The Reds and pitching guru Kyle Boddy are ending their relationship after two seasons, per a press release from Boddy himself. Boddy and Driveline Baseball, his player development organization, surged into the public sphere not long ago as major disruptors in pitching innovation and date-driven development. The Reds’ hiring of Boddy as their minor league pitching coordinator suggested buy-in on Cincinnati’s side, as did their promotion of Boddy to Director of Pitching. That makes this split somewhat surprising, but the relationship clearly did not progress as planned.
What this means for the future of Reds’ development is unclear. Changing philosophies organization-wide can be a slow and clunky process, but it’s certainly possible that the Reds don’t plan to make wholesale changes. Still, moving on from such a public and outside-the-box hire suggests that the Reds will be moving in a different direction in terms of their minor league development strategy. Elsewhere around the game…
- The Nationals are planning on avoiding a full-scale rebuild, according to comments made by GM Mike Rizzo, provided by Jesse Dougherty of the Washington Post (via Twitter). Perhaps most interestingly, Rizzo says that the players on the squad now will make the foundation of their next championship club. Juan Soto fits the bill, for obvious reasons, but it’s unclear who else might be a part of that supposed core. Keibert Ruiz, Luis Garcia, and Carter Kieboom are the most obvious candidates given their age and prospect status, but none of the three is yet clearly established as an above-average regular. Time will tell if Rizzo is right about this current crop of Nats.
- The Athletics continue to take steps towards relocating from Oakland to Las Vegas. Per Matt Kawahara of the San Francisco Chronicle, the A’s will winnow a list of potential sites down to a few finalists sometime in November. Although Vegas’ involvement might have seemed like a bargaining ploy to start, there’s clearly a real possibility of a move. This saga is far from done, however, as the city of Oakland remains in negotiations with the A’s about the prospect of building a new stadium.
Kyle Boddy is insufferable. The Red’s probably had all they could stand.
Steve, I’m curious if this is based on first-hand knowledge, things you’ve heard are read, or…
Dumb hire to begin with. You pay a nerd like Boddy for the information/knowledge you need, say thanks and move along. You don’t make him the Director of Pitching.
Oh aren’t you special. Nerd to you meaning so much smarter than you it hurts your fragile ego. You must have been a hoot in high school when you thought you were someone but reality bites.
Not a big fan of gurus in sports
LolReds
Reds organization just don’t seem to have a long term plan, they change philosophy from time to time. On those regards they’re, hard to recognize, miles away from the Cardinals.
Yeah, it’s pretty easy to recognize the Cardinals. All you have to do is look for the most underperforming team in the NL year in and year out. I wouldn’t be surprised if Arenado opted out and willingly took less money to go to a real contender
You mean the team with a losing record once since 2000?
How many championships ? There’s the champion … and then there’s everything be else … the rest is just noise.
Who cares how many championships. Championships are luck. You build a team to make the playoffs and if you win 3 coin flip series you’re the champ. Anyone of the 10 teams can win every year. None is more likely than the other. Playoffs are a crapshoot and it’s not debatable.
As a Nats fan, I agree with this.
It’s quite debatable that certain teams are more likely than others, that’s why world series odds exist.
How many championships? The Cardinals have 2 in the last 15 years and more than any other team in history other than the Yankees. What’s your point?
Two championships and four NL pennants since 2004 is pretty good
Not happening. He’ll give it 2 years at least (they gave him an opt-out after next year), but IMO, he still won’t. Not guaranteeing he won’t after 2022, but seemingly unlikely at this point.
They’ve certainly been wishy washy in recent years. They seem to keep doing everything half assed.
For the Nats Fan’s part I know some are nervous about Rizzo saying the core of the net championship run is already here. With the “obvious” names given in TC’s reporting and their performance this year many may contend that those are not championship caliber players.
Yet thy are not junk either Carter was rushed to the bigs to fill a void at 3rd base based on his minor league performance. Likewise, Garcia was brought because of injury and bounced between triple A and the bigs for a year or so be fore the trade deadline
But what struck me is the names that were absent. Lane Thomas is looking for all the world like our leadoff hitter of the future with solid CF defense. And Josiah Gray, despite his struggles looks to have all the tools to be a number 2 or three starter. Gray, in particular, impressed me with the late movement on his pitches. His fastball seems to be easy to track until right before it arrives at the plate to strong offspeed pitches to keep hitters honest or put them away bodes well for his future development.
Finally lets not forget the Nats will draft in the top half of the draft consecutive years for the first time in a decade providing a second wave of reinforcements for the farm system So no this is not a rebuild. It’s more like a one or two year reload. Think of this as the 2010 ir 11 level Nats…
Glad you mentioned Thomas. I don’t think he got a fair opportunity in St. Louis. They will regret trading him. He will be a solid ball player for the Nats.
They could be the angels 2.0. Wasting Sotos prime years by trying to go for it every year. Nationals started their successful run by drafting high and getting some superstars. At one point drafting 3 years in the row the best guy in the draft. Harper, strasburg and Rendon. Yes I know rendon was like the 6th pick but if you follow the draft and know anything about that year you know what I mean.
Now the Nationals are going to have to giants their way to competitiveness which I believe is much harder identifying the proper castoffs. They just better hope they drafted the right guys the last two years that’s most likely where the impact players will come from.
What is all this wasting a ball players prime years? Teams are paying huge money to be winners. Sometimes it works out. Owners don’t get up in the morning and wonder how can I get Soto, Trout, whomever to a championship.
While i understand the ease with which sports fans slip into negativity, I would point out it could easily be The Nats division to take next year. with the Haul of MLB ready or close players [many of which have already shown value] and the experience they are gaining added to this years draft and the offseason signings [and yes there will be some surprises] this core of longtermers will look much different by the start of Spring.. And different again as they move into the season.
This division has been hit by significant injuries at the top of every roster. other teams may have lost more man game but as a division the NL East is in the top two the last two seasons. Healthy this Division is one opf the best in Baseball. let’s not forget what COVID did to the division last year and to the Nats in particular at the start of this year.
as for Jo Jo he is VERY young his biggest task in the AFL this season will be to Spot his fastball that tends to move off the plate at the last second. If he con do that consistently he has the tools to be a top of the rotation pitcher. But we both know having the tools is only half the battle.
Don’t forget Josh either he has pitched well
Agree with your sentiments, especially about Lane Thomas, not so much on Gray. Lane strikes me as a player who needed a new environment in order to blossom. Me thinks we have three of those types of players right now. Stephenson needs to go somewhere to start over as an everyday outfielder, ditto on Robles (AAA), and Keiboom. I could write a whole page on Kieboom but in summary, he’s not ready for MLB level of play and needs a couple of more years in the farm or to another organization to start anew. He needs to get his baseball “smarts”…on defense, on the basepaths, and certainly with the strike zone and would have learned that in College or the minors…
Guys you draft this year are going to take way more than 1 or 2 years to be productive MLB players and I don’t see enough in the upper levels of their system, especially when they need to fill as many spots as they do. MLB.com ranked their system 20.
Unless they plan to keep raising the payroll, I have a hard time to seeing them really competing within 3 years, unless that division continues to be awful.
They owe Strasburg an Corbin over $70 million next year.
If they’re trying to avoid a full scale rebuild, they’d better to pay Soto between $400 and $500 million.
Payroll
A large portion of the payroll was sent to other cities some of which assumed the deferred money. There is space in the payroll for signing draft picks, acquiring an impact player or two and further improving the farm system
The Draft
The Nats tend to take College players early,, especially when counting pennies. There maybe some perp players in the 4th and fifth rounds and definitely some prep players later. But the players who matter most will be here fairly quickly.. This is not as true when drafting late in the draft with a stacked MLB team . But this year is different
“date-driven development”??
I can see it now — the stats say that fastballs work better on even-numbered days, and you should throw more offspeed pitches on odd-numbered days …
Its cutting edge thinking…
Hope you’re wrong about Angels 2.0. I hope Rizzo doesn’t just put bandaids on the holes in the lineup. Give the prospects a legitimate enough shot to determine if they can play at the highest level. He acquired prospects that were in AAA and had some time in the bigs, so he certainly seems intent on the quick turnaround.
Las Vegas A’s
You can BET on it
Boddy probably wanted to get back to playing D&D.
Anyone who knows the dump that the Oakland Colosseum is and sees what the Raiders new stadium looks like would be crazy to think the A’s should stay in Oakland.
Wrong Luis Garcia TC. You have the St Louis pitcher.
With Oakland playing hard to get and uncooperative with the A’s, why should the A’s bother with trying to stay there? Las Vegas sounds like they really want an MLB team there. Besides, the A’s already have their AAA team there. LV is calling!