"not worthy of its own thread" offseason thread

[Fat Strat]

Reyes should be closer until the back end of the rotation needs him.

If Mikolas/Wainwright/Weaver prove to handle everything okay, leave him in the closer role. If one is failing, bring him in the rotation.

Easy enough.

Reyes needs to have at least 15-20 starts (say 75-100 innings) this season somewhere in prep for a rotation role next year. That would still give him a couple months in the pen.

[Big Amoco Sign]

Agreed but this role would keep his innings down for awhile and I’m sure one of our five starters will fail anyways.

If he’s Jansen-esque, you have to roll with it.

[Magneto2.0]

[Jocephus]

Ken Rosenthal of The Athletic reports that the Giants have agreed to acquire Andrew McCutchen from the Pirates, pending a review of medical records.
No word yet on the return package. The writing has been on the wall for quite some time now, but the Cutch Era is over in Pittsburgh. Coming off a disappointing season, the Giants made it a priority to pull off some impact moves this offseason. While they fell short in their efforts to land Giancarlo Stanton, they have now managed to acquire both McCutchen and Evan Longoria. McCutchen got off to a rough start last season, but he recovered with a .279/.363/.486 batting line to go along with 28 home runs and 88 RBI. He could be asked to play a corner outfield spot in San Francisco. The 31-year-old McCutchen is due to become a free agent next offseason.
Related: Giants
Source: Ken Rosenthal on Twitter
Jan 15 - 3:19 PM

[MrCrowesGarden]

[Farewell Friends]

It appears to me that the Cardinals don't really have a good Plan B to pivot towards once they get rejected. It was going to be Donaldson-or-bust at third base, which I don't mind. But once they reached an impasse over Archer, there were no other pitching options to target via trade and they seem loathe to commit 5+ years to Arrieta or Darvish. I'm more annoyed that they allowed a parade of really good relievers to waltz on by.

[ZigZagCardsFan]

I'm more annoyed that they allowed a parade of really good relievers to waltz on by.

In the offseason following the trade deadline where 10+ good relievers were dealt for a whole lot of not much and we sat on our hands.

[Famous Mortimer]

Sure wish Goold had been backing me up when I said largely the same thing.

[Fat Strat]

That's not even a rant. That's just a fairly concise, relatively objective analysis of what the last 3-4 years have been for the Cards and Cards fans.

[Radbird]

The amount of fallback options we have in the current pen is scary. I'd hate to play(pitch) underwhelming baseball in Apr\May watching Luke attempt to get his "legs" back. Flounder in June, while we watch a carousel of Brebbia\Tui\Lyons\Cecil(yep) try to pitch us through 27 outs. Then lurk on the fringe of the trade market, hunting for a marginal upgrade that MIGHT fall to you on the waiver wire...WONT IT BE SO EXCITING?? game over

I have posted about this before, but also consider who is managing all that. Even the club has admitted that Matheny is not the best at handling a pen that doesn’t have set roles. Outside of Gregerson as the defacto “as of today” closer, no one else really has a defined role. Is Lyons the lefty specialist or the fireman? Cecil the lefty guy or the 8th inning guy, since Lyons is the fireman? Or is Tui the 8th inning guy, or fireman because Lyons is the 8th inning guy, or the longman because Cecil is the 8th and Lyons is the fireman?

I am sure that they will come out of spring training with some definition and that will last about 3 games and then typical bullpen hell will break loose and Matheny will flounder until July when we trade a 1st rounder for a Chisek type.

Any chance Maddux can have a positive impact on ‘pen usage?