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Minor League Transactions: Orvella, Hennessey, Sisco

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As always, Matt Eddy's minor league transactions post at Baseball America contains a few interesting names.

  • The Angels signed reliever Chad Orvella.  The 29-year-old spent '09 with the Royals' Double A club and the Rays' Triple A team.  Once considered the Rays' closer of the future, Orvella had shoulder surgery in May of '08.
  • The Twins signed pitcher Brad Hennessey.  Hennessey soaked up 360.6 big league innings for the Giants in his career, but the former first-rounder sat out the '09 season recovering from Tommy John surgery.
  • The Giants signed lefty Andy Sisco.  The towering 27-year-old southpaw missed the last two seasons due to April '08 Tommy John surgery.  The Giants also inked Pablo Sandoval's older brother Michael out of the Atlantic League.

Twins Interested In Jason Frasor

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The Twins are interested in Blue Jays reliever Jason Frasor, tweets Bob Elliott of the Toronto Sun.  Elliott qualifies the rumor by noting that the Blue Jays had two scouts at a Twins game, "but then they now have a ton of scouts to go to games."

The Twins interest in Frasor stems from Joe Nathan's likely need for season-ending Tommy John surgery.  Frasor could step in and handle any late-inning role.  The 32-year-old posted a 2.50 ERA, 8.7 K/9, and 2.5 BB/9 in 57.6 innings for the Blue Jays last year.  He's earning $2.65MM in his last season before free agency.  The Cubs are also known to be interested; the Jays might find it's a seller's market for quality relievers.

Joe Nathan May Need Tommy John Surgery

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Twins closer Joe Nathan has a torn ulnar collateral ligament, tweets Joe Christensen of the Minneapolis Star-Tribune.  Christensen's colleague La Velle E. Neal III tweets that Nathan will wait a few weeks and try to pitch with it.  If that fails, he'll miss the 2010 season with Tommy John surgery.

As you might expect, the Twins "are considering contingency plans at closer," tweets Christensen.  It's not easy to replace a 2.00 ERA and 40 saves, which is why the Twins are paying Nathan $11.25MM this year.

The Twins have a deep bullpen; I profiled a few backup closer options a week ago.  If they decide to look outside the organization, Jason Frasor, Heath Bell, and Kerry Wood have closing experience and might be available.  Ken Rosenthal of FOX Sports assesses the Twins' situation in this column, suggesting "the loss of Nathan transforms the Twins from AL Central favorites into mere contenders."

Twins Sign Nick Blackburn To Extension

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The Minnesota Twins have signed Nick Blackburn to a four-year, $14MM contract that includes an $8MM club option for 2014, according to a team press release.  Joe Christensen of the Minneapolis Star-Tribune says Blackburn will earn $750K this year, $3MM in 2011, $4.75MM in '12, and $5.5MM in '13.  The extension is very similar to Scott Baker's. 

Blackburn's first two full seasons in the Twins' rotation have been remarkably similar, with the right-hander posting an 11-11 record over 33 starts in both 2008 and 2009. His peripherals remained consistent as well, including a sparkling 1.8 BB/9 over the two seasons, along with a less impressive 4.4 K/9. The 28-year-old is one of many Twins pitchers who performed markedly better at home than on the road. He had a 3.57 career home ERA in the Metrodome era, and a 4.64 ERA in other stadiums.

The contract buys out all of Blackburn's arbitration-eligible seasons, with the Twins holding the $8MM option for his first potential season of free agency. Based on the righty's numbers to date, $14MM for the next four years looks like a reasonable price for the Twins. Blackburn's performance in those four seasons will dictate whether the Twins would be wise to invest another $8MM on him in 2014, at age 32.

The press release notes that the Twins also renewed the contracts of 20 other players, locking up each of the 40 players on their current roster for the coming season.

Latin Links: Ruiz, Haitian Players, Ramirez

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Links in Spanish, because English is so last season…

  • Jose Julio Ruiz's new agent Mike Maulini tells Jorge Ebro at Nuevo Herald that the Cuban first baseman made the switch from Jorge Luis Toca after realizing that his much-rumored signing with a major league team was "long overdue." Ruiz had a $2MM offer in hand from Tampa Bay in February, but since then, the market has stagnated and the lefty feared he was in danger of missing his opportunity to play stateside.
  • While Haitian baseball prospects exist, don't expect to see any of them signing with Major League teams, writes Juan Mercado in the Dominican newspaper El Dia. He talks with two coaches who complain that the MLB office on the island won't allow promising Haitian players to attend teams' academies because of the difficulty in verifying the players' backgrounds and paperwork. One source tells Mercado that the teams simply "prefer not to waste time" in fruitless investigations, while the two coaches call the policy discriminatory, saying many Cuban and Venezuelan players don't receive the same level of scrutiny. The only current Major Leaguer of Haitian descent is the Orioles' Felix Pie, though he was born in the Dominican.
  • Several veteran players were signed during this offseason under the justification of mentoring developing players. But lost in the circle-of-life storyline is the idea that those veterans are being paid for their blunt critical eye. New White Sox backup shortstop Omar Vizquel brings the point home to Luis Rangel of Nuevo Herald when he says that mentee Alexei Ramirez "needs to move his feet when fielding. He has the tendency to stand still and not move to the ball." Ramirez committed 20 errors in his first full season at short, tying for fourth most among major league shortstops.
  • Who says winter leagues help keep players in shape for the regular season? Yankees reliever Jonathan Albaladejo tells Esteban Pagan Rivera at Primera Hora that he shed 30 pounds this offseason after the team forbade him from playing in his home country of Puerto Rico. At the other end of the scale sits Pablo Sandoval, whose much-ballyhooed "Camp Panda" proved for naught when he came back from the Venezuelan Winter League in January heavier than when he arrived. 
  • The Twins signed one of Sandoval's fellow Navegantes of Magallanes in Venezuela, righty reliever Yoslan Herrera, to a minor league deal, confirms Joe Christensen at the Star Tribune. Herrera, who defected from Cuba in 2005, was a highly touted prospect in the Pirates system but disappointed in his only brief showing with the team in 2008. He showed more promise at the Bucs' Double-A and Triple-A levels in 2009 and will start out at Triple-A Rochester for the Twins. The Cuban blog Terreno de Pelota first reported the signing on Tuesday.

Odds & Ends: AL East, Mauer, D’Backs, Sheets

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Some links to read with Opening Day just a month away…

Heyman On Lee, Reynolds, Mauer

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The Mariners and Cliff Lee will likely wait until the season ends before discussing a deal to keep the lefty in Seattle long-term, but both sides tell Jon Heyman of SI.com that such an agreement is possible. GM Jack Zduriencik said there’s “no doubt” he’d like to have Lee around after he hits free agency this offseason. And Lee can imagine extending his stay in Seattle, too.

"So far I like it a lot,'' Lee said. "Obviously, free agency is where you want to be as a player … I'm not going to rule anything out.''

Lee says the Phillies offered him a deal “close” to the three-year $60MM extension they gave Roy Halladay after trading for him. Heyman notes that Zduriencik tried to acquire Halladay before the Phillies did, only to discover that Doc didn’t want to join the Mariners. Here are a couple more rumors from Heyman:
  • Mark Reynolds would like a two-year $18MM deal to cover his first two arbitration years. That's Prince Fielder money, but the D'Backs would prefer to pay him $13MM or so, which would be closer to what Dan Uggla made for the same stretch of his career.
  • There has been no acrimony between the Twins and Joe Mauer. That's a good thing for Twins fans, but other than that we know very little about the negotiations.

Mauer’s Agent Arrives At Twins’ Camp

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As expected, uncovering details on the Joe Mauer extension talks has proven difficult.  Still, La Velle E. Neal III of the Minneapolis Star-Tribune learned that Mauer's agent Ron Shapiro arrived at Twins' camp in Fort Myers, Florida.  Neal explains:

While it's being shaped as Shapiro's annual visit to spring training, the sides are expected to hold face-to-face discussions about the future of the Twins' MVP catcher.

In a slightly pessimistic note, Neal speaks of "indications that progress has slowed recently."  But don't worry Twins fans, SI's Jon Heyman (Twitter) and ESPN's Buster Olney both speak of optimism about these talks.  Neal still contends that no deadlines have been set.  Yahoo's Jeff Passan reported on November 30th that Mauer "plans on ending contract negotiations if a deal isn't struck by the end of spring training."

Tom Tango of Inside The Book recently tackled Mauer's value in an ESPN article, and determined that somewhere between $145-176MM would be appropriate for eight years.

Why Padres Likely Won’t Sign Adrian Gonzalez

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A pair of interesting viewpoints emerged today about the Padres, and why they are likely to trade Adrian Gonzalez, rather than extend his contract.

As Ken Rosenthal puts it in his latest column, regarding Padres fans, "I would want to know just one thing: Why can’t my team sign Adrian Gonzalez if the Twins can sign Joe Mauer?"

Of course, Rosenthal lists the many reasons: attendance is down in San Diego, San Diego is the 28th biggest television market in baseball, and a Gonzalez deal could net a number of prospects in return.

But there is a more ominous reason cited by Rosenthal: there are questions about new ownership's viability. As Rosenthal writes, "Just over a year ago, Moorad’s group reached agreement to gain controlling interest of the club from John Moores over a five-year period. That’s right, the other owners allowed one of their franchises to be purchased on a layaway plan — an unusual arrangement, to say the least."

Jake Peavy also weighed in on the choice by the Padres to deal Gonzalez during an interview with Dan Hayes of the North County Times.

"He's a great player, and at times I think to myself, 'How could they not sign this guy?'" Peavy said of Gonzalez. "A hometown guy playing for his hometown team and being the superstar player he is. At the same time, this is the same organization that let their Hall of Fame closer walk away."

Peavy was referring, of course, to Trevor Hoffman.

If ownership can't afford Gonzalez, of course, that puts them in company with many other small-market teams. But it will be interesting to watch just what San Diego can spend-payroll was less than $44MM last season.

Offseason In Review: Minnesota Twins

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Next up in our Offseason In Review series, the Twins.

Major League Signings

Notable Minor League Signings

Extensions

Trades and Claims

Notable Losses

Summary

For about $20MM and Carlos Gomez, Twins GM Bill Smith revamped his middle infield, retained a mid-rotation starter, added an excellent bench bat, and signed a groundballing middle reliever.  On paper, Smith improved his team at a reasonable cost.

In Hardy, Smith traded for two seasons of the offseason's best available shortstop.  Hudson should easily earn his salary, and might be able to top last year's Twins second base offensive output (.209/.302/.267) batting blindfolded.  Pavano's '09 peripherals suggest he deserved an ERA around 4.00 as opposed to his actual 5.10 mark.  Thome should come in handy; he hit .262/.383/.498 against righties last year.

The Twins' rotation looks respectable, with Kevin Slowey and Francisco Liriano likely to provide much more than last year's 227.3 innings of 5.42 ball.  Does the lineup pack enough punch?  CHONE projections suggest the Twins will score 850 runs.  That's optimistic, since injuries are inevitable for all teams.  Still, it's all relative, and the Twins' offense projects as the best in the division.  Thanks to Smith's fine winter, the Twins are my AL Central favorite.

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