Ken Rosenthal of FOX Sports breaks down a half-dozen managers who may be on the hot seat. Among them, only Blue Jays skipper John Gibbons could be in a postseason-or-bust position, in Rosenthal’s estimation (he also lists Bryan Price of the Reds, Walt Weiss of the Rockies, Robin Ventura of the White Sox, Chip Hale of the D-backs and Brian Snitker of the Braves — each for other reasons), who points out that Gibbons was hired by former GM Alex Anthopoulos, who is no longer with the organization. Moreover, the Jays have a number of free agents, including Jose Bautista, Edwin Encarnacion, R.A. Dickey and Michael Saunders, and new baseball ops heads Mark Shapiro and Ross Atkins could look to make a large transition with such a great deal of roster turnover already likely to be forthcoming.
More from the AL East…
- With such little certainty in their rotation heading into the 2017 season, the Yankees need to focus on starting pitching this winter, opines ESPN’s Buster Olney (Insider subscription required). Olney surmises that the Yankees have the financial firepower to add via free agency and should target left-hander Rich Hill as a high-upside addition to the staff. While Hill doesn’t come with much in the way of certainty himself, adding him would allow the team to enter the season with a high-upside mix of rotation arms and conserve its prospect depth and make a midseason pitching acquisition at a time when a greater number of targets will be available.
- Joe Kelly is demonstrating the potential to be a shutdown reliever for the Red Sox and could develop into a late-inning weapon in that role next season, writes Brian MacPherson of the Providence Journal. MacPherson spoke to Red Sox pitching analyst (and former big league pitcher) Brian Bannister about Kelly, with Bannister noting that Kelly has one of the best spin rates of any pitcher in baseball on his curveball. “As a reliever, he can showcase that much more often,” said Bannister of Kelly, who has all but cut out his changeup and slider since moving to the bullpen. “It’s as impressive of a curveball as you’ll see out of anybody. It’s just a matter of finding out how far that can take him.” Kelly would like another chance at starting, however, according to MacPherson, though the Red Sox have yet to have the necessary conversations to determine if they’ll give him that chance.
- Sticking with the Boston ‘pen, the Globe’s Nick Cafardo writes that the return of Koji Uehara has helped to stabilize what was once a weak point for the Red Sox and turn it into a strength. Uehara’s return, paired with Kelly’s emergence, has allowed Robbie Ross Jr. and Brad Ziegler to be used in more specialized high-leverage roles. Uehara’s strong work late in the season makes it imperative that the Sox try to re-sign him this winter, Cafardo opines, despite the fact that he’ll pitch next season at age 42.
Add to the fact that if Hill went to the Yanks, he’d have Rothschild again
Let’s hope the Yanks are smarter now and won’t sign Rich Hill. Someone will give him a couple of years at too much money for a 37 year old who has thrown more innings this year than any other year since 2007.
And still spent a bunch of time on the DL.
Hill gave up 4 runs in his last start. The last time he gave up more than 3 runs? July 21, 2009. Two clunkers in 210 innings is pretty good. Oh also: his arm is about 32 years old, because of the whole 460 innings in 8 seasons thing. His injuries have been non-nonstructural ones, just weird in-game stuff. I’d get him to callous up that thumb in the offseason though.
Lastly, he’s a top 10 pitcher in FIP and xFIP of everyone with more than 100 innings, you pay good money for that even if you know going in he’s no lock to make 30 starts. 20 starts where almost all of them are QS’s are what teams pay a premium for. Yankees paid Sabathia 25 million for 14 QS this year. Obviously Hill isn’t getting that, but giving him 3/60 is the kind of risk a borderline contender needs to make to put them over the top. Rich Hill is ridiculously good at pitching and he has the highest ceiling of anyone on the FA market. If he throws 30 games, he’s in Cy Young contention.
Lol. Any GM that gives Hill 3/60 should be immediately fired. He is basically a 5 year older version of Kazmir. Paying a 37 year old based on his last 25 starts is a recipe for disaster. The Yankees paying CC 25 million for 14 QS is irrelevant since he would never be paid that for this year if he hadn’t had a long term contract.
Lol
The 2017 FA starter list is so putrid that the Red Sox are considering picking up Bucholtz’s 13.5 MM option. Given that the NYY & LAD will both be trying to sign Hill average to below average SP’s will get way over paid.
Buchholz has pitched decent as of late.
I think what Bucholz needed was mental rest and arm rest. He is fragile physically – always has been. With the exception of the start in Toronto, He has pitched well in the second half. The season started badly for him and mentally, it seemed he was stressed and forcing things. Once he got used to the bullpen and worked on some things, he improved. Picking up his last year would be good.
Olney thinks the Yankees should give up the 15th pick in the first round to sign Rich Hill to a big money deal at the beginning of a rebuild?
Tanaka
Pineda
CC
Mitchell
Severino
Green
Cessa
Montgomery
Enns
Adams
That’s 10 starting pitchers ready to fight for MLB starting jobs next year.
Acevedo
Sheffield
Kaprielian
3 more that should be ready the following year.
I actually like Hill and would like him on the team. I wouldn’t be expecting him to be very good for more than a couple of years however and a signing like that means ignoring the kids, signing a couple of vets and trying to squeeze into the playoffs as a wild card.
The first round pick is a crapshoot but that’s too high a pick to give up for an old, expensive injury prone pitcher.
Rich Hill was traded during the season, eliminating the draft pick compensation. Yankees wouldn’t be giving up a pick, just the contract
Ahh. That’s right. Thank you.
In that case it probably doesn’t hurt too much.
I’d rather have Chapman if it’s a choice and would really like to see some of the young pitchers get a chance but it’s probably worth it if they are prepared to sign both of them.
Chapman is probably going to resign with the Yankees in the offseason. He said he loved it there. As a Red Sox fan, I hope he loves his new home. Lol
Only Tanaka is arguably better than Hill from that list though. Also there’s this phrase “You can never have enough pitching.” Hill makes every team in MLB better because of how incredible he is. He’s 4th in FIP in MLB with all pitchers with 100+ innings, 10th in xFIP. That fact alone should have teams offering $20m a year for him, especially with no QO pick attached to him.
I agree that Joe Kelly can be an effective guy out of the pen, but let’s not forget that he’s still walking too many batters. Until that issue is corrected, he’s essentially a 6th/7th inning guy.
I hope gibbons doesn’t get the boot. It’s not his fault his offense is wildly inconsistent or that a struggling Brett Cecil was still his best lefty option out of the pen for most of the year
I agree about the offense’s inconsistencies and I don’t believe he should be fired if they miss the playoffs.
Saying that, Gibby hasn’t exactly earned a guarantee to return either. He hasn’t adjusted as the season has gone along. He continually has insisted on using Cecil vs RHB even though righties have tee’d off on him for most of the year and now those struggles are shifting against LHB. His deployment of Osuna has also been questionable at times, especially recently. Bullpen aside, Gibby’s lineup’s haven’t been the most effective either(Bautista at lead off, Martin cleanup, etc).
I won’t be heartbroken if he’s fired as I’ve never been a fan of his. At the same time, he hasn’t been so bad that he deserves to be fired.
I think Bautista at lead off is the right call though. He gets on base soooo much, and Martin hitting 4th was mainly during his hot streak. I agree I won’t be angry if he is fired, but I think he’s easily the best manager in the division. Showalter is close but he makes a lot of questionable decisions.
I’m actually a fan of Girardi personally and Showalter has a much better track record than Gibby. Farrell and Gibby are a wash for me as both have similar weaknesses. I have a hard time judging what Cash has done as he hasn’t exactly been given much to work with in TB.
My lone worry if Gibby is fired is the Jays will put Wedge in to replace him. No offence to Wedge but I have not heard many good things about him from Cleveland or Seattle fans or media.
The window is always closing on contending teams and only one winner. The playoffs are outlier today.
Yanks will only trade for a top front line starter who is contolable. Otherwise they go with the ten young pitchers they have . I see them trading McCann, Gardner, and some prospects like Mateo, to land some pitching.
I would seriously consider picking Ivan Nova up again. I’m guessing he’ll sign for around 3-4 years at 12-15MM avg per season, on the high end. That’s not a lot of money for the Yankees AND by signing Nova you don’t give up a draft pick. Rich Hill is way too old for this Yankees team. Nova has pitched well with the Pirates.
I’d also like to see the Yankees try to trade away Pineda, who just doesn’t seem to fit in well on this team. From the pine tar on his arm, to his attitude when Girardi pulls him from games, this guy just never seemed to me like he has it all together mentally. On top of that, his delivery is very had to consistently repeat, which makes his results inconsistent. In my opinion, he will always be inconsistent and will never reach his full potential.
Other than starting pitching, the Yankees are in desperate need of more bullpen help after getting rid of Chapman and Miller. Resigning Chapman, or getting a guy like Jensen, will certainly help. I think Betances is better in a 7th/8th role than closer. Clippard has been decent, but he is no setup man. He is a middle reliever.
Pick up some arms, trade away guys like Brian McCann and Michael Pineda, and hang on to your top prospects. That’d be my plan this offseason.
After finding success elsewhere I don’t think you have any chance of Nova signing in NY unless they offer him ridiculous money that blows every other team out of the water. I’d actually be surprised if he left the National League. I think a lot of his success comes from leaving NY and the bandbox ballparks where they play many of their games.
If he gets a big contract, he won’t care after that where he’s pitching. It’d only matter for him for the next contract, but that’d be probably 4 years away. He’s in the NL now in his contract year putting up good numbers which should set him up for a pretty good deal. He will be especially attractive this offseason due to no draft pick compensation, his age, and the lack of free agent starting pitching options this offseason. I’d rather have him with his issues than 37 year old Rich Hill plus a draft pick and probably more money per year than Nova.
Hill doesn’t come with a QO attached.