We had a busy week here at MLBTR and this next week is likely to be even busier with the Winter Meetings starting tomorrow. Let’s run down the past seven days of arbitration offers, signings, and trades:
- I’ll start off by paying tribute to one of the greatest pitchers our era will see: Greg Maddux will officially announce his retirement tomorrow at the Winter Meetings. Congratulations to him on a spectacular career.
- The Red Sox pleased their fans by signing American League MVP Dustin Pedroia to a six-year, $40.5MM extension. Great signing for Boston. Pedroia at an average of $6.75MM per year? Hard to go wrong with that.
- The Braves’ busy week started when they acquired Javier Vazquez and Boone Logan from the White Sox in exchange for Tyler Flowers, Brent Lillibridge, Jon Gilmore, and Santos Rodriguez. That’s a nice return for Vazquez and Logan while improving the Braves quite a bit for 2009. Here’s some additional reactions. The Braves also inked Dave Ross to a two-year contract this week. And, on top of all that, they also appear to be very interested in A.J. Burnett. Maybe they really are done talking about Jake Peavy.
- What a week for Giants fans: They signed Edgar Renteria to a two-year, $18.5MM contract. National League Cy Young winner Tim Lincecum is open to a long-term deal. The Giants made a nice signing of Bob Howry, and could offer a contract to C.C. Sabathia. If Renteria returns to his standard NL form, the team could vastly improve.
- The Cardinals were also active, acquiring Khalil Greene from the Padres in exchange for Mark Worrell and a player to be named later. I like Greene as a nice rebound candidate this year. Getting out of PETCO and into a much better lineup certainly won’t hurt him. They also signed Trever Miller to a one-year, $2MM contract.
- The Mariners announced this week that J.J. Putz is on the trading block. They also signed Russell Branyan to a one-year, $1.4MM deal. As long as he’s only facing right-handers, that’s a nice signing.
- Here’s a look at all 24 free agents who were offered arbitration. There’s some surprises in there. Who would’ve thought back in August that the D’Backs would end up not offering arbitration to Adam Dunn?
- The Astros signed both Doug Brocail and Mike Hampton this week.
- The Rays appear willing to trade their team MVP, Jason Bartlett, this offseason. The shortstop market is weak, and Bartlett is arbitration-eligible. I never understood Bartlett’s selection as MVP personally. He played average defense with sub-par offense. I wonder what Evan Longoria and Carlos Pena had to say about that decision…
- The Red Sox signed 22-year-old Japanese right-hander Junichi Tazawa for $3MM over three years. This has potential to be a tremendous signing for the BoSox.
- Minor signings for the week: The Brewers signed Jorge Julio for one year, $950K plus incentives, the Indians signed Tomo Ohka to a minor league contract, the White Sox signed John Van Benschoten to a minor league deal, and the Reds signed Mike Lincoln to a two-year deal worth $4MM plus incentives. The Twins were apparently after Lincoln as well.
- Kevin Mench will be spending 2009 playing in Japan for the Hanshin Tigers.