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Indians acquire Brad Hand


zelbell

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1 hour ago, ramssuperbowl99 said:

I mean tbh they have the best catching prospect in at least 5 years, maybe 10 and they can't find a spot for him. That's really dumb.

When did we start talking about Gary Sanchez? ;)

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Mejia is obviously a really good prospect (probably 15-20 in all of baseball), however this was still a good move for the Indians.

For one thing, the bullpen is in a worse spot right now than the catcher position. Yes, Andrew Miller is coming back soon. We need a lot more help than him, however. 28th in the league in ERA. Hand has been one of the better relievers the last 3 years, while Cimber has been promising as a rookie. We now get 3 years of control for Hand, and 5 of Cimber. With both Miller and Allen being FA's at the end of the year, we kind of needed to find replacements if both walk. Hopefully we can re-sign one of them (most likely Allen) and have all 3 here for years to come.

Mejia and the Tribe haven't seen eye to eye in terms of development. They wanted him to come up this year to play RF, since his bat is MLB ready, but he should no interest. He pretty much demanded being a catcher, which is fine for next year, but why not help a World Series contending team and get to the majors? His bat would of definitely helped us this year in RF. He has improved at catcher defensively, but he still has a loooong way to go. He also still needs a translator for English, which doesn't help either. We led the league with Gomes/Perez last year in caught stealing percentage (42.5%), so that is obviously a pretty big component to our team.

We also have another catcher in the minors named Eric Haase, who fits the mold of what Tito wants- very good defensively and an average bat. With Haase, and drafting Noah Naylor this past draft, they probably felt comfortable enough to move on and still have decent prospects in the system. I am not saying that either of them will be better than Mejia, but I think that we have overestimated what the Tribe think of him.

Overall, we won't know who "won" this trade until we see what Mejia can do while playing a consistent role for the Padres. If I was a betting man, I would say both teams will be winners and glad that they made the trade.

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1 hour ago, ramssuperbowl99 said:

He's 22 years old. They started screwing with his position last year. 21 years old is like -8 in catcher years. Dumb dumb dumb dumb dumb.

He’s also just a prospect. I’ve seen countless fail at the big leagues. We bolstered our bull pen nicely with proven guys with control over them for a few years. The bull pen was by far our biggest weakness that cost us many wins. Also everything I’m hearing from the minors is Mejia isn’t good handling the pitchers and will eventually need to change positions. Don’t get me wrong I was really hoping we wouldn’t trade him. I think his hitting will clearly translate, his catching not so much. 

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25 minutes ago, Bonanza23 said:

He’s also just a prospect. I’ve seen countless fail at the big leagues. We bolstered our bull pen nicely with proven guys with control over them for a few years. The bull pen was by far our biggest weakness that cost us many wins. Also everything I’m hearing from the minors is Mejia isn’t good handling the pitchers and will eventually need to change positions. Don’t get me wrong I was really hoping we wouldn’t trade him. I think his hitting will clearly translate, his catching not so much. 

Thinking a 21 year old with a cannon arm, solid body for the position, and plenty of twitch can't be taught how to frame or call a game is silly. He has everything you can't teach, and the Indians had plenty of time to let him learn the rest of it. 

It's fine if you're okay trading him and you need the BP help. But this they didn't think he was a catcher argument needs to die.

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9 minutes ago, ramssuperbowl99 said:

Thinking a 21 year old with a cannon arm, solid body for the position, and plenty of twitch can't be taught how to frame or call a game is silly. He has everything you can't teach, and the Indians had plenty of time to let him learn the rest of it. 

It's fine if you're okay trading him and you need the BP help. But this they didn't think he was a catcher argument needs to die.

We are just echoing what has been the word coming from the Indians writers, farm system, etc.

Not like we  (at least myself) trying to say that he cant do it. Just what seems to be the rumblings here in Cleveland.

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It’s fine if you fellow Tribe fans are good with trading Mejia, but he’s an elite catching prospect. I mean, you guys do realize that Buster Posey was a freaking shortstop at Florida State, right?

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