How many moves wil KW make at Winter Meetings?

Chombi · December 3, 2007

Some of you give the impression that you think every single player on your team has to be solid to win a championship. You don't, we didn't in '05, and we won't next year. All we can hope for is a good group, some progress from the young guys and a little luck. In my opinion we need one more big bat, Fukudome or Jones, and we can compete if our young kids play well. Will we win a championship? Probably not but I would have said the same thing before the 2005 season too. Its much more about people stepping up to a role than how good your team is on paper.

Huge difference in 05. We had a good leadoff man for one. Our bats all had near career years offensively. We didn't really have anyone I can think of like we'd have this season. Jenks really is about it. BMac we all were high on and as a 5th starter, he pitched well. Offensively we had several battle tested bats. Not 3 guys with under a seasons worth of at-bats mixed with a potential 4th.

One other huge thing. We had 6 starters, not 2.

I don't think everyone has to be good but in the AL, in our division you need either lots of pitching...Which we don't have. Or you need a lot of offense, which we don't have.

I don't know how we can all pencil Fukudome in as some kind of stud or assume Jones will bounce back.

My whole thing is a lot of people on here are getting their hopes waaaay up and just assuming all of our guys will return to 05' form. Look outside of the box and realize we are at best the 3rd team in this division. I'd say worse w/o another couple moves. It'll be tough to compete with how good the AL is.

People will need to step up into their roles. 05' we had past performances to gauge expectations. We hardly have enough with some guys and others had bad seasons. It's tough to judge right now and that is what scares someone like me. I think with so many uncertainties it is very dangerous. We have 4 guys on offense who we are uncertain about, not counting the vets. And our staff has 2-3 holes. Same with the bullpen. Just dangerous at this point. Lets hope things shape out over the next couple weeks.

max power · December 3, 2007

QUOTE(Chombi @ Dec 2, 2007 -> 09:22 PM)

Huge difference in 05. We had a good leadoff man for one. Our bats all had near career years offensively. We didn't really have anyone I can think of like we'd have this season. Jenks really is about it. BMac we all were high on and as a 5th starter, he pitched well. Offensively we had several battle tested bats. Not 3 guys with under a seasons worth of at-bats mixed with a potential 4th.

We had Uribe and Carl Everett for the majority of the season. Timo on the bench. That's crap. Joe Crede was no prized piece at that point either. He was a question mark as much as fields is now, even his defense was not of any notoriety. Tad Iguchi was a huge question mark at second. Much more so than you are making Fukudome out to be further down in your post.

QUOTE(Chombi @ Dec 2, 2007 -> 09:22 PM)

One other huge thing. We had 6 starters, not 2.

6 starters are you kidding me? Going in to '05, Count wasn't anymore reliable than he is right now. El duque was a giant question mark. Bmac wasn't a starter or someone who was proven. He was also a question mark. So basically we had what we have now, plus freddy. Also I think Vas is better than garland and we don't know if kenny is going to add anything else.

QUOTE(Chombi @ Dec 2, 2007 -> 09:22 PM)

I don't think everyone has to be good but in the AL, in our division you need either lots of pitching...Which we don't have. Or you need a lot of offense, which we don't have.

I don't know how we can all pencil Fukudome in as some kind of stud or assume Jones will bounce back.

I think they will probably be studs, though I never said that before. They will almost definitely be solid number 6 hitters, probably better.

QUOTE(Chombi @ Dec 2, 2007 -> 09:22 PM)

My whole thing is a lot of people on here are getting their hopes waaaay up and just assuming all of our guys will return to 05' form. Look outside of the box and realize we are at best the 3rd team in this division. I'd say worse w/o another couple moves. It'll be tough to compete with how good the AL is.

People will need to step up into their roles. 05' we had past performances to gauge expectations. We hardly have enough with some guys and others had bad seasons. It's tough to judge right now and that is what scares someone like me. I think with so many uncertainties it is very dangerous. We have 4 guys on offense who we are uncertain about, not counting the vets. And our staff has 2-3 holes. Same with the bullpen. Just dangerous at this point. Lets hope things shape out over the next couple weeks.

Who on this board is getting their hopes up? I think we are on two different boards. The overwhelming majority of post here are from people who think we are going to suck ass, and when I so much as suggest that we could possibly compete if certain people step up and we get another piece or two, you start saying people are getting their hopes up? Gimme a break.

GreatScott82 · December 3, 2007

I think KW will be agressive on the first day tommorow and we will see a free agent signing and possibly even get a player via a major trade... I may be wrong... but im sure KW will be agressive early..

Chombi · December 3, 2007

We had Uribe and Carl Everett for the majority of the season. Timo on the bench. That's crap. Joe Crede was no prized piece at that point either. He was a question mark as much as fields is now, even his defense was not of any notoriety. Tad Iguchi was a huge question mark at second. Much more so than you are making Fukudome out to be further down in your post.
6 starters are you kidding me? Going in to '05, Count wasn't anymore reliable than he is right now. El duque was a giant question mark. Bmac wasn't a starter or someone who was proven. He was also a question mark. So basically we had what we have now, plus freddy. Also I think Vas is better than garland and we don't know if kenny is going to add anything else.

I think they will probably be studs, though I never said that before. They will almost definitely be solid number 6 hitters, probably better.

Who on this board is getting their hopes up? I think we are on two different boards. The overwhelming majority of post here are from people who think we are going to suck ass, and when I so much as suggest that we could possibly compete if certain people step up and we get another piece or two, you start saying people are getting their hopes up? Gimme a break.

K. Let's see.

Uribe in 05' was coming off a 23 homer campaign with an .833 OPS. I'd say that is much better looking then any of the 3-4 young guys in our lineup. So to say Uribe didn't look much better at this point in 04' is incorrect.

Everett was a proven 20+ homer guy who we were hoping would just remain healthy until Frank got back. We figured him playing DH would keep him healthy after a disappointing 04'. Again, something I was comfortable with. Much more comfortable then I am with Richar, Fields or Owens.

Iguchi in my eyes was the only real question mark but all we ever heard was he was a contact hitter that played good 2nd base. To me, I was all for it after. Again, he wasn't expected to do much outside of bunt or move Pods over. Not expected to roam CF and hit leadoff.

MB and Garcia were our front of the rotation guys. Both good. Garland we thought could do well as a 3 starter. Contreras was a huge ? and I remember being nervous with him but I also recall being so optimistic that he was out of NY and also formerly known as "The Titan of Bronze". Orlando Hernadez had played very well in NY the year prior to coming here and all of the concerns only were with his health. BMac had similar hype to Gio, maybe more.

Difference was we had good pitchers at the top. Garland and Duque we considered mediocre but not bad for 3-4 and Contreras/Bmac were wild cards in the 5 slot. This was how I remember looking at it when the season started. I'll give you we had question marks but 5 of our starters had been in the majors for a while, not the same as this year.

And I have seen lots of optimistic things on here. Be it the Garland trade, the Linebrink signing, trade winds section or the fact we think we can win by signign Fukudome and something else. And yea, your hopes are up if you expect people to have "career years" and other nonsense. I hate to belittle that train of thought but I say you're much safer betting everyone to put up their average years. If they do, it isn't a winning team. Not expecting them to "step up" and perform above expectations because then why not expect all our rivals to do the same and their players having "Career years" or "stepping up" will produce much greater results. It's illogical and optimistic. As I said.

Lets go a little further into the optimism. Juan Uribe should've been our least concern this offseason. He is a decent SS. One of few who have had 20+ homers the last few years and X amount of Rbi's. He does it hitting low in our order and while playing solid defense. Sure his OBP/AVG are low but we had much bigger problems/holes then getting rid of him (although I was pro-new SS). So what do we do. We deal one of our best chips for a SS, after we re-sign him. If you can honestly say Garland couldn't have landed a no.2 hitter in the form of an OF, or 2nd baseman then so be it. To me, a leadoff hitter would've been more important. Followed by any OF that can get on base at like a .340-.360 clip. Instead we land an aging SS who we hope will repeat last years first half, since thats what carried him through the season.

Don't act like there isn't optimism on here. There is enough. There should be more people frowning on this board right now because we just finished nearly in last place. We are 24 games behind teams who are GETTING BETTER. Meanwhile, we aren't. We are touching up sore spots on the team and hope the bandaid's hold over, and they won't.

Don't mistake some people who dream of landing a bigger name for guys who think this season will be bad. For further optimism, why don't you just go look into the thread of our projected 08 lineup. If that is optimistic, I don't know what is...So I guess if you haven't seen those things, maybe we aren't on the same board.

And I didn't mean to single anyone out or anythign like that. I was simply asking what you guys were seeing that I didnt or how you could say 2 moves fix this team when the two moves could be signing a Jose Guillen and like Bartolo Colon.

Edited December 3, 2007 by Chombi

max power · December 3, 2007

QUOTE(Chombi @ Dec 2, 2007 -> 10:40 PM)