Orioles Discussing Outfielders With Padres
The Orioles are still talking with the Padres about the possibility of dealing for a piece of San Diego’s overstocked outfield, Eduardo Encina of the Baltimore Sun reports. Left-handed hitters Seth Smith and Will Venable are the two names that have drawn the most interest from Baltimore, Encina adds.
For their part, the Padres have asked about young arms Kevin Gausman and Dylan Bundy — a common target for teams eyeing the O’s system — but that appears to be a non-starter. Baltimore has already shown it will not rush to fill in for the losses of Nick Markakis and Nelson Cruz, and Encina notes that the Padres are not exactly flush with leverage given their readily apparent logjam.
Though both Smith and Venable are most useful against right-handed pitching, Encina says that the O’s are content to combine such a player with another bat in a platoon. The club has long been said to be interested in a reunion with Delmon Young, for instance, and he would presumably be a candidate for that sort of role. Of course, Baltimore recently tendered a contract to Alejandro De Aza and owns the rights to David Lough, and adding a new left-handed-hitting outfielder would almost certainly push one or both of those players off the roster.
Blue Jays Prioritizing Closer, Looking At Trade Market
With Josh Donaldson, Russell Martin and Michael Saunders all in the fold, the Blue Jays are now prioritizing the ninth inning and are seeking a closer via trade, Jon Heyman of CBS Sports tweets. The team will look at free agents if a trade scenario can’t be worked out, Heyman adds, although quality options are dwindling.
There’s no shortage of potentially available relievers with closing experience. Jonathan Papelbon, owed $13MM in 2015 with a 2016 vesting option at the same rate, is certainly available. Tyler Clippard‘s name has surfaced in trade rumors this offseason on a few occasions as well, and some have speculated that the Royals might be willing to move one of their excellent-but-expensive relievers (Greg Holland and Wade Davis). While there was some reactionary speculation after the Braves signed Jason Grilli earlier tonight, president of baseball operations John Hart quickly dismissed the possibility of trading Craig Kimbrel, saying it hasn’t been considered.
The free agent market offers far fewer options than it did a month ago, but there are still some notable former closers out there. Both Rafael Soriano and Francisco Rodriguez remain available and have had recent success. John Axford and Brian Wilson represent buy-low options as formerly elite closers that have struggled recently.
The Blue Jays currently have about $103MM committed to next year’s roster, not including arbitration raises. Toronto has Marco Estrada ($4.7MM projected salary), Donaldson ($4.5MM), Saunders ($2.9MM), Brett Cecil ($2.6MM) and Danny Valencia ($1.7MM) all eligible for arb this winter, which could take them to around $120MM total. That’s still well shy of last year’s $137MM Opening Day payroll, so the Blue Jays should be able to add a high-leverage relief arm even if the price tag is fairly substantial.
Braves Sign Jason Grilli
The Braves have struck a move to bolster their bullpen, adding right-hander Jason Grilli on a two-year deal with a third-year club option, the team announced Tuesday night. Grilli, a client of player-turned-agent Gary Sheffield, will reportedly earn $8MM over the life of the contract.
The two-year agreement pays Grilli $4.25MM in 2015 and $3.5MM in 2016. The club option, which comes with a $250K buyout, is valued at $3MM.
The 38-year-old Grilli got off to a rough start in 2014 — the second season of a two-year, $6.75MM pact with the Pirates. A 2013 All-Star, Grilli slumped to a 4.87 ERA through his first 20 1/3 innings this season and also missed roughly a month with an oblique strain. He ceded the closer’s role to Mark Melancon and was ultimately flipped to the Angels in a one-for-one trade that sent Ernesto Frieri to Pittsburgh. The swap of struggling closers didn’t pan out for Frieri, but Grilli managed to right the ship and was very good down the stretch with Anaheim.
In 33 2/3 innings with the Halos, Grilli notched a 3.48 ERA with 9.6 K/9 and 2.7 BB/9. The control problems he experienced in the season’s early stages seemed to be corrected with the Angels, and he showed no drop in velocity following the oblique injury, as he averaged 93.1 mph on his heater with both teams.
Grilli will likely assume a large chunk of the innings that would have gone to Jordan Walden, who was acquired by the Cardinals alongside Jason Heyward in the trade that sent Shelby Miller and Tyrell Jenkins to Atlanta. Craig Kimbrel, of course, will again be tasked with defending ninth-inning leads, so Grilli will join Shae Simmons, David Carpenter and reclamation project Jim Johnson in bridging the gap from the rotation to Kimbrel. His two-year deal will lock in his age-38 and age-39 seasons, also giving the Braves an option for his age-40 campaign.
Grilli’s interesting Major League career began with the Marlins in 2003 but didn’t really take off until 2011 with the Pirates. Grilli missed the 2010 season after undergoing surgery to repair a quadriceps injury, and he carried a lifetime 4.74 ERA to Pittsburgh before breaking out with a 2.48 ERA and a hefty 10.2 K/9 rate. Grilli improved further in 2012, increasing his workload from 32 2/3 innings to 58 2/3 as his strikeout rate soared to 13.8 per nine innings. He eventually staked a claim to the club’s ninth-inning role and made his first All-Star team as Pittsburgh’s closer in 2013 at the age of 36. Over the past four seasons, Grilli has totaled a 3.09 ERA with 11.9 K/9, 3.3 BB/9 and a 34.2 percent ground-ball rate in 195 1/3 innings. His outstanding 2.47 SIERA ranks 16th among 216 qualified relievers in that stretch.
Ken Rosenthal of FOX Sports first reported the agreement (Twitter links). Jon Heyman of CBS Sports (via Twitter) and MLB.com’s Mark Bowman (Twitter links) provided contract details
Photo courtesy of USA Today Sports Images.
Cardinals Sign Jordan Walden To Two-Year Deal
7:35pm: Walden receives a $350K signing bonus before earning $2.5MM in 2015 and $3.5MM in 2016, Jon Heyman of CBS Sports tweets. The $5.25MM club option comes with a $250K buyout.
12:07pm: The Cardinals have announced a two-year deal with righty Jordan Walden to avoid arbitration, via Twitter. The deal includes a club option for 2017, giving St. Louis control over Walden for one season of expected free agent eligibility.
The deal is for $6.6MM over two years, per SB Nation’s Chris Cotillo (via Twitter). The club option will cost $5.25MM to exercise.
Walden came to the Cardinals along with Jason Heyward by way of trade earlier in the offseason, and this signing confirms that he was hardly a throw-in. Atlanta had picked him up in a swap for Tommy Hanson before the 2013 campaign.
With Atlanta last year, Walden pitched to a 2.88 ERA with 11.2 K/9 against 4.9 BB/9. Those strong results are now fairly typical for the 27-year-old power reliever, who has established himself as a dependable back-of-the-pen arm. Walden owns a 3.10 career earned run average in 211 2/3 frames over five seasons, and has not yet finished a season with lower-than double-digit strikeouts per nine.
Though his fastball velocity is down a few ticks from his first few seasons, Walden still averages nearly 96mph on his heater. And pitch values suggest that he has deployed it with even greater success, while also dialing up the effectiveness of his low-to-mid-80’s slider.
Cubs Sign David Ross
The Cubs announced today that they have signed catcher David Ross to a two-year contract. Ross will reportedly earn $5MM over the life of the deal, including a $500K signing bonus and identical salaries of $2.25MM in each of the contract’s two seasons.
Ross, a client of Sports One Athlete Management client, will add yet more veteran leadership behind the plate for the Cubs and be reunited with friend and former teammate Jon Lester. He will slot in alongside the recently-acquired Miguel Montero, providing a right-handed-hitting complement.
Before joining the Red Sox in 2013, Ross spent four years as the reserve option for the Braves. He slashed a robust .269/.353/.463, but never made more than 200 plate appearances in a given season. Ross has fallen back to a .650 OPS over the last two seasons in Boston, over 287 plate appearances. Defensively, Baseball Prospectus did not value Ross’s work very highly last year.
In the aggregate, then, there are plenty of questions about Ross’s abilities moving forward. But he does have a rather high established ceiling for a backup catcher, and obviously is one of the game’s most respected elder statesmen at this stage of his career.
Ken Rosenthal of FOX Sports first reported the deal (on Twitter). Jon Heyman of CBS Sports tweeted the salary breakdown.
Twins Sign Tim Stauffer
The Twins announced that they have signed right-hander Tim Stauffer to a one-year, $2.2MM contract. To make room on the 40-man roster, Eric Fryer has been outrighted to Triple-A. Additionally, Minnesota announced that Chris Parmelee, who had been designated for assignment to clear room for Ervin Santana, was outrighted to Triple-A as well.
The 32-year-old Stauffer, a client of agent Ron Shapiro (who also represents Joe Mauer), has spent his entire career to date with the Padres since being selected fourth overall in the 2003 draft. Though he hasn’t necessarily lived up to expectations that might be associated with his draft selection, Stauffer has quietly notched a 3.37 ERA in 480 1/3 innings dating back to the 2009 season. He’s battled injury problems a bit in his career, undergoing surgery to repair the labrum in his right shoulder and to repair a flexor strain in his right arm, but Stauffer has a clean bill of health over the past two seasons.
In that time, he’s worked almost exclusively as a reliever with mostly positive results. Since 2013, he’s notched a 3.63 ERA with 8.8 K/9, 2.9 BB/9 and a 46.3 percent ground-ball rate. Estimators such as FIP (3.30), xFIP (3.23) and SIERA (3.04) praise his work in those two campaigns.
Presumably, Stauffer will be working as a reliever for new manager Paul Molitor, though he certainly has proven that he can step into the rotation to make a spot start, should the need arise. (He posted a 3.73 ERA in 185 1/3 innings for the Padres back in 2011 and started three games in 2014.) He’ll join Casey Fien as a right-handed bridge to All-Star closer Glen Perkins.
Giants Re-Sign Jake Peavy
Pitcher Jake Peavy has officially agreed to a deal to return to the Giants, as first reported by Ken Rosenthal of FOX Sports (Twitter link). It’s a two-year, $24MM deal with a full no-trade clause, according to ESPN’s Jerry Crasnick. Peavy, a CAA client, will be paid a $4MM signing bonus and salaries of $7MM in 2015 and $13MM in 2016, writes Crasnick.
Peavy, 34 in May, posted a 3.73 ERA, 7.0 K/9, 2.8 BB/9, 1.02 HR/9, and 38.5% groundball rate in 202 2/3 innings for the Red Sox and Giants this year. The Red Sox traded him to the Giants on July 26th with cash for Edwin Escobar and Heath Hembree. Peavy posted a 2.17 ERA in 78 2/3 innings for the Giants after the trade. While his control improved with the Giants, his sharp drop in homer-to-flyball rate (3.2 percent) isn’t sustainable, even in the pitcher friendly AT&T Park.
While the level of production he showed in the season’s second half is very likely to come back down to Earth, there’s no doubt that a full-time move to AT&T Park and the NL West will be of benefit to Peavy’s numbers. He’ll provide the Giants with some much-needed stability in the rotation, as the team currently has a great deal of uncertainty behind ace Madison Bumgarner and veteran workhorse Tim Hudson. Matt Cain is coming off elbow surgery, Ryan Vogelsong is also a free agent, Tim Lincecum hasn’t been reliable for the past three seasons and Yusmeiro Petit, while excellent in 2014, has never held down a rotation spot for a whole season.
Peavy’s contract closely mirrors that two-year, $25MM contract extension that fellow 34-year-old NL West hurler Jorge De La Rosa signed in August, and it’s also in line with what both Hudson and Bronson Arroyo signed for last winter. While each of the latter two pitchers is considerably older than Peavy, they signed in a free agent market with less quality pitching available. In a free agent profile back in late October, MLBTR’s Jeff Todd correctly predicted that Peavy would top Hudson and Arroyo, though Peavy’s final deal fell a bit shy of his $28MM prediction.
This marks only the second significant move for Giants GM Brian Sabean this offseason — he agreed to terms on a two-year, $15MM deal with Sergio Romo earlier in the week — though not for lack of trying. The Giants made a legitimate run at re-signing Pablo Sandoval and have also been connected to Jon Lester, Yasmany Tomas and Chase Headley, among others, but each has signed elsewhere, leaving the Giants to seek upgrades elsewhere.
Photo courtesy of USA Today Sports Images.
LG Twins Sign Jack Hannahan
Korea’s LG Twins have reached a one-year, $1MM deal with corner infielder Jack Hannahan, per Naver Sports (Korean language link; h/t to Dan Kurtz of MyKBO.net). The 34-year-old has played in parts of eight big league seasons.
Hannahan missed much of last year after undergoing shoulder surgery, ultimately taking only fifty trips to bat with the Reds. Thus ended a disappointing two-year run in Cincinnati, over which Hannahan performed at a sub-replacement-level clip.
The veteran was quite productive back in 2011 with the Indians, when he slashed .250/.331/.388 over 366 plate appearances. With solid glovework, he was valued at over two wins above replacement in about a half-season of work.
Sergio Romo On Re-Signing With Giants
Sergio Romo was one of several big name relievers on the open market this winter and had plenty of chances to pitch elsewhere. However, at the end of the day, he opted to stay with “the only organization” he has ever known on a two-year, $15MM deal with incentives. I asked Romo if clubs other than the Giants came to the table with the opportunity to close or three-year offers.
“To be honest with you, yes,” Romo said. “Being a closer, that title doesn’t really matter to me…that third year would have meant a lot to me, but you’ve got to go to a place where you’re happy and excited to go to work every day. The Giants gave me an opportunity to be somebody. I enjoy going to work and I’m really glad that I was wanted back.”
Though it took a move to the closer role for Romo to achieve widespread recognition for his abilities, he says that he approaches his job the exact same way, regardless of whether he’s called upon in the sixth, seventh, eighth, or ninth inning. That’s good news for the Giants, who are happy to have the personable reliever back in the mix as a bridge to presumptive closer Santiago Casilla.
Romo may not have changed uniforms in his first trip through free agency, but he feels that it was an “eye-opening” experience that he will remember when he’s eligible again in two years. The 2016/2017 offseason is a long way away and there are a number of factors at play, but right now Romo does not sound like a man who is interested in relocating anytime soon.
“We can literally count ten seasons now in the minor leagues and big leagues. I’m very thankful for every opportunity I’ve gotten. This is the place where I was able to make a name for myself and I’m really thankful that I’ll be able to continue here,” Romo said. “My heart really has been in San Francisco since I got drafted – so let’s do it.”
Phil Hughes Talks Contract Extension
Phil Hughes was two years away from free agency, but both he and the Twins realized that they wanted to work something out for the long-term. Earlier today, the Twins announced a three-year extension that will pay him an additional $42MM, giving the right-hander a pact that will take him through the 2019 season. The deal gives Hughes job security, a healthy payday in the here and now, and also allows him the opportunity to cash in again at the age of 32. As our own Steve Adams pointed out this afternoon, Hughes is on track to hit the open market again at roughly the same age as James Shields is this winter. On a conference call earlier today, I asked Hughes about the importance of getting a deal that could allow him to land another hefty multi-year contract down the line.
“That’s the benefit of coming into the league at the age of 20, I put some service time behind me so even after this contract, I’ll be 32, 33, but that’s something for another day,” Hughes said. “I haven’t even begun to think about my next deal, this is five years away and I have a lot of things I want to accomplish. After that, we’ll see where we’re at.”
Hughes knows that he could have boosted his value even further by continuing on his previous deal, but he would have had “a little bit more of a struggle” in talking agent Nez Balelo into greenlighting an extension one year away from free agency. The 28-year-old is clearly comfortable in Minnesota and spoke glowingly of the team’s potential in the years to come. He was effusive in his praise of the roster, from promising youngsters like Danny Santana and Kennys Vargas to veterans like Ervin Santana and Torii Hunter.
“I didn’t want it to be where I came in for three years, kind of saw this team get back on the right track and then said, ‘Thanks for everything. Thanks for having faith in me, but see you later.’ I wanted to be part of this for years to come, and I believe in the process and the direction that this team is going,” said the hurler.
As GM Terry Ryan put it, the extension called for “some risk on both parties.” While Hughes passed up a chance to bet on himself and possibly earn more after the 2016 season, the Twins are making a sizable commitment to the right-hander and banking on the kind of pitching that he delivered in 2014. For his part, Hughes is confident that he will continue to excel while warming up to the idea of a veteran leadership role at such a young age.