I disagree pretty emphatically with this, TB. What is there about Liriano's 5+ BB/9 and 1.5 HR/9 that suggests he can help at all?
http://www.fangraphs.com/blogs/ranking-the-prospects-traded-at-the-deadline/
Agreed. Liriano is like a LH version of Clay. Similar career spikes of inconsistency (outside of the PITT magic he experienced until this year) laced with injuries. He's always had BB problems. His performance this year stinks. Sure, he'd have cost a lot less than Pomeranz - for good reason. I think patient (and RHH filled) lineups - like TOR's - would eat him alive.
O's have 9; Jays have 10. A wash in the division, but it could be significant in the WC race.
I guess that's what I was asking about, your certainty. I see how you could assume that, but I don't even necessarily think that quote is certain to be directed at Boston. Or it could mean he wanted either of Yoan or AB, or Urias from LAD or Gallo and Profar or a handful of other guys on the three teams mentioned. Or he wanted one of the 3 Bs, All of them have multiple untouchables. I'm just not seeing where that means Yoan/AB, even though it's a certainly in the field of consideration. Frankly I'm not even sure the two of them together would have gotten it done, but I'm also not really buying that they were going to move him unless it was an extreme overpay, as in more than those two. But it never made sense to me that they would trade him anyway, so I'm probably jaded there.
Let me preface this with "I would rather have any of the 5 current starters in this rotation other than Liriano." And there are some red flags beyond "he's having a bad stretch."
Shocking -- the guy who is 5 years older with the more expensive contract would be a cheaper get that the cost-controlled 27 year-old showing breakout signs.
It's also possible that Pittsburgh knows something. It seems like they knew what was wrong with him and how to fix him, doesn't it? They took a guy who just couldn't seem to quite get his shit together and, while not as well as that great year early on with the Twins, they got him straightened out. (I know, someone could argue that Liriano straightened himself out and it just happened to occur when he went to Pittsburgh. That's certainly possible.) It has to be a little disconcerting when the guys who, apparently, knew what to do to fix him choose to get rid of him.
I'm assuming the conversations were serious in the sense that the Red Sox identified catcher as a position to upgrade and contacted the Brewers in good faith to see what it would take to acquire Lucroy. The two teams probably discussed players as well, but when the price was too high the Red Sox may have walked away or made a lower offer that was rejected by the Brewers. According to rumors, some kind of contact between the organizations took place regarding Lucroy.
Wouldn't that depend on who the Red Sox gave up in terms of value?
It actually would have been defensible. Dave Cameron wrote an article on that specific thing a few weeks ago. I'll look for the link, but his point was that adding a good hitter to an already good lineup is more effective than adding a good hitter to a weak lineup. The concept was if the overall lineup is good, that new addition is hitting more often with guys on base or getting on base with good hitters behind him. As opposed to adding a good hitter to, say, the Mets and he often comes up with the bases empty or stands at first base while his team meekly tries to move him over.
This is fair, but I'd say we aren't at the point in the success cycle to take that gamble. I would have loved that kind of buy-low move in, say, late 2014, but now we're in a tight pennant race. We need to take a "what have you done for me lately" perspective, because the difference between winning the division and a wildcard slot could easily be a single game.
It is quite beautiful. Carries a lot of value over replacement descriptions.
http://www.mlbtraderumors.com/2016/08/sox-rumors-sale-quintana-bradley.html#comments
Even straight up, it's not a no-brainer. Bradley's at 4.4 WAR this season, over 6 in the last calendar year. Sale's best season is 6.2, and he should come in around 5 this season.
