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J.D. Martinez Rumors: Wednesday

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We haven’t heard an immense amount of chatter to this point on J.D. Martinez, the top free agent slugger, but that could well change today. The power-hitting outfielder is set to appear at the Winter Meetings to sit down with a few possible suitors, as Bob Nightengale of USA Today reported (via Twitter) yesterday. Here’s the latest chatter:

  • We learned yesterday that the Red Sox will get face-to-face time with Martinez and agent Scott Boras, as Jon Heyman of Fan Rag tweeted. Indeed, it seems that Martinez is a top priority for Boston, though adding him would presumably mean finding a deal for center fielder Jackie Bradley Jr.
  • The Diamondbacks are also slated to meet with Martinez, who starred there after a midseason trade, according to Jon Heyman of Fan Rag (via Twitter). Whether the Arizona organization can find the cash to make that happen remains to be seen, but it does seem the club’s discussion of Zack Greinke in trades is likely related.
  • While the Giants are also a rumored suitor, though GM Bobby Evans would say only that the team will “maybe” be among those meeting with Martinez, as Andrew Baggarly of The Athletic tweeted yesterday. As Baggarly further explains, though, in a subscription piece, there are ongoing concerns internally that blowing past the luxury line would not be wise. Certainly, there’s no clear path to adding Martinez (or any other high-priced free agents) without doing so.

Twins Sign Michael Pineda

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The Twins have announced a two-year deal with righty Michael Pineda. The former Yankees righty is still working back from Tommy John surgery. He receives a $10MM guarantee, split into consecutive $2MM and $8MM salaries.

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Pineda can also add up to $3MM via incentives, per Mike Berardino of the St. Paul Pioneer-Press, on Twitter. He’ll land half a million upon reaching 150 innings and for every ten frames thereafter, Jon Heyman of Fan Rag tweets, maxing out upon hitting 200 frames.

Pineda, who turns 29 in January, went under the knife in mid-July of 2017, so he’s certain to miss the bulk of the coming season. But it’s possible he could return late in the year. Clearly, though, the deal is aimed primarily at achieving value in the ensuing campaign.

Much like Drew Smyly, who went to the Cubs yesterday (also on a $10MM deal), Pineda seems to offer ample upside. Though he carried only a 4.56 ERA over the past three seasons, Pineda has tantalized with his power arsenal and maintained 9.5 K/9 against 2.0 BB/9 in that span.

Despite sparkling grades from fielding-independent pitching measures, home runs have to this point been a problem that Pineda has not solved. His rate of long balls permitted has steadily risen in each of his four years in the Bronx, topping out in 2017 at 1.87 per nine with a 22.5% HR/FB rate.

There are also health questions that go beyond the TJ recovery process. Pineda has dealt with significant shoulder problems in the past, though he had recovered to the point that he took the ball 59 times over the 2015-16 campaigns.

Regardless, it’s an intriguing move for a Minnesota organization that has a few unsettled spots in the current and future rotation. If the club can sustain contention as it did in 2017, it’s also imaginable that Pineda could return somewhat sooner and function as a possible impact reliever down the stretch.

Photo courtesy of USA Today Sports Images.

Cubs, Indians Have Discussed Potential Danny Salazar Trade

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According to Bruce Levine of CBS Sports Chicago, the Cubs and Indians have “had trade talk conversations,” and right-hander Danny Salazar’s name has come up. The Indians are reportedly asking for left-handed hitting in exchange. Levine adds that there is “nothing close at this time.”

That the Indians are willing to entertain trade scenarios involving Salazar is a bit unexpected, but makes some sense considering the depth of the team’s rotation and the 2017 emergence of Mike Clevinger as a solid starter. With Corey Kluber, Carlos Carrasco, Josh Tomlin and Trevor Bauer also in the fold, the Indians are one of very few MLB teams who have an abundance of viable major league starters.

Perhaps the bigger surprise is that the Indians are asking for lefty hitters in exchange. Based on a quick glance at the Tribe’s roster, one might guess that the Tribe would want players who hit from the right side of the plate. Their projected Opening Day lineup for 2018 (via Roster Resource) includes six players capable of hitting left-handed (switch-hitters Francisco Lindor and Jose Ramirez among them), while their righty options beyond Edwin Encarnacion haven’t proven themselves to be above-average hitters. If the Indians are indeed looking for a left-handed hitter, perhaps it’s an indication that trade talks for Jason Kipnis are in the more advanced stages, though that’s purely my own speculation.

It’s unclear whether the talks for Salazar came before or after the recent signing of Drew Smyly, who carries both similar upside and similar injury risk. If they came (or continued) after the Smyly signing, one might wonder whether the Cubs intend to use one of Salazar or Smyly as a bullpen arm; four rotation spots would already seem to be filled by Jon Lester, Kyle Hendricks, Jose Quintana and the newly-signed Tyler Chatwood. Of course, Chicago might simply be taking a page out of the 2017 Dodgers’ book; L.A. patched together a rotation of oft-injured, high-upside starters who bounced between the rotation and the DL over the course of the season.

As for Salazar, he carries tremendous upside. The right-handed fireballer has been known to hit the high nineties on the radar gun, even touching 100 on some occasions throughout his career. He mixes in a split change which ESPN’s Mark Simon once rated as the best pitch in MLB. Salazar also routinely carries one of the best strikeout rates in baseball, and though his career 3.82 ERA doesn’t jump off the page, his 3.42 career xFIP suggests he’s been quite a bit better than that number would indicate.

Consistency and health are what hold Salazar back the most. Although he’s shown flashes of utter dominance (his first five starts back from the DL this past season come to mind), he’s never proven he can sustain his success over extended stretched of the season. As for his health, the righty has only topped 140 innings once during his major league career. He’s been through Tommy John surgery in the past, and has experienced a variety of elbow and shoulder issues in recent years.

That being said, his upside is tremendous, and if Salazar is truly available, I’d expect the Indians will field a lot of calls on him. In particular, it seems likely that the clubs interested in Matt Harvey would want to reach out to Cleveland’s front office.

Rockies, Royals In On Mark Reynolds

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It seems as though the Rockies are “strong contenders”  to re-sign Mark Reynolds, who played first base for the club in the majority of their 2016-2017 games. The insight comes via a tweet from Chris Cotillo of MLB Daily Dish, who also notes that the Royals are looking at Reynolds as a backup plan in case Gold Glove-winner Eric Hosmer signs elsewhere.

The 34-year-old Reynolds has been worth about one win above replacement over the course of 1,034 plate appearances with the Rockies. His .274/.354/.471 batting line with the club has earned him a 103 wRC+ mark during that time, while his defense grades out as slightly below average.

Reynolds has long been known for his all-or-nothing approach at the plate. The right-handed slugger has blasted 281 career home runs, and they go a long way. In fact, his average home run distance was the longest in all of baseball at 419 feet (minimum 15 home runs). However, his whopping 1,806 career strikeouts already rank 18th-most all-time among MLB players. He’s got a 15.6% swinging strike rate for his career; for reference, that’s the number a 2017 league-average hitter would have posted if he faced Cy Young-winner Corey Kluber in every at-bat of the season. Reynolds has toned down the strikeouts a bit in recent years, but he’s still a good bet to whiff around 30% of the time.

Reynolds, then, would be a stark contrast to the type of player the Royals have generally rostered in recent years: high-contact, low-strikeout players with good baserunning ability. Then again, the Royals may enter a rebuilding phase if they can’t re-sign any of their veteran free agents (including Hosmer), and Reynolds would be among the cheaper first base options on the free agent market. You can see where Reynolds’ skills rank among the top eight free agent first basemen here.

As for the Rockies, they’ve been linked to Carlos Santana during the winter meetings, but it’s been said that their top priorities are not at first base. As such, it makes sense that they’re a strong contender for the inexpensive Reynolds.

 

International Notes: Keithron Moss, Bolsinger, Wagner

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The Rangers have signed 16-year-old shortstop Keithron Moss, according to Ben Badler of Baseball America. Moss, a native of the Bahamas, trained at the Max D Sports Academy and will get a bonus of $800K. As I noted when the club signed Yenci Pena recently, the Rangers are finding other ways to allocate the large bonus pool (about $3.5MM) they were saving in part to gain an advantage in the competition for Shohei Ohtani. The switch-hitting Moss is 5’10” and weighs 170 pounds. Ben Badler of Baseball America (insider subscription required and recommended) describes him as, “mostly a line-drive hitter with gap power and a bit more sock from the right side of the plate.”

A couple of other items from outside the United States…

  • Mike Bolsinger has signed with the Chiba Lotte Marines in Japan, J.P. Hoornstra of the Southern California News Group tweets. Bolsinger posted an ERA north of 6.00 across his past two seasons with the Blue Jays and Dodgers, but has had some success in the past. Most notably, the right-hander had a 3.62 ERA and a 53.1% ground ball rate with L.A. in 2015. Bolsinger began his career with the Diamondbacks after the club selected him late in the 2010 draft.
  • Elsewhere in Japan, the Seibu Lions signed right-hander Neil Wagner to a deal worth $750K (via Ben Nicholson-Smith of Sportsnet.CA). The contract is for one year, and comes with a potential $300K in incentives. The 33-year-old righty joined the Indians organization as a 21st round selection in the 2005 draft, but although he’s been with six different organizations, he’s only pitched in the majors in parts of three seasons. Across 53 MLB innings, Wagner has a 4.92 ERA, but a 4.08 xFIP estimates that he’s been nearly a full run better. He averages 96.2 MPH on his fastball and has excelled in limiting hard contact (26.8 hard%), but his 1.45 career WHIP may have been a deterrent for major league clubs.

NL Central Notes: Reds, Cardinals, Pirates

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Though the Reds didn’t ultimately make Shohei Ohtani’s list of seven finalists for his services, the team put together a detailed presentation in hopes of luring the two-way star to Cincinnati. Mark Sheldon of MLB.com wrote an insightful article detailing the Reds’ pursuit of Ohtani; the team shared the contents of its presentation with MLB.com and the Cincinnati Enquirer. Despite the fact that they could only offer him a maximum $300K signing bonus, GM Dick Williams and the entire Reds organization believed they could come up with a pitch attractive enough to sway Ohtani in their direction. “I’d like us to think that we might have a chance. I’ve followed this kid,” Williams said at the the beginning of the process. “I think he’s wired differently. He’s clearly shown he thinks out of the box.” The baseball operations, business, creative services, and marketing departments all worked together to tailor a presentation that included a 120-page book and 12-minute video. One of Cincinnati’s selling points was having Ohtani pitch in a six-man rotation (something he was used to doing in Japan), while playing the outfield and getting at-bats as a pinch-hitter. The Reds pulled out all the stops, including the addition of testimonials from Hall of Famer Barry Larkin and former MVP Joey Votto. Though they ultimately came up short, the release of the presentation’s contents to the media is generous to say the least, and provides a rare and fascinating insight into the player recruiting process.

More items from the National League’s Central Division…

  • Although he cautions that the club isn’t necessarily on the cusp of a big announcement, Cardinals GM Michael Girsch says that the club has “some sense of optimism” regarding their pursuit of a big bat (via Derrick Goold of the St. Louis Post-Dispatch). The Redbirds seem to have a desired hitter in mind, and reportedly feel good about their chances of acquiring him. “We’re not at the goal line, but we’ve made progress,” says Girsch. While Girsch himself didn’t mention any specific names, Goold notes in the article that the Cardinals have been linked to Miami outfielder Marcell Ozuna, while the Marlins have shown interest in St. Louis pitchers Jack Flaherty and Sandy Alcantara.
  • A hitter isn’t the only thing the Cardinals are pursuing. Recently, they’ve been linked to Rays closer Alex Colome as a potential means to fill a clear need at the back end of their bullpen. Somewhat intriguingly, Mark Topkin of the Tampa Bay Times reports that Colome began following four Cardinals-related accounts on his Instagram on Tuesday night (hat tip to NBC Sports’ Drew Silva). It could be nothing at all; social media activity certainly doesn’t have a strong correlation with transactional news. But while there are no reports of a deal in place, the flurry of follows has piqued curiosity and stirred the rumor mill. At the very least, it gives us another reason to closely monitor an interesting hypothetical.
  • Bill Brink of the Pittsburgh Post-Gazette reports that the Pirates are exploring the idea of adding a fourth outfielder through trade or free agency, in order to allow Jordan Luplow to begin the season at the Triple-A level. GM Neal Huntington notes that Luplow “didn’t have a ton of at-bats down there a year ago.” Indeed, Luplow only has 87 career plate appearances at Triple-A, and his .205/.276/.385 major league slash line indicates that his bat could benefit from more development at the minors’ highest level. The 24-year-old Luplow was drafted out of California State University Fresno with the Pittsburgh’s third-round pick; the right-handed outfielder is 24 years old, according to Fangraphs.

Rays To Sign Jelfry Marte

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The Rays have reached an agreement with former Twins international signee Jelfry Marte. Darren Wolfson of KSTP was the first to report the news; Jesse Sanchez of MLB.com confirmed later in the day and reminded his followers that Marte originally signed with the Twins. LaVelle Neal of the Star Tribune adds that Marte’s guarantee is around $800K.

Notably, the Rays have only about $440K left in international bonus pool funds (hat tip to Sanchez), which could mean they have plans to acquire more international money in a trade.

The 16-year-old Marte’s original deal with the Twins was worth about $3MM. However, Minnesota voided that deal when they discovered an alleged vision issue following his physical. Shortly thereafter, he began showcasing once again for interested teams. Clearly it didn’t take him long to find another club willing to pay for his talents, though his new deal comes at a steep discount; he’ll be paid roughly a quarter of what the Twins were going to give him.

Baseball America ranked the switch-hitting Dominican shortstop as the #13 international prospect in this year’s crop. “Marte is a bouncy, quick-twitch athlete with a chance to develop into a plus defensive shortstop,” BA’s Ben Badler writes. “He’s quick and agile with good body control and range to both sides, along with soft hands and an above-average, accurate arm.” You can read Badler’s full scouting report here (insider subscription required and recommended).

While scouts generally agree that Marte is an above-average defensive shortstop with some stolen base upside, some have questions as to how his bat will develop. He doesn’t have much power at the moment, but MLB.com’s scouts seem to believe he can improve on that over time. BA, on the other hand, hears from some scouts that he’s likely to be a bottom-of-the-order hitter at the MLB level.

Minor MLB Transactions: 12/13/17

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We’ll keep track of some recent minor moves in this post…

  • Greg Johns of MLB.com reports in a tweet that the Mariners have signed 32-year-old first baseman Matt Hague to a minor-league deal. As Johns points out, Hague hit .297/.373/.414 with the Rochester Redwings this past season (the Triple-A affiliate of the Twins). He’s also spent time with the Pirates and Blue Jays, both of whom gave him opportunities at the major league level. Notably, Hague has walked in the minor league at nearly the same rate he’s struck out, though that skill set hasn’t translated to the majors as of yet.
  • The Mariners have also inked former Cubs farmhand John Andreoli to a minor league pact, Johns tweets, adding that the 27-year-old outfielder hit 14 homers for Triple-A Iowa last season to go along with a .244/.348/.435 slash line. Andreoli was the Cubs’ 17th-round selection in the 2011 draft. He’s walked at least 12% of the time in each of his three seasons with the Iowa Cubs, though his strikeout rate has risen noticeably in each of those seasons. Andreoli has yet to reach the MLB level.

Trade Rumors: Montgomery, Hernandez, Castro, Mets, Span, Stratton, Fulmer

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Left-hander Mike Montgomery wants to be a starting pitcher, and would like that opportunity with another team if there isn’t a spot for him in the Cubs’ rotation, sources close to Montgomery tell The Athletic’s Ken Rosenthal.  Montgomery hasn’t told the Cubs about any desire to be traded, though he has told the team about his preference to start.  The 28-year-old has been a valuable swingman for Chicago since he was acquired in a trade from the Mariners in July 2016, and the team has been so actively looking for starting pitching that it seems Montgomery’s role won’t change in 2018.  Cubs GM Jed Hoyer told Gordon Wittenmyer of the Chicago Sun-Times and other media that Rosenthal’s report “kind of caught me by surprise….There hasn’t been any dialogue that should have spurred a report like that.  You just don’t know where it comes from.  But sometimes that happens.  Mike’s a great teammate.”  Montgomery is a valuable asset with four remaining years of team control, though he could also become a big trade chip for the Cubs if they did consider moving him.

Some more rumblings about trade talks….

  • The Phillies’ Cesar Hernandez is the latest second baseman on the Mets’ list of targets, FanRag Sports’ Jon Heyman reports (Twitter link).  Hernandez may come with the highest asking price, however, of any of the players — Ian Kinsler, Josh Harrison, Jason Kipnis — the Mets are considering, given Hernandez’s controllable salary.  One infielder the Mets aren’t interested in is new Marlins second baseman Starlin Castro.
  • The Giants are believed to have offered Denard Span as one of the three players going to the Marlins for Giancarlo Stanton, Henry Schulman of the San Francisco Chronicle reports.  Span would have helped fill the hole in Miami’s outfield and his $11MM salary would’ve helped the Giants offset a small portion of Stanton’s enormous contract.  The Giants continue to be linked to the Marlins in talks for Christian Yelich and Marcell Ozuna, though Span wouldn’t be part of those potential trades given the far different salary parameters involved.  It is fair to wonder whether Span will be wearing a different uniform in 2018, given how the Giants are looking to thoroughly upgrade their outfield both offensively and defensively.  Also in the piece, Giants GM Bobby Evans said that teams have been asking about San Francisco’s top prospects and younger players, including right-hander Chris Stratton.
  • Giants prospect Heliot Ramos is being asked about in almost every trade proposal, The Athletic’s Andrew Baggarly writes.  Ramos, 17 ,was the 19th overall pick of the 2017 amateur draft and he has already turned a lot of heads in his brief pro career.
  • Also from Baggarly, Bobby Evans said that teams have approached the Giants about trades that would see the Giants send a large-salaried player (and some prospects) elsewhere in what would essentially be a case of the other club buying minor league talent.  Evans said he isn’t considering those types of deals at this time, though Baggarly also writes that the Giants may be increasingly keen on getting under the luxury tax threshold this winter in order to position themselves for larger spending in the future.
  • The Rangers are one of the teams known to have contacted the Tigers about Michael Fulmer, though Anthony Fenech of the Detroit Fress Press reports that the two sides haven’t gotten very far in negotiations.  Fulmer’s ability and years of team control make him an attractive target for any club, especially the pitching-needy Rangers, though the Tigers have naturally put a huge asking price on their young righty.

Yankees Sign Erik Kratz

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The Yankees have re-signed veteran catcher Erik Kratz, as revealed in a tweet by Kratz’s representatives at JMG Baseball.  Kratz elected to become a free agent after the season rather than accept an outright assignment to Triple-A, though it appears he’ll be back in the pinstripes providing the Yankees with experienced catching depth in the minors.

Kratz only played four games for New York after being acquired on an August 31 trade from the Indians, as he was picked up to add more depth during the September roster expansion.  Those were Kratz’s only four Major League games of the 2017 season, giving him appearances in parts of the last eight big league campaigns.  Kratz has only a .203/.250/.366 slash line over 649 career PA with the Yankees, Blue Jays, Astros, Royals, and two separate stints each with the Phillies and Pirates.

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