Phillies Sign Didi Gregorius
Didi Gregorius and Joe Girardi have officially been reunited. The Phillies announced Friday that they’ve signed Gregorius, the longtime Yankees shortstop, to a one-year contract that will reportedly pay him $14MM before he returns to free agency next winter. Gregorius is represented by Excel Sports Management.
This is the latest noteworthy free-agent strike for general manager Matt Klentak and the Phillies, who signed right-hander Zack Wheeler to a five-year, $118MM contract earlier this offseason. They spent an incredible amount of money on free agents Bryce Harper, Andrew McCutchen and David Robertson just a year ago, but those moves didn’t lead to the club’s first playoff berth since 2011. The Phillies instead limped to an 81-81 record, which cost manager Gabe Kapler his job. The team has since replaced Kapler with Girardi, who happened to manage Gregorius with the Yankees from 2015-17.
Gregorius, who missed the first few months of the 2019 season after undergoing Tommy John surgery on his right elbow in Oct. 2018, will look to rebuild some free agent stock after a lackluster return effort from that procedure. Upon returning to the Yankees in June, the 29-year-old slashed just .238/.276/.441 with 16 home runs in 344 plate appearances, which prevented the Yankees from issuing him a qualifying offer worth $17.8MM.
However, as hands down the most promising shortstop in this winter’s class of free agents, MLBTR predicted Gregorius would receive a three-year, $42MM contract. While Gregorius did draw interest from at least a few teams, he opted to pursue a short-term deal in hopes of cashing in on a lengthier deal next winter. If his gamble pays off, it’s not hard to envision Gregorius commanding a four-year pact on the 2020-21 open market, although he may have a qualifying offer hanging over his head next time around.
For the Phillies, adding Gregorius should mean pushing 2019 starter Jean Segura to second base to replace the non-tendered Cesar Hernandez. With Gregorius, Segura, first baseman Rhys Hoskins and presumably Scott Kingery at third, the Phillies look to be in good shape in the infield. They’ve shown interest in the two best free-agent third basemen available in Anthony Rendon and Josh Donaldson, but Rendon is now off the board after agreeing to a seven-year, $245MM deal with the Angels. And between the Gregorius and Wheeler pickups, they’re closing in on the first level of the luxury tax of $208MM, which could make a Donaldson pursuit too pricey (although Kingery could shift to center field if owner John Middleton authorizes the front office to pursue Donaldson and exceed the luxury tax barrier). Before the Gregorius agreement, Jason Martinez of Roster Resource and FanGraphs had the Phillies at just over $186MM in luxury-tax payroll.
As for the Yankees, they’re saying goodbye to an accomplished player who had been a key part of their roster since they acquired him from the Diamondbacks before the 2015 season. But the Yankees do look well-equipped to move on from Gregorius, as they could move star second baseman Gleyber Torres to shortstop and use DJ LeMahieu as their primary second baseman in 2020.
Joel Sherman of the New York Post first reported the agreement. Sweeny Murti of WFAN added the length of the contract, and Jim Salisbury of NBC Sports Philadelphia reported the financial terms.
Giants Acquire Zack Cozart
Dec. 12: The Angels announced that they’ve acquired left-hander Garrett Williams from the Giants as a player to be named later, thus completing the Cozart swap. Sending him out as a player to be named later seems likely have been a measure of ensuring that Williams wasn’t selected in today’s Rule 5 Draft.
Williams, 25, was the Giants’ seventh-round pick back in 2016 and just completed his second season at the Double-A level, where he posted a 3.60 ERA with 8.8 K/9, 5.0 BB/9, 0.49 HR/9 and a 55.7 percent ground-ball rate in 110 innings (20 starts, nine relief outings). Williams, who was the Giants’ No. 29 prospect at MLB.com and landed outside the top 29 at FanGraphs, draws praise for a plus curveball but is obviously lacking in the command department. He’s averaged 4.9 BB/9 in his pro career to date, including a 5.7 mark in two seasons of Double-A ball.
Dec. 10: The Giants have acquired infielder Zack Cozart and shortstop prospect Will Wilson from the Angels for cash considerations or a player to be named later, Maria Torres of the Los Angeles Times reports. San Francisco will pay all of Cozart’s $12.167MM salary for 2020, per Jeff Fletcher of the Orange County Register.
Cozart joined the Angels as a high-priced free-agent signing two winters ago, when he inked a three-year, $38MM contract after a career campaign with the Reds. But Cozart was neither healthy nor effective as a member of the Angels, with whom he consistently struggled to perform and dealt with injuries. The 34-year-old took just 107 plate appearances in 2019, when he slashed a horrid .124/.178/.144 without a home run and missed the majority of the season with shoulder problems. Cozart’s year came to an end in mid-July when he underwent what the Angels called an “arthroscopic debridement of his left shoulder.”
Getting rid of Cozart looks like a major score for the Angels, who could use his money to further improve their chances of landing a major free agent (Gerrit Cole? Anthony Rendon?). In the Giants’ case, it’s unclear how much playing time Cozart will receive next season. They already have Evan Longoria at third base and Brandon Crawford at shortstop, after all, with youngster Mauricio Dubon possibly in line to garner the lion’s share of reps at second base.
Considering Wilson’s involvement, this may be a case of the Giants essentially buying a prospect. The 21-year-old Wilson, formerly with North Carolina State, is just months removed from joining the Angels as the 15th pick in the 2019 draft. The Angels paid $3.4MM to lock up Wilson at the time, but they’ve now deemed him expendable in an effort to get Cozart’s money off the books.
Photo courtesy of USA Today Sports Images.
Yankees To Re-Sign Brett Gardner
The Yankees have struck a deal with outfielder Brett Gardner, per George A. King III of the New York Post (via Twitter). It’ll pay him a guaranteed $12.5MM. There’s a $2MM signing bonus and $8MM 2020 salary, per MLB.com’s Mark Feinsand (via Twitter). The Yanks also have a $10MM club option in 2021, per MLB.com’s Bryan Hoch (Twitter link), with the alternative of a $2.5MM buyout (via King, on Twitter).
There was never much doubt that Gardner would end up returning to New York. The 36-year-old has already been with the club for a dozen seasons and has been rumored all offseason to be in talks for another. Gardner reportedly drew multi-year interest from other organizations but evidently didn’t have much appetite for change at this point in his career.
It is easy to overlook just how big a role Gardner has played over the years for the Yanks. Excepting his injury-ravaged 2012 campaign, he has appeared in at least 140 games for the team in every season for the past decade. Gardner is one game and five plate appearances shy of tallying 1500 games-played and six thousand PAs with the Bronxn Bombers.
The formula remains much the same now as ever. Gardner is an outstanding defender and baserunner who has consistently delivered league-average offensive production. He has grown into power over the years, though it remains to be seen whether he can repeat last year’s career-high 28 long balls and .503 slugging percentage. (Those stood out even in a year of leaguewide power enhancement.)
The Yankees will certainly need Gardner quite a bit out of the gates with Aaron Hicks slated to miss time. Just how roles will be sorted once Hicks is back will remain to be seen. The health and performance statuses of quite a few other players — including sluggers Aaron Judge and Giancarlo Stanton — will surely factor heavily. Having the dependable Gardner, along with 2019 breakout performer Mike Tauchman, will leave the Yanks plenty of options for filling in or mixing and matching if and when the roster is at full strength.
Photo courtesy of USA Today Sports Images.
Rockies Extend Scott Oberg
The Rockies have reached a contract extension with reliever Scott Oberg, Bob Nightengale of USA Today reports. It’s a three-year, $13MM deal with an $8MM club option for 2023. However, the pact contains escalators that could push the value to $15MM over three years and $26MM for four, per Ken Rosenthal of The Athletic. Oberg is a client of agent Brian Charles of Big League Management Company, LLC.
Prior to this extension, Oberg had been projected to earn $2MM via arbitration in 2020. That will still be the case, according to the New York Post’s Joel Sherman, who adds that Oberg will be guaranteed $4MM in 2021 and and $7MM in ’22. This extension will overlap with his final two arbitration-eligible campaigns and, if the option is exercised in a few seasons, buy out two free-agent years.
The fact that Oberg has become a core piece for the Rockies is fairly remarkable, as the team didn’t invest much in him (a 15th-round pick) when it drafted him in 2012. The right-handed Oberg became a regular out of the Colorado bullpen in 2015, but he didn’t truly blossom until 2018.
Oberg has quietly been one of the game’s most effective relievers since his breakout season, having relied on a fastball-slider combo to log a 2.35 ERA/3.20 FIP with 9.03 K/9, 2.75 BB/9 and a strong 52.7 percent groundball rate across 114 2/3 innings. Looking at Oberg’s home/road splits, it’s clear pitching at the hitter-friendly Coors Field hasn’t really fazed the 29-year-old in recent seasons.
Oberg did see his overall production plummet as 2019 progressed, but he was dealing with significant health worries then that affected his numbers. He didn’t take the mound past Aug. 16 on account of blood clots in his right elbow, which forced him to undergo surgery to address the issue. That was the second time Oberg has battled blood clots during his career, but there doesn’t seem to be any concern on the part of him or the Rockies that it’ll be an ongoing problem.
Photo courtesy of USA Today Sports Images.
White Sox Acquire Nomar Mazara
12:15am: Both teams have announced the trade.
11:05 pm: The Rangers and White Sox have agreed on a trade that will send outfielder Nomar Mazara to Chicago, Evan Grant of the Dallas Morning News reports. Outfielder Steele Walker is going to Texas in return, per MLB.com’s TR Sullivan (via Twitter).
This move represents a bet on Mazara’s long-lauded talent for the South Siders, who’ll hope he can finally break out at the plate after languishing just shy of league average to this point of his career. Mazara is just 24 years of age but is already in his second-to-last season of arbitration eligibility. MLBTR projects a $5.7MM salary.
Mazara has received ample opportunity ever since breaking into the bigs in his age-21 campaign. But through more than two thousand plate appearances at the game’s highest level, he’s hitting just .261/.320/.435 with a steady diet of ~20 home run seasons. That’s certainly not what you’d like to see out of a corner outfielder who isn’t a standout in the field. Mazara has yet to reach 2 WAR for his career. If you’re looking for evidence that Mazara is about to hit his stride, his power did jump in 2019, with a .469 SLG and .200 ISO both career highs. As he approaches his age-25 seasons, there’s certainly time for another developmental leap.
The Chicago organization has announced its intentions to press towards contention in 2020, upping the stakes for this move. Mazara will presumably be asked to handle the lion’s share of the time in right field, joining Eloy Jimenez as a corner outfield regular. No doubt the front office has visions of a breakout, youthful trio emerging when Luis Robert is deemed ready to man center field. Leury Garcia could hold down center to open the season and then step back into a reserve role.
As for the 23-year-old Walker, he’s a recent second-round pick who reached the High-A level last year with the Chicago organization. The former Oklahoma University star slashed .269/.346/.426 in 441 plate appearances for Winston-Salem in 2019. Walker is viewed as a high-quality hitting prospect who has a shot at sticking up the middle. He’s generally considered one of the ten best prospects in a strong White Sox farm. Walker will begin the season in Double-A, per John Blake, the Rangers’ Executive VP of Communications.
Photo courtesy of USA Today Sports Images.
Adam Jones Signs With Japan’s Orix Buffaloes
Longtime major league outfielder Adam Jones‘ time in the bigs may have just drawn to a close. Jones announced on Twitter that he’s signing with Japan’s Orix Buffaloes. He inked a two-year, $8MM contract with a club option for 2022, Ken Rosenthal of The Athletic reports. The deal could max out at $15.5MM if Jones’ option is exercised and the CAA Sports client earns the $2MM in incentives that are part of the pact.
The fact that Jones is heading to Japan now means he’ll avoid a protracted stay on the open market. As a free agent last offseason, the 34-year-old Jones was a victim of a league that has become more and more averse to signing aging players to guaranteed contracts. Jones went without a deal for several months, finally inking a $3MM pact with the Diamondbacks.
Even though Jones jumped out to a great start in Arizona, his numbers and his playing time declined as the year progressed. He wound up turning in a .260/.313/.414 line (good for a below-average wRC+ of 87) with 16 home runs in 528 plate appearances. In the field, the former defensive standout earned negative marks for the fourth straight year (minus-4 DRS, minus-2.2 UZR).
Despite his subpar numbers, Jones’ lauded leadership skills were surely valued in Arizona. Major league teams could have considered signing him to act as a mentor to their younger players in 2020. However, he would have had to settle for either a low-paying big league contract or a minors agreement. As a result, Jones made the decision to head to Nippon Professional Baseball for a much larger payday.
If this is the last we’ve seen of Jones in the majors, he’ll be remembered as a standout with the Orioles for a significant portion of his career. Jones was the 37th overall pick of the Mariners in 2003, but they ultimately traded him to the Orioles in 2008 in a swap that blew up in Seattle’s face and couldn’t have worked out much better for Baltimore. Jones debuted as an Oriole in 2008, the beginning of an eminently successful 11-season run in which the former center fielder batted .279/.319/.459 with 263 home runs, 90 steals and 29.5 fWAR, earned five All-Star nods and won four Gold Gloves.
Photo courtesy of USA Today Sports Images.
Twins Sign Alex Avila
DEC. 10: The Avila deal and the re-signing of Michael Pineda are now official, the Twins announced. They now have 37 players on their 40-man roster.
DEC. 6: The Twins have agreed to a one-year contract with free-agent catcher Alex Avila, ESPN’s Jeff Passan tweets. The Excel Sports client will take home a $4.25MM guarantee on the new deal, per the report.
Avila, 33 in January, is no stranger to the AL Central, having spent parts of eight seasons with the Tigers plus another year with the White Sox. He’ll give the Twins a left-handed-hitting complement to 2019 breakout star Mitch Garver and, ostensibly, replace Jason Castro, who seems likely to land a starting gig elsewhere in free agency.
The veteran Avila is somewhat of a divisive player, as some view his perennially low batting average and lofty strikeout totals as too detrimental to provide consistent value. Others will point to his sky-high walk rates and above-average power in suggesting that more traditional metrics undersell his value at the plate. Indeed, Avila had one of the game’s more bizarre stat lines in 2019 when he slashed .207/.353/.421 with a 17.9 percent walk rate (third among hitters with 200+ plate appearances) and a 33.2 percent strikeout rate (12th among that same subset of hitters).
Garver, 28, still stands out as the obvious starter in Minnesota after exploding with a .273/.365/.630 batting line and 31 home runs in 2019. Even if next year’s ball is corrected to be less conducive to home runs, the Twins assuredly want to plug Garver into the lineup as often as possible after a such a stout performance. He’ll see time against lefties and righties alike, but Avila will be a more than capable stand-in when Garver needs a breather and a righty is on the hill. For his career, Avila is a .241/.358/.417 hitter (15.3 BB%, 28.7 K%) when holding the platoon advantage, although his .212/.307/.311 career line against lefties is all one needs to see to steer him away from opposing southpaws. If Garver needs a day off when a left-hander is on the mound, the Twins could perhaps look to plus super-utility man Willians Astudillo and his right-handed bat into the lineup at catcher. Astudillo himself could’ve been deployed as a backup catcher in 2020, but in Avila, the Twins have found a drastically better source of on-base percentage and a better defensive option that allows Astudillo to continue on in a jack-of-all-trades, master-of-none role.
Avila has long been adept at controlling the running game (career 30 percent caught-stealing rate), but he was particularly impressive in 2019 with Arizona. Although he was only a part-time catcher there as well, Avila nabbed 11 of the 21 men who attempted to run on him (52 percent), and he was 9-for-30 (30 percent) a year prior. Avila’s framing rated poorly in 2017, but the D-backs’ efforts to improve him in that regard were successful, as he was above-average in both his seasons with Arizona, per both FanGraphs and Statcast. Baseball Prospectus, meanwhile, rated him as one of the game’s best at blocking pitches in the dirt in 2019.
Minnesota still has substantial work to do this offseason — namely augmenting a rotation that currently looks too similar to its 2019 iteration — but adding Avila to the fold crosses a more minor need off the to-do list at a reasonable price point. The one-year term of the deal continues with the Derek Falvey/Thad Levine-led front office’s penchant for short-term investments as well, thus maintaining future payroll flexibility. If the Twins hope to truly bolster the rotation, they’ll probably need to eschew that preference, but for smaller-scale moves like this it’s sensible to minimize contractual length.
Astros Have Reportedly Considered Carlos Correa Trade
Speaking with Brian McTaggart of MLB.com and other reporters Tuesday, Astros president of baseball operations Jeff Luhnow painted a somewhat bleak picture in regards to the team’s payroll. In Luhnow’s estimation, the Astros are going to have to clear out money if they want to acquire a top-end starting pitcher this offseason. With that in mind, it looks more likely than ever that they’ll be saying goodbye to the No. 1 player on the market, right-hander Gerrit Cole, who teamed with Justin Verlander and Zack Greinke to comprise an incredibly formidable trio in 2019.
Back in early October, before the Astros began what proved to be an American League-winning run through the playoffs, owner Jim Crane indicated he’d like to avoid going past the $208MM luxury tax in 2020. However, in the estimation of Jason Martinez of FanGraphs and Roster Resource, their luxury-tax payroll for next season is already over $231MM. As a result, the Astros could be more likely to shave payroll than make any major additions this winter.
The Astros would cut some money by trading star shortstop Carlos Correa, who’s due to earn an estimated $7.4MM via arbitration next year. Dealing the 25-year-old sounds like crazy talk, especially when you’re a championship-level team like Houston, but it’s not off the table. The club has “entertained” the possibility, Ken Rosenthal of The Athletic reports (subscription link). As of now, though, no deal appears imminent.
With the top free-agent shortstop, Didi Gregorius, now off the board, it stands to reason any shortstop-needy club would (or has) called the Astros in regards to Correa. In trading Correa, though, the Astros would be selling low after an injury-limited year and leaving themselves with questions at short (of course, they did do just fine without him for a large portion of 2019). For now, Correa’s one of several key Astros who’s due to reach free agency over the next couple years, which could hasten either a trade or an extension. Correa, Verlander and Greinke are under control through 2021, while first baseman Yuli Gurriel and outfielders George Springer and Michael Brantley are slated to hit the open market after next season.
Giants Sign Kevin Gausman
The Giants have signed right-hander Kevin Gausman, Andrew Baggarly of The Athletic was among those to report. It’s a one-year, $9MM contract with up to $1MM in performance bonuses, the team announced. Gausman is a client of Tidal Sports Group.
If he maxes out his bonuses, Gausman will end up with almost the same payday he’d have received had the Reds retained him for 2020. They moved on from Gausman at last week’s non-tender deadline in lieu of paying him a projected $10.6MM next season. However, that doesn’t mean Gausman performed poorly as a member of the Reds, who claimed him off waivers from the Braves in August. On the contrary, the soon-to-be 29-year-old Gausman pitched well over a limited sample of 22 1/3 innings, evidenced by a 4.03 ERA with tremendous strikeout and walk rates of 11.7 and 2.0, respectively.
Of course, Gausman only became a Red because he had trouble preventing runs as a Brave. He put up an ugly 6.19 ERA across 80 innings as a starter before working almost exclusively as a reliever for the Reds. That said, the Atlanta version of Gausman did manage a respectable 4.20 FIP with a similarly solid 9.6 K/9 and 3.0 BB/9. And before Gausman’s career experienced a downturn in Atlanta, he recorded several quality seasons as a starter for the Orioles, who selected him fourth overall in the 2012 draft.
Now that he’s on the fourth team of his career, Gausman will presumably return to a role as a full-time starter. The Giants – whose longtime No. 1 starter, Madison Bumgarner, remains a free agent – are sorely lacking in that department. Unless the Giants re-sign Bumgarner or add another veteran, the hard-throwing Gausman, who has averaged just under 95 mph on his fastball during his time in the majors, looks as if he’ll team with Johnny Cueto and Jeff Samardzija as the elder statesmen of the group. At least for now, Gausman’s guarantee is the largest one president of baseball operations Farhan Zaidi has doled out since he joined the organization last winter.
Photo courtesy of USA Today Sports Images.
Nationals Agree To Re-Sign Stephen Strasburg
4:02pm: The Nationals have announced the agreement. The deal also comes with incentives, Ken Rosenthal of The Athletic tweets. Strasburg will earn $500K for an MVP win, $250K for a second-place finish, $350K for third, $100K for fourth and $75K for fifth. His Cy Young incentives are the same. He’d take home $250K for another World Series MVP. An All-Star appearance, a Gold Glove and a Silver Slugger are each worth another $100K apiece.
1:48pm: The defending World Series champs and the game’s biggest agent have kicked off the Winter Meetings with a bang. The Nationals have reached agreement on a new contract with star righty Stephen Strasburg, Jon Heyman of MLB Network tweets. It’s a stunning seven-year deal that guarantees the Scott Boras client a whopping $245MM, per Jeff Passan of ESPN.com (via Twitter). The sides will announce the deal this afternoon.
If there was ever any doubt as to the stability of the relationship between the Nats and the player once hailed as a franchise savior, this contract resolves it. There’s a full no-trade clause, MLB.com’s Mark Feinsand tweets. The contract does not come with options or opt-outs, per Tim Brown of Yahoo (via Twitter). About $80MM of the money is deferred, Bob Nightengale of USA Today adds on Twitter, but they will include interest, per Jared Diamond of the Wall Street Journal (Twitter link).
We had come to expect a record-setting pitching deal this winter, but not from Strasburg. Top-of-the-market ace Gerrit Cole had long figured to top David Price for the biggest-ever rotation contract. He’s certain still to do so … quite likely by far, far more than had been anticipated. Strasburg has now blown the prior $217MM record out of the water. It also tops the average-annual value record held previously by Zack Greinke.
Way back when the 2019 season began, it was highly questionable whether Strasburg would even opt out of the four years and $100MM left on his prior extension with the Nationals. The former top overall draft choice ended up turning in a huge regular season followed by an iconic postseason, leading the Nats to a long-awaited World Series berth. It was everything that he and the organization dreamed of when he was selected first overall back in 2009 and then made a stirring debut in 2010. That he navigated a devastating Tommy John surgery, shutdown controversy, and various travails thereafter only made it all the more meaningful.
It has been a rollercoaster for the Nats faithful, which watched Bryce Harper head to the rival Phillies last winter. Strasburg is back … but what about Anthony Rendon, who was the third consecutive first-round pick that president of baseball operations Mike Rizzo knocked out of the park. Ownership has said it doesn’t believe it can sign both Strasburg and Rendon. While that claim is worth questioning, it’s also quite a bit more understandable now that we know just how much the club had to pay to retain the former.
We’ll have to wait and see whether the Nats continue to pursue Rendon. But there’s an obvious impact on his market, which includes quite a few other major bidders. It’s also not difficult to see the connections between Strasburg’s signing and the still-developing rotation market. Pressure soared on the pitching market and the NL East arms race when the Phillies inked Zack Wheeler to a $118MM pact, snatching him from the Mets. With multiple teams pushing for Cole, and some viewing Strasburg as a major fallback target, the Nats acted decisively to bring back their ace. Having now secured larger-than-expected early strikes for Strasburg and Mike Moustakas, Boras can turn to ratcheting up the bidding on Cole, Rendon, and his other major open-market clients.
It’s quite something to see a contract of this magnitude for a 31-year-old pitcher just one winter removed from a spate of high-end hurlers inked extensions. Two aces in a similar age bracket — Jacob deGrom and Chris Sale — received much more modest guarantees. Those pitchers were obviously protecting against the risks of pitching in the majors, but they were also surely cognizant of a frigid free agent market. Now, it seems the thaw may be on … though how far it will extend remains to be seen.
To be sure, Strasburg not only ensconced himself in Nats lore but reaffirmed his top-shelf status in 2019. He topped two hundred innings for the second time in his career and worked to a 3.32 ERA that may actually have belied the true quality of his effort. With 10.8 K/9, 2.4 BB/9, and a 51.1% groundball rate, he showed all the skills that help a pitcher generate outs. Strasburg graded at a 3.25 FIP, 3.17 xFIP, and 3.49 SIERA in 2019. His 13.4% swinging-strike rate was a career high, though he’s now averaging about two ticks less on his fastball than he did for much of his career. And he showed yet more in a blistering run through the postseason, when he allowed just eight earned runs with a ridiculous 47:4 K/BB ratio over 36 1/3 innings, topping it all off with a World Series MVP.
The risks are equally obvious. Though he has avoided another devastating arm injury, Strasburg averaged 145 innings annually between 2015-18 and has had arm scares throughout that time. (He also carried a 3.27 ERA in that span.) He’s now under contract through his age-37 campaign.
While the Nats are obviously pleased with the output they’ve received to this point, having now twice inked Strasburg to massive contracts, they’re still banking on quite a bit more in the second half of his career. The club has now expanded its already huge commitment to its trio of high-end starters, with Strasburg now topping the big salaries promised to Max Scherzer and Patrick Corbin. Washington’s 2020 prospects will be determined in no small part by the way in which these hurlers bounce back from a Herculean postseason effort.
Photo courtesy of USA Today Sports Images.