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Archives for February 2018

Quick Hits: Cashman, Free Agency, Rebuilding Teams, Pedroia

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On this day 20 years ago, the Yankees announced Brian Cashman would take over for the resigned Bob Watson as their general manager. The 50-year-old Cashman remains in that post today, making him the game’s longest-tenured GM, and it’s no surprise he has hung around when you consider the team’s accomplishments on his watch. The Cashman-led Yankees have gone to the playoffs 16 times, earning six American League pennants and four World Series championships along the way. The fact that Cashman has lasted as long as he has in the sport’s biggest market makes his run all the more impressive, a rival GM suggested to Buster Olney of ESPN. “Twenty years, in New York,” he said. “That’s, what, 140 dog years? Two hundred years?”  Olney’s piece is worth checking out for more on Cashman first two decades as a GM, including the relationship he had with former boss and late Yankees owner George Steinbrenner. 

More from around baseball as this historically slow offseason continues to plod along…

  • Tyler Kepner of the New York Times discussed this inactive winter with with a free agent who, like many other veterans, hasn’t enjoyed his trip to the open market. While commissioner Rob Manfred is zeroing in on implementing pace-of-play changes, the players themselves have bigger concerns, according to the free agent. “The players are so much more focused on what’s always been the crown jewel of our union, which is free agency, and the way that’s kind of been taken away,” he said. “It’s something you once fought and strove for — you wanted to become a free agent desperately.” Saturday looks set to pass without any major league free agent signings, continuing to leave upward of 110 players without deals.
  • The Astros, Cubs and Nationals have pulled off model rebuilds in recent years, observes Jim Bowden of The Athletic (subscription required), who goes on to rank the majors’ current rebuilding clubs based on how well they’re executing their plans. No one is doing a better job than the White Sox, Bowden opines, in part because of the recent returns they’ve received in trades for such veterans as Chris Sale, Jose Quintana and Adam Eaton. The ChiSox have five top 100 prospects, per Baseball America, and three – Eloy Jimenez, Michael Kopech and Dane Dunning – joined the organization via those deals (as did second baseman Yoan Moncada, who has graduated from top prospect status). The other two – Alec Hansen and Luis Robert – came from the draft and international free agency, respectively, which Bowden also highlights as important avenues in which rebuilding teams must hit the jackpot.
  • Red Sox second baseman Dustin Pedroia will sit out some of 2018 after undergoing left knee surgery in October, but there’s hope he won’t miss much time. As per his rehab schedule, Pedroia is lining up for a late-April or early May return, Nick Cafardo of the Boston Globe estimates. Pedroia told Cafado that he hasn’t suffered any setbacks in his rehab, adding that his “knee has responded well” to running and strength exercises. After roughly six more weeks of running and then, as Cafardo writes, “a period of agility work,” Pedroia will be able to start baseball activities. The 34-year-old franchise stalwart also explained to Cafardo that knee problems weighed on him both physically and mentally in 2017, when he appeared in just 105 games, but he’s currently pain-free.

NL Notes: Cubs, Mets, Nunez, Pirates

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Checking in on the National League…

  • The Cubs are “still looking to add depth” to their pitching staff, general manager Jed Hoyer tells Jesse Rogers of ESPN.com. “That’s an annual thing you think about. You prepare for injuries even if some years you go unscathed,” he continued. Starting depth does appear to be an issue at the moment for the Cubs, who lack battle-tested options beyond their current projected rotation of Kyle Hendricks, Jose Quintana, Jon Lester, Tyler Chatwood and Mike Montgomery. Of the other healthy starting possibilities on their 40-man roster, only Eddie Butler brings significant experience in the majors, though he hasn’t been particularly successful. Of course, the Cubs would help their cause quite a bit by signing Yu Darvish (who remains on their radar) or bringing in another high-profile starter via free agency or trade.
  • The Mets are reportedly interested in free agent infielder Eduardo Nunez, but Mike Puma of the New York Post wonders (on Twitter) if the organization’s hitting philosophy may ultimately prevent a signing from occurring. The club “emphasizes selectivity,” Puma points out, and that’s not the case with Nunez. Among hitters with at least 400 plate appearances last year, he had the seventh-lowest walk percentage (3.7) and the 14th-highest chase rate (39.6 percent).
  • Left-hander Josh Smoker went from the Mets to the Pirates in a trade this week, and it didn’t surprise the reliever that he ended up in Pittsburgh (via Bill Brink of the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette). “I kind of had a feeling that Pittsburgh might have some interest because in the past I had heard rumblings that Pittsburgh had always had a little bit of interest in me,” Smoker said. “I know it’s a team that needs some left-handers, too.” Indeed, Smoker became just the fourth southpaw on the Bucs’ 40-man roster. While Smoker has only managed a 5.02 ERA across 71 2/3 career innings, he’s hopeful renowned Pirates pitching coach Ray Searage will be able to help him break out with his new team. After the trade, Smoker discussed Searage with his friend, former Pirates reliever Matt Capps, who offered praise for the pitching guru.

Baseball Blogs Weigh In: Free Agents, Yelich, Jays, Lynn, Astros, Cards

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This week in baseball blogs…

Submissions: ZachBBWI @gmail.com

AL East Notes: Rays, Odorizzi, Orioles, Jay, Yanks

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Entering the offseason, Rays right-hander Jake Odorizzi looked like a shoo-in to end up elsewhere via trade, but the lack of action across the majors this offseason has played a role in preventing that, Marc Topkin of the Tampa Bay Times writes. Although the soon-to-be 28-year-old Odorizzi says he’s “still happy” to be in Tampa Bay, he’s cognizant that a trade could come together in the next few weeks – especially considering all the pitchers the low-spending Rays have dealt in the past. “There’s always that unsureness, especially with us and when people get to where I’m at in contract status and years left remaining (until free agency), this is typically the time (to be traded),” Odorizzi said. “We saw (Jeremy Hellickson), David (Price), (Drew) Smyly, (Matt) Garza, like everybody who gets to that point. We know it’s a pretty strong reality of how things go.” The Rays will “almost certainly” trade Odorizzi at some point, according to Topkin, and, as the player himself pointed out, it figures to occur soon given his dwindling team control. He’s in his penultimate year of arbitration eligibility and will earn between $6.05MM and $6.3MM, depending on what the panel decides.

More from Tampa Bay and two other AL East cities:

  • Along with the previously reported Carlos Gonzalez and Jarrod Dyson, the Orioles have interest in free agent outfielder Jon Jay, per Roch Kubatko of MASNsports.com. Signing any of the three would give the Orioles a much-needed lefty-swinging outfielder to join a group that currently includes four righties (Adam Jones, Trey Mancini, Austin Hays and Joey Rickard) and a switch-hitter (Anthony Santander). Jay, who’ll turn 33 in March, has offered average to slightly above-average offense throughout his career, and he has typically held his own against both lefty and righty pitchers. In 433 plate appearances with the Cubs in 2017, he hit .296/.374/.375 – good for a 101 wRC+.
  • The Yankees have been on the hunt for starting pitching help throughout the offseason, though they haven’t made any significant moves on that front aside from re-signing CC Sabathia. Although the Yankees have a full rotation on paper with Sabathia, Luis Severino, Masahiro Tanaka, Sonny Gray and Jordan Montgomery, Sabathia would like to see them add to it. “It is what it is, (but) you always need more,” Sabathia said to Brendan Kuty of NJ.com. “It’s a long season. You never know what’s going to happen. The more arms we got, the better.” As Kuty notes, the Yankees’ talented rotation does come with questions, namely in the form of durability/workload concerns regarding everyone in the quintet.
  • Joining the Rays this week on a minor league pact was an easy decision for righty Ryan Weber, details Topkin, who adds that the 27-year-old told his agent to immediately take their offer. Weber was eager to accept the Rays’ proposal because he’s a local product who still lives in the area. “This is where I first saw a big-league game, telling my parents I’m going to be out there one day,” he said of the Rays’ home ballpark, Tropicana Field. “So to actually have a chance to play for the Rays, that’s cool. That’s pretty cool.” As a member of the Mariners last season, arm problems limited Weber to just seven appearances between the majors and minors, but he’s now “100 percent.”

Quick Hits: Van Hekken, Free Agent Spending, Rockies

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38-year-old former Tigers starter Andy Van Hekken is attempting to earn a job with an MLB club, Anthony Fenech of the Detroit Free Press writes. Anyone calling it a comeback attempt should note this bit of context: Van Hekken hasn’t pitched in the majors since 2002 and only has five career starts at that level. Still, the Holland native is reportedly training back in his home county, and a late-thirties push for MLB has been in his plans for a while. “I’ve been thinking about it over the last few years,” he said. “I always wanted to come back and give it another try to get back to the big leagues and see if I could do it. I would love an opportunity and hopefully there will be one.” As Fenech aptly points out, Van Hekken’s timing couldn’t be worse… there are well over a hundred free agents who have yet to sign during what has been a phenomenally slow hot stove season. The left-hander is best known for throwing a complete game shutout against the Indians in his major league debut. He’s mixed a high-80’s fastball with a forkball to great success in Korea during the past half-decade or so, posting solid ground ball and strikeout rates.

Some other items from around the league as we inch closer to spring training…

  • Have fans been conditioned to accept half-hearted attempts at contention? Travis Sawchik attempts to answer this question in a piece for Fangraphs. Sawchik writes that while it’s typically for business owners to take great care in running their businesses efficiently and at a profit, baseball is not a typical business. Fans invest in ballclubs both emotionally and fiscally (with their taxes), so owners have a civic duty to put a competitive product on the field. He references former Tigers owner Mike Illitch, who at times spent irrationally on his club. He even kept a General Motors advertisement above the center field batter’s eye when the company could no longer afford it, in similar spirit of upholding the city’s identity. Sawchik then turns his focus to Nutting, who has gutted the club’s core to slash payroll by $20MM this season without paying for a single free agent. Sawchik suspects that the club could cover its current payroll without selling a single ticket, and points out its $50MM BAMtech payment from Disney (that also hasn’t been reinvested in the team). He posits that fans have been trained to accept the “small-market” excuse for not spending as a reality, when in fact it may not entirely explain a given club’s low payroll.
  • The Rockies have built a contending club in part by betting on its youthful rotation, Daniel Cramer of MLB.com writes. Back in spring training of 2016, GM Jeff Bridich apparently told young right-hander Jeff Hoffman that the club wasn’t seeking any veteran upgrades. Fast forward to today, and the organization hopes to build on a “blossoming pitching culture with the potential for sustained success”. Cramer describes Colorado’s blueprint for pitchers as “a power arm supplemented with a mental confidence to pitch at Coors Field.” For their part, a group consisting of German Marquez, Kyle Freeland, Tyler Chatwood, Jon Gray, Jeff Hoffman, Antonio Senzatela, Tyler Anderson and Chad Bettis combined for 11.8 fWAR last season (good for 11th in the majors), and that entire group minus Chatwood is set to return for 2018.

Latest On Brewers’ Search For A Starter

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Much has been made of the reports that the Brewers made a contract offer to Yu Darvish about two weeks ago. A quote from ownership stating that GM David Stearns is “working on” adding another pitcher has only added fuel to that fire. But when asked Saturday if there’s been any progress in that search, Stearns metaphorically threw a giant bucket of cold water on those hot stove rumors. “We continue to have discussions on a variety of fronts,” he said (via Tom Haudricort of the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel). “But at this point I anticipate going (to spring training) with our current group.”

If the Brewers did make a proposal to Darvish, Haudricort notes, it wasn’t enough to lead to a deal. Additionally, the team has not confirmed any reports that they might sign Darvish, who is believed to be seeking a deal in the range of $150-$175MM. Further dampening any Darvish hopes from Milwaukee fans are reports that the right-hander would like to return to one of his previous teams: the Rangers or the Dodgers.

Stearns’ comments also seem to indicate that the club’s recent efforts to trade for Rays right-hander Chris Archer didn’t bear any fruit. It’s a trade scenario that already seemed unlikely in the first place, given that only ten days ago Archer told Marc Topkin of the Tampa Bay Times that he expects to remain in Tampa Bay to open the season.

It’s not as though Stearns completely closed the door on adding a starter. According to Haudricort, he did express that the club is open to acting “if the right opportunity presents itself.” But he followed that up by saying that the club has a “high level of confidence” in its in-house options.

On the surface, Milwaukee would appear to be one of the MLB teams with the most pressing need for a starter. Beyond Chase Anderson, Zach Davies and the injured Jimmy Nelson (who projects to miss a good portion of the 2018 season), the Brew Crew have a group of low-ceiling starters vying for the remaining spots in the rotation. That group includes Yovani Gallardo, Brent Suter and Jhoulys Chacin. While a rotation comprised of the pitchers above wouldn’t represent a bottom-dwelling cast, it’s curious that the team would make such a strong effort to acquire Christian Yelich and Lorenzo Cain while failing to improve on the starting pitching front. Of course, it’s worth noting that the Brewers will control both of those outfielders for five full seasons, and they aren’t set to lose any of their most important core players any time soon.

Prior to this news, Milwaukee was thought to be at least an assertive shopper in the free agent pitching market. If they’re indeed prepared to turn up their noses and roll with internal options to open the season, it’d prove bad news for a 2018 free agent pitching class that has yet to see any of its top four candidates come off the board. Teams have yet to show any serious interest in Jake Arrieta, Alex Cobb or Lance Lynn at their current asking prices, and MLB clubs seemingly haven’t gained any traction with even Darvish to this point in the offseason. With just a few weeks until the start of spring training, this development can only further freeze a historically cold MLB hot stove.

Adeiny Hechavarria Wins Arbitration Case Over Rays

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Rays shortstop Adeiny Hechavarria has won his arbitration case against his club, Bob Nightengale of USA Today Sports tweets. He’ll earn a $5.9MM salary for the 2018 campaign, which is considerably more than both the $5.35MM that Tampa Bay had filed for and the $5.0MM figure that MLBTR’s Matt Swartz had projected. His arbitration salary comes as a $1.55MM raise in his third trip through the process.

Hechavarria’s raise comes on the heels of a 2017 campaign in which he hit .261/.289/.406 with eight homers and 30 RBI across 348 plate appearances for the Marlins and Rays. Following a month-long stint on the DL due to an oblique strain, the Rays acquired Hechavarria for a pair of minor-leaguers.

The 29-year-old Cuban native is known far more for his glove than he is for his bat. He owns a career wRC+ of just 72, and has gotten on base at just a .291 clip across six major-league seasons. He’s currently seated atop the team’s depth chart at shortstop, though the club will likely give the newly-acquired Christian Arroyo a fair chance to compete for the starting job this spring.

Roberto Osuna Loses Arbitration Case

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Blue Jays closer Roberto Osuna has lost his arbitration case, according to Bob Nightengale of USA Today Sports. The right-hander had filed for a $5.8MM payday in his first trip through the arbitration process, but he’ll instead take home the $5.3MM salary that Toronto filed for. That amount represents about a $4.75MM raise in his first arb year, and falls just $300K shy of the $5.6MM figure projected by MLBTR’s Matt Swartz.

Osuna has shown excellent command of the strike zone over the course of his three MLB seasons, evidenced by his phenomenal 6.15 career K/BB ratio (a figure that ranks third among qualifying relievers from 2015-2017). He’s posted a solid 2.86 ERA during that time, though ERA estimators such as FIP (2.69), xFIP (3.23) and SIERA (2.64) don’t quite agree on his true talent level. Regardless, Osuna is one of the top closers in the game of baseball, and he’ll be rewarded for it this season.

Fellow first-time arb-eligible closer Ken Giles will earn $4.6MM after winning his case. Giles has tossed 36 1/3 more big league innings than Osuna with better run prevention, strikeout and ground ball results. However, the arbitration process values saves heavily, and because Osuna has 95 career saves (30 more than Giles), he’ll out-earn his Houston counterpart by over half a million dollars this season.

Osuna was an international signing of the Blue Jays in 2011. He pitched his way onto the big league roster out of spring training camp in 2015 at the age of 20, and earned his first career save just two and a half months later. He’s been an anchor at the back of the Jays’ bullpen ever since. Barring an extension, he’s set to pitch three more seasons with the team prior to reaching free agency following the 2020 season.

Ken Giles Wins Arbitration Case Over Astros

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Reliever Ken Giles has won his arbitration case against the Astros, Jon Heyman of FanRag Sports tweets. The Astros filed at $4.2MM, but Giles will take home the $4.6MM that he and his agent filed for instead. That salary falls $400K shy of the $5MM projected by MLBTR’s Matt Swartz, and represents a raise of about $4MM in his first trip through the arbitration process.

Though a bad taste may still linger in the mouths of Astros fans due to Giles’ poor postseason performance (11.74 ERA with 5 walks and 3 homers allowed in 7 2/3 innings), the fact remains that Houston’s 27-year-old closer has posted some eye-popping numbers across his first four seasons in the big leagues. Among qualifying relief pitchers, the right-hander ranks 7th in xFIP, 10th in K/9, 13th in ERA, and 16th in Win Probability Added since the start of the 2014 campaign. His 65 saves probably figured into his arbitration win as well.

Giles was drafted by the Phillies back in 2011. The righty made his big-league debut on June 12th of 2014, allowing a home run to the first major-league hitter he faced but striking out the next in a game the Phillies would eventually win over the Padres. Following the 2015 season, the Astros acquired him (along with shortstop Jonathan Arauz) in a trade that brought back former number one overall pick Mark Appel, Vince Velasquez and three others. Since coming to Houston, Giles has struck out nearly 13 batters per nine innings thanks in part to a fastball that’s averaged a whopping 98.3 MPH during that time.

Minor MLB Transactions: 2/3/18

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We’ll use this post to keep track of today’s minor moves…

  • The Rays have added catcher Adam Moore on a minors pact, tweets Jerry Crasnick of ESPN. The 33-year-old will receive an invitation to spring training camp. Moore hit .238/.313/.369 with a 31.4% strikeout rate across 277 plate appearances with the Columbus Clippers (the Indians’ Triple-A affiliate) in what ultimately ended up being his first season without MLB action since 2008. Since being drafted 171st overall by the Mariners in 2006, he’s played in the majors for them and three other clubs: the Royals, Padres and Indians. Moore owns a .197/.237/.303 lifetime slash line and has been worth just over a win below replacement for his career.

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