08-14-2013, 11:12 AM
A counteragrument why tanking a season isn't necessarily the best path:
http://www.fangraphs.com/blogs/why-im-no...n-purpose/
I completely agree with the plan to stay away from big ticket free agents. Given the state of the FA market, the "big ticket" players should be players who are home grown. But the FO should be trying to find mid-tier FA's on two- or three-year deals and undervalued FA's, not necessarily to spin them at the deadline, but to make the team more watchable and possibly catch lightening in a bottle.
And, I think that was the plan for 2013 (Jackson was the mid-tier FA, Shierholtz was the diamond in the rough), but the struggles of the BP and Jackson sank the team, so they ditched players who weren't certain to be around in 2014. For 2014, I think we're going to see a lot of platooning, especially in the OF (basically trying to steal a page from the A's playbook).
http://www.fangraphs.com/blogs/why-im-no...n-purpose/
I completely agree with the plan to stay away from big ticket free agents. Given the state of the FA market, the "big ticket" players should be players who are home grown. But the FO should be trying to find mid-tier FA's on two- or three-year deals and undervalued FA's, not necessarily to spin them at the deadline, but to make the team more watchable and possibly catch lightening in a bottle.
And, I think that was the plan for 2013 (Jackson was the mid-tier FA, Shierholtz was the diamond in the rough), but the struggles of the BP and Jackson sank the team, so they ditched players who weren't certain to be around in 2014. For 2014, I think we're going to see a lot of platooning, especially in the OF (basically trying to steal a page from the A's playbook).