TRADE BOOM: Cleveland Guardians Could SCORE Big Swap After Sonny Gray Deal Shakes Market

TRADE BOOM: Cleveland Guardians Could SCORE Big Swap After Sonny Gray Deal Shakes Market

The first significant starting pitcher on the trade market has been moved and it bodes very well for the Guardians if they want to trade a starting pitcher. Tanner by really Guardians and you’re listening to Locked On Guardians. You are Locked On Guardians, your daily podcast on the Cleveland Guardians, part of the Locked On Podcast Network. Your team every day. Hey. Hey, what’s up Guardians fans? Thanks for hanging out with us for the next half hour on today’s episode of Lockdown Guardians, the only daily podcast that covers your team every day for the majors, the minors, the draft and everything in between. Part of the Lockdown Podcast Network, now the number one sports podcast network. I’m Justin Ladder what he took host for the last three years and counting and my friend and co host, Jeff Ellis. I’ve also spent 18 years covering the Guardians minor league system as a prospect writer and editor. As you mentioned. I’m Jeff Ellis. I’ve been here since Locked on started baseball. Before that, I was a national writer at Scout in 247 focused on prospects in the draft. I want to thank you for making today’s episode your first listen. Today and every day wherever it is, you get podcasts. So as a big shout out to all of our everydayers out there and the people we see every day in the comments, gave some shout outs through the course of the week. There’s so many of you. Disc Golf, that’s someone I haven’t given a shout out to. And we see him in the comments every single day. I haven’t gotten to you. Trust me, I will. But thank you all for joining us each and every day here at the number one sports podcasting network. Yes, we appreciate each and every one of you. Shout out to the insiders as well. So Jeff spent yesterday’s show, if you haven’t had a chance to listen yet, talking about where to find impact hitters. So today we’re going to look at which hitters in the Guardian system have the best impact tools. We’ll do our annual Prospect Tools draft, starting with position players, but we’ll start today’s show with the Sunny Gray trade to Boston and what it means for the starting pitcher market and if the Guardians can flip a starter for a hitter. Today’s episode brought to you by FanDuel. Right now, new customers can bet just $5 and if that bet wins, you’re gonna get up 300 in bonus bets to use across the app. Download FanDuel today. So the Cardinals, if you’re living under a rock or you just have been busy or you’re not necessarily tuning into the landscape of baseball. St. Louis Cardinals are kind of tearing things down a little bit. They I, for the most part they are. So they’re selling kind of starts with Sonny Gray going to the Red Sox who’ve been looking for rotate upper level rotation depth. I wouldn’t necessarily call Gray number two. We thought the Red Sox. I do. I mean his FIP was so good. Like the under the hood data is really strong with him. I mean the FIP was good. The fastball velocity is declining. He’s older. Well, that’s why he doesn’t use the fastball that much anymore. 22 usage on her last year, I believe. Yeah, so he goes to the Red Sox for one year for a lot of money. We’ll talk about that. But the Red Sox, what it looks like is there, I’m sorry, the Cardinals, what they were aiming for in this trade was, you know, to get Sonny Gray off the roster while they could because they have been looking for that trade and they’ll look for other ones. But one of the returns was Brandon Clark who’s a very athletic and big left handed pitcher who can touch 100. The fastball has really good fastball metrics. I was listening to Jeff Ponce, you know, who we on last week from Baseball America talking about. He has one of the most unique sweepers in the minors because he throws in the upper 80s and it has so much horizontal sweep and it’s just very unlike anything else. But there’s also a guy with health and control issues. So that gives him, you know, a lot of relief risk. But it’s a high trait arm which we know a lot of teams are going for. So that gives us an inkling into what the, the Cardinals are looking at. And they also get Richard Fitz who’s a mid-20s back rotation type guy. The big thing to me that was a surprise in this deal was that the Cardinals are sending $20 million to the Red Sox to cover the deal. So gray essentially gets 41 million because he’ll have a 10 million dollar buyout at the end of the year. So he’s essentially going to get 41 million for the season. And the Cardinals are covering half of that. And the Red Sox, they gave up, you know, a high end, A high end relief arm with a lot of risk. And Clark and then Fitz, who they’re upgrading from a guy who’s like a 5 starter to I would say, you know, Gray is a high performing 3 AD not I can’t go as far as a 2 on him right now maybe five years ago, the thing I’ll. Say with Gray is you give this guy all the credit in the world for how many times he’s reinvented himself. Like remember he got traded to New York and had his struggles and he’s bounced. But he’s. What’s made him so good is his sweeper. He might have the best sweeper in baseball. Like full stop. Like there’s. It’s, it’s definitely top five. And that’s why he had elite Chase rates. He doesn’t. He is maybe the best control artist in baseball, which is what ages the most gracefully guys who have that command and control. So a lot of ground balls doesn’t walk anyone. Guys chase and whiff when they make contact, they hit the ball hard. Like that’s, that’s the issue. His fastball six different pitches a year ago as well. Like it’s a very diverse pitch mix which we used to say, oh, it’s too many pitches. Now we’re finding like depending on how you mix and match and the looks like that that is extremely valuable. Like I think a sweeper is a legit 65, 70 grade pitch. His curveball is still a 60 grade. It’s mostly, you know, he’s not gonna throw it well. He throws it more versus lefties than righties. Same thing as his fastball, I guess. Fastball is a heavy use pitch versus lefties versus righties. It’s almost never touched. He is just going all sweeper and cutter, I believe. Well, he, he replaced it with the sinker. The sinker is his number one use fastball for and right handers. Yeah. Yeah. So you know, I think he is by the way. Yeah. I never thought Sonny gray we’d say $41 million so credit to him. But I think he’s a solid guy. I think he’s. If he’s. I think he’s solidly maybe between a 2 and a 3, which is a 2.5 is maybe the best way to put it. And the market is pretty sparse. Like Frambers had health issues. But he’s really interesting. Rag Ranger Suarez is great. Not gonna butcher the picture from Japan but you know, I, I think he’s going to be kind of more of a mid rotation guy. Maybe I’ll be wrong. I, I sometimes often am. So. But I think trying to find that guy who can be a solid like who you can count as a playoff starter, like Sonny Gray can start games for you in the playoffs and you’re not going to feel bad about it like Maybe he’s game three instead of game two. But they got a guy for one year with the potential to keep him for a second. If he’s fantastic, then they don’t do the opt out and they pay him. What is it, 16 million next year? It’s. Well, what it’s going to be is I believe it’s 30, but they’re going to pay 10 of it either way. So then it’s 20 million and it’s like, well, 20 million in free agency. Yeah, probably. So, you know, it’s a positive situation for him. They upgrade their rotation. I would argue if you wanted to do a, you know, a Clark in Cleveland system, it might be Joeyoki in terms of value. Just that guy who could be a starter. Small chance, like your reliever, but has some fantastic pitches. Though do like Oki’s fastball more. Clark’s fastball is very hit up and that’s maybe the theme of this trade. Both Clark and Gray, very hittable fastballs, like, you know, Gray is this, you know, potential two, three starter fastball, really mid. Clark has a fantastic velocity and everything, you know, interesting release points. But his fastball has been hittable in the low miners. So it’s probably, as you said, a reliever. And Fitz, Fitz gives you fits, right? Like here’s a guy who’s on his third org. That always is typically a sign of, yeah, teams kind of like you, but no one likes you enough to like really fight to keep you. A year ago at this time, his value was a lot higher. He just didn’t step up. People are like, oh, you know, Boston has done a nice job of kind of helping Quinn Priester level up. So with Fitz, like I said, it’s his third award. Boston helped Priester level up a bit. They thought maybe they do that with Fitz. And the reason I want to talk about Fitz in particular is because how it relates back to Cleveland. So Fitz has value, but he is a swing guy. I think Logan Allen, even with less control, is more valuable as a lefty. You know, he doesn’t maybe have the flashes that Fitz has had, but at the same time he’s had two solid major league seasons. So it also kind of shows you a baseline because St. Louis, the return, you know, they paid 20 million, they got, you know, a top five prospect and the guy who no longer qualifies as a prospect but is probably going to replace Gray in the rotation. So I think it kind of gives us that a degree of valuation with Logan Allen or with a, you know, one of the Other fives or maybe one of the other guys that could move up and down. That’s where this trade really kind of reflects back to Cleveland. I think it helps from the perspective of teams. You know, what did St. Louis want? They wanted a guy they could count on to put on the rotation who is not hyper expensive. And there’s value in that for Cleveland in terms of their trade assets. With a Logan Allen, you know, with maybe again, I don’t see him say trading Saccony because his values are all over the place. But it’s like if you’re gonna pick between Messick or Cantillo, it’s like having these pitchers with multiple years of control with low cost in terms of salary is huge right now. Yeah, I mean, Alan Allen is a stable starter. He’s at least giving you innings. He’s been healthy and there is a solid floor there. So that’s something the Cardinals clearly valued in Richard Fitz. I think there’s a solid floor for him and they got the other side of it with. With Clark being the upside arm. Like you said, that could be like a joeyoki type. So that’s just what the Cardinals are targeting, I think. I think it’s important to note for them going forward because the Cardinals may or name may not be one of the best trade fits for the Guardians this off season. We talked, you know, ad nauseam about Brendan Donovan, so that’s something to keep an eye on in terms of what the Cardinals are looking for. They’re looking for a package of guys that might give them some stability but also some upside. And that’s why you mentioned, you know, a guy like Okie and then a guy like Fitz. We’ll talk a little bit more about Logan Allen and other pitchers the Guardians may or may not be able to trade what it says about the rest of the market. And we’ll talk about tools. Cardinals wanted big tools. We’ll talk about who has the best tools in the system among the position players. We do our Prospect Tools draft coming up next. NBA action is back. There’s no better place to get in on the action than FanDuel, the official sports betting partner of the NBA. 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So head over to fandom.com to sign up and play your game with Fandel, the official sports betting partner of the NBA. Appreciate all of you hanging out with us every single day and making us part of your daily routine with Lockdown Guardians. And an even bigger thank you to everybody who has made Lockdown the number one sports podcast network. We’re not number one because of us, we’re number one because of you. So I appreciate that you can keep up to date with all things Guardians all off season long, even during the holidays. Hit the Bell on YouTube for reaction videos. The latest episode of the show auto download on all your audio platforms. So we stay in your feed wherever. So you can always catch up if you’re busy during the holiday season or you know, you’re going out and working out. You got to walk the dog in the snow. You can warm up with a little baseball talk even during the holiday season. All right, let’s be putting up decorations. That’s what I was doing. Yeah. In the podcast and putting up some decorations and listening myself. Yeah. Let us know if you got some fun baseball Christmas decorations. I. I’ve always been on the lookout for more baseball themed Christmas decorations. So comment below if you’ve got any good ones. Maybe some recommendations that we can find out there. So a little more on the trades. So we’re talking before about how the Cardinals were looking for, you know, big tools with a guy like Clark and a little bit of stability and fits. I’m still, I’m still flabbergasted by the fact the Cardinals are also paying. Yeah. 20 million, half that salary. That’s just, that’s just amazing to me. So that just kind of tells you, like I, I don’t think. Well, there is, there is the stipulation that gray had a 10 and 5. So he got to choose whether or not he was gonna waive his no trade clause. Like he. He had a bad experience in New York where they tried to totally change him and it didn’t work for him which has really hurt his value. Obviously doesn’t to worry about that now because he’s at the end of his career but still pretty good. But you know, he’s a guy who’s earned the right to choose where he wants to go. So this might have been one of the few places that they were talking to that he was gonna agree to wave it to. So I don’t want to sit there and I don’t want to over judge and say okay here’s the market, it’s set. You know this is what we can compare the you know any possibility of trading a Guardians pitcher for a bat. But it gives us a good idea that you know reliability is good. You said the market’s sparse and I think it stands. One just quick note is too. As you look at St. Louis they’ve had a lot of really interesting pitching prospects and almost zero translation. Yeah. Like you know for as much as we kind of take it for granted like guys like Logan Allen and that not every team is like that like the Cardinals kind of have the. What the guardian struggles with hitters is what they have with pitchers right now. Yeah. The problem for guard the Guardians is as far as flipping a bat or a picture for a bat is they don’t have a ton of proven reliability like Williams and five year up there they don’t have a sunny Gray on this roster unless it’s by. It’s not even Bobby Williams. Truthfully it might. Maybe it closes as by the in terms of stability and performance but he’s obviously not doesn’t have the track record Gray does yet. So they don’t have that big piece. I think, I think Allen is the only like stable guy in terms of the back of the rotation. Like Sakone had one solid year and half a year and Cancelo, you know, has had flashes but hasn’t been super. But it really is a good window into the fact that it is a very seller friendly market if you’re trading any pitchers. So like Guardians could get a solid return for Allen if they want to flip him. Obviously the you know the beauty is the, the high of eye of the beholder here. But I think there’s at least a reasonable shot to say like they could find a controllable outfielder. I’m not saying we’re gonna get. You’re gonna get an all star but I think there’s a possibility if there’s a team out there, you could get like a platoon bat who has some control. Like, I, I think legitimately, if you wanted to include Logan Allen in your return for like a Brendan Donovan package, you could do it. You could offer him and like, I wouldn’t go, I wouldn’t go. Okie and Alan, like you were just talking, I would, I could include him in a high athletic traits prospect and say that might get the deal done because the Cardinals are looking for more pitching. I mean, you could probably, if you just want a guy like, who is potentially a platoon guy who’s had some success. It’s like you could probably trade Logan Allen for Jesus Sanchez tomorrow after his struggles and with all the outfields. Houston has all the outfields. He’s got two years of control. So it’s like, you know, I think there’s ways where you can make it work. Even if it’s not with St. Louis, though, you and I both, I, I, you know, I feel like this is going to get clipped, but I’m just going to go ahead and say it. You and I have both been kind of lusting after Donovan for a few years now. Yeah, you know, it’s just give me a consistent hitter. Yeah, consistent hitter who can help this lineup and hit two. And he’s well, I mean, he’s well sought after for a reason. We keep talking about Diamond. I know some people don’t think he’s a great target, but a lot of teams are interested in him. You don’t get, you know, five, 10 teams interested in a guy unless you’re any good. So you shouldn’t, you know, demand is what drives all this. So. All right. Speaking of demand and high end tools, you know, you and I have talked a lot about how the Guardians lack impact tools in the system. And a year ago, at least it was. Yeah, it was a year ago. So the reason we do this annual exercise is to see if the Guardians have improved their ability to land impact tools in the draft or they’ve developed them and where that helps us, you know, kind of understand where the system is and what other teams, what players other teams could have their eyes on or, you know, which guys could help Cleveland the most and soon. And because you talked about the hitter side of things yesterday, we’ll talk more about it today. So I will go ahead and be generous and give you the first pick. And we’re not doing this to build the best one. We’re doing this to see where the best tools in the system lie with who and, and how they put that together. So I’ll go ahead and give you the first pick. So we’re just talking pure tools. You know, I, I think I’m still gonna go with Bazan as hit tool for as much as people. I, I think there’s actually a lot of interesting guys right now for power. So this is intentionally me punting power because I think it’s easier to find power. People are gonna, you know, just in terms of when you’re trying to find one tool, it’s easy. Easier to find power right now than hit tool. I’m still a big believer in his hit tool. You know, I. Cooper in goal is probably the other guy I was considering for this if it had gone the other way. But, you know, when I’m looking at hit tool, it’s not just hit. It’s kind of the whole thing. Like, you know, he, he pulls the ball. He has a good eye for the zone porters. You know, he’s not passive. We looked at some of the data that showed, like, he’s in that perfect kind of range in terms of, you know, some stats. So it’s. He just needs to get healthy. Like, bottom line, he just needs to get healthy and in health is what held him back this year. I still believe in that being a plus hit tool. And I don’t know how many other guys in the system where I’m like, yeah, plus hit tool, potential 300 hitter. I don’t know how many other guys I would say that about. Yeah. When you bake in approach for Bazana, I think it all comes together like. And you also have to, you know, characterize like the work ethic too, I think in this sort of thing. And that’s not necessarily a tool on its own, but when you bake that into everything you’re. You’re looking at with him, it all. Everything kind of levels up. Right. Like, it’s almost like a plot. Like, if you’re looking at a video game, it’s a. It’s a. A plus sp, Right. Like you. You could say his, his makeup and his work ethic drive everything. So you get. Every little tool gets like a little plus five or a little level up. Because of his higher growth potential. Yeah, yeah, something like that. I mean, it’s like, you know, when Mario gets a mushroom, right? That’s. You can level up a little bit when you, when you do that. That’s the best I can come up with anytime in terms of video games. Every would. Would know because my video game playing is very limited to baseball and aliens. So you probably would have been made a better reference to that than. Than I did. Yeah. I was thinking about, like, Fire Emblem and how some certain characters have higher growth profiles, but that’s probably too nerdy, so I’m just gonna stop. Yeah. Yeah. Do the Ninja Turtles get something for eating pizza? I played that game way back. They get health back, but. But they get health back for eating pizza. See, I wish we could do that in real life. Yeah. There’s a few other things. My daughter loved that Shredder’s Revenge game, so we played it together. Yeah. Great game if you have little ones, but yeah. So what are you going with? Well, speaking of Shredder’s Revenge, I’ve got a name that pairs very well with that. And I’ll tell you who I’m picking in our tools draft coming up next. If you need some more Guardians talk to warm you up during the winter. We just talked about the fact that we know you do. It’s gonna snow actually out here for Thanksgiving, so that’s kind of a bummer and. And not surprised. But you can always follow Jeff@Jeff MLB Draft. You can follow myself at Jail Underscore baseball or JL baseball as well. And you can join the Lockdown Guardians insiders club. We text with daily with the community when I’m not sick or at a concert. We drop news and rumors when we get them too. We ask them for mailbag questions, which we’ll do next week. And we do monthly video chats, which we’ll also do next week. We do bonus content for them from time to time as well. So that’s joinsubtext.com locked on guardians to tap in and get some more baseball talk. Some more Guardians baseball talk over the winter. Tell a friend, tell a family member at Thanksgiving that you’re listening to locked on Guardians and only if you like us. If you don’t like us, don’t tell them that. We don’t want you to prejudice anything. Go ahead and tell them. You know, maybe they’ll like us. I’ll take a hate. Listen, I will. Well, no, it’s, you know, just friends. Some. I. I got things friends are interested in that I have no interest in. So who knows? Yeah, you never know. All right, so I mentioned that my pick has something to do with Ninja Turtles. I’m taking Rat, not Raphael, but Ralphie. Does he have size? He does have size. He does have power. No. Oh. Oh. Sides like the. Like that. That one totally off my head. Yeah. It would not be my first pick in the Ninja Turtles draft. Is Raphael. But. And it is my first pick here because I, again, I keep saying I’m all in on Ralphie Velasquez. I don’t think anybody in the system is going to get to his level of power that he has. Like he’s got legitimately, I think, plus raw power. Like we’re talking 60 grade. And on the 20, 80 scouting scale where 80 is like Aaron Judge and 20 is, I don’t know, Miles Straw, Nick Allen. Yeah. So he’s got, he’s legit 60. I think he has got 70 raw power. I think it’s harder to get to that in the game. But as good as Bazan is with the hit tool and he can get to all this power, he doesn’t have Ralphie’s raw power. And since you took the best hit tool in the system, you’re not wrong in saying there’s more power guys than there have been in the past, which is kind of shocking. But nobody in the system, I think, has the ability to get to their power and good power as consistently as Ralphie. I think legitimately we’re seeing him come around to a guy you can bet on as a corner bat. And I, I think there’s. It’s gonna be a big year for him. I think everyone’s gonna be talking about him come mid summer one way or another. No, I, I can definitely see that. I, you know, when I’m, you know, going through and looking at guys he, you know, I still have on hell too. But there’s part of me that Kev Bass and Ralphie back to back, you know. No, before the end of the year, they might end up before I put out my final list. It might be the top two guys in system. Yeah, the, the big debate for me with this pick is now I have my choice of power hitters. It’s also interesting because I was looking more raw power than anything else when I was kind of putting my list together. So. Because teams want big tools they can develop. So I, I wasn’t necessarily. Ralphie was. Was actually third on my list in terms of raw. And then the other interesting thing is, you know, if I’m looking speed again, that’s not where this organization stands out to me right now. That’s, that’s, again, that’s not something that they’re really targeting that I have a long list of guys who stand out for speed. So, you know, I do. I go for defense here. That becomes the, the new question, the, you know, that I might go with. And again, it’s Interesting because there’s not a whole lot of plus defenders. You know, how much of an impact, how much of an impact are you going to get from defense? Like you get a lot. I mean you get it depending on the position. It’s, it’s still valuable. Like, I mean. Outside. Okay. Talk about speed and defense. Outside of the ill advice trade that included Sean Murphy and his story Ruiz guys, teams don’t trade for. No, I mean I agree with that, but I do think they’re underrated traits often when you’re evaluating. But the only reason I’m considering going there is because I don’t have, I have lots of power options. I don’t have as many in those two areas, but it’s like I’m gonna take. I might go a little weird here and go Cheerios defense in center field because I think it has a chance to be a plus defender up the middle because again, I have all of these hit power guys looking at raw power. There’s a lot of raw power guys to go with. I don’t see a lot of defense, I don’t see a lot of speed. I think Cheerio can be a plus defender in center field. So I just, I was looking at someone who’s a plus defender at a premium position. I think it’d be a 60 grade defender. He had his ups and downs a year ago, don’t get me wrong. But he was also hurt. Sometimes that can really mess up an entire year as we’ve seen. So I’m gonna give him a little bit of grace. I think he can bounce back and I still am a firm believer in his defensive upside. Yeah, I’m not quite as high on Cheerio’s defensive upside as I was a year ago. There were some weird things in Lake county this year. I mean, he’s not healthy too. Yeah, that’s the thing. How healthy he was, I don’t think. That impacted his defense as much like his read. Sometimes, like you would get really good reads and, and jumps on the ball and then sometimes they’d be pretty bad. His route running was okay, but he, he had some weird moments this year in center field that make me think it’s more of a corner profile in terms of defense. I’m not saying he can’t play center field, but I’m thinking it’s probably not like a slam dunk. I don’t think we’re talking Gold Glove center fielder and that’s where the impact. No, I just think he’s got a chance to at least be a maybe a 55 there. Like, you know, that’s still pretty good. That’s still very good. I mean, a Gold Glover to me is like a 65, 70 guy most years. Has such an elite high ceiling at the position. Well, it does. I. I just also would like. If I’m taking a guy, if I’m targeting somebody with. With big tools, that’s not the first one I’m going for. And if I am, it’s certainly not going to be a guy like Cheerio. It’s going to be a guy that’s got way more impact on defense than. Than he does. So this is where things get ugly in the system. Like you talk about, there’s a multiple power guys you can go for. I had three more on my list for power after this that I was going to go for. If you took power first, you took Ralphie’s power first. But obviously it took the one guy in the system who has the best approach. The issue with that is like the rest of the system doesn’t have a good approach. Like everybody talks about. There’s so many places you can read that talk about hit tool and they’re like, oh, this guy makes a lot of contact. That’s great. And I know Ernie Clement just had like the best postseason of all time for the Blue Jays, but that we’ve seen people in the past give Ernie clement like a 70 or 80 grade hit tool. And it’s like you can. I think we’ve said this multiple times on the show. You can’t say hit tool. Hit is totally 100 driven by the ability to make contact. Because if that’s the case, look how many guys in the system and the guardians in the past like Andre Cementes would have a great hit tool and Milestra have a great hit tool because they don’t. They don’t really swing and miss a ton. They make a ton of contact. And it’s. Andrews did chase a lot though. He did. But he made poor quality contact. So that. That’s where I get into. And. And like I like Cooper Engels hit tool in terms of his approach and his ability to make contact. But I’m very concerned about Cooper’s impact quality when he makes contact. Like he has the second best approach in the system behind Bazana, bar none, I think. So I’m probably gonna go on Hellha now, I think for my hip tool, because to me he represents the best of the blend of the things you need where he can make contact, hits the ball hard. The swing decisions could be a little Better for him. I’ll give him the benefit of the doubt this year, but to me, he’s the next best one. When you blend all of them together. Approach, contact and impact quality. If I was going to go just on approach and contact, I would go Engel, but I think now it’s got better impact quality. When you, when you talk about hit tool. No, I can, I can see that. I, I had an out third. I had angle too. Just because Hanau had some ups and downs as well this year and there are points where he wasn’t as clean as he was in years past. So it’s a little bit more concerned with his overall performance. That’s kind of where I was like a little bit lower. But I mean, I had them kind of on the same overall grouping in terms of next tool. Again, there’s still so much potential power that I feel like I gotta go with speed. And this is where I kind of run in the hurdle. I think I’m gonna take Khalil Watson. I just, I don’t even know if he’s a great runner, but I don’t know who else. Like, it’s kind of crazy. Like this organization as a whole, like they don’t even have a lot of plus runners in the minors that I know of. I’m sure there’s someone I’m forgetting who’s like not a top of my head guy, who’s not a top 30 guy. Like, because I’m trying to kind of stick to guys who are in the top 30 for this list or, you know, are a recent high pick if they’re not. Or they’re a top 30, but they’re not in my top 30. Right. Like, I’m trying to kind of stick in that area. We are long from the days. Was it Gabriel Mejia and Todd Cheetah Machida and Todd Isaacs? Right. You know, yeah. It’s like those type of runners just don’t exist in this system at all. Like, they have completely punted speed. So I really wasn’t sure who like well been and. Or not well been out. I don’t think runs very well, but it’s like I was looking at. He runs good. Yeah. You know, Aaron Walton, who they added though. I don’t think he, like, he had some decent data, but I don’t, I don’t think they have like too many guys. I’m like plus. So I’m gonna go with speed because again, I can keep punting power because there’s, there’s quite a few guys to choose from. Well, yeah, I’m not taking. There’s no more power else to take from. But the Watson speed is good because, like, there’s. Obviously he doesn’t have the most steals in the Miners, but it’s impact speed, like on the bases and like, he’d be a good pinch runner. It’s going to impact him on defense too, which helps. So I 100 agree with that. I had guys that were off the board here and like, I know everyone’s gonna say, Tommy Hawk, he had all those steals last year, and it’s like, yeah, but catching in that. In that level is awful. So I’m not going there. I actually. I actually looked at Nick Mitchell, who’s a guy you like a lot. I do like Nick Mitchell a lot. I looked at his speed, like, he’s not a center fielder. So, like, it’s not. That’s. And that’s not. Not really about his speed. That’s more about his overall ability and left in. In the outfield. But I like his speed. I think if you put all this stuff together, if you’re looking for a guy who has that extra tool can be like a fourth outfield type. I think Mitchell is that guy. That. That makes a ton of sense. I had Bazanis be on the list too, because I think that’s an impact tool for him. But I obviously took his hit tool, so I wasn’t gonna double up there. There’s other guys who could have gone like you said, Welbin, Jonad, Venkula. But yeah, there’s no guy in this list where I’m like, yeah, this guy’s got standout speed and he’s an impact type prospect. There’s not. You’re right. It’s. It’s literally just Cleo Watson. All right, so quickly, let’s talk about. You got to do power and then I’ll do defense. I’ll just. Raw power. I’m gonna go Shoebart, like, raw power and exit Villos. Wow. He’s. I mean, does anyone have a higher exit VO in the system? Yeah, hard to say. I mean, yeah, it’s just like raw power. Like, you know, Jace. Jace is a better prospect. Don’t get me wrong. There’s a lot of guys who have power who are better prospects. I. Dean Curly’s even got like, I think average power. Who’s a better prospect? But if I’m just talking pure raw power. High end exit Villas. It’s. It’s Schubart, and that’s why they drafted him. Even Though all the data is terrible. Even though he played poorly against bad competition, even though he’s probably a first base only like there’s so many negatives he got taken where he got taken just because he’s huge and kills baseballs and if you can work with him at all, like maybe you have something there if you don’t. Right now he’s a poor man’s version of Noel. Yeah, I didn’t have him on my list at all. That’s interesting. I had Rosario, Watson and then Bazana just because of Bazano’s ability to get to his power in game because of the approach. I was just looking raw. I was looking. Yeah, Rosario is way up there for me. Rosario hit the crap out of the ball when I saw him in Lake county when he made contact like he pulls the crap out of everything and he just. It whistles. Defense. I was between Petey Halpin and Aaron Walton, but I think Petey Halpin’s defense is the one thing that’s the reason he’s on the 40 man roster. Honestly, that’s the reason he had. He could have a major league role. Yeah, I could see that. I, I just didn’t consider him because he wasn’t in my top 30. But you’re right, he’s definitely a better defender than Cheerio. I just, I, I didn’t view him as top 30 guy so I didn’t have him there and, and Walton’s a good call. I probably should have gotten Walton over Cheerio, but whatever, you know. Yeah, Walton’s got the ability to impact the game with his legs and his glove and we’ll see everything else. Looks like we’ll do pitching eventually here on this one. Tomorrow or I’m sorry, yeah, Thanksgiving. I’ll be with you giving you some Guardians talk. We’re going to talk about who the Guardians most likely trade partners are this off season if they make a trade. We’ll talk about what we’ve learned about ranking prospects as well. So make sure you tuning in as you’re making your drive to Thanksgiving to have some turkey. Happy to be with you. Happy to talk Guardians on Thanksgiving with you. And if you can’t do it on Thanksgiving, make sure to tune in while you’re out there doing your Black Friday shopping or just, you know, whatever, whatever you have to do. Maybe going out to get a tree. Whatever you’re doing, make sure you’re checking us out. Thank you for joining us. Remember, download daily. It helps. And go, go Guardians. Go.

Cleveland Guardians should feel good about the prospect of trading a pitcher for a hitter after the Sonny Gray deal between the Cardinals and Red Sox signals a seller-friendly landscape, with Logan Allen emerging as a prime asset. Can the Guardians flip a young starter for a coveted controllable bat like Brendan Donovan or Jesus Sanchez?
Justin Lada and Jeff Ellis analyze the implications of the latest MLB trades and dissect the Guardians’ prospect pool in a dynamic Tools Draft. The show spotlights elite minor league talent—how does Travis Bazana’s hit tool stack up against Ralphy Velazquez’s raw power? We debate impact tools, positional value, and potential trade targets, while exploring pressing questions: Which Cleveland prospect has the best chance to help the big league lineup, and which rivals offer the best fit for a crucial upgrade?

00:00 Cardinals Trade Sonny Gray
03:28 Cardinals’ $20M Trade Surprise
08:05 Logan Allen’s Value as Lefty
14:37 Selling Pitchers in Hot Market
16:32 Annual Guardians Prospect Tools Draft
21:32 Ralphy Velazquez’s Power Potential
23:53 Prioritizing Defense at Premium Positions
28:26 Kahlil Watson Runner Speculation
30:21 Nick Mitchell as Impact Runner

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