Older ballplayers are showing a lot of life so far this season, writes Nick Cafardo of the Boston Globe. Veterans Paul Konerko, Derek Jeter, David Ortiz, and Jamie Moyer have all looked sharp in the month of April. Ortiz lost 25 pounds to get himself into shape for this season and plans to keep up the hard work as he hopes to play for another two seasons. Here's more from Cafardo..
- The Angels have inquired on A’s pitcher Grant Balfour and he is becoming one of the more sought-after bullpen pieces. The Halos have also shown interest in Joel Hanrahan of the Pirates and the Mariners' Brandon League, but Balfour seems the most logical.
- If the Twins don’t turn things around by the trade deadline, Carl Pavano will be a highly sought-after pitcher. The right-hander is earning $8.5MM in the final year of his contract and has limited no-trade protection. Jason Marquis, Matt Capps, and Francisco Liriano could also be used as chips to land prospects.
- Teams probably have their eye on Astros right-hander Brett Myers. Many teams, such as the Angels and Red Sox, could use the 31-year-old’s arm right now. He has also shown that he can pitch in a big market with his time in Philadelphia.
- If Tigers outfielder Delmon Young is convicted of a hate crime, it will be interesting to see whether the the club void his contract. They would be within their rights to do so under the collective bargaining agreement. The 26-year-old earns $6.75MM this year and can become a free agent after the season.
- The A's are a good bet to land Brandon Inge.
- Most baseball people feel there’s no way the Red Sox let Aaron Cook hit the open market by not calling him up May 1. The 33-year-old will earn the prorated portion of $1.5MM if he is called up to the majors.
If the likes of Jason Marquis is worth one thin dime as being worthy of bringing back prospects in a trade, much less Pavano and his 8m salary.. Why not Aaron Cook and his paltry 1.5m salary? It might be worth it in Boston’s case to just let him get 1-2 starts to just let him get them for just that purpose alone.
I cannot believe the amount of times I have heard Aaron Cook talked about in the last week. If this guy was with any other team besides Boston, we would never hear of him. Every team has an Aaron Cook in AAA. He’s still terrible.
True, but to be fair, if he was on ANY big market team, you’d hear about him.
Oh I am not saying Cook is anything but a back end, emergency starter at BEST, but Marquis and Pavano? Pavano is making 8m? Who would even PAY him 8m, much less TRADE and then PAY him that much? Then there is Marquis, who has been a journeyman junkballing backend (at best) his entire career and is making 3m?
Why give up anything for that guy and PAY 3m? I can’t see Cook being any less, even Ohlendorf, who Boston also has at AAA and doing about as well is as good as Pavano and Marquis and that isn’t saying much…
The article never said that the Twins would be able to trade them AND their salary. It simply says that Marquis and Pavano could be used at the deadlins to acquire prospects. I’m sure if the Twins are out of it in July. they would eat some money to bring in a prospect.
Anyway, if I have a chance at the playoffs and I need a starter, I want Pavano over Cook every time.
This is going back a bit here..
Think Pavano already has had his trade value.. Like when he was the key piece in the Pedro Martinez trade and actually had some velocity on his FB. Boston had Pavano and this other top SP by the name of Brian Rose at that time and Montreal chose Pavano over Rose.. Shame, cause Rose flamed out and Pavano had a decent career until his arm blew out, lost 3-5mph on his fb and he became the trash thrower he is now.
haha I totally agree.
Hey dude, kinda off topic, but is Jake Westbrook for real this year? Who do you think will have a better year, Westbrook or Lohse?
Westbrook looks better this year with the weight loss. He’s also pitching with a lot of confidence that I’ve never seen in him. That said, I don’t know how far that all goes. I could see him keeping an ERA under 4 this year. He is over-achieving, no doubt. We just have to see how much.
Lohse is one of the more underrated pitchers in baseball when healthy, IMO. Every season he has been healthy in St. Louis, he has produced. If he can stay healthy, he will have the better year of the two. A lot of people don’t realize Lohse led the Cardinals in Wins, ERA, and WHIP on a 90 win team last year.
A’s aren’t going after another useless hitter at third base
This. Makes much more sense for the A’s to stick with Sogard and Rosales at 3B.
It’s a pleasure to watch a guy like Konerko perform so well out of the spotlight. If you say his name outside of Chicago, folks would say Paul who?
Any serious baseball fan would know Paul Konerko. As an Oakland fan, I am familiar with his exploits, especially recently with his game tying homer off Balfour.
True, serious baseball fans know him. His performance has been good enough and steady enough that casual fans ought to know him too but I don’t think they do.
You would have been right a few years ago. His consistently good play has put him on the map, though, I’ll give you he’s not as well known as he should be with those numbers year in year out.
I think with the millions of fans who play fantasy baseball each year, Paul Konerko is certainly well-known outside of Chicago. You may have to leave Chicago for some research before making such a dubious claim. I’ll agree that he’s been an under-rated masher for too long, but he’s not an unknown player hiding out in the small market of Chicago.
Not everyone plays fantasy baseball. I think that Konerko suffers from the same problem that many good 1B-men have suffered from over the years. There are always a small handful of superstar 1B-men who are nearly household names in baseball. And then there are some very good ones who labor in the shadows of those superstars for most of their careers, who probably deserve more recognition than they may get, and may also suffer from not playing on a premier team like that gets a lot of national exposure. That is, if Konerko played for the Yankees, for example, I expect that he’d be a much more widely known name, even if he wasn’t really one of the true superstar 1B-men. Just being a Yankee would make him better known.
Serious fans probably know who these types of players are, but I expect that lots of casual fans may not.
ESPN didn’t say *anything* when Paulie hit HR #400 recently. Seriously.
Baseball’s a funny game… 4 years ago could anybody have expected Pavano would still be pitching, let alone considered a trade asset?
balfour for either trumbo or segura, cuz the Angels already locked up aybar.
Trumbo would be perfect at first base… Good bye Barton :D
Trumbo or our best prospect for one and a half years of a 34 year old reliever… yeah, probably not.
actually, that kinda trade makes sense, if you just look at the 2010 trade of Dotel (at age 36) to the Dodgers, they got a decent starting pitcher (who was at least as valuable then as trumbo is now) and at the time, a good power hitting prospect, although he’s fizzled out since then.
also, as MLBTR pointed out, and this is straight from their article: “If the A’s listen to offers for Balfour now, expect them to demand a significant return — perhaps a controllable player capable of making an impact at the Major League level plus supplementary pieces.”
and if he waits: “If teams balk at the asking price, Beane can simply wait until July when he’ll have the chance to obtain value from a team in serious need of relief help.”
edit: and the trade for dotel was for HALF A SEASON of him, not 1 and a half years
I think a better comp deal would be 1.5 years of Mike Adams for Erlin and Wieland, especially since Ned Colletti’s veteran fetishism wasn’t involved. No reason the A’s shouldn’t get similar for Balfour who has a 2013 club option (that stays a club option even if he gets traded).
Also, Balfour has saves, an excessively overrated stat. That always helps.
The A’s have no reason to trade him now unless they’re getting a serious overpay in return.
mike adams was also a couple years younger, so that doesn’t really help balfour’s case
I’m not saying they won’t have to overpay, but I doubt Trumbo or Segura are going anywhere.
Honest, non-snark question: Is Jean Segura considered to be passable at 3B?
Actually it would make a lot of sense for the Astros to trade Myers for a Trumbo type player. They will be in the AL next year and will need a DH/Power hitter type to go against the AL West. They have Singleton for 1B but Trumbo could fill and and play a little 3B and DH. Seems like a good fit.
It would inflate the mess out of the relief market if Myers was traded for Trumbo.
As a fan of a team with relievers to trade, I support this move.