A recent MRI showed that C.J. Edwards’ shoulder has no structural damage, but the Cubs prospect could still miss over a month, Gordon Wittenmyer of the Sun-Times reports. For the Cubs, this is good news — manager Rich Renteria tells the Tribune’s Mark Gonzales (via Twitter) that Edwards’ diagnosis provides “a tremendous sigh of relief.” Edwards had “tightness” while pitching in a side session earlier this week. Baseball America’s Prospect Handbook 2014 ranked Edwards the Cubs’ third-best prospect in a strong system, behind only Javier Baez and Kris Bryant. He pitched brilliantly down the stretch for Class A+ Daytona last season after arriving from the Rangers in the Matt Garza trade. Here are more notes from around baseball.
- The Red Sox’ recent success has been driven, in part, by a turn away from expensive veteran free agents, Joshua Green of Bloomberg BusinessWeek explains in a long profile of Sox owner John Henry. The trend of players signing pre-free agency extensions has made free agents less valuable, according to GM Ben Cherington. “There are fewer and fewer players getting to free agency, or even close, in their prime-age seasons,” he says. “The average age of a free agent has continued to increase. It used to be 30. It’s now north of 32.” Henry thinks Jacoby Ellsbury’s departure from the Red Sox to the Yankees this offseason was a key indicator of the two teams’ differences in outlook. “It is a wildly different approach,” Henry says. “We haven’t participated in this latest feeding frenzy of bidding up stars.”
- With the emergence of Marcus Semien and a number of other potential future options at second base (Leury Garcia, Carlos Sanchez, Micah Johnson), Gordon Beckham could become a trade chip for the White Sox, ESPN Chicago’s Doug Padilla writes. Until they deal Beckham (or if they don’t deal him), the White Sox could keep Semien in the lineup by giving him occasional starts at shortstop and third base. Beckham is set to make $4.175MM this year.
- The Blue Jays’ key question marks include the back of their rotation and second base, GM Alex Anthopoulos tells ESPN’s Buster Olney in the Baseball Tonight Podcast. (Anthopoulos’ segment begins about 30 minutes in.) The Jays currently have Dustin McGowan in the fifth spot in their rotation, and Ryan Goins at second. Anthopoulos mentions that he likes Goins’ defense, but feels the team can upgrade on him offensively.
- Union chief Tony Clark has expressed concern regarding the Mets’ payroll, but MLB commissioner Bud Selig isn’t worried, Newsday’s Steven Marcus tweets. Selig says that he has confidence in the Mets’ ownership.
Guess the Sox are still fooling themselves without Ellsbury, they have no leadoff hitter, no base stealing threat and it hurt them. Cherington has to realize that not all their stars are going to accept a low-ball offer like Pedroia. What he also needs to realize is that the Yankees paid that much for Ellsbury because they knew it would hurt the Sox athletically way more then it will ever hurt the Yankees financially.
They do now finally have Victorino, which if he can repeat last year will be fine near the top of the order. Not sure if he can actually repeat that, he had been kinda average for several years beforehand. I’m a bit surprised they haven’t really tried Bogaerts near the top of the order, he hasn’t showed tons of power, but his obp and average are really good. I’ve liked his offense, his defense not so much.
I was thinking the same and I’ve heard many other Sox fans echo the same thing about Boegarts being at the top of the lineup. Maybe Farell is trying to make the lineup longer? Bottom line is the Sox didn’t improve this offseason while others in the East did. Ellsbury production at the plate or on the basepaths hasn’t been replaced. I was saying the signing of Sizemore countered that but Sox fans didn’t think so but he’s playing CF and batting first right?
they are defending champions… im not sure they felt a lot of pressure to improve. were they crazy to think that not making any moves to keep or replace certain players would keep them at a championship competing level? maybe, but we are just in the infancy of the season…
and i dont think anyone expected Nava to tank (at least as bad) as he has. he was kind of the lead off plan if im not mistaken? they have recent a history of making big mid season moves, if things stay like they are i assume one of those might be in the works.
He’s playing left field and batting 5th or 6th. Bradley is in center.
Boston has gone literally decades without any base stealing threat at all in the lineup, excepting a 2-3 year window with Jerry Remy before he destroyed his knee at Yankee stadium.
I see no reason they should have gone out and doubled what they felt his worth was, just because some fans feel they needed him after a poor start following the next season.
The team can attempt to get Mookie Betts up in another couple of years as a leadoff hitter, maybe Cecchini and go with Victorino for now, possibly even JBJ if he picks up hitting a tad better.
Coco Crisp was a base stealer as well as Damon, need I go back farther in history? But those are the cursed years.
“Yankees paid that much for Ellsbury because they knew it would hurt the Sox”
Signing a guy to a 7 year contract, because it will hurt their rival in ’14. (Sox will have several leadoff options hitting the majors in ’15 and ’16). Sounds like a move the Jets would make. Trying to out think a division rival instead of managing their own team. Hows that working out for them?
Who has the better record so far? We’ll come back later in the year to see how much you all miss him.
Ellsbury will be on the DL shortly.
Not before Sizemore. Didn’t Pedroia already have an injury? I know Victorino did 😉
I admire the Red Sox office immensely for their success, but they tend to gloss over just how lucky they were with the trade to the Dodgers. If that had not occurred, would they really have been lecturing the rest of us on the value of short-term contracts?
Right. Cards and Rays are showing a good model. I mean the Sox went and bought Napoli and Victorino, after they were lucky to get all those contracts taken off their hands.
Maybe Clark should be more concerned about minding his own business. The Mets meet payroll and aren’t bankrupt.
Bud Selig, is that you?
Beyond thankful that Edwards doesn’t have structural damage. He’s been lights out and just needs to continue putting on weight as he advances. Hope he can come back strong. Rest up kid.
The cubs better trade one of those infielders or they’ll end up like the orioles which is all hitting no pitching.
The Cubs have a fantastic market. I think they just need to at one time start assembling the team, and trying to fit all the parts together. They can take on some contracts when the time comes, and if it’s all pitching just splurge.
The Cubs pitching prospect depth is there. Its not as good as our position players, but its really there. They WON’T be without pitching.
White Sox will struggle to give Beckham away at his salary. He’s not even an average baseball player. He’s horrible.
Beckham might appeal to the Yankees, who are hurting at 2B with only a well over-the-hill, not to mention injury-prone Brian Roberts and Solarte as the back-up to both him and Jeter (who is also aging and has also recently seen the DL). I’m not sure what we could get back, but some help in the bullpen sounds great right about now.
“The Red Sox‘ recent success has been driven, in part, by a turn away from expensive veteran free agents,”
Well, first they were able to get the Dodgers to accept the ones they signed (Crawford and Adrian Gonzalez who technically was not a FA but signed for FA money). Everyone agrees that was a gift although Beckett and Gonzalez have been good this year.
They were led to the World Series by free agents Lackey, Victorino, Napoli, Gomes, Dempster, Uehara, Drew and their own free agent Ortiz. Total spent on these free agents just for 2013 was 87 million, which is more than the total payroll of many teams
Pretty sure Albert Almora is the Cubs third best prospect behind Baez and Bryant.
Depends on the rankings that you are looking at. Most people have Almora 3rd and Edwards 4th, but BA has them flipped.