Dr. Frank Jobe, the man who performed the first — or, perhaps more accurately, the – Tommy John surgery, has passed away at the age of 88. As MLB.com's Ken Gurnick writes, the longtime Dodgers medical director was instrumental in pioneering that now-commonplace, immensely impactful procedure: "it was Jobe who invented it, performed it, refined it and taught it to hundreds of training orthopedic surgeons." Needless to say, Jobe's contributions to the game will continue to have impact for generations to come, and MLBTR joins the rest of the baseball world in saluting him in passing. If you're interested in learning more about his remarkable life, see this excellent bio piece from MLB.com's Doug Miller.
More from the NL West:
- Padres outfielder Cameron Maybin suffered an arm issue of his own, rupturing his left biceps tendon, but will not need surgery at this point, MLB.com's Corey Brock reports. GM Josh Byrnes said he feared the worst — a season-ending injury — but that after consulting the medical staff "the strong consensus was no surgery." Though a timeline has not yet been set, Maybin could return within four to six weeks. San Diego should have plenty of depth to cover in Maybin's absence, though the club will certainly hope for a positive resolution of this latest setback for the 26-year-old, who signed a five-year, $25MM deal before the 2012 season.
- Meanwhile, the Padres have let third baseman Chase Headley know that they fully intend to make him a qualifying offer at the end of the year, reports Jon Heyman of CBSSports.com via Twitter. While this does not come as a surprise, it indicates that San Diego — like the Indians with Justin Masterson — views the QO as a card to be played in extension talks.
- Former Rockies closer Rafael Betancourt will work out with the club for a ten-day stretch as he seeks another shot at a MLB job, reports Troy Renck of the Denver Post. The club previously declined to exercise its half of a mutual option on the 38-year-old after he underwent — you guessed it — Tommy John surgery late last year. It is surely worth it for Colorado to take a look, as Betancourt has largely been an outstanding reliever since breaking into the bigs at the late age of 28 back in 2003.
If the qualifying offer card is being played by teams in extension talks then they really need to get rid of it in the next collective bargaining discussion.
I agree. It needs to be done away with immediately.
I don’t think they necessarily need to get rid of it I just think they need to rethink it and make it so a team has to really think about offering it. For example make the qualifying offer a mandatory 2 year deal not 1 year.and make it the average of the top 50 salaries NOT the top 125.
That would probably only make teams offer it to the best of the best. For example if that were the case now the top 50 salaries come to just about $17MM times that by 2 = $34MM. Under this system a player would have to be made a QO of 2 years for a total of $34MM.
That might just be enough to make make teams think twice about offering it to players that are on the fringe of being worth it. And it might be enough for those same players to accept it if they were offered it.
No matter where you set the QO there are going to be players that just reach it and have their market altered. Ervin was a no doubt for me, and Drew I thought could get a multi-year at slightly under the QO, so he should reject it. Morales and Cruz though are a different story. Does either player really think they are worth $14M over a multi-year? Those are the players that should have taken the offer, Is not like they are forcing them to go to arbitration, they get a very good offer that is way over what their market really is, so that is mucking it up for them.
No system is going to be prefect. The idea is to make it more fair. My proposal was an attempt to do that.
The way I see it if we look at the 4 players you mention above: Santana, Drew, Morales and Cruz. I think and it’s only my opinion Drew and Morales would have definitely accepted a QO under my proposal. Cruz probably wouldn’t have gotten a QO from the Rangers under those circumstances and he would have made out better. That’s 3 of the 4 that in my opinion would have benefited from my proposal.
As for Santana his ridiculous demands of a deal worth $100MM killed his chance anyway. The QO wasn’t Santana’s achilles heel that only now is coming into play because he finally got more realistic with his demands. My guess is what’s holding up Santana has just as much to do with his inconsistency as other things. His change of heart about reducing his salary demand in my opinion was to little to late.
None of those four guys are worth $17mil/year let alone on a $34mil/2 year contract. I would give Santana $16mil and Drew $14mil but not more than $11mil to Cruz or Morales. Their agents tried to cash in on these guys but failed badly, that’s all. Making ridiculous demands because their initial plan failed doesn’t help either (opt out clause plus market value).
Whether you realize it or not you have made my point.
Re-read my post below because you missed the whole point of it.
Do you think the Padres, Indians, Pirates, and among others can afford to not get some sort of compensation when their players leave for FA? Not even the Yankees and their financial might would offer QOs when it essentially gives slightly above average players a salary meant for elite players. Your system essentially handcuffs players to not offer QO to anyone but the 1 or 2 elite players that hit the market each year (and that’s if you are lucky since teams are more willing to extend their elite players).
There is nothing majorly wrong with the current compensation system as it is working as intended. What happened was that these 4 players and their agents stubbornly overplayed their hand and got burned pretty badly. Out of 200+ FA players, only 13 were offered a QO, and only four of them decided to price themselves out of their market value with ridiculous demands and are suffering the consensuses.
Whether you realize it or not you have made my point.
So where would above average but not elite players fall in that scenario of yours? The way player salary is shaping up every year, that scenario of yours would give players $20mil/year very soon (last year the average top 50 salaries was around $18.5mil). Many teams would lose their above average players to FA without any compensation and let’s face it, small market team wont be able to retain their players if the need to give out $40mil for two years. The number of qualifying offers will go down from 13 (this year) to 1 or 2.
I don’t see the problem with teams using the QO to force extension talks. Why are players and agents able to take advantage of loopholes and hold team hostages but when teams do something similar the system is flawed and must be changed?
Because it’s having the intended impact?
Not really a surprise. Headley is good and young enough that a multiyear deal around that aav is fair to assume he gets.
“You’d better take our offer now because we fully intend to hinder your ability to secure a multi-year contract at market price this offseason.”
If clubs aren’t willing to give up a draft pick because of the QO then I also agree that it should be done away with.
Honestly i think once the QO hits 16MM or 18MM clubs will be risking more
If Dr. Jobe had only negotiated a percentage of the future earnings of the players who underwent his procedure. He brought Orel Hershiser back…that was a big deal to me at the time, also dealing with health issues