Well that seals it for me, I'm renewing my 17 game plan

Wait....he was in AA and Rube gave him a big league deal?

What am I missing?

Phred wrote:Wait....he was in AA and Rube gave him a big league deal?

What am I missing?

Rube has to trust what his scouts are telling him.....

Wow! What an exciting day so far.

Phred wrote:Wait....he was in AA and Rube gave him a big league deal?

What am I missing?

doubt it was for much money and he has a few options left.

Zo:

He has never pitched in the big leagues, but Araujo had several teams pursuing him after he become a Minor League free agent. The 23-year-old split last season with Double-A Akron and Class A Carolina, where he went a combined 2-1 with a 3.42 ERA and 11 saves in 43 games. Araujo struck out 50 in 50 innings.

“He adds depth and gives us another quality arm in the system,” Phillies pro scouting director Mike Ondo said. “With Bastardo, Diekman and Hollands, he’s just another guy in competition.”

Araujo, who is 6-foot-6, is pitching for Zulian in the Venezuelan Winter League, where he has struck out eight in seven scoreless innings.

“We’ve seen him at 92-27 mph this year with a slider,” Ondo said.

THA GAS

We'll see what happens. Seems like he has a cannon of an arm. If he puts it all together it's the right move.

BigEd76 wrote:Zo:

He has never pitched in the big leagues, but Araujo had several teams pursuing him after he become a Minor League free agent. The 23-year-old split last season with Double-A Akron and Class A Carolina, where he went a combined 2-1 with a 3.42 ERA and 11 saves in 43 games. Araujo struck out 50 in 50 innings.

“He adds depth and gives us another quality arm in the system,” Phillies pro scouting director Mike Ondo said. “With Bastardo, Diekman and Hollands, he’s just another guy in competition.”

Araujo, who is 6-foot-6, is pitching for Zulian in the Venezuelan Winter League, where he has struck out eight in seven scoreless innings.

“We’ve seen him at 92-27 mph this year with a slider,” Ondo said.

THA GAS

Holy shit, that is quite the range.

Must be his changeup.

This is 1000 times better than the Francoeur signing.

summary of my parameters for judging this offseason:

failure to trade either byrd or papelbon for good prospects = F.
failure to trade both for good prospects = maximum grade of C-.
sorry, but all it should take to get good prospects back is eating all of their salary, and the phils can afford that.

howard getting the chance to start at 1b for the phils next season = max grade of D for offseason as a whole. put out the word that the first team to offer a ptbnl and $5million for him gets him. if he's still around after a month, put the word out that the fist team to offer a ptbnl OR $5million for him gets him.
after a month, give up trying to get anything for him and cut him loose. this team needs to prove they understand sunk costs and can give up on running out guys they made a mistake on hoping to eventually be proven right (i'm worried that will happen with brown or tomas as well).

failure to sign yoan = maximum grade of B- (and that comes only if the right things happen with all of byrd, papelbon, and howard and nothing else is screwed up, like a schillingesque trade of hamels).

a trade of hamels for anything but a slam-dunk prospect package is an automatic F.
a trade of giles for anything but a slam-dunk prospect package is an automatic reset of the maximum to a C-.

a big contract for tomas will earn an automatic "incomplete" grade for the offseason, unless it otherwise earns an automatic f.

Ryan's wife Krystle gave birth

Oh here we go

Cafardo says the Red Sox have already shot down a couple trade proposals from the Phils for Cole

Don't worry Rube. I'm sure you'll get em to knock down their buying price eventually

Saw that earlier, not sure I believe it.

"Swihart and Dev..."
"No."
"Xand..."
"No."
"K bye"

Sox would be brain dead if they wouldn't do swihart and marrero. Want no part of marrero. Definitely has to be bogarts or betts to start.

"Hey, fellas--who's out there that might work out exactly like Manship did?"

"Hang on, Ruben… oh wow, how about this guy?!? Can't believe he hasn't been snatched up!"

The Phillies have signed right-hander P.J. Walters, according to Eddy. The 29-year-old comes with 152 innings of big league experience, though he’s struggled to a 6.28 ERA in that time. Much of that work came with the 2012-13 Twins, where he posted a 5.79 ERA in 101 innings. Walters has a 4.70 ERA with 8.0 K/9 and 3.6 BB/9 in 735 2/3 innings at the Triple-A level.

Is it a minor league deal?