Interesting. To me, option #1 is far and away the most appealing.
You still have a chance to win a World Series this year, but if you don't then you turn your prospects into the best possible starting pitcher available for the next couple of seasons.
Who cares if we won't win the division by 18 games next year? This team is going to make the playoffs the next three seasons barring a complete collapse, and to me you want to have the optimal lineup and rotation for multiple playoff runs.
It's also not out of the realm of possibility that we win it all this year and still have Tucker, Whitley, Martes, Fisher, etc. for the foreseeable future. Frankly, adding Hand, Gray, Britton, etc. doesn't increase your odds all that much on paper.
You still have a chance to win a World Series this year, but if you don't then you turn your prospects into the best possible starting pitcher available for the next couple of seasons.
Who cares if we won't win the division by 18 games next year? This team is going to make the playoffs the next three seasons barring a complete collapse, and to me you want to have the optimal lineup and rotation for multiple playoff runs.
It's also not out of the realm of possibility that we win it all this year and still have Tucker, Whitley, Martes, Fisher, etc. for the foreseeable future. Frankly, adding Hand, Gray, Britton, etc. doesn't increase your odds all that much on paper.