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MLBPA Expected To Present Next Economics Proposal On January 24

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JANUARY 20: The league and players union are planning to meet next Monday, January 24, reports Jeff Passan of ESPN (on Twitter). At that sit-down, the MLBPA is expected to present a counter-offer to MLB’s most recent economics proposal. It’ll mark the second in-person meeting between the parties since the beginning of the lockout. MLB’s most recent offer was made via videoconference.

JANUARY 19: The MLB Players Association is preparing its response to the proposal made by Major League Baseball last week, tweets Jon Heyman of the MLB Network. Heyman adds that the union is expected to put its next offer on the table within a matter of days.

The league broached some features of core economics last Thursday, marking the first instance of discussion between the two sides on any especially contentious issues since MLB instituted a lockout on December 2. The league’s offer didn’t address all the most pertinent issues, though, with no mention of free agency eligibility or the competitive balance tax. Instead, MLB’s proposal focused on such topics as the draft order, arbitration, possible solutions to service time manipulation and playoff expansion, among others.

According to various reports, the players were generally dissatisfied with the league’s decision not to cover free agency or the luxury tax. It wouldn’t be a surprise to see the union try to reignite discussions on those issues, as the MLBPA is seeking earlier paths for players to potentially reach the open market and dramatically heightened tax thresholds.

Time is dwindling for the parties to make significant progress in talks if they’re to avoid interruptions to Spring Training, as Ken Rosenthal of the Athletic wrote this morning. Exhibition play is scheduled to begin February 26, and Jeff Passan of ESPN wrote a few weeks ago that Spring Training would likely be delayed if there weren’t notable developments by the start of next month.

Draft Prospect Peyton Pallette To Undergo Tommy John Surgery

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Peyton Pallette, a pitcher at the University of Arkansas, has sustained a UCL injury that’ll require Tommy John surgery, as first reported by Kendall Rogers of D1 Baseball. That’ll obviously end Pallette’s third season in Fayetteville before it begins, with TJS procedures typically requiring a recovery timeline in the 14-16 month range.

It’s a crushing blow for the Razorbacks, as Pallette had been the expected ace of a team with legitimate national championship aspirations. It’s also a very notable development for major league teams, with the 6’1″ right-hander projecting as one of the top pitchers in the upcoming amateur draft. Earlier this week, Baseball America’s Carlos Collazo slotted Pallette as the class’ #13 overall prospect. Among college pitchers, only Tennessee’s Blake Tidwell (#12) ranked higher.

Pallette boasts a power arsenal, with Collazo writing that he typically sits in the 93-95 MPH range and has been clocked up to 99. His top secondary weapon is an impressive curveball with elite raw spin rates, while he also generates some promising arm-side action on his changeup. Pallette only made four relief appearances before the 2020 college season was canceled due to the pandemic, but he emerged as a key member of the Hogs’ starting staff last year.

Across 15 appearances (including 11 starts), Pallette worked 56 innings with a 4.02 ERA. He fanned 27.2% of opposing hitters against an 8.1% walk rate. He suffered a season-ending elbow injury last May, however, missing out on Arkansas’ run to super regionals. While it looked for a while as if he’d be able to rehab from that issue and return to the mound this season, that’ll unfortunately prove not to be the case.

It remains to be seen how significant a blow the surgery will prove to Pallette’s draft stock. Upon learning of the procedure, BA dropped him to 29th in their overall rankings. As that suggests, it’s not out of the question he still comes off the board in the first round. Last summer, the Blue Jays selected Ole Miss righty Gunnar Hoglund 19th overall, despite the fact that he’d undergone his own Tommy John procedure two months prior. Hoglund had a lengthier track record of success as a starting pitcher than Pallette has compiled, though. Perhaps a more apt reference point may be former LSU hurler Jaden Hill, selected 44th overall by the Rockies despite undergoing TJS after seven starts during his first season as a full-time rotation member.

Quick Hits: Alfonzo, Correa, Clark

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Longtime Queens fan-favorite Edgardo Alfonzo has been hired to manage the Staten Island Ferry Hawks of the independent Atlantic League, reports Jon Heyman of MLB Network. The move to Staten Island actually checks a third of New York City’s five boroughs off of Alfonzo’s professional checklist; in addition to his eight seasons playing for the Mets, Alfonso joined the High-A Brooklyn Cyclones in 2014 as Tom Gamboa’s bench coach, eventually managing the Mets affiliate for three seasons following Gamboa’s retirement. He also played briefly for three other New York-area teams: the Long Island Ducks, the Bridgeport Bluefish, the Newark Bears, all also of the Atlantic League.

After eight productive seasons in Queens shuffling between second and third base (and occasionally shortstop), Alfonzo signed a three-year, $18MM deal with the Giants ahead of the 2003 season. He split 2006, his final big-league season, between the Angels and the Blue Jays, logging only 95 plate appearances between the two. For his career, the infielder posted a .283/.357/.425 batting line across twelve major league seasons.

Other news from around the game:

  • Slugging shortstop Carlos Correa, MLBTR’s number one free agent, recently hired Scott Boras to represent him as he looks to secure a $300MM+ payday after a new CBA is reached, and Boras doesn’t seem to have ruled out the Astros as the team that could pony up. Though reports are that the Astros’ best offer came in at five years and $160MM and that owner Jim Crane has insisted he won’t go beyond six years with the star free agent, Boras tossed out a few comments clearly pointed at the Houston brass, telling reporters that the Astros have “been at the championship level for three or four years and…can continue for six or seven if they are able to retain those true core pieces of All-Star level talent” (quotes from Mark Berman of Houston’s Fox 26). Correa is reported to have turned down a ten-year, $275MM offer from the Tigers before the lockout. Should Correa be forced to settle for a shorter-term deal, it’s likely he’ll insist on an opt-out clause that would allow him to return to the market as soon as next offseason.
  • The Royals have hired former Braves chief of scouting Roy Clark as a senior advisor for baseball operations, the club announced Wednesday. Clark had already been scouting for the Royals in an informal, part-time capacity, but the new role puts him back into the office with Royals president of baseball operations and longtime friend Dayton Moore. Moore actually owes his career in professional baseball to Clark, who recommended him for a scouting job in John Schuerholz’s front office in 1994, when Moore was a coach at George Mason University. Moore was hired as the Royals’ GM in 2006, and Clark left the Braves to join the Nationals in 2009. While with the Braves, Clark had a hand in scouting and signing an impressive roster of future big-leaguers, including Adam Wainwright, Jason Marquis, Brian McCann, Charlie Morton, Craig Kimbrel, Jason Heyward, and Freddie Freeman.

Rays’ Tampa/Montreal Timeshare Plans Nixed By MLB

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12:42 PM: Though he made no express commitments, Sternberg made his disappointment with the Executive Council’s decision clear. When asked explicitly if he’d explore moving the franchise out of the Tampa Bay region, Sternberg neither confirmed nor denied that such an idea had entered into his plans, stating that club brass “will see how the stands look this year…to help inform us as we move forward” but that they had been “all-in on this plan” and had “completely pushed our chips in.”

The owner also made a bit of news in disclosing that he’s privy to full-season proposals currently being put together by both the city of Tampa and Pinellas County (home to St. Petersburg) but expressed doubts about the long-term viability of either (it isn’t clear if Tampa’s full-season proposal involves the same Ybor City site that the split-season proposal did). Though he stated that “the region is willing to and able to and looking forward to supporting us in every way it can” and that he was “certainly going to be exploring things in the Tampa Bay region,”  he also expressed doubts that the region could “handle 81 games of baseball…that just hasn’t happened to this point.” Asked directly if Tampa deserves a full-season baseball team, Sternberg responded simply that it “deserves to have baseball.”

Most striking, perhaps, were Sternberg’s comments on the long-term viability of single-city teams, even as he stands alone among owners in major sports in proposing a split-city arrangement. “Partial seasons are going to be the wave of the future in professional sports,” he stated, adding that Montreal has “earned the right to have baseball back.”

11:58 AM: In a blow to principal owner Stuart Sternberg’s attempts to secure a new ballpark in or around the city of Tampa, the Major League Baseball Executive Council officially quashed the Rays’ plans to split time between Tampa and Montreal, reports Marc Topkin of the Tampa Bay Times. MLB had given the Rays permission to explore the ’sister city’ concept in 2019.

The decision puts the Rays future in the Tampa Bay region very much in doubt. As MLBTR explored last week, Tampa mayor Jane Castor expressed her commitment to keeping the Rays in the area but offered only qualified support for a proposed $700MM open-air ballpark in the northeast Tampa neighborhood of Ybor City, stating that the community would be best served by keeping the team in Tampa while all but ruling out the possibility of a significant investment of public funds into the project. The Rays had committed $350MM to the project.

It’s presently unclear whether the Ybor City plan, which called for the construction of a similar park in Montreal to host half the team’s games, is now effectively dead as well. Though unusual, the plan was not unprecedented. In both 2003 and 2004, their final two seasons before relocating to Washington, D.C., the Expos played 22 of their 81 home games at Hiram Bithorn Stadium in San Juan, Puerto Rico while under the stewardship of Major League Baseball; the league bought the team from Jeffrey Loria (who subsequently purchased the Marlins) ahead of the 2003 season.

The Rays’ lease on Tropicana Field — an object of near-universal derision around the game — runs through 2027. It obviously isn’t yet clear what would happen thereafter should the Rays fail to secure a new stadium, but a move to Nashville — where a group calling itself Music City Baseball has attempted to organize both an ownership group and community support for a potential big-league team in the city — could be an entirely live possibility. High-profile individuals associated with the project include former United States Attorney General Alberto Gonzales, former Titans running back Eddie George, and current White Sox manager Tony La Russa.

Nationals Sign Rusney Castillo To Minor League Deal

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The Nationals signed former Red Sox outfielder and one-time top prospect Rusney Castillo to a minor league deal earlier this month. The 34-year-old Cuban defector, who spent 2021 playing for NPB’s Tohoku Rakuten Goldean Eagles, will most likely begin the season with Triple-A Rochester but could be given a chance to compete for a bench role.

Castillo signed a seven-year, $72.5MM deal with the Red Sox in 2014 after Major League Baseball declared him a free agent, but he never lived up to the lofty expectations that followed. After posting an impressive .333/.400/.528 line in a ten-game cameo to close the 2014 season, the toolsy outfielder opened 2015 with Triple-A Pawtucket, appearing in 80 major league games after a late-May call-up. Though he played sparkling defense in Fenway Park’s atypical outfield, logging 14 Defensive Runs Saved across all three spots, he struggled to get on base and to hit for power, notching only 5 home runs and 13 walks in 289 trips to the plate on the way to a .253/.288/.359 overall line. For his career, Castillo sports a .262/.301/.370 triple-slash in 337 plate appearances across three seasons.

Following a brief stint in the bigs, the Red Sox placed Castillo on waivers in June 2016, outrighting him to the PawSox after he went unclaimed. The outfielder played out the remainder of his contract there, posting a palatable .293/.335/.425 line across parts of five seasons, but was never given another shot to hack it in Boston.

With the rebuilding Nationals’ outfield in a state of flux, Castillo could get the chance to log some time in the bigs in 2022. Despite struggling to a .225/.276/.282 line in Japan’s top division in 2021, he’ll look to compete for a role in an outfield mix that currently includes Yadiel Hernandez, Lane Thomas, Andrew Stevenson, Donovan Casey, and former top prospect Victor Robles alongside all-world right fielder Juan Soto — though an additional spot could open up should the new CBA include a universal DH and the Washington brass seek to lessen Soto’s injury risk by keeping him off the field. Fans should expect the Nats to bring in another minor league free agent or two to join the competition before Spring Training arrives, whenever that may be.

Pro Hockey Rumors Seeking Part-Time Writers

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We’re looking to add multiple part-time contributors to the Pro Hockey Rumors writing team. The positions pay on an hourly basis.

Applicants must meet all of the following criteria:

  • Exceptional knowledge of all 32 NHL teams, with no discernible bias. We want you to be as comfortable writing about Janis Moser and Connor Dewar as you would be writing about Connor McDavid and Auston Matthews.
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We understand that many of those who read this have applied in the past. If you have previously submitted an application for PHR and are still interested, please submit it again. Many will apply, so unfortunately we cannot respond to every applicant.

Oakland Ballpark Proposal Clears Key Hurdle

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The A’s moved a step closer to securing a new ballpark in downtown Oakland on Wednesday when the six-member Oakland Planning Commission voted unanimously to recommend the certification of the Howard Terminal environmental impact review following conclusion of public comment (Casey Pratt of ABC7 reported the results of the vote). The decision, which could be put to a vote by the City Council as soon as next month, moves the $12 billion waterfront development project — which would include a roughly 34,000-seat ballpark on land currently owned by the Port of Oakland in the Jack London Square neighborhood — a step closer to fruition.

Oakland mayor Libby Schaaf celebrated the vote, calling the decision “a huge win for our entire region” that “puts Oakland one step closer to building a landmark waterfront ballpark district with the highest environmental standards.” Per reporting from Sarah Ravani of the San Francisco Chronicle, opponents of the certification cited issues surrounding affordable housing (an increasingly prominent issue in a rapidly changing city), traffic congestion, air pollution, the project’s compatibility with seaport operations, and inadequate measures to deal with toxic substances known to be present on the site.

In addition to the new ballpark, the development plan for the 55-acre plot includes 3,000 housing units, a mid-sized performance venue, 270,000 square feet of retail space, 1.5 million square feet of office space, and up to 400 hotel rooms and 8,900 parking spaces. In accordance with city law, either 15% of the 3,000 housing units (450 in this case) must be designated as ’affordable’ (defined as housing that is “restricted to occupancy at an affordable rent or an affordable housing cost to moderate-income households, low- income households or very low-income households”) or the A’s will need to pay an impact fee to the city for the construction of affordable housing units elsewhere. Per a 2019 report from Sam Carp of SportsPro Media, stadium plans include a $123MM gondola system that would ferry fans between downtown Oakland and the waterfront.

Should the broader proposal move forward as planned, it would bring to an end one of the longest running stadium dramas in baseball history. The A’s have played in the multi-purpose Oakland Coliseum since moving to Oakland to from Kansas City in 1968, sharing the facilities with the NFL’s Oakland Raiders (who moved to Los Angeles in 1981, returned to Oakland in 1995, and left again for Las Vegas in 2020) for the majority of their tenure. Considered innovative and cost-efficient in the 1960s and ’70s, multi-sport ’cookie-cutter’ stadiums such as the Coliseum have fallen out of favor, and the A’s are the last major league team to play its home games in a multi-sport facility from that era (the Rogers Centre, home of the Blue Jays, has hosted the CFL’s Toronto Argonauts and the NBA’s Raptors but was opened in 1989 and is qualitatively different from its earlier counterparts).

Though still sometimes celebrated for its relative affordability, a small but dedicated cadre of die-hard fans, and a baseball-first atmosphere that stands in stark contrast to the amusement-laden parks recently in vogue (season ticket-holder Jack Nicas memorably called it “baseball’s last dive bar” in a 2019 essay in the New York Times), the Coliseum has long been cited as one of baseball’s worst ballparks. In 1996, late Raiders’ owner Al Davis controversially secured $220MM in public funding from Oakland and Alameda County to build more than 10,000 additional seats in the upper deck. The structure — dubbed “Mount Davis” by A’s fans — blocked views of the nearby Oakland hills and made non-playoff sellouts all but impossible, detracting from the ballpark’s intimacy and leading to a 2006 decision to cover more than 20,000 seats in the upper deck with a tarpaulin.

In recent years, the stadium’s dilapidation has become more apparent. In June 2013, an overtaxed sewage system flooded both clubhouses with raw sewage, forcing the A’s and the visiting Mariners to share the Raiders’ locker room on a higher floor, and a September 2013 walk-off win against the Angels was marred by reports of an aberrant stench emanating from the clubhouse toilets into the dugouts as a result of overflowing toilets. In May 2019, a malfunctioning bank of lights led to a 98-minute delay in a game with the Reds, and two dead mice were reportedly found in stadium soda machine during a Raiders-Steelers game in December 2018. Former owner Lew Wolff also admitted that on at least one occasion, the Coliseum’s food service had to be halted as a result of sewage leaking into stadium kitchens.

Attempts by A’s ownership to secure a new ballpark date back to at least 2005, when Wolff made an initial proposal to build a new stadium on land near the Coliseum. Those plans fell through when the owners of the land chose not to sell, but new plans to build a park in nearby Fremont were announced in 2006. Following substantial opposition, Wolff changed tack in 2009, attempting to a secure a site in downtown San Jose. The Giants, the club’s Bay-area rivals, objected that San Jose fell within their exclusive territory, however, and in 2015 the Supreme Court declined to hear the A’s objection to Major League Baseball’s decision to honor the Giants’ objection. The A’s began (since aborted) talks to construct a new stadium at the Coliseum site in 2014 and briefly engaged in negotiations for a site near Oakland’s Laney College in 2017 before focusing its efforts on the Howard Terminal site in 2018.

Several obstacles remain to the waterfront project’s ultimate consummation, of course, but the commission’s vote does represent progress in one of two long-running stadium dramas (along with a similar situation in Tampa) cited by commissioner Rob Manfred as obstacles to potential expansion. Manfred had previously urged the A’s to explore relocation. Whether his public remarks on the matter were intended sincerely or as a means of exerting pressure on the city of Oakland, the A’s did explore the possibility of relocation to Las Vegas, even submitting a bid on the site of the Tropicana hotel and casino complex, per a report from CNBC’s Contessa Brewer. Should both cities’ issues be resolved, in addition to Las Vegas, frequently noted markets as possible expansion targets include Nashville, Montreal, Portland, Charlotte, and Vancouver, though the commissioner’s office won’t want to green-light any serious expansion talks until the league has confidence that owners won’t be better served by relocating a team unable to secure a new stadium.

CPBL’s Wei Chuan Dragons Sign Ronny Rodriguez

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The Wei Chuan Dragons of Taiwan’s Chinese Professional Baseball League announced this afternoon they’ve agreed to a deal with infielder Ronny Rodríguez (h/t to CPBL Stats). It’ll be the first CPBL action for the 29-year-old, who spent some time in Japan last season as a member of the Nippon-Ham Fighters.

Rodríguez has two seasons of big league experience, logging time at all four infield positions with the Tigers between 2018-19. After seven seasons in the Indians organization, Rodríguez signed with Detroit as a minor league free agent over the 2017-18 offseason. He earned his first MLB call in May 2018 and tallied 206 plate appearances across 62 games as a rookie.

Despite hitting just .220/.256/.335 during his debut campaign, the right-handed hitting Rodríguez received fairly significant run the following season. He appeared in a bit more than half of Detroit’s games and showed intriguing power, popping 14 home runs with an impressive .217 ISO (slugging minus batting average). Yet Rodríguez also punched out at an alarming 27.9% clip while walking in only 4.4% of his plate appearances, contributing to an untenable .252 on-base percentage.

The Brewers claimed Rodríguez off waivers the following offseason, but he never appeared in a game with Milwaukee. He spent the bulk of the 2020 campaign at their alternate training site before being outrighted off the roster that September. Rodríguez’s jump to NPB last season proved unsuccessful, as he stumbled to a .197/.216/.426 mark across 125 plate appearances with the Fighters. He’ll try to more closely approximate the .293/.324/.473 line he’s compiled in parts of four Triple-A seasons during his first year with the Dragons.

MLBTR Poll: Carlos Rodon’s Contract

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The free agent starting pitching market moved very quickly before the transactions freeze. Carlos Rodón and Clayton Kershaw are the clear top two starters remaining, and it seems Kershaw’s market could be limited by geographical concerns. That’d leave Rodón as the lone potential top-of-the-rotation arm available in free agency, but his status is complicated by health questions.

Rodón’s story has been covered a few times this offseason. After a few injury-plagued years, the former #3 overall pick broke out with an ace-caliber first half. He was a deserved All-Star and on a potential Cy Young pace until hitting the injured list with discomfort in his throwing shoulder in August. He missed a few weeks — albeit after it was apparent the White Sox were coasting to an AL Central title — before returning to make a few starts at the end of the season.

While Rodón continued to be effective after that IL stint, the average velocity on both his fastball and slider ticked down a couple miles per hour. Rodón’s fastball velocity ramped back up during his lone postseason start (his slider speed did not), but he was knocked out after just 2 2/3 innings during a rough outing against the Astros. The White Sox were eliminated before he got another opportunity to take the hill.

It wasn’t an ideal finish, but Rodón’s season-long production was excellent. He posted a 2.37 ERA with a massive 34.6% strikeout rate over 132 2/3 regular season innings, showcasing dominant swing-and-miss stuff at his best. Yet the White Sox declined to make the 29-year-old a qualifying offer, perhaps indicating some trepidation on the club’s part about his health. Given that durability uncertainty, MLBTR forecasted Rodón to take a one-year, $25MM deal in hopes of duplicating his excellent 2021 numbers in search of nine figures next offseason.

That doesn’t seem to be a course of action Rodón’s considering — or, at least, it wasn’t on the table early in the offseason. Agent Scott Boras told reporters in November they’d have rejected a QO had the Sox made one, saying the southpaw was on the hunt for a multi-year deal. Yet there were essentially no substantive rumors regarding Rodón in the weeks leading up to the lockout, leaving his market highly uncertain. MLBTR’s Steve Adams examined his best potential landing spots last month.

What kind of deal might Rodón command? Perhaps the market’s other starters can provide some idea. Max Scherzer landed the biggest contract of any starter this offseason, signing for a whopping $130MM over three years. He’s a unique case, with the next couple tiers offering cleaner possible comps. Robbie Ray received five guaranteed years and $115MM, with an opt-out possibility after the third season. Kevin Gausman signed for five years and $110MM.

Aside from that trio of nine-figure hurlers, the biggest starting pitching deals went to Eduardo Rodríguez (five years/$77MM, with an opt-out clause after the second season), Marcus Stroman (three years/$71MM, with an opt-out after the second season) and Jon Gray (four years/$56MM). Below them are Steven Matz (four years/$44MM) and Anthony DeSclafani (three years/$36MM).

Where will Rodón fit into that mix? What does the MLBTR readership think his post-lockout contract will be?

(poll links for app users)

 

 

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