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SABRMatt sez,

Remember when Doc complained about Mike Hargrove's player template...said slappy singles hitters who draw walks but can't run the bases have very little actual value?

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Well, sure.  If Vogelbach is going to max out at 9 homers a year, then you can safely write him off, unworried even about any freakish OBP outcomes.

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Diderot sez,

If Vogs loses 30 pounds, I still don't think he can play first.  It's an athletic thing to me, not a weight thing.  So i agree with Matt.

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Right.  Everybody agrees he's a DH first, hopefully able to provide your backup 1B glove.  I'm right with everybody else on this, except I think that he MIGHT get by with 100 games of defense a year for a couple of years while he's young.  Depending.  

And it's asking a LOT for a player to take one of the 10 or so DH jobs there are each year.  But it's not like Vogelbach has to be Nelson Cruz to help a club at DH.  Last year's DH's included Mark Trumbo, Kendrys Morales, Albert Pujols, Carlos Beltran, and the A's Ryon Healy -- those just being the DH's whose OPS+ were below 100!  There were two guys over 115 at DH last year:  Boomstick, and Encarnacion at 132.

You get a true 110-120 hitter playing DH for the league minimum, you got somebody Billy Beane wants, that's fer shure :- )

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Mo' Dawg sez,

We traded a hugely valuable resource for him.  44 MLB PA's is hardly an adequate look-see.  

G said above that he was sure that the Orcs could use Vog's 105-110 OPS bat in some fashion.  Guys, that was Alonso until this season.  In his three seasons as a mostly fulltime player, he had ISO'ed .120, .99 and .114.  In 2010, at age 23 vs AA/AAA, Alonzo vR'ed .295-.372-.469.  The next season, Vs. AAA/MLB it was .305-.383-.492.  Alonso just became a 3x$8M guy, or something like that.  I would prefer we invest that dough elsewhere.  1B types are usually pretty easy to pick up.  I would just as soon we give the gig to Vogs, platoon him if necessary, and bid bigger on Otani, etc.

Over the last two years, Vogs has had vR lines (AAA and MLB combined) of .307-.430-.516 ('16) and .304-.412-.485 ('17).  He's hit 32 homeruns in 864 vR appearances and had 143 BB's vs. 148 K's.  All evidence suggets the guy sort of clubs RHP.  He was terrible vs. LHP this year (.618) but more than passable (.791) last year.  

Vogs will hit.  I"ll take his 110 next season, which would make him a bat like Segura, Cano or Seager this season. That makes more sense to me than the multi-year contract you're going to give Alonso.  

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You know, I wasn't especially a Vogelbach fan a week ago, but ... LOL.  As we're talking here, I'm having a hard time seeing a big contract for Alonso compared to giving Vogelbach $500K and re-deploying the money elsewhere.

You have the issue of the glove but....  Just watched the Moneyball movie in which Beane was laughed out of every room he was in for putting Scott Hatteberg at first.  No need to get absolute about things.

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SeattleNative sez,

I'm fat too, and I played basketball in college.  From that experience I recall looking at opponents and deciding they were "unathletic", "uncoordinated" and/or overweight.  And almost to a person was contradicted in competition.   My only point is looks/appearance don't make the athlete an athlete.   Alot is heart.  Just my opinion. Some of the fattest, uncoordinated dudes were monsters.  Also, I may think someone is fat and you do not, doesn't mean either is right or wrong, it's my opinion.

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I like G-Money's point about 'Bach being stiff and mechanical, with a disconnect between the lower half of the body and the upper.  Could have said that about Snelling too; he moved impressively only when in the batter's box.  'course Snelling was miles ahead of Vogelbach, but Beane's A's have played an awful lot of Matt Stairs-type stiff mechanical hitters.

Bottom line:  we can all agree that 'Bach's sports motion problems are OUTSIDE the batter's box.  Inside it he is quick, mobile, torquey and natural.

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RYAN DIVISH sez,

In the article linked in the last section, 

With Yonder Alonso and Danny Valencia eligible for free agency and Daniel Vogelbach unable to establish himself in a role that had previously been given to him, the Mariners will need to find an experienced first baseman for next season.

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Wait.  The M's have to move on this winter, because 'Bach was unable to establish himself at the ML level?  Is that pretty much what that says?  :- )  Dr. D is a little slow on the uptake sometimes.  Did he miss something?  Like the fifty at-bat milestone, for example?

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BASEBALLHQ sez,

(Before this season, and bearing in mind nothing changed this season)

"Dealt from CHC to SEA mid-season, hung a .417 OBP and 0.97 EYE in the minors.  Translated numbers are understandably whittled a lot, but this is a budding patience-and-power profile.  Defensive shortcomings could impact PT, but this is a bat worthy of a late-round MLB 2017 flyer in deeper leagues."

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OHTANI'S AGENT sez,

Make way dude.  The question is moot.

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UND TAKE ZIS MIT YOU, Dept.

Ryan Divish has a first look at the construction process for the 2018 Mariners.  Excellent quotes from Dipoto, starting with JeDi's view that this winter's 1B class is "pretty flush" and that the mutual interest with Alonso is strong.

Would be cool by me.

Here is a Lookout Landing summary of possible SP targets.  Your list will be different from theirs, but it's a fun little read.

BABVA,

Dr D