Eugenio Suarez’s Dramatic Resurgence
Three months ago, it was in doubt whether Eugenio Suárez would finish the season with the Diamondbacks. Arizona's offseason acquisition of the veteran third baseman from the Mariners seemed like a bust. Suárez started the season horribly. He hit .241/.310/.357 through the end of April and fell into an even worse slump over the next two months. From the start of May through the end of June, Suárez posted a .165/.259/.280 line while striking out more than 30% of the time.
By the middle of June, the D-Backs were contemplating a change. On June 9, USA Today's Bob Nightengale wrote that the D-Backs were willing to consider what would've been a salary dump trade. Nightengale indicated that Suárez's hold on the third base job was tenuous and manager Torey Lovullo said a few days later that the Snakes would give more third base reps to rookie Blaze Alexander. That never really transpired, as Alexander scuffled in the limited playing time he did receive.
At the same time, Suárez began to find his footing. He reached base at a .391 clip between the time of Lovullo's comments and the end of the month. Once the calendar flipped to July, he transformed into an elite power threat.
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Fantasy Baseball: Well, You Lost – Now What?
Hello, friends.
This is the best and most exciting week of the fantasy season. It's a time for taking the final steps towards a championship, staying laser-focused on every minute decision within your control; whether to eke out one or two more points to pass your final rival in roto (or keep from being passed) or trying to win one final head-to-head matchup.
Or, perhaps it's a time to coast because your in-season dominance has been such that the chances of being caught have approached a literal zero. Ahh, now that's nice -- getting to enjoy the fruits of your labors a week early, taking deep inhales from championship flowers while exhaling some cutting and clever burns on your vanquished league-mates, perhaps referencing their past trash talk that now seems very foolish, in hindsight. "Ha-ha!", you might say. "You said that my fantasy baseball team was going to be very bad but it is, in fact, the best fantasy baseball team. In your face -- ha-ha, HA!".*
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Live Chat With Fantasy Baseball Expert Nicklaus Gaut
Fantasy baseball expert Nicklaus Gaut will be holding a live chat today at 11am central time, exclusively with Trade Rumors Front Office subscribers. This will be Nicklaus' last chat of the year! Use the link below to ask a question in advance, participate in the live event, and read the transcript afterward.
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The Rays Already Look Primed For A Rebound In 2025
After years of regularly exceeding expectations brought about by their low payrolls and reliance on unproven talent and/or reclamation projects, the 2024 Rays have finally had a rough season. At 74-78, they've been out of playoff contention for quite some time and have uncharacteristically been outscored by 60 runs. This will be their first playoff miss since 2018, although even that season saw them win 90 games. This is shaping up to be Tampa Bay's first sub-.500 season since 2017 -- a remarkable feat when considering the front office's perennially limited budget and the subsequent roster churn that brings about.
The Rays operated as sellers at the deadline, trading their most established power bat (Randy Arozarena), two starting pitchers (Zach Eflin, Aaron Civale), their All-Star third baseman (Isaac Paredes), one of their best relievers (Jason Adam) and a series of useful role players (Amed Rosario, Shawn Armstrong, Phil Maton, Tyler Zuber).
Oftentimes, deadline sales of that magnitude serve as a portent for an offseason dedicated to rebuilding, as recently illustrated by the 2023 White Sox and the 2021-22 Nationals. That type of rebuild, however, seems largely unnecessary in Tampa Bay. Even with a lineup consisting of unproven journeymen and a host of light-hitting, glove-first regulars (e.g. Jose Siri, Ben Rortvedt, Jose Caballero), the Rays already look like a team that could jump back into contention as early as next season.
Let's take a look at the reasons for that.
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Front Office Subscriber Chat Transcript
MLBTR’s Anthony Franco held a live chat today at 2:00pm central, exclusively for Trade Rumors Front Office subscribers.
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MLB Mailbag: Cardinals, Yankees, Mariners, Dodgers
In today's mailbag, we get into a potential offseason plan for the Cardinals, the impact of managers, third base in Seattle, whether the Yankees should sign Juan Soto, NL playoff rotations, and much more.
Sam asks:
Hi Tim, imagine your phone rings and it's Bill DeWitt Jr. he says, "Tim, I've always liked your work at MLBTR and I've decided that I want to focus all my attention on acquiring as many Arby's as possible. 63 just isn't enough. So I've decided to gift you the St. Louis Cardinals and enough money to maintain the team's current ranking in payroll among the other 29 teams for the next 3 years, effective immediately." How do *you* Tim Dierkes go about fixing the Cardinals?
I generally support efforts to put more Arby's into the world.
The Cardinals' current competitive balance tax payroll is about $216MM, so I'll just stick with that. That gives me about $92MM to work with. Key arbitration eligibles include Ryan Helsley, JoJo Romero, Lars Nootbaar, Brendan Donovan, and Andre Pallante. I'm pretty sure those guys will cost less than $20MM, so if I tender them contracts I'll have about $75MM with which to work.
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The Juan Soto Blockbuster Has Been Even Better Than Expected
Last winter's Juan Soto trade was the biggest in a long while -- probably the most significant since the previous Soto deal. The Padres were slashing payroll and didn't want to accommodate a salary north of $30MM for his final year of arbitration. Extension talks never got off the ground. The Padres were about to lose four potential starting pitchers to free agency, leaving them with Yu Darvish, Joe Musgrove, and a bunch of questions.
San Diego determined to build their return for Soto around MLB-ready starting pitching. They'd not only shed payroll but directly address the biggest need on the roster. It's impossible to trade Juan Soto and not deal a huge hit to the lineup, but the Padres could mitigate some of that loss by bringing back rotation help. Even the San Diego front office probably didn't envision it turning around the staff to this extent.
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Fantasy Baseball: Searching For ROS Diamonds
Hello friends.
Congratulations to those who have made it this far, but for most the journey will not be finished until the very end. With less than two weeks to go, many races will separated by just a few points, with razor-thin margins on multiple categories allowing for the possibility of many endings. Translation: All's well and good right up until you lose a championship on the last day by one-hundredth of a point in batting average and a single stolen base*.
*Not that this exact situation has ever happened to me. Nope, definitely not ever, and even if it had, I certainly would've gotten over it by now and wouldn't still be bitter.
Every one of these last games can be huge but waiver-wires are thin and most hold little overall value. But category specialists can still be found, as can overlooked players on bad teams, and teams who play their last six games on the moon. With that in mind, let's use the rest-of-season projections from Razzball and see if we can find anything floating around the wire.
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Live Chat With Fantasy Baseball Expert Nicklaus Gaut
Fantasy baseball expert Nicklaus Gaut will be holding a live chat today at 11am central time, exclusively with Trade Rumors Front Office subscribers. Use the link below to ask a question in advance, participate in the live event, and read the transcript afterward.
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Front Office Subscriber Chat Transcript
MLBTR’s Steve Adams hosted a live chat today, exclusively for Trade Rumors Front Office subscribers.
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