The Orioles officially signed Wei-Yin Chen today and we caught up on the left-hander's new team earlier this evening. Here’s the latest on the rest of the AL East…
- Alex Speier of WEEI.com hears from multiple sources that the Red Sox are not near a deal with Hiroki Kuroda.
- The Red Sox continue searching for low-cost pitching help, Nick Cafardo of the Boston Globe writes.
- The Rays have started extension talks with manager Joe Maddon and plan to resume discussions soon, Jon Heyman of CBSSports tweets.
- Agent Scott Boras told Marc Topkin of the St. Petersburg Times that free agents Carlos Pena and Johnny Damon could return to Tampa Bay. However, both players are drawing interest from other clubs.
- Blue Jays GM Alex Anthopoulos hasn’t ruled out adding a reliever, Gregor Chisholm of MLB.com writes. However, the GM says he doesn’t want to force a deal. “There's a lot of things we could have done this past offseason to say that we did it, but I just don't ultimately believe they would have been good signings or good trades for us,” he said. “I think they would have been bad.”
AA is never done
He’s trying to stop Boras from using Toronto as a negotiating piece.
Can’t really stop him. Boras is like a parasite, he’ll just keep trying to attach on to someone until he unloads his spawn. AA has done a good job of avoiding him.
Scott Boras is the best agent in the world. how is he a parasite..
and AA hasn’t stayed away on purpose, he cant afford his clients.
Scott Boras, is that you?
edit: please quit dropping the Jays name to make your guys sell
sigh
Its ok, you dont need to worry. The Nationals are always willing to over pay
So good that some teams refuse to work with him.
poor teams that can’t afford his clients.
There actually was a GM that refused to even negotiate with Boras.. Had his associates do everything for the few people he had on the roster with him and refused to sign FA of his, all because the GN said he went back on his word over a deal..
You recall who that GM was?? I tried googling and cannot find.. It was years ago.
and the downhill narrative continues.
A GM that refuses to work with any agent is proving themselves to be either weak minded or not capable of negotiating with said agent. A good GM works with everybody. The only reason that an agent should be “off limits” to a GM is when they are breaking the law.
You might not like Boras, but he does his job, and does it well enough to represent some of the best talent in the sport. I don’t like or dislike him, if it wasn’t him, someone else would represent these players, and frankly I can’t feel too upset about billionaire owners paying millions of dollars for what amounts to their hobby.
well one could say that he’s a good agent because he’s a parasite.
although i would say that parasite is probably not the most apt term to use.
also i have the feeling that AA could afford boras’ clients if he really wanted them, i just think hes sticking to the plan they probably set out back when he was hired. i get the feeling that he wants to model the jays after a team like the rangers who made their first WS with a payroll comparable to what the jays have now. then they spent on beltre the following offseason and now their payroll projects into the $100+mill range with their moves this offseason.
granted the rangers dont play in the AL East, and it remains to be seen if anyone besides the rays can beat the sox and yanks with a modest payroll, but i really think AA believes the idea that the team will tell him (in the standings) when they’re ready for a major acquisition. rightly or wrongly of course, but i think the jays get there eventually.
The Rangers is a team AA has often said he’s modeling after, but you said it, they don’t play in the AL East.
AA needs to be a tad more aggressive.. He’s done really well so far I love so many of his moves..
but I will be curious as to what Fielder ends up with, if it ends up being a modest 5-6 year contract, I’ll be pretty disappointed.
yea i would be too. 5-6 years is not too much risk to assume in someone of fielder’s calibre.
i do think he gets more than that though. i just dont believe that boras will gun for 10 years and end up with 5-6. if he drops the asking price to 5-6 years, a bunch of teams will jump on the phone and before you know it they will be bidding against each other back into the 7-8 year range. one way or another i think he ends up with a number like that.
based on his more limited skill set he probably doesnt deserve a teix or agonz-type deal, but of course agents arent looking at what their players deserve, only how much they can get.
having a 1-2-3-4-5 of escobar, johnson, bautista, fielder, lawrie
just seems like so much fun. sigh
maybe 2009 Lind will show up?
I want the Jays to sign Fielder so badly. That would really start shifting the balance of power in the AL East – it’d make that division way more interesting. 4 Contenders – can you imagine both the Yankees and Red Sox not making the playoffs?
I think they make the playoffs this year if they sin Fielder and swing a trade for Garza. I don’t know what they’ll do about a closer though.
apparently the asking price for garza is too high, so they might have to hope for the best with alvarez, mcgowanand cecil or carreno ..
Closer is santos, acquired from the white sox. with santos, oliver, frasor and janssen, back end of the bullpen shouldnt be a problem.
trying to earn as much money as possible for your client (also called doing your job) = parasite?
You’re right, maybe he should write a 80 something page essay of why he’s so great and deserves to be paid more than he’s worth.
you literally make no sense
Its a joke, doesnt need to. If AA isn’t willing to deal with Boras, then thats a good enough reason for me. In AA we trust.
If AA offered you grape kool-aid while on a trip to Guyana would you drink it?
I don’t recall ever reading AA stating that he wouldn’t deal with Boras, but if he actually did say that publicly, that is one really good reason to not trust his abilities as a GM.
Sorry, I would have replied earlier but i drank this kool-aid and took a really long nap. Guess i was really tired
theres no reason to think AA wouldnt deal with boras. its probably just that his clients, and all excessively expensive FA’s, dont currently fit with the jays MO right now.
Agreed. I always wondered what would happen if AA and Boras would go tete-a-tete. Fight to the death!
AA is great how can you say that he is just sitting in 4th place half the season had davis patterson rivera in the OF and nix on 3b plus now look at the pen jays are much improved
davis is your fourth outfielder if he even makes the cut this season…sheesh. your outfield looked a lil different if you paid attention at all. their pen is always good…has been since they got rid of bj ryan. they wont be relevant til the new divisions take place next year.
Im just saying half the season there was an outfield of rivera, davis and patterson starting now since lawrie is up its Bautista, rasmus and thames that a tone better and when was our bull pen good? we had a tone of blown saves and now we have a closer
How can you have a post about the al east and not mention the yankees once?
blasphemy.
I’ll sum up what’s happened with them… “The Yankees have continued to look for a starting pitcher without having to overpay / over-commit.”
I like Joe Maddon. He seems like a great guy.
dude paid his dues to get to where he is..
I dont always agree with his in game moves, but you gotta respect him
Not that a manager really changes the complexion of a game (unless he can’t manage a bullpen, see: Farrell), but I’d have to think Maddon is one of the top 3 in the game, probably because he takes his vitamins on(c)e a day.
#1 on my list and it isn’t close
No Scoscia?
too much jeff mathis love and mike napoli hate.
can we trade for him?
Joe Maddon for Mike Stanton. Start the rumor mill!
Maddon’s one of the few managers that I think really changes the complexion of the game, so to speak. There is no other way to account for the frequency with which the Rays pull garbage off of the scrap heap and excel with it. Friedman’s a phenomenal GM and he does well with his limited resources, but he’s not the one coaxing above replacement level production out of guys like Farnsworth and Kotchman. Maddon deserves a lot of credit for the way so many of his guys play over their heads.
Boras saying Pena and Damon might go back to Tampa? I thought he always just says that a lot of teams are interested and the market is great for all his players even after getting Ryan Madson only 1 year.
Yea, so much goes into maintaining (my usual rants)…seeming to be (informative) while (dumping all over) Toronto (fans). It takes finesse to make a chronically irrelevant (statement).
edit: dude, i missed you
The Jays
The guy is only a fan of reading his own obnoxious trolling.
and then gave 65 of it to Jose