When are the windows in the AL East?

[nvalvo]

Here's something I've been thinking about as the roster has taken shape.

Since the 2012 team failed to achieve lift off and was broken up, we've been looking forward to opening a new window with a new core. The 2013 team was very good, but unpredictably so — they got career years from a number of players all at once. So 2013 aside, it's been clear for awhile that the window would open during the years of control of Bogaerts, Bradley and Swihart, with Betts' meteoric rise to perhaps the most promising of the group in 2013 and 14 a very welcome surprise.

The Price signing suggests a real emphasis from ownership on contending in 2016, which seems at least credible. The window extends until the pre-arb core of Bogaerts ('20), Bradley ('20), Betts ('21), Rodriguez ('22), Swihart ('21) and now Smith ('21) reach scheduled free agency, and during the contracts of David Price and Dustin Pedroia, with one year of Ortiz and two of Buchholz at the front end. The hope is that Ramirez, Sandoval, Kelly and Porcello will be complementary pieces rather than impediments, and reinforcements should arrive from a farm system that Jim Callis called the best in baseball.

Four or five shots at another World Series title, then. But everyone here is familiar with this team, and where it is on the success cycle. I wanted to start the thread to discuss what's going on with the competition, starting with the AL East, but perhaps expanding around the game. Which other teams are expecting to be good during this projected window?

I'll start, but I don't at all mean to present myself as an authority on the state of the rosters and farm systems of all of these clubs.

Toronto

The Blue Jays are a fascinating contrast. Anthopolous emptied the farm last season to tool up for an exciting playoff run. But now, with Price departed for Boston and Encarnacion and Bautista nearing free agency, it's hard to see how Shapiro will be able to maintain a roster this competitive beyond 2016, unless payroll is going to be considerably higher than we've seen.

They should certainly be part of the pennant hunt in 2016.

2015: 93-69
Key departure: David Price

Tampa Bay

I'm sure where Tampa Bay stands, at all. They have a fantastic rotation, but little beyond it to recommend them. I have heard rumors that they may consider trading from their SP depth with an eye to the future, but I am not sure how much sense that would make. The farm system looks pretty interesting just looking at the rankings, but I'm not familiar enough with their system to have a sense of how impactful some of the coming promotions are likely to be, but Adames and Snell seem very exciting.

2015: 80-82

Baltimore

Machado and Jones are excellent players, but there's not much star power around them. That said, they have a lot of league average-type players and very little in the way of long-term commitments. Gausman and Bundy provide young, high-upside pitching. Even just keeping Davis and Chen in orange would make a big difference in Baltimore for 2016, but would it be enough? The farm is fairly weak apart from Bundy (and he has health questions), so I'm not sure what Duquette will or should do here, apart from extending Machado, which I would have done yesterday if at all possible.

2015: 81-81
Key Departures: Chen, Davis

New York

I've left the Yankees for last because they are the most curious case. They have a roster clogged with the usual aging veterans, but the front office is also clearly taking steps to get younger in the post-Jeter era. There's enviable talent on the roster and some noteworthy prospects in the high minors, and payroll is down somewhat from the recent excesses. From my reading in the Yankees forum, it seems like JA, Wingack and the gang expect NY to stay out of major FA acquisitions until the 2018 off season, when Harper, Kershaw, Keuchel, Harvey, Donaldson, and Richards are among the possibilities.

Do they even have windows in the Bronx?

2015: 87-75

 

[Buzzkill Pauley]

With the advent of the play-in wild card game, almost every team has its window open every season. Even the worst teams only really need about two years at most to re-tool, if ownership really wants the team to do more than rake in money (Hello to you, Mr. Loria!).

Moreso than ever, a team's chance to contend in any particular season comes down to health.

 

[Minneapolis Millers]

...
New York
... From my reading in the Yankees forum, it seems like JA, Wingack and the gang expect NY to stay out of major FA acquisitions until the 2018 off season, when Harper, Kershaw, Keuchel, Harvey, Donaldson, and Richards are among the possibilities.

Do they even have windows in the Bronx?

2015: 87-75

I'm sure NY and other teams want to be positioned well for that FA class, but to your last point/question, I think they could still make a splash next offseason, especially if the cross-town Mets again do well. They'll have Beltran and Teixeira coming off the books - that's $38M to play with. They could make a Heyward or Cueto-level signing and still save $15M. The following year, A-Rod and Sabathia are done. Yikes. The monster will certainly be awakened by that point.

 

[Philip Jeff Frye]

Do they even have windows in the Bronx?

Do we have them in Boston? Has the team gone into any of the last several seasons not expecting to compete? Even last year's horror show was preceded by plenty of predictions that the Sox would win the AL East. They certainly didn't hold back on the money saying "We need to let Betts, Bogaerts and Swihart mature before our window is open." It didn't work out well, but it wasn't because the front office punted on the season before it began.

And I would hope when the current "window" closes in 2020 or whenever it is that Boras escorts Xander out of town, we have plenty more replacements to coming through the front office's talent development system, be it from the minors or through free agency and trades.

Really, with the exception of Tampa, the AL East teams are all among baseball's haves. The fans will buy the tickets and watch the broadcasts if a good product is on the field, creating the revenue that will pay for that good product. A competently run team in Baltimore or Toronto ought to be able to avoid "windows" just like the Yanks and Red Sox.

 

[grimshaw]

I would say the Jays window is the shortest right now. They don't have much major league ready pitching depth, and had a couple of old men last year with Dickey and Buerhle, and a guy who missed a big chunk of time. Their system really needs some young pitching so if things go south they have quite the chips to move in Bautista, Encarnacion and Dickey. Tulo started to show some cracks last year too, but he should be able to outperform what Reyes had been contributing. Depending on if the Jays add a starter or not, I think they are primed for some big regression.

The Rays still have the pitching, and more in the pipeline (Snell and Guerrieri+), so if they ever opened the wallet and spent on offense, they could inch towards 85 wins. Obviously the stadium situation is holding them back financially, or the Tampa market just blows.

I'm starting to give up on Bundy, but the O's still have Hunter Harvey, and Gausman to hopefully help stabilize the rotation. Both should have more upside than the relative mediocrity they have. They're upper tier on offense, but if they go all in on Davis, they may set K records in that lineup between him Trumbo and Adam Jones.

The Yankees and Red Sox can still just buy their way out of mistakes and put together playoff teams on paper - so windows really don't apply to them.

 

[nvalvo]

My sense was that Harvey ended his season shut down with elbow discomfort and with a visit to Birmingham. [link]

If they want to contend near term, you'd have to think a Maeda bid makes sense.

 

[chrisfont9]

I would say the Jays window is the shortest right now. They don't have much major league ready pitching depth, and had a couple of old men last year with Dickey and Buerhle, and a guy who missed a big chunk of time. Their system really needs some young pitching so if things go south they have quite the chips to move in Bautista, Encarnacion and Dickey. Tulo started to show some cracks last year too, but he should be able to outperform what Reyes had been contributing. Depending on if the Jays add a starter or not, I think they are primed for some big regression.

The Rays still have the pitching, and more in the pipeline (Snell and Guerrieri+), so if they ever opened the wallet and spent on offense, they could inch towards 85 wins. Obviously the stadium situation is holding them back financially, or the Tampa market just blows.

I'm starting to give up on Bundy, but the O's still have Hunter Harvey, and Gausman to hopefully help stabilize the rotation. Both should have more upside than the relative mediocrity they have. They're upper tier on offense, but if they go all in on Davis, they may set K records in that lineup between him Trumbo and Adam Jones.

The Yankees and Red Sox can still just buy their way out of mistakes and put together playoff teams on paper - so windows really don't apply to them.

Re Toronto, Joey Bats makes $14m and Encarnacion only $9m, so when those deals are up... Well, Bats will be 36 next winter, so maybe he re-ups at the same level. But Encarnacion will be 33 and a hotter commodity. They'll have a lot of competition there. And I'm not sure they have any position prospects who are close enough to the majors to help for a while. It's impossible to predict "windows" for teams with money, which is at least three and maybe four of these clubs, but Toronto has the most to do to keep theirs open for more than the next season.

 

[nvalvo]

Perhaps my "window" framing was overblown/obsolete/too Moneyball in the double-wildcard, new-TV-money era. More holistically, then, how do we see the competitive picture in the AL East shaking out?

Toronto is an interesting case. Stroman is excellent and under team control through 2021, but the rotation options behind him (Estrada, Dickey, Happ, Hutchison, Chavez) are less exciting. It sort of reminds me of the 2015 Red Sox rotation: Buchholz with the ace ceiling marred by durability questions, and then a bunch of pitchers expected to be okay. Of course, Toronto's offense is really something, especially if Tulowitzki can stay on the field. But am I alone in feeling like there's some real risk that the Jays might not have the run prevention side of things where it needs to be, even in the near term?

 

[jon abbey]

I'm sure NY and other teams want to be positioned well for that FA class, but to your last point/question, I think they could still make a splash next offseason, especially if the cross-town Mets again do well. They'll have Beltran and Teixeira coming off the books - that's $38M to play with. They could make a Heyward or Cueto-level signing and still save $15M. The following year, A-Rod and Sabathia are done. Yikes. The monster will certainly be awakened by that point.

There's not much quality available in the market next winter, and NY has Bird and hopefully Judge ready to step into those two spots in 2017.

 

[Minneapolis Millers]

There's not much quality available in the market next winter, and NY has Bird and hopefully Judge ready to step into those two spots in 2017.

Sure, but they could take on salary in a trade (e.g. Gardner for something better/younger/more expensive). Someone could emerge on the cusp of FA into a bigger money player than currently expected and become a desirable target. Judge could stall. Etc. The basic point is that they're going to be gaining significant financial flexibility as soon as next offseason - unless getting below the LT limit becomes a real goal.

 

[jon abbey]

I do think they'd like to reset the tax rate if possible (and the new CBA will presumably have a higher limit so that will be easier to do), but I think the main issue with big financial outlays for NY isn't the actual money so much as the loss of roster flexibility, and that's what they're trying to regain some of if possible. For instance, Ellsbury is making $21M+ per year through 2020, so he's likely not going anywhere no matter how badly he falls off the cliff, also this is why Sabathia has stuck in the rotation the last couple of seasons, even though he clearly wasn't one of their best five options at times.

 

[nvalvo]

I do think they'd like to reset the tax rate if possible (and the new CBA will presumably have a higher limit so that will be easier to do), but I think the main issue with big financial outlays for NY isn't the actual money so much as the loss of roster flexibility, and that's what they're trying to regain some of if possible. For instance, Ellsbury is making $21M+ per year through 2020, so he's likely not going anywhere no matter how badly he falls off the cliff, also this is why Sabathia has stuck in the rotation the last couple of seasons, even though he clearly wasn't one of their best five options at times.

Do you think Cashman et al will want to retain this newfound flexibility and become more of a normal team in terms of distribution of pre-arb, arb-eligible and FA players, or do you think it will be a return to the frequent high-ticket FA signings of yore? In other words, do you see NY *only* signing one or two free agent stars in 2018 (say Kershaw and Harper), or do you think they will simply shift from the Teixeira/Sabathia/Beltran/A-Rod/McCann core of immovable veterans to a new and hopefully more effective group?

 

[grimshaw]

I think the Yanks big key in making another playoff run comes down to Tanaka's health, and Ellsbury bouncing back since they have really upgraded the roster all that much yet unless you consider Castro a good get. They got some value out of the position, but I'm not sure how much more he'll improve.

They have a pretty solid top 3 in the rotation (including Severino), and an otherworldly back of the pen - though not sure what they are trying to do with Miller yet. Teix had a nice year going until he got hurt, and then Bird kept the seat more than warm, but there's no room for both of them unless A-Rod breaks down or finally regresses. And he had a very solid year too, so even if they have depth in those two spots it's not going to help their bottom line wins very much.

The lineup just has no real upside until minor league help arrives. Aside from Ellsbury, the only other guy who could improve substantially is Headley which will probably happen given that he had an uncharacteristically tough year in the field. Still - there is probably a much better chance of substantial lineup regression given how old it is, though the infield D could help mitigate that a bit.

 

[jon abbey]

Do you think Cashman et al will want to retain this newfound flexibility and become more of a normal team in terms of distribution of pre-arb, arb-eligible and FA players, or do you think it will be a return to the frequent high-ticket FA signings of yore? In other words, do you see NY *only* signing one or two free agent stars in 2018 (say Kershaw and Harper), or do you think they will simply shift from the Teixeira/Sabathia/Beltran/A-Rod/McCann core of immovable veterans to a new and hopefully more effective group?

I think it depends how much they have in place from their own system at that point, and it will be interesting to see when the drunken sailor international spending spree from summer 2014 starts to yield MLB-ready players, 2019 might still be too soon for most of those guys.

But if the general dud rate of big name FA deals keeps up, I'd think that most teams would be pretty wary of dipping heavily into that market in another few years, especially for the age 30-32 guys, not just the Yankees. I get the argument that revenues are higher than they've ever been and there's no other real way to invest big money on your team, but even with that, I'm still not sure how many big FA signings really make sense in the post-greenie era. Rolling the dice on Price made a lot of sense for Boston IMO, but I think there are very few players and teams for whom that is actually the case.

 

[nvalvo]

I think it depends how much they have in place from their own system at that point, and it will be interesting to see when the drunken sailor international spending spree from summer 2014 starts to yield MLB-ready players, 2019 might still be too soon for most of those guys.

But if the general dud rate of big name FA deals keeps up, I'd think that most teams would be pretty wary of dipping heavily into that market in another few years, especially for the age 30-32 guys, not just the Yankees. I get the argument that revenues are higher than they've ever been and there's no other real way to invest big money on your team, but even with that, I'm still not sure how many big FA signings really make sense in the post-greenie era. Rolling the dice on Price made a lot of sense for Boston IMO, but I think there are very few players and teams for whom that is actually the case.

This is the kind of insight I was looking for. I'd forgotten about the IFA shopping spree NY went on, but it means NY has tons of upside in the low minors. Some of those will hit, but it's way too soon to know which.

And as you say, that wave of talent should start to make itself felt around 2019 or 2020, or sooner via trade.

 

[Papelbon's Poutine]

But if the general dud rate of big name FA deals keeps up, I'd think that most teams would be pretty wary of dipping heavily into that market in another few years, especially for the age 30-32 guys, not just the Yankees. I get the argument that revenues are higher than they've ever been and there's no other real way to invest big money on your team, but even with that, I'm still not sure how many big FA signings really make sense in the post-greenie era.

While this position may seem logical on the surface, I find it incredibly naive to think teams are going to stop spending big money to acquire big name FAs. It's not a new development that the contracts usually don't work out - there were plenty of busts before PED bans went into effect and there's been enough time since to realize that chance has increased. Above and beyond owners having more money in their pockets, the simple fact that revenues are so high means that if the owners dont* spend it, you're looking at a work stoppage.

 

[Snodgrass'Muff]

Do they even have windows in the Bronx?

Sure, but they face other windows.

 

[jon abbey]

While this position may seem logical on the surface, I find it incredibly naive to think teams are going to stop spending big money to acquire big name FAs. It's not a new development that the contracts usually don't work out - there were plenty of busts before PED bans went into effect and there's been enough time since to realize that chance has increased. Above and beyond owners having more money in their pockets, the simple fact that revenues are so high means that if the owners dont* spend it, you're looking at a work stoppage.

I totally agree with all of this also, but I think it's possible if not probable that NY specifically has been burned enough on these deals in recent years that they will be very careful with them going forward (and they have been for the last two seasons, everyone here seemed sure they'd sign Lester or Scherzer last winter, if not both). Of course there's no real way to be careful with them in real life, you sign the big contract and keep your fingers crossed it works out pretty much no matter who it is.

Also, I guess it could/would never happen, but somehow more money should go to guys in their first six years of team control. This would of course need to be in the CBA, and probably neither side has much interest in that happening, but as the average impact player gets younger, it would be the most fair thing.

 

[Papelbon's Poutine]

I totally agree with all of this also, but I think it's possible if not probable that NY specifically has been burned enough on these deals in recent years that they will be very careful with them going forward (and they have been for the last two seasons, everyone here seemed sure they'd sign Lester or Scherzer last winter, if not both). Of course there's no real way to be careful with them in real life, you sign the big contract and keep your fingers crossed it works out pretty much no matter who it is.

Also, I guess it could/would never happen, but somehow more money should go to guys in their first six years of team control. This would of course need to be in the CBA, and probably neither side has much interest in that happening, but as the average impact player gets younger, it would be the most fair thing.

I understand you follow the Yankees more closely than I do, but two seasons ago they signed Ellsbury, McCann and Beltran, as well as dropping the money on Tanaka. While also already having ARod, Teixiera and CC sucking up big numbers. And while taking about getting under the cap, which if I'm remembering correctly, you bought into before the spending spree. I wasn't surprised they weren't in on Scherzer of Lester because everyone has limits, even if they are pretty damn high and the Yankees need to consider the penalty surplus on every dollar they spend.

Regardless, with Teixiera and Beltran coming off the books, I fully expect them to be in on Stras next offseason. And with ARod and CC the year after that, while they may dabble, I expect them to save their big bullets for the huge class the following season. I think it's not necessarily that they learned any lessons, other than not to have so many such big deals at one time. Once they start clearing them out, I find it tough to believe they will resist doing it again, just not five or six players tying up $150M.

And it seems you realize your secondary point will never happen - and hopefully why it shouldn't - so I think we are agreement there.

 

[Mookies Lip Curl]

Re Toronto, Joey Bats makes $14m and Encarnacion only $9m, so when those deals are up... Well, Bats will be 36 next winter, so maybe he re-ups at the same level.

Joey Bats would have to nosedive pretty steeply this year to only command a contract around $14m AAV, or he would have to give Toronto a massive discount. An elite bat like his will earn no less than ~$20m as FA cleanup hitter mercenary.