Mailbag: Should the D-backs Trade Juan Morillo for Yankees' Luis García Jr.?

00:00:09
Speaker 1: Hello and welcome to another episode of Snakes Territory, part of the Foul Territory Network. Be sure to like this video, subscribe to our channel, maybe leave us a five-star review wherever you get your podcasts. I am Jesse Friedman alongside Jack Summers. And Jack, today we are here doing one of our favorite things. It is a mailbag episode and these are always a good time.
00:00:31
Speaker 2: Yeah, it's awesome. And, you know, I just want to lead off by saying, wow, you guys came through with so many good questions. This is a strict mailbag episode. We don't have to talk about any games or any other stuff. So we're going to get to a lot of them, but we got so many good questions. We're not going to be able to get to every single one, but we'll try to do some crossover and cover topics, even if your question doesn't make it on screen.
00:00:56
Speaker 1: Yeah, we were sort of like, we're going to have to make some hard decisions here. Otherwise we might have like a two hour long show. And in retrospect, we did make hard decisions and I kind of think we still will have a two hour show, but we're going to we're going to see what happens. We're going to go ahead and dive right in to a question from James over on Twitter who said, would you trade Juan Murillo for Luis Garcia Jr. from the New York Yankees? And of course, just to set this one up, this question does come with some context. There is a report from Joel Sherman over at the New York Post. that the Arizona Diamondbacks were actually the runners-up for Luis Garcia Jr. at the trade deadline. Of course, Garcia wound up going to the New York Yankees in a deal with the Washington Nationals. We don't know exactly what those conversations were like between the Diamondbacks and the Washington Nationals. But yeah, clearly there was interest there, understandably so. The Diamondbacks' need for a left-handed bat at first base slash DH was very well-documented. And Jack, Juan Murillo is a name that came up in Joel Sherman's article. More speculative than anything else, but the Yankees are always the kind of team looking for these fireball relievers with club control. Certainly Murillo is in that category and be a really fascinating deal if the Diamondbacks went in that direction.
00:02:22
Speaker 2: Yeah, this is a really interesting intellectual exercise to try to break this one down. There's lots of pros and cons. I don't want to say I do want to say up front that I don't have a firm decision on where I would land on this at the moment. I mean, I've only had this afternoon to think about it a little bit. But when I look at the pros and cons, I mean, first of all, if you talk about Juan Murillo, obviously he was fabulous last year, you know, had a few ups and downs. But for the most part, I mean, a low two ZRA supported by peripherals that were all under three. He pitched in 70 games, 64 innings. He's got fabulous stuff, fastball, slider, combo. I mean, they just, you know, the stuff plus numbers are all there. I mean, the stuff is there. He had the command and control that you need for the most part to be able to capitalize on that stuff. It was a fantastic year. And there's five years of control left of Juan Murillo. So, you know, giving up that, especially in the context of, You know, how many good relievers do the Diamondbacks have after free agent departures? We're going to talk about that a little later in the show. That would be a tough pill to swallow to give up, Mario. On the other hand, regression is a harsh mistress. And, you know, reliever volatility is thy name. And if you look at the projections, I mean, he's projected to have a 3-6 ERA next year. You know, and probably there's some regression to the mean for him. when it comes to what to expect from him going forward. So recency bias is going to make us feel like you can't give up Murillo. He's too damn good. But on the other hand, he's a reliever. Relievers are up and down. He could have an arm injury coming forward. So it's not like you're assured that you're going to get five more years of this season you just had. So that's the Murillo part of the equation. I didn't even touch on Garcia yet.
00:04:22
Speaker 1: Yeah, I mean, just to hit on Murillo, I know we talk a lot about how no matter how smart you are, you cannot reliably beat these projection systems that we look at all the time. But I'm just going to say, Jack, according to the Jesse Friedman projection system that exists in my brain, Juan Murillo is projected to have a much lower ERA than 3.65 in 2027. Maybe not much lower, but certainly south of that. I mean, this is a guy who had a 2.2 far 2.24 ERA in 2026 and 64 in a third innings. We have some other graphics that we'll get to here, but I'm going to show just his savant page, blow that up here real quick. I mean, this was not a fluke that Juan Murillo had in 2026. I mean, the whiff rate was in the 79th percentile. The chase rate was in the 93rd. He was almost impossible to barrel up at a 3.1% barrel rate. That was in the 98th percentile. He gets ground balls. He throws hard. He does everything that you want a relief pitcher to do. And do I think that Juan Murillo is going to be an awesome reliever for all five seasons that he's under contract for? Probably not. That just doesn't tend to be the reality with relievers. As you said, reliever volatility is... I mean, that is a very, very real thing, and we should acknowledge that. At the same time, given some of the other options the D-backs have in the bullpen, the fact that there is not much depth there, I think Juan Murillo is a really valuable asset. And I don't think this is a crazy trade, but I don't think I would trade Juan Murillo for Luis Garcia Jr.
00:06:08
Speaker 2: Yeah, the caveat I'm going to give you, of course, is going to go back to walk percentage. So, you know, 2026 was the first time in his career that he had a single digit walk percentage.
00:06:24
Speaker 1: Yeah.
00:06:25
Speaker 2: And through most of his minor league career, we were looking at low to mid teams, you know, like 10, 12, 13, 14, 15, 16% walk rates for Juan Murillo. Even in 2025, when he impressed, you know, in his debut season for the Diamondbacks, he had a 13.2% walk rate. So that's why the projections are having a hard time with him because there's no way for them to just say, well, he got it under, he got it to 8.7% in 2026. They're not going to project that walk rate going forward. They can't. I mean, the projections are based on weighted averages of, you know, previous track record. And his projected walk rate is 10.8%. So that's where push comes to shove. That's what it's all about with Juan Maria. If his command and control, like if he figured that out and that sticks and it doesn't revert, then he's going to beat his projections. But if it does revert, then he won't. So that's the Murillo piece. When we talk about Luis Garcia Jr., I mean, again, pros and cons, right? Young player. He's 26 years old now. Next year is his 27th season. He's left-handed, crushes right-handed pitching. and plays first base. What's not to like? I mean, that's exactly what this team was missing last year, a major missing piece. And he seems to fit like a glove. And so it's no surprise to find that the D backs were runners up, whatever that means, you know, in like he's Sherman throws that out. They were runners up. I mean, I don't know how accurate that is. And I don't know what prospects they offered, you know, or, Was it, you know, who, who they offered for, for him? I don't know. I mean, it's hard to say who they were going to give the nationals for him, but there's also the caveat that he's only got one year left of control. He's a free agent in 2028. So it's only one year versus five years for Murillo.
00:08:34
Speaker 1: Yeah.
00:08:35
Speaker 2: And secondly, teams do not increasingly do not trust him against left-handed pitching. And, Jesse has a graphic or two we're going to look at. This is from Baseball Reference, and it's the platoon advantage percentage, the percentage of the time that he had the platoon advantage, meaning the percentage of the time that he faced a right-handed pitcher. And in the first few years of his career, and before he basically moved to first base, he was playing almost every day, you know, or he was getting 73% of his plate appearances against righties and 27% against lefties. That's pretty close to what you would expect an everyday player. But then you can see starting in 24, five and six, once he was moved over to first base, that platoon advantage percentage goes up to 78, 80, 84% last year. So in other words, last year, only 16% of his plate appearances were against left-handed pitching. And there's a really good reason for that. If we go to the next table. As we can see for his career in 639 plate appearances, Luis Garcia Jr. 's hit 238 with just a 336 slug, only seven of his career home runs have come against left-handed pitching and 639 plate appearances. And he has a. 600 OPS. And that also includes 24 walks and 125 strikeouts. Last year was a little better than the year before, but it's still only a. 653 OPS. against left-handed pitching in 87 plate appearances. And when he went to the Yankees, he basically, you know, they never let him face the lefty. So, you know, yes, he can crush righties, but how much are you going to give up for a guy that you essentially are only going to play against right-handed pitching or should only play against right-handed pitching and where teams are going to, you know, just throw in their left-handed relievers against him all the time whenever they get the opportunity.
00:10:49
Speaker 1: This trade idea reminds me of a trade the Diamondbacks actually did make a couple years ago when they brought in Josh Naylor from the Cleveland Guardians for Slade Ciccone. Kind of a similar situation. You give up a whole bunch of control in Ciccone of what at the time seemed like a promising young pitcher. He hasn't been great in Cleveland, but he's filled a decent role for them as well. D-backs also gave up a competitive balance pick in that deal. But yeah, I mean, Josh Naylor was kind of a similar player to Garcia, a decent but not great defender at first base, a guy who is maybe Naylor's platoon splits are not quite as dramatic. You probably felt a little better about Naylor against lefties than you do about Luis Garcia Jr. But yeah, it's a it's a pretty similar profile. And, you know, you think about Saccone's value plus a competitive balance pick. a couple years ago versus Murillo right now. I mean, I think we're in the right ballpark here value-wise, but Murillo is pretty important to the operation of this baseball team. When you think about five years of him versus one year of Garcia, I have a hard time believing that Hazen is going to, you know, finally build a bullpen that was really everything you wanted it to be and then just turn right around and trade off one of those big names. Maybe in some case, but not for one year of a first baseman.
00:12:21
Speaker 2: Yeah, I think if Garcia had two years or three, he would do it. For one, it's a lot tougher. Yeah.
00:12:31
Speaker 1: Yeah, so we'll see. It's a really, really interesting idea that was thrown around. Again, I don't think the value is way off. We're not sitting here mocking this trade idea. But yeah, from the Diamondbacks perspective, seems unlikely that they would go through with that. I'm curious how Yankees fans feel about this one on their side of things. We have a whole lot more mailbag questions to get to. We're going to take a quick break here on Snakes Territory, so don't go away. We'll be back right after this.
00:13:02
Speaker 3: Hey, at FK and the Foul Territory Network, we have so many shows, so many schedules, so many hosts.
00:13:08
Speaker 2: It is really hard to stay organized. That's why there's House Call Pro.
00:13:12
Speaker 3: If you work in the HVAC, if you work in plumbing, if you work in construction, you work with your hands, they'll organize your schedule.
00:13:18
Speaker 2: They'll make your bill paying easy. It's all right there in Housecall Pro.
00:13:22
Speaker 3: Yeah, AJ, you can have a plumbing business, electrical, HVAC. Housecall Pro will help keep you organized. Estimates, invoices, the next lead. So you can do the job, focus on the task at hand, but still keep the business cranking. And on average, pros using Housecall Pro save more than eight hours per week. On average, pros grow the monthly revenue they generate through Housecall Pro by more than 35% in their first year. And Housecall Pro is already trusted by over 200,000 pros. Ready to save time and win more jobs for a limited time only? FT listeners get 50% off base plans for their first three months when you head to housecallpro.com slash foul. That's housecallpro.com slash foul for 50% off. After you sign up, they'll ask you where you heard about them. Please support our show and let them know we sent you.
00:14:04
Speaker 1: We are back here on Snake's territory. We really appreciate all of you being here with us. If you haven't already, be sure to drop a like on this video. It's a great way to support the show. If you're joining us on Spotify or Apple Podcasts, we say this a lot, but it really does give us a nice boost. if you would leave us a five-star review over there. And you can always find us on Twitter. We enjoy interacting with you there. I'm at JesseNFriedman. Jack is at ShoeWizard59. And those of you who submitted questions, many of you did that on Twitter. You can follow us at SnakesTerritory to submit. Or Jack usually puts a message out on Reddit as well. We try to pull some questions from both places. So thank you again to all of you for being here with us, for supporting the show. We really, really appreciate it. Sticking with the theme of first base here, we have a question from King Corbin on Twitter who says, what is your preferred first base option? Nathaniel Lowe, Paul Goldschmidt, Jake Bowers, Teraki Sato, or alternatively some sort of platoon of current players on the roster mixed with one of the names mentioned? Jack, I'll give you the first crack at this one. What do you think?
00:15:23
Speaker 2: Well, I think I can rule out Paul Goldschmidt. The team needs somebody that can hit right-handed pitching that is no longer Paul Goldschmidt. I know a lot of people want to see him back, but don't at me in the comments. Just please go look up Paul Goldschmidt the last four or five years, last year and the years before, against right-handed pitching. He doesn't hit them anymore. It's just that simple. So I'm going to eliminate Paul Goldschmidt from this. Jake Bowers, I mean, he had an excellent season. There's kind of a big emotional story for him, you know, as far as how he ended up, you know, getting to where he's at with Milwaukee. I'd be surprised if they didn't try to bring him back. And I think that his price tag went up, went up exponentially with that 12 pitch walk last night. So, you know, I'm probably going to land back on Nathaniel Lowe. I think that he's a guy that you can very easily slot in there as your left-handed first base slash DH option. If somebody emerges for you at first base or you need to remove them for a defensive replacement, you can always do that. And he's not going to be a problem in your clubhouse over it. You know, Nathaniel Lowe's known as a good clubhouse guy. He's not going to wow you, but Nathaniel Lowe is an established veteran player. who is everything that Pavin Smith was supposed to be. That, I mean, the dream, if you were dreaming on Pavin Smith in years back, a guy that give you 110 to 120 OPS plus hitting from the left side, getting on base, hitting with at least some power. That's what, you know, Pavin Smith was supposed to be. That's what Nathaniel Lowe is. And he's a veteran. He knows how to get it done. He had a big hit last night in the post season, but that's, I've been beating Nathaniel Lowe drum for a long time, so I'll stick with it. I mean, I think you can get him on a one year with an option or a two year deal. I think, you know, it'd probably be pretty reasonably priced. He didn't have such a great season that, you know, his price has gone through the roof, but it would be still such an upgrade over what the Diamondbacks have.
00:17:34
Speaker 1: I think Nathaniel Lowe would be totally fine. He has 761 OPS this season, 111 OPS plus, as you said, a big upgrade for the Diamondbacks offensively. I do think, I mean, the defense metrics there are not great. There was a time when Nathaniel Lowe was a decent first baseman. He won a gold glove a few years ago with the Texas Rangers back in 2023. But he didn't play a whole lot of first base this season. And you look at the metrics when he was at first base and they were really not very pretty. Um, so I, I think that could be a, a point of hesitation for the diamond backs. I'm looking at the numbers here. He was at minus seven DRS, uh, minus three fielding run value in 494 innings. Uh, so that's in, uh, 69 games over first base 47 at DH. So, uh, so I think that could be a point of hesitation there. Uh, he's, he's really more of a bat first guy. Uh, he also had an 83 OPS plus with Cleveland, uh, So after the trade, Nathaniel Lowe took a pretty steep downturn. I know he's come through in some moments in the playoffs, but I don't think he's the plan A because I think you'd hope you could do better than Nathaniel Lowe over the course of the offseason. But he's certainly better than what the Diamondbacks have in house. As for the other options, I agree with you on Paul Goldschmidt. I think he's a platoon player and the platoon is just going the wrong direction at this point. so that the D-backs do not need another right-handed hitter who really only can hit lefties. And that leaves us with Jake Bowers, who you mentioned, and then Tereraki Sato, who is expected to come over from Japan. He is maybe the most interesting name out of this list. I mean, we all just saw what Murakami managed to do for the White Sox. Sato's numbers in Japan were not quite as eye-popping as Murakami. I don't think you'd be expecting quite that level of power, but he's 27 years old. He's played third base and outfield over in Japan, probably going to come over and play first base in the States. But yeah, the Diamondbacks haven't really played in that market in the past, and may they really like this guy this could be a a player where they they really push the chips.
00:19:54
Speaker 2: In um yeah i mean look you know if ken hadn't come out and said that he was cutting payroll sure but i mean you know it's going to cost a posting fee um and you know he's going to get similar money to murakami i mean the guy's coming off 40 and 39 home run seasons, left-handed bat. But, you know, here in the States, he's probably going to hit 20, 25 homers with a 30% strikeout rate. And, you know, I don't think Ken's going to pay a posting fee plus 15, $ 18 million a year for that. So I, I wouldn't, I wouldn't mind rolling the dice on him and seeing if you get lucky a little bit, you know, with, with him. But again, I just don't think it's very realistic in the framework of what we're looking at. I think if we're looking at a free agent, I go back to low because it's affordable and at least you know what you're going to get. And of course, that's why we were just talking about Garcia because that's an opportunity via trade. The reality is there are no easy, clear-cut options for the Diamondbacks. And if they're going to trade for a first baseman, that's any better than this free agent list. It's going to cost them dearly, either off the major league roster or in prospects or both. So it's going to be a tough hole to fill. It's not going to be an easy hole for them to fill, is my conclusion. Now, we're going to do a whole show on first base a little later in the offseason. But I think we've pretty much hit the main points here. We just got a lot more homework to do.
00:21:29
Speaker 1: I guess kind of sticking on that topic, here's a question from SuspiciousBug4770 on Reddit, who says, is there any validity to the narrative that has been discussed regarding moving Cattell Marte to first base to fill that hole if he's not traded and relying on Troy slash Krasantis at second base? Clearly still need more production out of the DH spot, but the D-backs haven't treated that position as a whole. in any of the seasons since the NLDH addition. Seems like they use the position exclusively as a way to get veteran players a half day off. Is there any indication that their philosophy on DHs has changed? I guess I'll start this conversation by saying the D-backs did run Jock Peterson out there in the DH slot a couple years ago, and that was certainly a change of course for them. They've shown a willingness to at least put an established slugger in that spot. But yeah, given where Cattell Marte is at at this stage in his career, and I think also Gabriel Moreno, the productivity that he gave them in the DH slot, it is maybe a little bit, seems unlikely that they would go out and just pick up a DH this offseason.
00:22:46
Speaker 2: Or ironically, Gabby didn't actually hit all that well as a DH. He hit much better when he was catching. Sure.
00:22:53
Speaker 1: But it's always hard to tease out, like, is that a real thing or is that just kind of the, you know, the way it played out for, for a season?
00:22:59
Speaker 2: Well, there's a DH penalty for position players at DH. It's just like, there's a very severe pinch hit penalty. There is a research backed DH penalty. So position players that, you know, get 10, 20, 30% of their plate appearances via DH to quote unquote, get them off their feet. Typically on average hit worse than, they do when they're playing in the field. It's not straight chalk. There's exceptions, but it's been studied and that's kind of the reality. And that's what it was for Gabby. But I mean, between Gabby and Cattell, those two guys are going to get plenty of DH appearances. And so I don't think the team is going to go back out and get the next Jock Peterson, my opinion. I don't think, I think they're going to be more focused on trying to get the next Jock Peterson for first base is what, is what I think they're going to do. But, Hard to say. The other thing here is they're not going to move Cattell. I'd be shocked, I should say, if they move Cattell to first base and he did so willingly. They've got enough problems with him. He doesn't want to play first base. You know, and moving him to that position is not something that is going to make things easier in their relationship with him, for sure. So, you know, you can say, well, just stick him there and tell him he's got to play. Whatever. You know, I mean, let's just be realistic here. That's not what's likely to happen.
00:24:22
Speaker 1: Sticking with Cattell Marte. We have this question from Joker for goat on Reddit, who says multimillion dollar question. Will Cattell Marte be playing for Arizona come opening day of 2027? Jack, what do you think?
00:24:39
Speaker 2: Um, I think the team is, um, doing either one or two things. They, they republished a video, um, today, October 13th at, uh, the, you know, off of the MLB video, uh, archives. And it was all teammates praising him, uh, for the player he was, for the teammate he was, for the energy he brings, um, one after another, after another of all of his teammates, uh, praising him and saying how great he was. Uh, so either they're trying to pump them up for a trade or they're trying to prepare the fan base for the fact that he's not going anywhere. Um, I don't think he's going to be traded because I said this last year ad nauseum. I don't think he's going to be traded because I don't think they're going to find the value that Mike Hazen's looking for in a trade. Turned out to be correct in that. You know, hindsight 2020, there might have been some trades on the table that they could have or should have accepted. But at the time, you know, none of us felt like those trades were enough for Cattell. or we're going to be enough to entice Mike Hazen to trade Cattell. And I think that now the perceived market value for him is only significantly lower. I mean, another cheap year is off the books now, right? And he's one year closer to that section of his contract that's not so cheap. He's got $ 13 million this year, but then it jumps to like $ 20 million the next three after that. and then an 11 million player option for his age 37 season. So he's no longer cheap after 2027. And, you know, he's going to be 34, 35, 36 for those years. So I don't think you add in all the off-field baggage. I don't think the trade value is going to be enough to entice Mike Hazen to pull the trigger. Now, I could be wrong, as I often am. And maybe some team says, yeah, we don't care about any of that. We can handle Cattell. We'll get it right. We think he's primed for a bounce back year. Look at his ex-roba and then go get something done. And that may happen. I mean, you know, never say never.
00:26:56
Speaker 1: I think in some ways, the only question that really matters here is what, what are the, what is the D-backs perception of like Cattell Marte standing in the clubhouse? I mean, do they really feel behind the scenes? Of course, they would never say this publicly, but do they feel like they owe it to the other guys in that clubhouse to move on from Quetel Marte and just kind of start a new chapter without him in this organization? There were some comments that Mike Hazen made that we talked about in his presser, some of his interviews after the season ended, where he acknowledged that he wasn't blind to what's going on in the clubhouse. He talked about needing to evaluate whether core of players that he has right now is the right core moving forward. And certainly he wasn't talking about trading, you know, Corbin Carroll or Geraldo Perdomo, very likely not Gabriel Moreno either. He was talking about maybe trading Quetel Marte. So I think that's the most important variable here. Based on some reporting that Nick Pecoro has done, he of course visited us here last week. It sounds like There were people in the Diamondbacks clubhouse last year who told him that they kind of had an expectation that this offseason, the D-backs were going to deal with this. We're going to move Cattell elsewhere. And so I think that's possible. I think it is very possible that that's really how the team feels behind the scenes. They're never going to say it publicly again. So I'm not surprised that they're not openly saying, yes, we're going to trade Cattell Marte right now. But I mean, I couldn't sit here and say I know the answer to this question. I think anyone who told you definitively that they knew Cattell was either going to be here or not going to be here, I think that's just a lie at this point. But I continue to lean against it, Jack. I think I continue to lean against Cattell Marte being on this team in 2027. That's just kind of my gut feel based on everything that's happened behind the scenes and maybe some stuff that we haven't heard about publicly.
00:29:02
Speaker 2: Yeah, well, we'll see. I mean, you know, I don't doubt that any of that are major factors in all of this. But at the end of the day, my gut tells me that Mike Hazen will make a baseball decision that will trump any concerns he's giving lip service to about clubhouse chemistry. I mean, maybe he's just got to get hit over the head with it so many times that maybe he gives in on that fact. But he clearly never has before. I mean, the issues we could tell predated this year and they gave him a big extension anyway, you know, so that was a fun off. decision and so that he's already told told us how he views this situation and then today that the team you know releases or re-releases all these video clips of everybody saying how wonderful he is So.
00:29:53
Speaker 1: To be fair, I'm on their website now and they, they release, they re-release similar videos about Gabrielle Moreno. They re-release their best dressed video, uh, their Merrill Kelly, like drive around video. So I think they did like a batch of these. It wasn't just the Cattell one, but I, there may be other ones they could have released.
00:30:11
Speaker 2: And they chose the Cattell one.
00:30:15
Speaker 1: Maybe, maybe. But I think that's a fair– I mean, I think those are all fair points. The Diamondbacks, at the end of the day, if they move on from Cattell, if they do make that trade, you're almost certainly not getting the kind of value that you really want for him. Was there anything else you wanted to say on that?
00:30:31
Speaker 2: Yeah.
00:30:32
Speaker 1: Yeah.
00:30:33
Speaker 2: That's why I don't think he'll do it. Like, he's not going to get 80, 90 cents on the dollar. He's probably not going to get 75 cents on the dollar. If he trades him, it's going to be 50 cents on the dollar. And I just don't think Mike Hazen can will himself to do that.
00:30:49
Speaker 1: Yeah, that's fair. Yeah, and that's why I also am not saying like, oh, for sure, this Cattell Marte trade is going down. At the end of the day, it's going to be a hard decision for this organization to make. Transitioning away from Cattell, looking ahead to the future, some of the younger players on this team, we have this question from Mighty Schumann on Twitter, who said, who among Waldschmidt, Troy, Fernandez, and Lawler is going to take the largest step forward in production next year? I would imagine it would be Waldschmidt so long as he can get his K percentage down to even just around league average. I'll start on this one, Jack, and just say, I mean, I think Jordan Lawler is sort of my standard answer, but it probably has more to do with him just being healthy for an extended period of time next year and actually being able to stay on the fields than it does him being a vastly improved player. I mean, Jordan Lawler was already a pretty darn good player when he was on the field this year. So I think he's someone that you could see taking a big step and being a big factor in 2027. But really, that just starts with him finding a way to be healthy. In terms of the on-field performance, I think Ryan Waldschmidt is probably the name that I would think of first year. He certainly has more prospect pedigree than Tommy Troy or Jose Fernandez. And even though things did not end well for him, D-backs were basically unwilling to play him in the month of September. I still think there's promise there. I think he's going to be a decent player when all is said and done.
00:32:25
Speaker 2: Yeah. I mean, you know, the reason he fell out of favor, it wasn't just looking at the strikeout rates. I mean, it was, you know, Torrey and the coaches working with him and trying to, you know, giving him like, Hey, don't swing at this pitch. You know, this guy's got like a really good slider down in a way you got to lay off that pitch and then hit, just go chase it anyway. And that's why, I mean, like when you tell a guy that as he's stepping out of the dugout and going out to the on-deck circle, and then he does exactly what you told him not to do, it makes you lose confidence and trust in the guy. Now, as a young player, and he can certainly improve and figure that out, I think maybe losing that playing time, you know, probably humbled him a little bit and made him really focus in on what he's going to have to do to improve. But at the same time, you know, can he? I mean, this is the big question. We just don't know. I mean, he's had fairly high swing and miss and strikeout rates in his career, and so it wasn't a shock that he struck out as much as he did. I mean, when you see a guy striking out 20%, 22%, 23% in AA, AAA, it's no shock to see that go up to 28%, 29% in MLB. So, you know, that's my thoughts on Wald. Yes, he's got to get the strikeout rate down Cause you can't depend on a three 50, three 60, three 80 bad, but your whole career, unless you're Paul Goldschmidt and he doesn't hit the ball like Paul Goldschmidt. Sorry. The names are similar, but the quality contact is not. I'm going to go with Lawler. I mean, obviously it's always with the caveat of he can stay healthy, but if Jordan Lawler can get on the field for 130, 40 games, I'm not even being greedy and saying 160. All right. We're not going to have 160 game season anyway, but you know, If he can play well over 100 games, then to me there's no question in my mind that he will take that step forward and outproduce Waltzman, Fernandez, and Troy by a significant margin.
00:34:28
Speaker 1: Yeah, I'd agree with that. Fernandez certainly has a chance to take another step, and Tommy Troy as well. But I think in the long term, given what we've seen from those guys in the minors, your expectations are just naturally going to be tempered a little bit with both of those guys. Moving on to our next question here, we have one from Roberto from Twitter who says, how do we feel about Nolan Arenado going into next year? Is he slated to be our starting third baseman? It seems we caught lightning in a bottle with his resurgence this year. Can we really expect a repeat of that performance this Jack, I have a feeling I know what you're going to say on this one.
00:35:13
Speaker 2: What I'm going to say is if I intend to make a living trying to predict Nolan Aranato's demise or production to fall off a cliff, I'm probably not going to make a very good living because I certainly didn't last year. That's fair. That's what I'll say about that.
00:35:33
Speaker 1: Yeah, I mean, it was just unbelievable to see Nolan grow Get off to the start that he did and frankly look like his career was all but over. I mean, that was the feeling in the first few weeks. It wasn't just a bad stretch. It was like, man, like, can this guy actually, you know, catch up to a fastball at this stage in his career? And then somehow he found a way and he had an 806 OPS. He had 30 home runs. He he had his best season offensively since he finished fourth in NL MVP voting in twenty twenty three. He wasn't quite that level of player, but he was pretty darn good, Jack. And I think naturally you have to temper your expectations going into next season. At the same time, I'm not going to sit here and put serious doubt on Nolan Arnauto and say he's going to have a 500 OPS or something. But naturally, the truth probably lies somewhere in the middle. Projections are probably going to say he's going to have like a 700 something OPS again, you know, somewhere in the low 700s. And that's probably my expectation as well.
00:36:38
Speaker 2: Yeah, just don't go looking at a savant page. I mean, you know, that'll definitely skew you. Look, he made some adjustments, right? You know, he went and worked, you know, with the hitting coaches here and as well as some people on the outside. And, you know, he figured out some adjustments that he was able to make, you know, and he went pull crazy. I mean, he was always a pull hitter anyway, but I mean, you know, he took it to very much an extreme and pulled in the air and, You know, it just worked. You know, how many home runs did he hit into the left field bullpen, right? You know, or just to the right of the bullpen. I mean, that was his money spot. Can he do that again? Will pitchers adjust? You know, we'll see. But at the same time, you know, I had a lot of fun watching Nolan Aranato do his thing last year. You know, I never have a problem. Like, one thing, I'm just going to, like, segue off here a little bit. One thing that drives me crazy is like sometimes when people project wrong or get it wrong or have an opinion about a player that turns out to be untrue, they end up like hating on that player or, you know, going out of their way to try to tear the guy down to prove that they were right. And I can't stand that line of thinking, you know, Nolan Arenado completely proved my doubt wrong. And it was a joy to watch. I mean, I had a lot of fun. I mean, can't tell you how many times I turned around and looked at Alex Weiner in the press box and went, you know, like that was so cool what he just did. And, you know, you get to know the guy a little bit in the clubhouse, you know, very down to earth person, a very straightforward, you know, and very honest in everything that he said. And I just, you know, for a guy that's going to the Hall of Fame, I mean, you know, just his personality and demeanor I thought was very chill. Not like he's very intense in preparation-wise, but just the way he talks to you and deals with people. You know, I felt like he was a real revelation as a human being as well. So, you know, how can you not root for the guy? I hope he gets 30 more. It would be awesome to see. I hope he continues to make the adjustments. Don't ask me to do the math.
00:39:04
Speaker 1: Maybe he goes into the Hall of Fame with a Diamondbacks cap. I don't think that's happening. How many more years of 30 homers with the D-backs does Nolan Arnotta have to put up before he would do that? Maybe not in the cards. You mentioned his poll rate, though, and I'm looking at these numbers now. His poll rate on batted balls was 49.8% in 2026, far and away the highest mark of his career league average is 37.5%. So this was Nolan just selling out to try to pull as many balls down the left field line as he possibly could. And obviously worked out for him really, really incredible, incredible season season from him. Our next question here comes from rebel King two zero two three over on Reddit. They say, what player do you feel the most confident in on the diamondbacks heading into the 2027 season from each of the following positions, starting pitcher, reliever, and position player. This one is pretty interesting, Jack. Uh, I kind of sat with this one for a while. What, uh, what do you got here?
00:40:08
Speaker 2: Um, well, I'm going to go Brandon fought. Um, you know, I, I feel confident in him to post up more than anything else. Um, you know, it, whether or not he'll be able to post a sub for ERA remains to be seen. I mean, you know, he's still kind of ebb and flowing a little bit. I mean, he was fabulous for quite an extended period in the second half, but then he kind of faulted a bit in September. It wasn't quite the same, but he posts up, he can give you the innings. And I'm very confident that, you know, Brandon, Brandon Fott can give you 30 starts, you know, and 160, 70 innings or more. So I'm going to, go with him for starting pitcher for reliever. I'm going to go with Brandon Garcia. I think that he's a guy that's just going to continue to get better and better and more dominant. And for a position player, I mean, how could you not go with Gabby? He's a catcher. He hits. You know, I don't know if he's going to win a batting title again, as long as he stays healthy. But, you know, there's a couple other candidates on this team that you can go with as well beyond Gabby. But I'll stick with him.
00:41:14
Speaker 1: Am I allowed to say Michael Soroka for starting pitcher? Just sort of under the assumption that the Diamondbacks are going to bring him back, even though that's definitely not a guarantee. He, frankly, is the starting pitcher that I feel better about than any of these other guys going into 2027. But if not him, I think I have to agree with you on Brandon Fott, Jack. He had a. 377 ERA. It was lower than that in the starting rotation. We saw the adjustments he made down the stretch. He's not missing many bats at this point, which is not completely a bad thing, but it isn't great necessarily. But yeah, I think I feel a little better about Brandon Fott than even Eduardo Rodriguez. I know maybe that feels like a crazy thing to say. Erod is going to get some down ballot Cy Young votes probably. But you look at the underlying numbers for both of those guys, they're pretty similar. And Fott has, as you said, there's a durability element there. You feel like he's He's going to be able to contribute. Corbin Burns is total wildcard at this point for me. Merrill Kelly is hard to bet on. So I think I'm in agreement with you there. Brandon Garcia, I also have to agree with you on the relief pitcher side. It's close between him and Murillo and Justin Martinez. But Garcia, to me, just the eye test. He looks like the most dominant guy out of that group down the stretch. And then for position player, I will differ there. Gabriel Moreno was unbelievable in 2026. But I'm going to just go back to Corbin Carroll. Even though it wasn't a great finish for Corbin, he had a couple months that were really rough. Speaking of not betting against guys, Corbin is a guy that I am just not going to bet against moving forward. And I think I'm really going to bet on him to turn things around. Maybe he's not going to hit 300 or have an MVP type season like I was sort of predicting. going into 2026, that didn't wind up happening. But do I think he's going to have an OPS that's maybe a little closer to 850 or 860 than an 800 flat? I do think that. Is he going to continue to be an awesome base runner and a really, really good defender in right field? I think those things are pretty safe bets as well. So, you know, nothing against Moreno. I think he could have a great season again as well. But Corbin is just kind of the default answer. I mean, he's been He's been the most consistent performer for this team going back several years at this point.
00:43:47
Speaker 2: Yeah, I can't argue that. I mean, you know, again, with Gabby, the caveat is health. You know, I mean, if Gabby gets, you know, 550, 600 plate appearances, again, he was like 570 something this year, then, you know, he can approach what Corbin can bring you in all around value. But if Gabby's under 500 plate appearances, then the total value produced in a season is kind of hard. to hold up to what Corbin is going to give you, even if he doesn't hit 285. Yeah, right.
00:44:19
Speaker 1: Well, yeah, we'll see what comes of that. That was a good question, though. Curious what people in the chat have to say. Let us know. Let us know down in the comments. Our next one comes from PretendReach397 over on Reddit, who says, how do you see the bullpen shaking out going into next season? And, uh, Jack, I know you've done the, the spreadsheet thing here with regard to the Diamondbacks bullpen depth, and I'll let you take it away on this one. What do you, what are you thinking with, uh, with this bullpen in 2027?
00:44:49
Speaker 2: Yeah, well, you know, we, we touched on in our last show, um, the synopsis given to us by our good friend Diamondbacks stats and info of what, uh, John Gambadoro had said on his program. Um, and he said that the team was trying to bring back Taylor Clark, um, And, you know, he talked about Gerardo Carrillo and Juan Burgos and Cade Stroud as young pitchers that they're going to look for for depth. Mike Hazen also mentioned Burgos and Stroud in his end of season press conference. And really, I mean, it's fairly clear that they're not going to be able to bring back Jonathan Loizaga. His season priced him out of their range. He made $ 5 million last year. He's probably going to make $ 8 million or $ 9 million going forward on a multi-year deal. He's probably going to get two or three years, $ 20 million or more. And I don't think the D-backs are going to do that. I don't think they're going to spend that kind of money on Loisica. But somebody's going to give him at least two years, at least $ 7 million, $ 8 million or more guaranteed. Kevin Ginkle posted on Instagram what very much sounded like a thank you, goodbye message. Probably an indication that whatever discussions have gone on between him and the team, he's probably not coming back. John Gambadoro said that Ryan Thompson's not coming back. So, you know, when you look at the names and actually put them up on a sheet of paper. And so I've made this little graph and you know, at the top three, I have Brandon Garcia, Juan Mario and Justin Martinez, and they're all in green. They're clearly, you know, green lit as the, best part of your bullpen. And any team would be excited to have those three guys. And they all put up fabulous numbers last year, albeit Martinez in more limited sample size, but all very low ERAs, 193, 224, 203 for Garcia, Murillo, and Martinez, respectively, all with FIP and WIP and underlying peripherals and strikeout rates to match. But then again, I put the next three pitchers that have been mentioned by the front office in yellow, i.e. caution. Gerardo Carrillo, Juan Burgos, Cade Stroud. Now, they didn't have very many innings in the majors last year. Carrillo just 17, Burgos four, and Stroud three. And you really can't look much into their numbers. We were impressed by Carrillo until he lost the strike zone. I mean, the first strike, Eight or nine or ten innings he threw were fabulous, and then the last eight innings he threw were terrible because he couldn't find the strike zone at all. So I don't know where he's going to be at with that. On my chart here, I do show AAA innings pitched in ERA. Burgos had a 6.84 ERA, and Stroud had a 6.02 ERA for Reno. So, you know, it's not like they pitch great in Reno. Carrillo had a 3-9-9 ERA, which is pretty good for that environment. But these three young pitchers, that's the next line of defense you have for guys that you know are in your organization that are being mentioned by the team, that are being put forth by the team. And I don't think that's going to give anybody a measure of comfort behind Garcia, Murillo, and Martinez, who, if that's your bullpen, those guys are all going to give you 70 outings healthy just to have any kind of shot. And then down below that on the paper, I show Taylor Clark, you know, just because that's who is the, you know, he's probably affordable. He's probably not too expensive. He's a free agent. They're likely to try to bring back. And then the next section is six pitchers listed of just additional depth. None of it, which is very exciting. Dre Jameson, two lefties, Spencer Giesting and Yumin Lin. Giesting has already been converted to bullpen. Lynn has not. He's still starting. Dylan Ray, he was converted to a right-hander that was converted to the bullpen. Jonathan Bernal and Landon Sims. And, you know, none of them have very great numbers. And none of them look like they've advanced to the point where maybe Geisting probably deserves a shot, but he's not a stuff guy. You know, he doesn't throw very hard. He's more of a deception lefty as is Lynn. You know, and we've seen a lot of Dre Jamison. He's never been able to put it all together into majors over a longer period of time. So I just don't see the depth here.
00:49:36
Speaker 1: What I see is a team that's about to sign a whole lot of relief pitchers to minor league contracts over the offseason. We've seen that, I mean, the past few years, the Diamondbacks, I mean, all teams do that, and the Diamondbacks certainly have rolled the dice on a lot of those guys the past few years. But, I mean, right now, it looks, frankly, like you need to get three relievers from outside the organization. I mean, maybe looking at Stroud and Burgos, Uh, and, uh, who's the other name in that list?
00:50:09
Speaker 2: I'm forgetting.
00:50:10
Speaker 1: Carrillo.
00:50:10
Speaker 2: Yeah.
00:50:11
Speaker 1: Out of those three guys, I think, I think you could maybe talk yourself into two of them, you know, really deserving an opening day roster spot. Maybe Stroud finds his command. You know, Burgos did look decent when he was in the big leagues, even though it was just four innings, as you said, uh, Carrillo, the stuff is really exciting. Uh, but Even when you throw in a Dre Jameson and a Spencer Geisting and all these other names, I really think realistically you shouldn't be counting on more than two big league relievers out of that group. And that means you've got three more spots to fill in your bullpen going into 2027. And maybe one of those is Taylor Clark. Maybe one or two of them is guys like Jonathan Loizaga who were brought in on incentive-laden, pretty low-cost type minor league deals. And I think the diamondbacks might have no choice, but to really lean into that heavily next season. Yeah.
00:51:07
Speaker 2: They're going to have to pull a rabbit out of their hat once again. Yeah. They're going to have to be able to recreate the magic that they did last year. And look, I mean, that approach didn't work many years in a row and then it worked last year. So I don't know where my confidence level is for that approach to work this year, you know, and I hate to say it, but I mean, You know, some pretty heavy workload on Garcia and Mario and Clark last year as well. And, you know, relievers that have a really heavy workload one year tend to kind of falter the next. So I don't know if we can count on all three of those guys to be as good as they were in 2026. Justin Martinez, you know, throws a million miles an hour, but he's had two Tommy Johns. Yeah.
00:51:59
Speaker 1: It is just another aspect of this roster that is going to need some attention going into the offseason. We have one more mailbag question before we finish things out. Touching on a recent news item that the Diamondbacks are bringing Joe Mather back as their hitting coach. The question here from Reddit regarding Joe Mather's return. There seems to be mixed reception at best among fans. How is he viewed by players? Do we have a sense of how he's viewed by other clubs? How do Jesse and Jack feel about him?
00:52:29
Speaker 2: Really?
00:52:30
Speaker 1: Jack, I'll, I'll give you the first shot at this one. What do you, what do you think?
00:52:34
Speaker 2: Well, whenever I speak with Joe Mather, I mean, you know, he preaches a line drive approach, but the reality is the Diamondbacks were either first, second or third, depending on the metric that you want to use for it in, in being out in front of the ball or pull. So their pull percentage was I think the third highest and the amount of contact they made out in front was the highest in the majors last year. Um, but they didn't get enough power results out of that approach. I mean, like if you're trying to pull everything, um, you know, you need a lot more home runs than they hit. Like they were missing about 20 or 30 homers. Um, obviously, you know, a few players might've skewed that number a little bit, not, not, uh, you know, not the least of which was Nolan. Um, but it kind of really stands in sharp contrast to say to the Milwaukee Brewers who were the exact opposite. They had the least amount of contact out in front of the plate and the most going the other way. So, you know, I think that at the very least they need a little bit more balance here and they need to do a better job of evaluating the personnel that they have and making sure that some of the guys are going the other way with the pitch and And the guys that really need to pull, sure, let them pull. But Torrey often in the press conferences talks about having an all-field approach, but they didn't have it. They just didn't. They absolutely did not have an all-field approach this year. Now, was this the players not listening to the coaching? Was the coaching different than what we're being told in press conferences? I don't know. I was never on the fire Joe Mather train. I still think at the end of the day, it's up to the players. to figure it out. But, you know, obviously if the team doesn't hit better in 2027 and hit better situationally, then Joe's seat will not only be hot, it'll be pulled out from under him. Yeah, I agree.
00:54:38
Speaker 1: I think the leash here is pretty short after the season, the Diamondbacks just had, does that mean that Joe Mather is to blame for the shortcomings the Diamondbacks had offensively? Hard, hard to say. Uh, it's all, as we say, often it's hard to tease out, like what is Tori Lovello really responsible for behind the scenes? And what is, uh, you know, what is Brian Kaplan responsible for when he was here? It's really hard for us to know these things from the outside looking in. Um, you know, I, I think, I think Joe deserves a little bit of leash here, given that the diamondbacks kind of came out of nowhere a couple of years ago and had an unbelievable offense. I mean, there are success stories here, like Gino coming into the organization and having the renaissance that he did. Nolan, as we just talked about, having a pretty similar, not quite as dramatic, but a pretty similar kind of late career breakout type year. So yeah, I think Joe Mather is well-respected around the industry. We have no indications to the contrary, but understandably, the leash might not be too long after the season that D-Back just had. I guess the main thing that people are thinking about is the hitting with runners in scoring position and how the Diamondbacks struggled situationally down the stretch in times when it really mattered. But that's another thing that's just so hard to tell how much impact your hitting coach is really having. Sometimes the hitting coach does say all the right things and the team is just unable to execute. And on the flip side, sometimes the hitting coach is not contributing enough all that much maybe, but the results can still be good. Like these things happen and it's, it's really hard for us to know the difference.
00:56:23
Speaker 2: Yeah. I mean, again, we're not, it's, it's about a lot more than just, you know, uh, tweaking guys, hitting mechanics. That's part of it sometimes, but it's also about coming up with a game plan like day in, day out, uh, you know, how are you going to face this pitcher? How are you going to attack this pitcher? What's the plan to go after this pitcher? And that plan is a combination of work from the hitting coach and from the front office analytics team, right? So, you know, they're collecting data, they're bringing it to the coach. The coach is assimilating what data he thinks is useful and then bringing it to the players and saying, this is how we need to attack this pitcher. This is the game plan. And they do that every day, you know, every single day they do that. And so, you know, one of the consistent things we saw all year from the team was they struggled out of the gate, especially in the first and second inning and third inning, you know, the beginning parts of the game, they weren't getting it done against the starters until they saw the starter the second time around and got into other teams' bullpens, right? That's when the offense started to click. And that was a very, very consistent thing. So, Forget the runners in scoring position thing. That's just regression to the mean. They were great at it before. They were great at it the first two months of the season. They sucked at it the last four months of the season. Here we go. Wash, rinse, repeat. You know, the end of the day, that's not predictive. But the trend that really bothered me was why they couldn't get to starting pitchers earlier in the game. And it always took to the second time around in the order and into the bullpen. They need to correct that. They need to play more downhill baseball. They need to get to pitchers, you know, the opposing pitchers earlier in the games. The 40-whatever comeback victories, you know, that's not necessarily what you want. I mean, it's great that they never gave up. It does speak to their fighting attitude, you know, and they were grinding, but they just didn't ever seem ready to hit the first couple innings.
00:58:35
Speaker 1: I mean, I feel like we could kind of make the same case with even the struggles early in games. Like no team has been better in the first inning. Looking at the past five years, no team has been better in the first inning than the 2024 Arizona Diamondbacks. If you look at a batting average, the 2024 Diamondbacks hit 325 in the first inning and scored 124 runs, which led baseball that year. It's the second highest total by any team in the last five seasons. And I know that 2024 team had had more talent and that's not to say that's all Joe Mather, but I feel like in the same way that runners in scoring positions stuff can kind of vary year to year. I think hitting in the first inning can kind of vary year to year. It's hard for me to even pin the blame for that on Joe Mather.
00:59:26
Speaker 2: Uh, let's see.
00:59:27
Speaker 1: Uh, I can find that for you. Uh, let's see if we go to, so the 2025 Diamondbacks scored, uh, let's see, they scored 95 runs in the first inning. Uh, they hit 254 as a team. So I think that would also be a pretty good, a pretty good number. 95 runs that ranks in the yeah. Top third or so of teams of the past five seasons. So this is something they've been good at the last couple of years. And it's really hard for me to say that Joe Mather had something to do with the D-backs not being ready to hit in the first inning when they were pretty dang good out at the two seasons prior.
01:00:10
Speaker 2: Great counterpoint. Thank you.
01:00:13
Speaker 1: But it just underscores like it's really hard for us to really make heads or tails of any of this. The point is, Joe Mather seems to be well respected around the industry. And understandably, he's probably on a pretty short leash. after the season that the Diamondbacks just had. We could go on about this question and many other ones, because once again, you all submitted some pretty fantastic stuff for this episode. So we are sorry we have to cut it off there. But keep submitting questions. As I said earlier on the show, you could find us on Twitter. I am at JesseNFriedman. Jack is at ShoeWizard59. And our show is at SnakesTerritory. You can find Jack's written work over at Arizona Diamondbacks on SI. He does a great job. in the off season alongside Alex D'Agostino, uh, who's put, uh, pumping out some great stuff over there as well. Uh, Jack, any final thoughts here as we say goodbye?
01:01:07
Speaker 2: Yeah, I just want to say thanks again for all the great questions. Um, you know, it's funny. I just, I look at the questions, not the questioner. Um, like I don't remember. I never remember whose questions really we used last time. You know, it's, it's, So always bring your A game is the point I'm making. And you guys sure did this time. I mean, you know, we had 20 something from Reddit and 20 something from Twitter and, and like, you know, we had like 40 great questions to pick through. I don't think there was a single bad one in the lot. So if your question didn't get answered, please don't think that it wasn't a good question because we can't do a two hour show.
01:01:48
Speaker 1: Well, we could, but yeah, maybe. I don't know if anyone would make it to the end of that. But hey, if you made it to the end of this episode, we really, really appreciate you sticking around and being here with us. Once again, you can find us on Twitter. It's a great way to interact with us in between shows. And leave us a comment here on YouTube. We also enjoy seeing what you all have to say there. Our next episode will likely be coming on Friday. I know we'd mentioned we'd have a prospect episode coming with a special guest joining us. That is still in the works. Pushed back a little bit, but still in the works. We're going to do that episode soon. But yes, we'll continue to have two episodes a week and do our best to keep all of you entertained in the coming weeks. Is there anything else you wanted to add there, Jack?
01:02:39
Speaker 2: Oh, just the torrential rains. Raining out games in the fall, they kind of messed up the prospect schedule.
01:02:45
Speaker 1: Yeah, that's fair. That's fair. Yeah, hopefully there aren't any more hurricanes headed for the Southwest in the coming days. Won't have to deal with that anytime soon. Thank you again to all of you for being with us on this episode. We really appreciate your time. And we'll be back very, very soon with another edition of Snakes Territory.
01:03:06
Speaker 2: Snakes Territory