game play-in. I loved the 2021 post-season since it came out of nowhere, but they were the prototypical team that got hot at just the right time. But it really did raise the bar for 2022 since every team is supposed to get better in the off-season.

Honest question: if 2021 raised your expectations, did 2022's end result lower yours at all? Or did (do) you consider 2022 a hiccup that had no effect on your expectations?

 

[buttons]

I can’t understand why anyone would be happy to watch a bad or at best mediocre team for a few years in the hope that someone will wave a magic wand and suddenly the team will be World Series bound.
For me it’s the hunt that matters. I want to be watching in August and September because there is a chance that we can at least get to the playoffs.

 

[Archer1979]

Honest question: if 2021 raised your expectations, did 2022's end result lower yours at all? Or did (do) you consider 2022 a hiccup that had no effect on your expectations?

I wouldn't say that 2022 lowered my expectations as much as it is that it tempered them. That said, the off-seasons tend to feed my enthusiasm more than the previous season's results.

 

[Yelling At Clouds]

What are the Cubs doing?

It's a lesser version of what Texas did, right? They traded away Baez, Bryant, and Rizzo, but instead of going for a prolonged down period, they signed Stroman and Seiya Suzuki, then Bellinger, Taillon, and Swanson. They also, somewhat famously, didn't trade Contreras or Happ last deadline. One could certainly question the wisdom of these moves, but I don't think they're the type of thing you do if you don't plan on being competitive. Maybe it's actually a different version of the needle-threading.

The other team who seems to me to be attempting the needle-thread is the Giants, although they did offer Arson Judge a lot of money and were a physical away from signing Correa. They've maybe had a few more of the "coin flips" go their way than some other teams this year, though; Thairo Estrada and Lamonte Wade were never really top prospects and neither is exactly young, but they're both playing well at the moment. Logan Webb wasn't a top-100 guy, either, but he's emerged as a perennial all-star type. They had Rodon for a year, which seemed calculated on their part, and this year they took relatively small-time chances on Haniger and Conforto; one has been decent the other has been quite bad. Seems not dissimilar to the Sox plan in concept if not execution, necessarily - plus they're managed by a Sox ring-winner and their Baseball Ops is run by A Guy Who Used To Work For Andrew Friedman. (BTW, I think there are people who post here who actually follow the Giants a little bit, so feel free to correct me on any of this!)

EDIT: Upon further consideration, maybe “coin flips” is the wrong phrase - “decisions that look risky or underwhelming on paper but had the potential to work” is what I mean. Although, if it keeps working out for them, maybe they just know what they’re doing.

 

[Blizzard of 1978]

One thing a good majority of free agents signings last winter are turning out to be bad moves. Look at the Padres and Mets as they are both below .500. The Red Sox have a better record then both with also much more payroll flexibility this off-season.

 

[burstnbloom]

I think @JM3 said most of what I wanted to say better than I would but I'll add a few thoughts. Many of the posters in this thread are showing a willful refusal to acknowledge what is obvious about what the Red Sox are trying to do. I think the position is "I disagree with the plan" more than "there is no plan" and I don't really understand why so few people are saying that part.

There is an extremely clear plan here. The Red Sox are building their player development machine while trying to field a competitive team with short term veteran signings. They are absolutely refusing to sign long term contracts that will pay players past their primes, especially if the best part of the contract will be in this current window. You can quibble with whether or not you think that's smart, but that's what they are doing.

The economics of baseball make it extremely difficult to manage your payroll if you don't have pre-arb contracts on your books. You cant pay retail for 26 veterans in MLB. That creates a repeating cycle that only escalates payroll and John Henry is not doing that. He famously hates paying the luxury tax all the way back to when it was first introduced.

The team may be mediocre but again, is difficult to build a contender without pre-arb contracts. All you need to do is look at all the contenders in MLB to see that this is true.

In 2019, the Red Sox had $241m CBT payroll and exactly 1 above average regular on a pre-arb contract (Benintendi). This year's team has Houck, Casas, Duran, Crawford, Bello, Wong and Wink all playing meaningful roles, a young pitcher they extended early at a "discount" in Whitlock and $179m payroll. There are no glaring long term commitments sinking the balance sheet and there are $124m in salary commitments next year. That's almost $100m in space to next year's tax threshold. They have a strong farm system poised to push new pre arb contracts onto the roster in the next couple of years and we're starting to see a new wave behind that.

I'm not making a commentary of my approval or disapproval of the job that's being done, just that its extremely obviously the plan. I think its has a high likelihood of succeeding, but given how little depth the farm system had in 2019, and the series of losses the system took in the international signing arena right as the draft got harder, it takes a while to create waves or pre-arb roster players that have buoyed the Rays, Dodgers and Astros in recent years.

Edit - forgot to say that you certainly don't NEED to do it this way but it's clear that Henry isn't going to Cohen this roster.

 

[8slim]

One thing a good majority of free agents signings last winter are turning out to be bad moves. Look at the Padres and Mets as they are both below .500. The Red Sox have a better record then both with also much more payroll flexibility this off-season.

Has there been work done on how big ticket free agents do in year 1 with their new team vs subsequent seasons?

It seems, observationally, that no small number of high profile FAs underperform their norms in year 1. Maybe it’s due to adjusting to living in a new city, changing their routine, playing in a new park, dealing with the stress of “living up” to a big contract, etc. But it seems not uncommon.

So I’m always hesitant to make long terms judgements about FA strategy based on the first half season of a specific set of players.

 

[JM3]

I think @JM3 said most of what I wanted to say better than I would but I'll add a few thoughts.

Don't undersell your ability to say things. Agree with pretty much all of this.

There are no glaring long term commitments sinking the balance sheet and there are $124m in salary commitments next year. That's almost $100m in space to next year's tax threshold.

At some point I'll have to look at the arbitration estimates to see how much of that $100m would be eaten up by arb. My $40m guess was probably high.

Regardless, though, it should be a fun off season.

 

[Max Power]

Here's another study of draft value from 2022: https://www.baseballamerica.com/stories/is-the-draft-really-a-crapshoot-not-exactly/. The article reaches this conclusion: "First, teams historically have an excellent track record of correctly identifying the top three players in each draft and selecting them in order. Teams also have a strong track record of correctly identifying and selecting the top seven players in a draft within the top 10 picks."

View attachment 66067

There's a missing piece in all of this. WHEN do those drafted players produce on the major league level? Unless you're picking a good college player, it's 3-5 years until they hit the majors and sometimes a year or two before even being productive. So the great plan to intentionally lose games for 3 years straight might not even produce anything at the major league level for 5+ years. I'm not interested in watching a terrible team for 3 years for a chance at seeing a few great players 7 years from now.

The Red Sox should only ever be in two modes. First is what they're doing now, which is keeping all their prospects, putting a decent team on the field with a chance to make the playoffs if luck breaks the right way, and trading away at the margins if things don't look good at the deadline. Second is trading away the hoarded prospects for pieces to help the big league team when they're leading the division at the deadline.

Under no circumstances should the Red Sox ever enter a season looking like the A's or Royals where there's zero chance of contending from day one. The season may end terribly, but it shouldn't start that way. They have too much money to go into a season with no chance.

 

[HangingW/ScottCooper]

I think is the "reload" vs. "rebuild" mantra. They want the team to be serviceable as they rebuild and that explains things like Kenley and Kluber but also explains why they're not following through completely with a fully competitive roster. I still maintain they could have been competing in 2023 if they committed to tearing it down in season in 2022.

 

[Sandy Leon Trotsky]

I think is the "reload" vs. "rebuild" mantra. They want the team to be serviceable as they rebuild and that explains things like Kenley and Kluber but also explains why they're not following through completely with a fully competitive roster. I still maintain they could have been competing in 2023 if they committed to tearing it down in season in 2022.

How?

 

[scottyno]

How?

They could have got under the tax in 2022 so they could jump back over it in 2023 and compete like the mets, padres, and phillies currently are

 

[DavidTai]

They could have got under the tax in 2022 so they could jump back over it in 2023 and compete like the mets, padres, and phillies currently are

The current Sox (35-35) have a better record than the Mets (33-37)/Padres (33-36) are now, and one game behind the Phillies (36-34).

 

[Petagine in a Bottle]

The current Sox (35-35) have a better record than the Mets (33-37)/Padres (33-36) are now, and one game behind the Phillies (36-34).

that’s the joke.

 

[DavidTai]

that’s the joke.

Ahhh, it's so hard to tell when someone is serious, and when someone is ignorant these days...

 

[scottyno]

Ahhh, it's so hard to tell when someone is serious, and when someone is ignorant these days...

Yeah, the only thing tearing it down in 2022 would have done is let them spend a year earlier. It's not like Eovaldi, Wacha, JD or anyone else they could have realistically traded in a 2022 tear down (not counting X because of his no trade) would have given them anyone that would have been a meaningful contributor in 2023. I'm sure the plan is to go back over the tax in 2024 or 2025, so if they'd spent another 50 million or so in 2023 they would probably be better this year, but likely not that much better.

 

[Mueller's Twin Grannies]

They could have got under the tax in 2022 so they could jump back over it in 2023 and compete like the mets, padres, and phillies currently are

This is the one area where Bloom really screwed the pooch last year, IF there was a chance to do it. I still think he should have moved JDM for a bag of balls, if that was the offer, to get under the limit (if moving him alone would have done it, as some speculated at the time). If he couldn't even get that good of a return or it would have taken more, it's hard to blame him for hoping for a strong second half (not unheard of for this franchise, especially in recent years), especially for guys he was looking to move in the off-season.

 

[HangingW/ScottCooper]

Failing to get under the luxury tax at the 2022 trade deadline was a major mistake. Just because other teams didn't spend money wisely going into 2023 doesn't mean that an increased ability for the Red Sox to spend in 2023 would have ended the same way.

I wasn't expecting the Red Sox to give Xander the Padres contract, but was Dansby Swanson's contract ridculous? Could they have re-upped Eovaldi when he came back asking if their original offer was still on the table? I know they didn't work out, but I think many of us on here were on board with the short term / big money contracts the Mets threw out there for Scherzer and Verlander.

They could have stuck to their principles on length of contract / risk but still fielded a better team.

 

[JM3]

If they had actual assets to trade, sure. Pretty sure the plan was always to have '23 as a reset year as the window has always been set up to open in '24.

Tanking their 20% or whatever playoff chances last year to salary dump & create an incremental playoff % addition this year, which would negatively impact their spend once their window opens seems suboptimal.

 

[ZMart100]

It would have been better long term to get under. The picks for Xander and Eovaldi would have been a better, ~70 rather than 132 and 133, if they had gotten under the tax even if they did everything else the same.

 

[LogansDad]

It would have been better long term to get under. The picks for Xander and Eovaldi would have been a better, ~70 rather than 132 and 133, if they had gotten under the tax even if they did everything else the same.

This was the big failure, to me (not to mention they lose International pool money, too, I think), but I really think there just wasn't anyone who wanted to give up prospects to take on any of their contracts last year.

 

[ZMart100]

This was the big failure, to me (not to mention they lose International pool money, too, I think), but I really think there just wasn't anyone who wanted to give up prospects to take on any of their contracts last year.

It sounded to me from the discussion after the deadline like there were offers, but the FO wanted more. I'm not sure we should have been averse to giving away JD for free since a prospect return would come later. I understand most of what the FO has done under Bloom even if it isn't always exciting. Muddling through the deadline last year will always baffle me.

 

[grimshaw]

The focus has been on the questionable deadline strategy, but it should have been an objective starting in the offseason if replenishing the system was the bigger goal. Maybe there could have been a bit more money to play with at the start of the season rather than scrambling to shed it at the deadline.

 

[ZMart100]

They assembled a team with flexibility to get under. At the deadline they were somewhat close to the wild card. I wouldn't have minded if they went for the playoffs and got better, though it wasn't my preferred strategy at that point. I could see the argument for adding too. It was the lack of a decision that frustrated me. They didn't really try to get better and didn't get under the tax. Treading water was the least sensible strategy.

 

[Red(s)HawksFan]

They assembled a team with flexibility to get under. At the deadline they were somewhat close to the wild card. I wouldn't have minded if they went for the playoffs and got better, though it wasn't my preferred strategy at that point. I could see the argument for adding too. It was the lack of a decision that frustrated me. They didn't really try to get better and didn't get under the tax. Treading water was the least sensible strategy.

I'm not sure how they didn't try to get better. They acquired an outfielder, a catcher, and a first baseman which filled three holes in the lineup. Granted, one of those holes was created by trading away their incumbent starting catcher, but it was still a hole that needed plugging. None of the players acquired were exciting or splashy so maybe that's why people feel like they were nothing. They didn't really work out in two out of three cases, but the intent seems obvious to me: marginal improvements for a marginal team.

 

[Rovin Romine]

They assembled a team with flexibility to get under. At the deadline they were somewhat close to the wild card. I wouldn't have minded if they went for the playoffs and got better, though it wasn't my preferred strategy at that point. I could see the argument for adding too. It was the lack of a decision that frustrated me. They didn't really try to get better and didn't get under the tax. Treading water was the least sensible strategy.

That's not what they were trying to do. They were waiting on people to come off the IL.

 

[AB in DC]

The question for me, if they were already planning to be under the tax in 2023, is there any added benefit to getting under for 2022 as well? I"m thinking probably not. So they reasonably thought there was no great return to getting rid of the (even small) chance of contending in 2022.

 

[simplicio]

The question for me, if they were already planning to be under the tax in 2023, is there any added benefit to getting under for 2022 as well? I"m thinking probably not. So they reasonably thought there was no great return to getting rid of the (even small) chance of contending in 2022.

Getting under in 2022 would have meant their draft picks from their QOs would have come after Competitive Balance Round B instead of after the 4th round.

 

[scottyno]

The focus has been on the questionable deadline strategy, but it should have been an objective starting in the offseason if replenishing the system was the bigger goal. Maybe there could have been a bit more money to play with at the start of the season rather than scrambling to shed it at the deadline.

They were coming off a 92 win alcs appearance, they were never going to go into the 2022 offseason and early season with the idea of not spending and shedding payroll

 

[wade boggs chicken dinner]

It would have been better long term to get under. The picks for Xander and Eovaldi would have been a better, ~70 rather than 132 and 133, if they had gotten under the tax even if they did everything else the same.

Getting under in 2022 would have meant their draft picks from their QOs would have come after Competitive Balance Round B instead of after the 4th round.

According to this article - https://blogs.fangraphs.com/an-update-on-how-to-value-draft-picks/ - expected value of draft picks in the 70s versus in the 130s is pretty minimal; they probably thought that the minor chance of making the playoffs had the better return on investment.