Rangers assistant general manager Thad Levine has withdrawn himself from consideration for the Diamondbacks’ GM vacancy, reports Nick Piecoro of the Arizona Republic (via Twitter). Levine tells Jon Heyman of CBS Sports that he had a good talk over the phone with Arizona chief baseball officer Tony La Russa prior to his decision (Twitter link). As of this weekend, it was reported that Dave Stewart, former pitcher and current agent to Matt Kemp (among others), is considered the favorite for the job.
Here’s more on the D’Backs…
- Cody Ross understood the reason that the Diamondbacks sat him in favor of impressive rookie David Peralta upon his activation from the disabled list, writes Zach Buchanan of the Arizona Republic. However, now, with Peralta out due to a back injury, Ross is trying to prove himself once again and prove that he belongs on the team in 2015. Ross tells Buchanan that he hopes to remain in Arizona. Given his $8.5MM salary next season and lack of production over the past two seasons, it’d be tough for a new GM to move him anyhow, Buchanan notes.
- “It took a full-scale collapse to force the necessary organizational reboot, but change is definitely coming in Arizona,” writes Fangraphs’ Dave Cameron in an intro to a colleague Kiley McDaniel’s excellent rundown of the Snakes’ farm system. Cameron feels that there’s far more than one offseason’s worth of work to fix the D’Backs, while McDaniel runs down a list of prospects topped by Archie Bradley, Braden Shipley, Aaron Blair, Brandon Drury and Touki Toussaint.
- In a second piece, Buchanan writes that last offseason’s hiring of first base coach Dave McKay away from the Cubs has paid significant dividends for the D’Backs. McKay has placed a strong emphasis on improving the club’s baserunning, and the results show in baserunning metrics on both Fangraphs and Baseball Prospectus, Buchanan notes. The D’Backs jumped from respective marks of -10.5 runs and -9.7 runs in 2013 to +0.4 runs and -0.5 runs in 2014.
I was upset that the Cubs lost Dave McKay. He did a fantastic job for us. The D-backs got a good one.
I read that as Matt Kemp being favored for the D’Backs GM job :-) I think he’d be terrible at it!
I disagree with the assessment that the Dbacks are more than a year off from contention. They are a few top of the rotation arms away from contention. They have depth at just about every offensive position. Their bullpen is young but has promising arms. They even have starting pitching depth (Corbin, Arroyo, Collmenter, Nuno, Cahill, Anderson, Delgado, Miley). The biggest issue is that they don’t have front end starters. For all we know Blair, Shipley, and Bradley could solve that problem internally
I wish I could agree with you but I can’t. They basically have a bunch of 3, 4, and 5 starters. Corbin if healthy can be a 2 and Miley when he is on is a solid 3 but the rest are lower rotation guys. Bradley’s control issues are a little scary and Shipley and Blair most likely won’t be in the majors next year. If Goldy’s hand heal perfectly, AJ Pollock continues to impress, and the rest have decent seasons they should be alright offensively. Having 5 OFs doesn’t help the roster. Why can’t the NL have the DH too!
That’s my point. Offense is fine. Bullpens are hit or miss but there is definitely the talent there, and they have 8 pitchers that, when healthy, are at least major league pitchers. They all top out at #3s but they are all serviceable. The only thing this team really needs is top end starters. When I said those guys could fill that role I was talking hypothetically. The other option is going out and getting a guy in FA or via trade. My overall point is, this team really is only a piece or 2 away from contention, whether its an internal or external piece
The only problem with that is I do not see them getting a guy in FA or in a trade that is a TOR arm. It will be interesting to see what a new GM does.
Well they shed McCarthy ($10.25M), Prado ($11M), and Parra ($4.85M) this season. That gives them $26.1M to work with for 2015. Obviously arbitration raises will bring that number down, but I don’t see any reason why they wouldn’t be able to add a guy like Ervin Santana or James Shields. Especially if they shed additional salary like Pennington this offseason
I read recently that they want to stay around $100 million payroll. They were at $112ish so they should be around $86 which gives them some room to add a guy but I’m not sure Santana or Shields is worth $15+ million a year. They need to develop arms and hope that one of them turns into a TOR guy. Free agency isn’t the answer.
They have the money to spend and really don’t have any other areas of need. Cahill and Arroyo come off the books next year so they also have the money long term. I don’t see why they shouldn’t sign a guy like Shields or Santana now. It adds a reliable TOR arm in the short term, and a solid 3 guy at the very least at the back end of the contract. With Cahill making $12M next year and Arroyo making $10M Shields really doesn’t seem like an overpay at something like 4 years and $65M. I agree that they need to develop arms, but I also think the last thing you want to do is force a prospect like Archie Bradley to have to be “the guy” right out of the gate. The hope would be that you have someone in place and then a guy like Archie simply out pitches him and takes the top spot. Then suddenly a rotation that goes Bradley, Shields, Corbin 1-3 looks pretty good