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Blue Jays Claim Mauro Gomez; Designate Dave Bush

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The Blue Jays claimed infielder Mauro Gomez off waivers from the Red Sox, according to a Toronto press release.  The Blue Jays designated pitcher Dave Bush for assigment to open a 40-man roster spot for Gomez.

The Red Sox had designated Gomez for assignment last week to open a 40-man roster spot for Jackie Bradley, Jr.  Gomez, 28, hit .310/.371/.589 with 24 home runs in 426 Triple-A plate appearances last year, playing mostly first base.  He reportedly drew some interest from the Hanshin Tigers during the offseason.

Bush, 33, has logged over 1,100 innings in the bigs, and led the National League with a 4.37 K/BB ratio for the Brewers in 2006.  After spending all of 2012 at Triple-A, he clawed his way back to the Majors only to suffer the indignity of allowing four homers to the Red Sox yesterday in his one appearance.  Bush was the first to manage that since Brian Bass in 2009, but at least George Caster's record of six home runs allowed in a relief appearance, set in 1940, still stands.

Rangers Designate Jeff Beliveau For Assignment

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The Rangers designated lefty Jeff Beliveau for assignment to open a 40-man roster spot for newly-acquired catcher Robinson Chirinos, according to a team press release.  The Rangers had claimed Beliveau off waivers from the Cubs in December.

Beliveau, 26, posted a 3.89 ERA, 10.6 K/9, 3.7 BB/9, and 0.82 HR/9 in 44 relief innings for the Cubs' Triple-A affiliate last year, making his big league debut in July.

Rangers Acquire Robinson Chirinos

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The Rangers acquired catcher Robinson Chirinos from the Rays for a player to be named later, tweets Jon Heyman of CBS Sports.  Chirinos had been designated for assignment on March 31st.

Chirinos, 28, missed the entire 2012 season after suffering a concussion.  In 2011, he hit .259/.343/.376 in 319 Triple-A plate appearances, a disappointing offensive season after a breakout 2010 factored into the Rays acquiring him from the Cubs as part of the Matt Garza trade.  After 2010, Baseball America wrote that Chirinos "always had shown an ability to handle the bat and control the strike zone, and now he has developed power to all fields."  They also praised his work behind the plate.

Why I Chose My Agency: Daniel Hudson

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Diamondbacks starter Daniel Hudson amassed 25 victories and a 3.19 ERA across 336 innings well before he reached even two years in big league service time.  Last year he underwent Tommy John surgery, from which he's aiming to return around the All-Star break.  Last month, I spoke to Hudson about his choice of agent, Andrew Lowenthal of Proformance.

On how he chose Lowenthal:

In '08 I think he had gotten my number from a previous player I had played with.  He contacted me and we met a couple times, and before I went to the Cape Cod League in '07 I pretty much told him, "Hey I just wanted to let you know, I'm probably going to use you."  Andrew and I kind of clicked, so it was a pretty easy decision for me to make at the time.  I felt like he really wanted me, and I feel like he made a really concerted effort to come down and see me pitch.  He would make an effort to call or text me after every single start, and basically just see how I was doing.  

On how it went leading up to the draft in '08:

I don't really know much about his aspect of what he does.  He does his best to explain everything to me, and I trust him enough to tell him, "I trust your expertise and what you know about this game, and I trust you to make a good decision on my behalf."  He obviously kept me informed about all the negotiations and all the conversations he had with the White Sox, and I just let do his thing because I obviously didn't know what the heck was going on.  It was fairly painless.  A week and a half later I was on a plane to Great Falls, Montana to sign my contract.

On talking to Andrew about going year-to-year versus doing a long-term extension:

He laid it all out on the table.  He's very good at giving me comparables as far as where I am in my career to where certain guys were at the same point in their careers and what contracts they signed and when they signed them.  Before every season he gives me these thick notebooks and explains to me where I'm at in my market level with all the other guys.  Obviously going year-to-year is a little bit more risky, but you can make a little bit more money in the long run.  Or you can go for the security, if the team is willing to offer you an extension before you hit arbitration.  He's very good and very open at giving me his opinion, but at the same time he wasn't for or against either one too strongly.  So if the Diamondbacks offered me a contract last year and he didn't think it was a good deal but I wanted the security, he would not pressure me to not sign it.

Did the Diamondbacks throw anything out there before last season?

We talked.  We had short conversations, but I don't really want to get into the number aspect of it. 

On Andrew's involvement in Daniel's recovery from Tommy John surgery:

I feel like I couldn't have picked a better agent to feel like I still mattered even though I'm on the DL.  I never felt like I wasn't getting attention because I was on the DL and going to miss 12 months.

On recommending Andrew to other players:

We have conversations about that from time to time, with different teammates and stuff.  Sometimes you get to the point where some guys are like, "I'm really not liking my situation, I'm thinking about throwing my name back out there and seeing if any other agents bite."  I know I've gotten Andrew meetings with a couple different guys I've played with, and once those guys saw what Andrew does for me and how helpful he is with me and my family, they want more of a personal relationship, which is what I have with Andrew at this point.  I consider him more of a friend that handles my baseball stuff more than my agent.  If guys like that, I flip them Andrew's number and let him take care of it from there.

Does a small agency offer an advantage over a big one?

I think so.  It's human nature – the more clients a guy has, the less time he has to take care of you or talk to you.  Especially with a smaller agency they don't have that many guys, I feel like at any point in time I can call any single one of them and I'll never get their voicemail.  I feel like I'm just as important as the guys that are making $15MM for them.

Check out our other interviews in the Why I Chose My Agency series with Shaun Marcum, Mark DeRosa, Ted Lilly, Ryan Ludwick, Cody Ross, Aramis Ramirez, Adam Wainwright, Jeremy Affeldt, David Wright, Jay Bruce, Matt Holliday, Jamey Carroll and Jake Odorizzi.

Offseason In Review: Colorado Rockies

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The Rockies added a late-inning reliever and a pair of back of the rotation starters, electing to have a quiet offseason after hiring new manager Walt Weiss.

Major League Signings

  • Jeff Francis, SP: one year, $1.5MM.
  • Jon Garland, P: one year, $500K.
  • Jorge de la Rosa, SP: one year, $11MM. Player option exercised.
  • Total Spend: $13MM.

Notable Minor League Signings

Trades and Claims

Extensions

Notable Losses

Needs Addressed

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With a move back toward the more traditional five-man rotation, the Rockies certainly won't be giving 46% of their innings to the bullpen again in 2013.  Still, you can never have too many late-inning relievers, so the Rockies acquired Wilton Lopez from the Astros in what turned out to be the biggest move of their offseason.  The club acquired three years of Lopez's services, with Alex White the main piece going to Houston.  Certainly neither Rockies senior vice president of Major League operations Bill Geivett nor Astros GM Jeff Luhnow expected it at the time, but White will soon undergo Tommy John surgery.  The Phillies had nearly acquired Lopez (pictured) from the Astros in November, killing the deal after his physical, but the Rockies were more comfortable with his health.  The Rockies' bullpen seems in better shape this year, even with the losses of Reynolds and Roenicke.

The piggyback experiment aside, the Rockies simply had a terrible rotation in 2012.  Geivett addressed the rotation, in a sense, by re-signing Francis and adding Garland.  It's a low-risk, low-reward pair of signings, totaling just $2MM in guaranteed money.  Francis has become one of the game's softest tossers.  He led the team with just 113 innings last year, given their experiment.  An ERA around 5.00 seems like the best-case scenario for him.  The Rockies added another hittable hurler in Garland, who is bidding to make ten big league starts for the first time since 2010, due to shoulder injuries.  When they're right, these veterans can at least keep the ball on the ground, a Rockies mantra.

Geivett added additional depth on the cheap, picking up backup catcher Torrealba, reserve infielders Brignac and Wheeler, and starter-turned reliever Volstad.  The Torrealba signing allowed the Rockies to trade catcher Ramon Hernandez to the Dodgers, which nets the club about a million bucks plus whatever minor piece they can get for the already-designated Aaron Harang.

Perhaps Colorado's biggest move was not the Lopez trade but rather their managerial hire, Walt Weiss.  After Jim Tracy resigned, the team got in on the trend of hiring someone with no managerial experience.  Weiss, at least, should be on board should the front office decide to do something outside the box again.   

Questions Remaining

The Rockies' rotation consists of Jhoulys Chacin, Jorge de la Rosa, Juan Nicasio, Francis, and Garland.  Though the group is off to a nice start for the first four percent of the season, it's hard not to view them as a massive question mark.  Even if the Rockies didn't like the free agent prices, there were three front-rotation types traded this winter in R.A. Dickey, James Shields, and Josh Johnson, plus some mid-rotation arms.  The Rockies' rotation doesn't have much in the way of name value, but perhaps they can sneakily land in the middle of the NL pack, as FanGraphs' rotation rankings suggested last month.

The Rockies also have uncertainty in the infield, with Chris Nelson and Josh Rutledge taking on full-time roles and Todd Helton not a great bet to top 100 games.

Deals of Note

The Rockies did a pair of two-year extensions in the name of cost certainty, snagging arbitration years from Fowler and Chacin.  In the case of Chacin, I found it unnecessary.  Though he's the team's de facto ace, Chacin has shown a declining strikeout rate but a stable, high walk rate over his career.  He must continue to prevent hits to survive, a dicey proposition that did not hold up last year.  Why lock him in for $4.85MM in 2014?  The Rockies saved a little bit of money in the best case, but they've lost the ability to pay Chacin less if he has a lousy 2013.

Overview

The Rockies march to the beat of their own drum, and you have to respect that.  But even after a nice opening week, they look like a .500 club moving forward, and their quiet offseason is a factor there.  Still, with star power from Carlos Gonzalez and Troy Tulowitzki plus quality bats in Dexter Fowler, Michael Cuddyer, and Wilin Rosario, the Rockies can put some runs on the board if everyone stays healthy.  I'll enjoy watching to see if Walt Weiss' team can continue to defy expectations.

Photo courtesy of USA Today Sports Images.

Angels Re-Sign Bill Hall

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Utility man Bill Hall has rejoined the Angels organization, according to his Twitter page.  The Halos had released Hall last month, avoiding paying him a $100K retention bonus.  He battled some nagging injuries during Spring Training.

Hall notes that he'll be heading to extended spring training.  The 33-year-old appeared briefly with the Orioles last year, spending most of the season hitting .246/.300/.430 at Triple-A while playing mostly second and third base.  Hall's 35 home runs in 2006 are the most in baseball history for someone who played at least three games each at shortstop, third base, center field, and second base.  Previously, Felix Mantilla hit 30 bombs in 1964 while playing each of those positions.

Mets Notes: Buck, Maine, Tanous

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As MLB.com's Anthony DiComo mentions, catcher John Buck was attached to a pair of major trades during the offseason, both times with a team just trying to dump his $6MM salary.  Buck has been more than an afterthought in the early going, however – after adding four RBIs in today's defeat of the Marlins, the backstop now leads the National League with nine runs knocked in.  More on the Mets:

  • Continued success by Buck would allow more time for Mets catching prospect Travis D'Arnaud to marinate in the minors, wrote Jared Diamond of the Wall Street Journal last night.  From a business standpoint, it makes sense for the Mets to wait until at least mid-June to recall D'Arnaud, so that he will not be arbitration eligible as a Super Two player after the 2015 season.  Same goes for pitching prospect Zack Wheeler, who is "not far away" according to Las Vegas 51s manager Wally Backman (Mark Hale of the New York Post reporting).  With a walk rate of 4.7 per nine innings in his young Triple-A career, Wheeler legitimately needs the development time.
  • To make room on the 40-man roster for Sunday starter Aaron Laffey, the Mets moved Johan Santana to the 60-day DL, notes DiComo.  Santana's Mets career is already over, as he underwent season-ending shoulder capsule surgery this week.  Check out this ESPN report from earlier this week for more on the procedure.  Between his $25.5MM salary and the $5.5MM buyout he'll receive after the season, the Mets are paying Santana $31MM in 2013.
  • "My shoulder was being held together with duct tape at the time. They knew everything that was going on. They all knew. It was obvious. You don’t go from throwing 94 to 84 miles per hour. They knew my condition. I was 100 percent upfront about it; I didn’t lie about it. At the time it wasn’t so much pain, I just didn’t have anything," Marlins reliever John Maine told Jorge Arangure Jr. of the New York Times Friday, regarding the end of his time with the Mets in 2010.  Mets pitching coach Dan Warthen had called Maine a "habitual liar" regarding his health, after that game.  Maine, 31, has clawed his way back to the bigs as part of Miami's pen. 
  • Worth a read: Conor Glassey of Baseball America published an interview with Mets scouting director Tommy Tanous yesterday.
  • Did you know MLBTR has a Mets Facebook page with over 2,300 fans?  Join in the discussions today!

Free $400 Fantasy Baseball Contest From DraftStreet

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Pick one player from each of eight tiers and you've got a shot at part of the $400 prize pool in DraftStreet's latest MLBTR freeroll!  You've got nothing to lose by signing up and making your picks, as this game has no entry fee.  You'll be competing based on the stats your eight players accumulate in Friday's night games. 

My team is all about high ceiling offensive talent, with Ryan Braun, Bryce Harper, Joey Votto, Justin Upton, and Jay Bruce, among others.  Anybody have a better strategy going?  Check out the scoring categories in the rules section.  A screenshot of my roster:

Draftstreet

Take five minutes to make your picks for Friday's games, and you've got a shot at the $400 prize pool!  Registration closes at 6pm central time on Friday; day games are not included.  Draftstreet has a deposit promo that expires at 10:59pm central time on April 11th: they are offering a 30% deposit bonus of up to $150 (max bonus = $150). Simply enter the code MLB13 in the "Promo code" area when making your next deposit.  Please note that this post is a paid advertisement by DraftStreet.

Minor Moves: Donald, Berken, Gartrell

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Today's minor moves…

  • Reds infielder Jason Donald cleared waivers and was outrighted to Triple-A, according to the International League transactions page.  He'd been designated for assignment on Sunday.  The 28-year-old hit .277/.365/.441 in 296 Triple-A plate appearances last year.
  • The White Sox added righty Jason Berken to their Triple-A roster, tweets Mark Gonzales of the Chicago Tribune.  Berken, 29, tossed 19 2/3 big league innings in 2012, mostly for the Cubs, but was removed from their 40-man roster in October.  For the Orioles' Triple-A club, he posted a 3.50 ERA, 6.1 K/9, 2.4 BB/9, and 0.63 HR/9 in 144 innings last year.  Four years ago, Baseball America explained that Berken can throw strikes with any of his four pitches, but doesn't have swing-and-miss stuff.
  • The White Sox also released outfielder Stefan Gartrell, tweets Gonzales. Gartrell had signed a minor league deal with an invite to big league camp. The 29-year-old hit .251/.335/.452 over 472 plate appearances last year for the Braves' Triple-A affiliate.

Jeff Todd contributed to this post.

East Notes: Halladay, Loria, Rays, Ellsbury

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"He's more like a [No.] 4 starter for me now," a scout said to ESPN's Jayson Stark after watching Roy Halladay's bizarre start for the Phillies last night, in which he allowed five earned runs, six hits, and three walks while striking out nine in 3 1/3 innings against the Braves.  It seems likely that Doc will slide down our 2014 Free Agent Power Rankings, as he tries to reinvent himself with a less-effective fastball.  On to today's East links…

  • "It’s great baseball. It’s the beginning of a new era for us and it’s exciting," Marlins owner Jeffrey Loria told reporters including Joe Capozzi of the Palm Beach Post before last night's game.  The Marlins do have a pair of exciting players on the big league roster in Giancarlo Stanton and Jose Fernandez, but they're also brimming with replacement-level guys.  Outside of Stanton and Fernandez, I'd say the Marlins have one of baseball's least-exciting teams to watch.
  • Roberto Hernandez's start today for the Rays ended a streak of 1,207 straight games without using a free agent starting pitcher, according to the team.  The last one was Hideo Nomo in July 2005, which predates the current front office by a few months.
  • "You have examples like CarGo, Weaver, Andrus, Varitek — there’s a ton of examples of guys that have signed before [free agency]," explained Red Sox center fielder Jacoby Ellsbury to WEEI's Alex Speier in the wake of Elvis Andrus' new contract. "[Agent Scott Boras] gives you advice, but it’s up to you to make your own decision."  Ellsbury may be the top available free agent position player in free agency, if Robinson Cano signs before then.
  • Earlier today, the Yankees released David Aardsma, the Orioles claimed Josh Stinson, and the Nationals signed Chris Young.

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