Reds general manager Dick Williams was on hand to witness what might have been right-hander Shohei Otani’s final start in Nippon Professional Baseball, reports C. Trent Rosecrans of the Cincinnati Enquirer. Otani didn’t disappoint, as he held the Orix Buffaloes to just two hits while racking up 10 strikeouts in a masterful shutout. Per Rosecrans, the Reds have legitimate interest in signing Otani despite the fact that they’re prohibited from signing an international amateur — and Otani does qualify as an amateur under MLB’s 2017-21 CBA despite significant pro experience in Japan — for more than $300K. Otani’s decision to leave well over $100MM on the table to jump to MLB this offseason instead of two years from now suggests that money isn’t his ultimate motivation, thus giving Cincinnati and other clubs in the international “penalty box” some degree of hope. That said, Rosecrans notes that Cincinnati is still a long shot to sign Otani, who may land in the AL where he can serve as a DH when not pitching.
Here’s more out of the NL Central …
- The Reds have decided to add a lower-level affiliate, as Zach Buchanan of the Cincinnati Enquirer writes. The Cincinnati organization will own and operate a ballclub in the Appalachian League, taking the open slot for a team in Greeneville, Tennessee. Jumping on this opportunity was part of a longstanding effort to add another lower-level affiliate, Buchanan notes.
- As the Cardinals look to improve upon a disappointing 2017 campaign, the team will change up the coaches working with the pitching staff, as Derrick Goold of the St. Louis Post-Dispatch writes. Pitching coach Derek Lilliquist and bullpen coach Blaise Ilsley are both on the way out, with the Cards said to be seeking “a more modern approach to starter usage and bullpen deployment.” The St. Louis org says it hopes to make new hires in short order.
- This winter holds as much or more uncertainty for the Pirates, though it’s not at all clear there’ll be much roster change. Stephen Nesbitt of the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette tackles some fan questions in an interesting read. He predicts that, so long as the team doesn’t find trades for significant players, it will likely keep the same essential form as it had this year. (Side note: best wishes to Stephen as he transitions off of the beat into a new role, as he discusses in the link.)
Good pull by the Reds. I’m not sure why a team _wouldn’t_ be interested in adding 60 or so games to their organizational docket foe their prospects to get better at Be sure to draft more pitchers on the third day who will be reasonably good enough as professionals to be able to fire a few innings at the Appy League level.
“a more modern .approach to starter usage and bullpen deployment”?
Their pitching development has been fine. The Redbirds might be able to use a few more arms. As with above with the Reds, add a few more arms every season in the 11th-16th Rounds who can get pro hitters out.
Guys like Siegrist, Rosenthal, and guys like that.
What
Yeah, I left my decoder at home.
“starter usage and bullpen deployment” has nothing to do with development. The Cardinals consistently over work specific relievers and leave pitchers in too long. It’s more to take advantage of the great development of so many young pitchers.
If a team only has three or four useful relievers to take the required 18-21 innings per week, those 3-4 guys will get their arms incinerated.
Whereas, if a team has “Yankees pitching depth”, the innings-per-reliever can be better managed.
While StL used to have a Triple-A bullpen of worthy call-ups, they rolled quite heavily with a foreign import (Seung-hwan Oh) and a Rule 5 addition (Matt Bowman) the last two seasons.
They were both effective in 2016. And overworked. Hence, less so in 2017.
Depth plays, folks.
You can blame Matheny. I have routinely. However, until the pipeline starts producing useful relievers from internal means, other avenues become necessary.
And Brett Cecil gets 4 years and $30 million guaranteed.
I agree on the overuse of Bowman, but Oh was a closer in Japan and Korea and was a capable closer in 2016. I don’t think he got overused simply because closers have to be able to handle that load. I think it just became clear that Oh wasn’t a capable closer in a Major League role. So you can call it overuse but I think it was more that he just wasn’t the guy for that job. It’s a damn shame that Rosenthal went down because he was just starting to regain his 2014 and 2015 form. Oh seemed to use smoke and mirrors too often. Guys like that are never effective for more than a year…maybe year and a half. The league catches up.
You hit the nail on the head about the usage of Cardinals pitchers. Especially the bullpen. I believe Bowman throwing arm has to be 6″ longer at the end of the season that it was in March. I have no idea how he kept from blowing it out by being used virtually every day!
Maybe the Cardinals front office should apply the same “modern approach” to the actual manager. Matheny obviously makes most decisions on his brilliant gut instincts and rarely shows any evidence of using scouting reports or advanced metrics. Hence the same dopey mistakes for the past 5 years without any signs of improvement.
Read the article. It talks about how Matheny made his decisions. FO seems to be looking for a new pitching staff that will present a “more modern” aka metrics stats to give Matheny a different point of view so to change how they handle the bullpen.
It would help Matheny if someone anyone would have gotten outs instead of throwing gasoline on the fire.
really Dick! spend the money on players you might sign. not people you won’t. what a waste of development $$
Please reassign Matheny to another part of the orginzation
Janitor?
Beer vendor
Yes the relievers were worthless so let’s blame Matheny again.
Worthless? How about not used correctly and also a bunch of injuries that occurred !
It makes some sense for the pirates not to do a lot. They’re pretty set in position players, the biggest question there is Kang
Starting pitchers where generally poor but they got enough talent there that should be respectable next season. Unless they’re getting an Ace for reasonably cheap then standing pat is probably better option here.
They also have the makings of a good pen, Rivero could be one of the best, and a hand full of young guys that have alot of talent that haven’t gotten a lot of chances yet and also Kontos who might be one of the best transactions in the MLB for 2017
If anything add a quality pen guy, maybe two and if you are reasonably sure Kang won’t return look for a second or third base guy with a bit of power on a short term deal (duno if any are available though)
It’s safe to say the pirates will be doing nothing to improve the team during the off season and even more likely dumping star talent for nothing but empty promises and crappy records for near future.
Also just as certain, pirate trolls that blame no one but the fans for the short comings of this team will be on full alert to cry harder over the fans. Yet free passes for poor management and ownership will continue to be passed out in high volumes.
Basically a permanent catagory 5 hurricane setting up on the Alleghany River over PNC park would be less destructive then the crap storm heading to pnc park in April.