Dodgers positioning for a BLOCKBUSTER Trade...

The Los Angeles Dodgers are positioning for a blockbuster trade as after the Dodgers fall for the first time in two years and they won't be bringing home a World Series trophy, now is time to make the big move and there's one move that is going across the media as the move for the Dodgers this offseason. Today we talk about it. Elly De La Cruz, an LA Dodger, we'll break it down for you here today on a Dodgers Digest. Welcome everybody, I'm Jace Andrews and I hope you're having a fantastic day wherever you might be appreciate all the support on our latest videos off-season content coming all off-season even through the lockout so don't worry whenever that happens we're keeping the content going so hit that subscribe button for the latest and the greatest on your Los Angeles Dodgers and let's start with what prompted this video about a month ago at this point and that was Joey Votto talking about Elly De La Cruz now on here we talk about and proposing a specifically Dodgers-oriented Elly De La Cruz trade, which is somewhat true just because the Dodgers have the most of what he was talking about, but his proposal was more for the Reds to make the move now rather than later on L.A. Now, again, here was the original design. De Paula for L.A., who says no. Now, I don't love this trade, and I'll talk about that throughout today's show, but he then also followed it up by saying, I think you should trade L.A. to the Crews for as many prospects as possible. Now, if he's saying Josue De Paula straight up for Elly De La Cruz straight up, maybe, I'm very hesitant, but we also have seen a very small amount of Josue De Paula. We've seen a large amount of Elly De La Cruz. Now, I have full faith that De Paula is going to become a great player, but this was interesting. Now, let's go further into this and kind of going straight out there. So, again, it was a straight proposal for him, for De Paula, for Elie. Now, Elie, obviously, in a couple of years, is going to be required to be paid. And we're going to be required to be paid quicker than Josue De Paula as he's got six years left on his rookie contract. And we know that for Cruz, he's going to be asking for a monumental market value. His average exit velocity, 97th percentile. His slugging percentage, 94th percentile. His hard hit percentage, 94th percentile. This is one of the elite players in the MLB, and sometimes the average doesn't always show it. But this year it did. .283, .365, .515 with an .880 OPS. All of those top 10% in the MLB, top 3% in slugging and OPS. He's top 3% in homers. His RBI is reaching 80. His runs were nearing 100. Everything about this is a player that you want on your baseball team. An over five win player alongside all these statistics and the defensive capabilities that he does bring at shortstop make him the perfect trade target, especially when thinking about the future of your infield with an aging Freddie Freeman, an aging Mookie Betts, and trying to kind of maneuver around an aging Max Muncy at third base as well. There's options in your minor league system, but the question is, does Elie De La Cruz supersede all of those people? now of course this is a rumor this is not something that is you know fully you know out there in the world it's hypothetical and of course there's no agreement there's no talks of this being a discussion however the Dodgers there are going to be aggressive and whatever happens with the new CBA whatever transpires with the new laws that they're going to try and in place I don't think it's going to be a cap that just seems immeasurably impossible especially with the two world series teams this year being the bottom of the you know market value teams milwaukee is spending in the 27th uh the 27th most spending in the MLB I think the Rays and the like Guardians are both in the bottom you know 20s as well so very much there and at least the star shortstop so like you know at the end of the day monetarily you'd have to pay him eventually but right now he's only getting paid what five ten million dollars obviously he'll go to arbitration this year so he's going to make you know 20 million as soon as we get there but i i am intrigued to say the least about what a official offer might look like um i think that in a lot of ways it would cost Oswaldo Paula but i think there's a case where you could probably get away with keeping Oswaldo and and still getting Ellie but it would cost you probably the rest of your farm now Vato of course does talk about why they should sell high and kind of the the thought process on getting Ellie to the cruise now and here's the second part of what he said saying i would trade Ellie for as many prospects as possible so that's where i think i don't know if this sounds bad i don't know if just JDP would get it done i mean granted he's an elite player and the Reds would not have to pay him for six years as opposed to Ellie who you know you'd have to pay him very very very soon sorry my hair uh but either way i do think that Vato is putting in a good spot and it's funny because he said this are you going to give up half or a third of your payroll on one player once Ellie does get to that point here in a couple years doesn't make sense so why not sell high and his future price is something that's going to be talked about now again right now he is under contract until 2031 we don't know the monetary value though as it's 5 million and supposedly this next year you're going to have of course the coming years of arbitration in his payroll and it's going to be a heavy thing to pay him once he does get to his full contract and The arbitration alone is going to be upwards of $20 million. I mean, heck, what was the breaking point for Scooble this past year? Didn't he get like $30 million in arbitration? So you're going to get a lot here in him. And the numbers, obviously, are very good. Now, here's Joey Votto's logic. You're avoiding one huge salary commitment for the Reds, who is not a spending team. You're accumulating a deep prospect package, in theory, from the Los Angeles Dodgers. And you're spreading roster value across portions. So we know that Joey Votto, he is not a guy who is a front office man for the Cincinnati Reds. but he is a major part of their organization and was a major part in a very long time. And I think what's interesting about this is Elly De La Cruz, he has had some past with Reds wanting to be there and now not wanting to be there. There's a lot kind of entailing that. Now, what's funny about this is he has declined the Reds extension offer. They, in fact, offered him a ginormous contract that would have kept him under control until I think 2035, 2030, even maybe longer than that. so he ultimately decided no and has said that he has higher ambitions than playing in Cincinnati for the rest of his career it sounds from his talks that he does appreciate the Reds in the organization but that is not his future and there is a lot to say about that and you know it's interesting to talk about it but at the end of the day we have seen the reports you know Nick of the Cincinnati Reds saying we engaged in spring training of 2025 and presented an offer extension talks never got to anything we didn't have any further conversations regarding the offer especially as soon as he declined it now um i want to go into this a little more the reds want Elly De La Cruz and Elly of course denied that offer he did not request a trade and the reds know they would still have time to potentially extend him throughout the next three seasons however long it might be but what it does show is that he is not willing right now to commit to the future of the Reds. And if he's not willing, why would the Reds commit to a future of him when they know they could get a King's price right now for him, which is where the Dodgers would have to kind of weigh their options in this. Now, in my opinion, I think Elly is a fantastic player and I would love to see him on the Los Angeles Dodgers. However, if the package is going to have to include Josue De Paula, I get a little hesitant because I guarantee you, if that's the case, you're also going to be getting some of the top prospects in this organization. Now, I'd be more willing to say, hey, here's a Mike Sirota, played fantastic in AA, and as much as I think that he would be a fantastic piece for the Dodgers long-term, Elly De La Cruz would also be a fantastic piece for the Dodgers long-term, and you know that you can bring him in. So I'm curious to see, but right now this is all a very interesting thing, and of course the price is going to be the big thing that they're going to have to weigh. Now again, DePaula is the one that is going to get the major, major coverage when it's all said and done. and JDP is a fantastic player, and the few times we got to see him this season, it was a .323 average with a .500 OBP, a .581 slug, and an over 1,000 OPS, which you get all numbers that are better than Elly De La Cruz, but it's 11 games against some of the worst teams in the National League, might I add. I'm not trying to disengage in what Jose de Paula did. Like, everything he did was amazing. The discredit is not towards that. It's just trying to be a little more realistic about we can't expect 323 i mean that's just not a reasonable thing to expect we can hope for it for sure and think that that is the future of him but we can't expect that to be the way that it goes and he has superstar upside he has the ability to be a superstar just like Elly De La Cruz question is is it worth the risk of JDP maybe not panning out as expected that's a slight risk versus the risk of him being moved and in theory long term maybe ended up as a better option than Elly De La Cruz. If there's a way you can keep both, there's not a prospect on the list that the Dodgers have that you can't touch besides JDP. Anybody in the minor league system, if you would like them, we can add them into the deal. No one's off limits, but JDP is probably where I draw the line. So let me know in the comments section what you think would happen if this was a actual trade-off or would Cincinnati demand more prospects? Obviously, I think they would have to include somebody else other than just Jose DePaula. Again, team control is a huge thing because you get six years of control on JDP versus the next three for Ellie and then of course a long term extension is very much in play as soon as you do trade for him so let us know in the comment section if you would make the trade and i'm not going to say just DePaula for Ellie but if you would include DePaula in a Ellie De La Cruz trade you say why for yes then that's going to be hey make the blockbuster trade in for no as that's saying i'm keeping DePaula or i want you to type rp if you think it's for the right price so y for yes and for no rp for right price let us know down in the comment section we all know that the dodgers didn't accomplish what they wanted to accomplish this is the first time in three off seasons that we are going to see Andrew Freeman attack especially if that lockout doesn't end in immense immense repercussions for spending we know the dodgers have money we know what they're going to do and we know that the value and the trades they're going to make are going to be more gargantuan because as much money as they are spending on their roster, Mookie is aging. Freddie is aging. Muncie is aging. And they have a lot of prospects that they could go and pay a little bit or they can go out there and trade those and pay Ellie a lot of it. So we'll see what happens. Right now, I'm excited for the offseason and I'm excited to see what transpires. For now, guys, we appreciate watching. Peace out.