Workman & Hembree to Phillies for Nick PIvetta and Connor Seabold

OurF'ingCity

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You guys who don't like the return in this deal better prepare yourselves to see how little we get back for Moreland, Bradley, Pillar, and JD. No one wants to give up anything in a season that could end at any time.
They’re not going to trade Martinez, and I’d like to think maybe they could get something half-decent for Moreland since there’s a club option in his contract. But, yeah, they’re not getting much for JBJ or Pillar.
 

Papelbon's Poutine

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You guys who don't like the return in this deal better prepare yourselves to see how little we get back for Moreland, Bradley, Pillar, and JD. No one wants to give up anything in a season that could end at any time.
They aren’t trading JD but otherwise agree. I’m not seeing a team with a glaring hole at CF or else maybe JBJ but he’s too streaky.
 

Flynn4ever

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Pivetta is a sneaky good acquisiton here by Bloom; he's obviously done in Philadelphia given the rough 2019 and early 2020 struggles, but at this price it seems worth it to see if he can regain his 2018 form, where he fanned 10.32/9 and walked sub 3/9 -- with a 3.80 FIP and a 3.42 XFIP.

There are also things to like from 2019, where he fanned nearly 9 per inning but saw a walk rate spike. Seems like the issue here is the long ball, which doesn't bode super well for Fenway but perhaps Bloom likes him in the pen.

You need to find ways to get some starting potential in here with basically none in the high minors, so I like the speculative gamble here.

--

re: Seabold, stats look alright but pretty soft stuff from the right side. Polished college pitcher who might be a #5 SP or long-reliever. I'd have preferred some of the other similar arms in the Phillies system with better stuff [Francisco Morales stands out], but another guy that should help and soon, and could start. Fangraphs has him with a 40/40 fastball, so he's certainly an atypical type with a lot of soft stuff.
This might be a push to cut down on walks and nibbling . Anecdotally every game I’ve watched this this season feels like watching a staff of Matsuzakas.
 

Brand Name

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Has there ever been a case of a “PTBNL or cash” where the PTBNL turned out to be anything special?
None have ever made the hall but six, including the aforementioned Ortiz, became all-stars: David Ortiz, Moises Alou, Marco Scutaro, Gio González, Jason Schmidt, Michael Brantley. Trea Turner probably will join this group eventually.
 

Lose Remerswaal

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None have ever made the hall but six, including the aforementioned Ortiz, became all-stars: David Ortiz, Moises Alou, Marco Scutaro, Gio González, Jason Schmidt, Michael Brantley. Trea Turner probably will join this group eventually.
Cool info, thanks! Ortiz didn’t make a difference for the Twins when they received him as a PTBNL, but you’re saying there’s a chance with that list and I didn’t know that.
 

DennyDoyle'sBoil

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Have player 2020 year credits vested? In other words is it the same timing as the tax reset or have all players already vested? Is there any event that would keep UFAs from being UFAs?
 

JBJ_HOF

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Have player 2020 year credits vested? In other words is it the same timing as the tax reset or have all players already vested? Is there any event that would keep UFAs from being UFAs?
They are getting ~2.7 days of service time for every 1 day on the roster, every player is different. Stroman hit his mark and opted out.
 

DJnVa

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I guess Pivetta gets a shot on Tuesday. We shall see. Mediocre deal.
Doesn't look like it. The Sox are sending him to the alternate sight. Bloom said they want to get "their arms around him" a bit and see what they have.

https://nesn.com/2020/08/why-new-red-sox-pitcher-nick-pivetta-will-go-to-alternate-site-instead-of-joining-team/
“That’s a good question – so, he has been on option with Philadelphia,” Red Sox chief baseball officer Chaim Bloom said Friday over Zoom after making the trade. “And, look, this is a guy who we have a lot of faith in him as a starting pitcher, but just for right now, knowing that he’s been through some ups and downs, role changes over there, a lot of different things. We thought the right thing right now was just to get him to our alternate site, get our arms around him a little bit, get to know him and then we can figure out a plan for the rest of the year. We don’t know what that will be yet, but we want to get him in here, get to know him and then we can figure out a plan from there.”
 

nvalvo

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Thinking more about it, it's a curious trade. The established big leaguer is a lottery ticket, and the AA pitcher feels like we know what we're getting, although his excellent 2019 points to some upside.

But it almost has to be a good trade. Relievers, even good ones like Workman, just aren't worth much to a bad team. In contrast, controllable starting pitchers are worth a ton to us.

We have some interesting position player prospects in the high minors (Downs, Duran, Dalbec, Wong), really most of our pitchers (except Mata, really) are either probable relievers unless some real development happens (Houck needs an approach to LHH, Thad Ward needs more reliable command) or have various other impediments (Song is in the Navy, Groome needs like 100 more IP before we can really begin to tell what we have with him).
 

high cheese

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My son said the other day “I never thought I’d be so glad to see Heath Hembree pitch”. Sums It up. So long Heath.

Not super excited about our future as thrift store shoppers.
 

amRadio

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I like Seabold. I don't know anything about his health history and it appears he only made 11 starts and pitched 56 innings in 2019, so it would seem something is up. He averaged almost 6 IP per start from A+ - AA across 2018 and 2019, though. Had a nice run in 40 IP at AA last year. If he can put up league average rate stats or thereabouts and give us ~5.2 IP as a starter that's a huge win for Bloom. It's an "if" but when you sell for prospects, some "if's" have to pan out.
 

Jinhocho

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I am a fan of Bloom's thinking on Pivetta.
I am not sure Pivetta will work out, but odds are that he will not. That being said, I have always liked him and carried him in a strat league for years. A lot of prospects really struggled when Gabe Kapler took over in Philly. I cant speak for Pivetta as this being the reason, but I am not sure Philly was a good place during those years for players making the adjustment to MLB.
 

Papelbon's Poutine

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None have ever made the hall but six, including the aforementioned Ortiz, became all-stars: David Ortiz, Moises Alou, Marco Scutaro, Gio González, Jason Schmidt, Michael Brantley. Trea Turner probably will join this group eventually.
Good lord, I've no idea how you found that list...lol. Seriously how did you find that?

I'd bicker with Turner only because it was known he was the PTBNL, they just had the draft rules to work around so they couldn't literally name him, but he'd been agreed upon. The Nats robbed that trade.
 

edoug

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None have ever made the hall but six, including the aforementioned Ortiz, became all-stars: David Ortiz, Moises Alou, Marco Scutaro, Gio González, Jason Schmidt, Michael Brantley. Trea Turner probably will join this group eventually.
There is a huge name that wasn't an all-star because the All-Star game wasn't a thing yet. He probably won't make the HOF but he has his supporters, it's Shoeless Joe Jackson.
 

grimshaw

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Cesar Crespo

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I like Seabold. I don't know anything about his health history and it appears he only made 11 starts and pitched 56 innings in 2019, so it would seem something is up. He averaged almost 6 IP per start from A+ - AA across 2018 and 2019, though. Had a nice run in 40 IP at AA last year. If he can put up league average rate stats or thereabouts and give us ~5.2 IP as a starter that's a huge win for Bloom. It's an "if" but when you sell for prospects, some "if's" have to pan out.
Strained oblique. He had another 4 starts and 17.0 ip in the AFL last year too.
 

nvalvo

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I like Seabold. I don't know anything about his health history and it appears he only made 11 starts and pitched 56 innings in 2019, so it would seem something is up. He averaged almost 6 IP per start from A+ - AA across 2018 and 2019, though. Had a nice run in 40 IP at AA last year. If he can put up league average rate stats or thereabouts and give us ~5.2 IP as a starter that's a huge win for Bloom. It's an "if" but when you sell for prospects, some "if's" have to pan out.
It was an oblique injury. After he recovered, they sent him to the Arizona Fall League to get a few more innings and he absolutely dealt: 22 SO against 3 BB and only 7 hits in 17 IP. He wasn't even old for the league: 13 pitchers older than him on his Scottsdale Scorpions roster.

edit: oops, redundant...
 

Green Monster

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I like Seabold. I don't know anything about his health history and it appears he only made 11 starts and pitched 56 innings in 2019, so it would seem something is up. He averaged almost 6 IP per start from A+ - AA across 2018 and 2019, though. Had a nice run in 40 IP at AA last year. If he can put up league average rate stats or thereabouts and give us ~5.2 IP as a starter that's a huge win for Bloom. It's an "if" but when you sell for prospects, some "if's" have to pan out.
I don't think there is any cause for concern...He followed the 2019 season by pitching 17 innings in the Arizona Fall League and dominated
 

BaseballJones

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For reference...

Average age:
A: 21.2
A+: 22.4
AA: 23.8
AAA: 28.2
MLB: 28.5

So Seabold was really 23 when he was in AA last year. Just under the average for that level.
 

amRadio

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Thanks for the follow ups, guys.

I'm excited for Seabold, I think this was exactly the kind of pick up we were hoping to see from Bloom. If he turned 30 games of a reliever into 6 years of a starter, we'll look back on this one fondly. Here's hoping.
 

mauf

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I wonder if they think Pivetta is doing something wrong that can be fixed. Because otherwise, it seems to me you’d throw him in the rotation and see what you’ve got for 2021.
 

YTF

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I don't think there is any cause for concern...He followed the 2019 season by pitching 17 innings in the Arizona Fall League and dominated
FWIW, I was listening to the Sox broadcast on Friday night while driving to work and Castig mentioned that the trade was discussed on ESPN and it was mentioned that many scouts believed that Seabold had the best arm in the AFL last season. SSS being 17 innings, but hopefully they're were correct in they're assessment.
 

A Bad Man

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Seabold's new changeup could be a big deal. Excited to find out.
"Finding my changeup, just by throwing it in bullpens and playing around with it, that ended up being the best part of the whole injury," Seabold said. "The way I use it, the way I throw it, it was just some subtle tweaks really. I started turning it over more and basically overpronating to get it to do what I want. The velocity was always there, but the action has been even better, and that's what it needed. All of that mostly happened just by playing with it when I was hurt."
The AFL results, as others have mentioned, are tantalizing. SSS caveats apply:
Pitching on Wednesday at Salt River Fields at Talking Stick -- where Statcast data is available -- Seabold sat 91-93 mph with his fastball, topping out at 94.1 in his fifth and final inning. He threw 76 pitches, 16 of which resulted in swings and misses. That 21.1 percent swing-and-miss rate was a significant jump from his 14.5 percent average during the regular season, which ranked 13th among the 146 pitchers to get at least 40 innings in the Eastern League. What's more, those misses came on a variety of pitches -- six on the fastball, seven on the slider and three on the change. Also notable, Statcast has recognized the changeup, which sits 80-81 mph, as a curveball, proving that the pitch is fooling more than opposing batters.
 

Max Power

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The extra twist on his arm sounds like he might be throwing a screwball/changeup combo. That kind of action made Pedro's change basically unhittable.
 

LogansDad

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I'm going to be honest, Bloom's comments up above have me really excited for the future. There something to be said for leaders who actively try to put their people into situations in which they can succeed, and it seems to me that he is that kind of a GM. Dombrowski seemed like more of a "get this guy here and make him fit" GM, while Bloom, at least early on, seems like a "what can we do to help this player succeed" kind of GM. I don't think this team can turn things around immediately, but I think he has the ability to turn it around faster than some people think.
 

Rough Carrigan

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I'm going to be honest, Bloom's comments up above have me really excited for the future. There something to be said for leaders who actively try to put their people into situations in which they can succeed, and it seems to me that he is that kind of a GM. Dombrowski seemed like more of a "get this guy here and make him fit" GM, while Bloom, at least early on, seems like a "what can we do to help this player succeed" kind of GM. I don't think this team can turn things around immediately, but I think he has the ability to turn it around faster than some people think.
Well, in a slight defense of Dombrowski, he was bringing established players here so it wasn't necessary to the same degree. You bring a Chris Sale to the team and you know you don't have to do anything.

But I'm happy to see that Bloom is doing this.
 

LogansDad

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Well, in a slight defense of Dombrowski, he was bringing established players here so it wasn't necessary to the same degree. You bring a Chris Sale to the team and you know you don't have to do anything.

But I'm happy to see that Bloom is doing this.
I absolutely agree with you on Dombrowski, and he brought us 2018 so I can't even really complain about him, but even with Detroit his way of doing things was never really good for the long term success of an organization (which I think was known the minute the Sox signed him).

I think that from what I know and have read of Bloom, both in the past and recently, he is, perfect might be too strong of a word, but a really good fit for what the Red Sox need to do over the next few years. And I am really excited to see what he can do with this team.
 

Red(s)HawksFan

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I absolutely agree with you on Dombrowski, and he brought us 2018 so I can't even really complain about him, but even with Detroit his way of doing things was never really good for the long term success of an organization (which I think was known the minute the Sox signed him).

I think that from what I know and have read of Bloom, both in the past and recently, he is, perfect might be too strong of a word, but a really good fit for what the Red Sox need to do over the next few years. And I am really excited to see what he can do with this team.
Thing is, when he was in Detroit, he had a mandate to go out and win a ring before Ilitch died, and sacrificed the future a bit because from that perspective, there was no tomorrow. His teams didn't quite get over the hump (bullpen meltdowns aside, I thought the 2013 team was probably the one for Dombrowski, only they ran into a Red Sox buzzsaw that was not to be denied).

He came to Boston with a similar mandate only without the urgency of a dying owner. He was brought in to convert what Cherington had built up into a title, and he did exactly that. Bloom represents a needed change in direction in the wake of how Dombrowski was instructed to work.
 

curly2

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I echo what others have said about Dombrowski. It's really ugly now, but the 2018 team was immensely enjoyable. If you go for broke, you need to win, and Dave did that.

It will be interesting to see how fast Bloom can turn this around. Assuming they get through the next nine days and the luxury tax resets, there will be money to make moves -- like maybe Stroman on a one-year pillow contract -- to be competitive in 2021 and still try to build up the system.