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MLBTR’s 2017-18 Offseason Outlook Series

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The MLB Trade Rumors writing staff has completed our annual winter previews for all 30 teams.  Given the unusually quiet nature of this offseason so far, every team still has much to address on their winter to-do lists even though we’re already in December.  Click the links for a full analysis of what your favorite team has in store before Opening Day…

AL East

AL Central

AL West

NL East

NL Central

NL West

Notable 2017 Non-Tenders

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The open market welcomed 26 additional free agents Friday when various major league teams chose not to tender contracts to certain arbitration-eligible players. While no one is going to confuse the new members of this winter’s unsigned class with any of the top free agents, there are at least a few who could boost teams’ chances in 2018 and beyond. As Tyler Flowers, Steve Cishek and Welington Castillo have shown over the past couple years, a non-tender doesn’t have to be a career death knell.

Here’s a look at the best of this year’s group:

  • Hector Rondon, RP: The hard-throwing, right-handed Rondon isn’t that far removed from a two-year showing in which he was among baseball’s premier relievers. The former closer pitched to a minuscule 2.03 ERA with 8.91 K/9, 2.03 BB/9 and a 50.8 percent groundball rate across 133 1/3 innings from 2014-15, during which he combined for 59 saves on 68 attempts. However, Rondon’s effectiveness began fading during the Cubs’ World Series-winning 2016 campaign – thanks in part to an arm injury, perhaps – and he’s now fresh off a year in which he posted a 4.24 ERA. But Rondon managed at least 50 innings (57, to be exact) for the fourth straight season in 2017, when he also continued his groundballing ways (48.3 percent) and logged a career-high swinging-strike rate (11.3 percent). Further, even during his disappointing 2016-17 stretch, he saw his K/9 rise to an impressive 10.55 (against 2.33 walks per nine). While neither the Cubs nor any other team thought Rondon would be worth a projected $6.2MM in 2018, the 29-year-old still figures to intrigue a host of clubs – some of which may not be in the mood to pay high prices for established relievers this winter.
  • Mike Fiers, RHP: An estimated $5.7MM for Fiers was too rich for the Astros and other teams, but it wouldn’t have been an unreasonable amount relative to what the 32-year-old has done during his career. Since debuting as a starter with the Brewers in 2012, Fiers has racked up 694 1/3 innings from the rotation and compiled a respectable 4.15 ERA, also notching 8.64 K/9 against 2.79 BB/9. Fiers was one of the few members of the World Series champion Astros who endured a miserable 2017 (5.22 ERA, 5.43 FIP in 153 1/3 frames), but if the personal-worst 19.5 percent home run-to-fly ball rate he put up more closely resembles his career mark of 13.6 going forward, he could return to being a decent innings eater.
  • Matt Adams, 1B: Lefty-swinging first basemen who struggle against same-handed pitchers aren’t exactly rare, so it wasn’t that surprising when the Braves jettisoned Adams in lieu of potentially paying him around $4.6MM in 2018. That said, Adams has been quite useful versus right-handed pitchers, having slashed .286/.333/.495 against them in 1,510 plate appearances, and has typically been adept at first base (14 Defensive Runs Saved, 8.3 Ultimate Zone Rating). Those skills should make the 29-year-old Adams a worthwhile pickup for someone, though he’s a small fish in a big free agent pond that includes other proven first base types in Eric Hosmer, Carlos Santana, Logan Morrison, Yonder Alonso and Adam Lind.
  • Jared Hughes, RP: As a groundball specialist who has generated excellent results despite a dearth of strikeouts, Hughes isn’t all that dissimilar to more hyped free agent Brandon Kintzler. But even though he has a good track record and was projected to earn a very reasonable $2.2MM in 2018, the 32-year-old Hughes is now on the unemployment line. Based on Hughes’ history, Milwaukee’s loss could be a big gain for another club. Since 2014, his first of four consecutive solid years, the ex-Pirates righty has thrown no fewer than 59 1/3 innings in any individual season and ridden a 62.1 percent grounder rate to a 2.55 ERA. Hughes ranks eighth among qualified relievers in GB rate and 18th in ERA over the past four seasons, despite having registered only 5.54 K/9 against 3.02 BB/9 during that span (notably, though, his K/9 rose to a career-high 7.24 in 2017).
  • Drew Smyly, LHP: With his estimated $6.85MM salary, Smyly was a non-tender waiting to happen the moment he underwent Tommy John surgery in June, officially ending a season in which he was unable to take the mound for Seattle. The Mariners acquired Smyly 10 months ago with the hope that he’d serve as a capable mid-rotation starter – something he had been at times with the Rays from 2014-16. Smyly combined for 395 innings of 3.94 ERA ball during those seasons and recorded 8.59 K/9 against 2.53 BB/9, and offset a paltry grounder rate (34.2 percent) with a league-best infield fly mark (15.3 percent). It’s anyone’s guess whether Smyly will resemble his old form when he returns (perhaps not until 2019), but he’s still just 28 and looks worthy of taking a flyer on at an affordable cost this offseason.

Giancarlo Stanton Rumors: Sunday

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In case you were unaware, Giancarlo Stanton is still on the Marlins. We’ll keep track of today’s rumblings on the National League MVP and trade candidate here…

  • The Red Sox are no longer involved in the Stanton race, per Craig Mish of MLB Network Radio on SiriusXM (Twitter link). A report on Wednesday indicated that Boston and Miami hadn’t discussed Stanton since the general managers meetings in mid-November, so the Red Sox’s apparent exit from the sweepstakes doesn’t come as a surprise.
  • While Stanton has personally met with the GMs for the Giants and Cardinals, the Los Angeles-born slugger is still waiting to see how serious the Dodgers’ interest is before he’s willing to completely embrace going to another team, according to Jon Morosi of MLB.com (Twitter links). However, the Dodgers and Marlins haven’t made any “substantial progress” in talks, Morosi adds, as LA is wary of the luxury-tax implications that would come with acquiring him. Meanwhile, both the Giants and Cardinals are still “in the dark” about whether Stanton would waive his no-trade clause to join them, Mish relays on Twitter.
  • San Francisco and Miami have reportedly discussed Giants outfield prospect Heliot Ramos; however, there’s “no indication” the Giants have actually offered Ramos to the Marlins, Henry Schulman of the San Francisco Chronicle tweets.

Baseball Blogs Weigh In: Ohtani, Abreu, Dodgers, Jays, Bruce, Cubs, Rays

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This week in baseball blogs…

Submissions: ZachBBWI @gmail.com

Padres Extend A.J. Preller

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The Padres have signed general manager A.J. Preller to a three-year contract extension, Dennis Lin of the San Diego Union-Tribune reports. Preller’s new deal will keep him with the team through 2022.

MLB: General Managers Meetings

The Padres and Preller struck the agreement back in October, per Lin, who notes that the GM had been under control through 2019 until then. The team turned its full attention to securing Preller for the long haul after re-upping manager Andy Green through 2021 back in August.

The 2018 campaign will be the fourth full season in San Diego for Preller, whom the club hired in August 2014. Previously the Rangers’ assistant GM, Preller has created plenty of headlines since joining the Padres. The club was amid its ninth straight non-playoff season when it landed Preller, who tried to orchestrate a quick turnaround by trading for the likes of Matt Kemp, Justin Upton, Craig Kimbrel, Melvin Upton Jr., Wil Myers and Derek Norris during his first offseason on the job. The majority of those acquisitions didn’t pan out as hoped, though, evidenced by the fact that San Diego hasn’t returned to the playoffs in the Preller era and Myers is the only member of that six-player group who’s still with the organization.

After Preller’s plan to immediately compete went belly-up, he reversed course and began a full-scale rebuild whose first significant move came by way of a November 2015 trade with the Red Sox. Preller sent Kimbrel to Boston in that deal, which netted the Padres a potential long-term building block in center fielder Manuel Margot. The 23-year-old Margot and the 28-year-old Myers (whom the Padres signed to a six-year extension last winter) rank as the most notable current Padres position players acquired under Preller, whose tenure has also included the astute addition of now-standout reliever Brad Hand via waivers in 2016.

Hand, 27, may soon turn into an extremely useful trade chip for a Padres team that’s not in position to push for a playoff spot yet, thus further beefing up a farm system that, thanks in part to Preller, has become one of the game’s best. That system includes Preller-acquired prospects in infielder Fernando Tatis Jr. (stolen from the White Sox for the fading James Shields in 2016); left-handers MacKenzie Gore, Adrian Morejon, Logan Allen and Joey Lucchesi; right-handers Michel Baez, Cal Quantrill and Anderson Espinoza; and shortstop Gabriel Arias. All nine of those farmhands rank among the Padres’ 10 best prospects, per Baseball America.

While Preller has impressed Padres brass during his time with the club, his reign has come with obvious black marks. The club lost catcher Yasmani Grandal in the Kemp deal, for one, and followed that by parting with young shortstop Trea Turner in the Myers trade. Both Grandal and Turner have since turned into more valuable big leaguers than the vets the Padres acquired for them.

Every GM has hit-and-miss trades, of course, but most executives don’t end up serving suspensions during their tenures. That hasn’t been the case for Preller, whom MLB issued a 30-day ban back in September 2016 for failing to disclose required medical information in the trade that sent lefty Drew Pomeranz to the Red Sox for Espinoza. In addition, a couple months prior to his suspension, the Preller-led Friars agreed to undo a portion of a swap with the Marlins, taking back injured righty Colin Rea after Miami learned about undisclosed medical information.

While the Padres’ front office was reportedly split on retaining Preller in the wake of his suspension, his extension makes it obvious that he has the support of team brass. Executive chairman Ron Fowler and managing partner Peter Seidler believe Preller and Green are the tandem that will eventually bring an end to the Padres’ playoff drought, perhaps by 2020, according to Lin.

“A.J.’s really earned this extension,” Seidler told Lin. “He’s built a great organization around him, and that’s seen from scouting all the way through Andy Green and the major league staff. Personally, I couldn’t be happier. We’ve got a ways to go, but I think it’s with confidence we extend him and with confidence we think we’re on the right path.”

Photo courtesy of USA Today Sports Images.

Quick Hits: Blakeley, Braves, Rays, Cedeno, Makita, Padres

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As a result of the Braves’ transgressions on the foreign market from 2015-17, former international scouting director and special assistant Gordon Blakeley lost his job in October and received a one-year ban from Major League Baseball last month. Now, Blakeley is preparing to meet with members of the team’s ownership group, Liberty Media, on Dec. 14 to discuss those violations, David O’Brien of the Atlanta Journal Constitution reports. Blakeley contends that there were high-ranking Braves officials aware of what he and permanently banned ex-GM John Coppollela were doing, per O’Brien, and it seems he’s set to name names in his meeting with ownership. To this point, MLB has punished Blakeley, Coppolella and the team itself, which the league stripped of 13 prospects the prior regime signed. Former president John Hart has dodged discipline from MLB thus far, but he’s now out of the Atlanta organization.

More from around the game:

  • Free agent left-hander Xavier Cedeno is generating “a lot of interest from other clubs” in the wake of the Rays’ decision to non-tender him on Friday, agent Melvin Roman told Marc Topkin of the Tampa Bay Times (Twitter link). However, the reliever hasn’t ruled out re-signing with the Rays, who elected against tendering him at a projected $1.4MM. The 31-year-old Cedeno missed nearly all of 2017 on account of forearm issues, but he was a strong member of the Rays’ bullpen from 2015-16, registering a 2.88 ERA, 9.18 K/9 and 2.67 BB/9 across 84 1/3 innings. He also logged a 51.3 percent groundball rate during that stretch.
  • Joe Trezza of MLB.com profiles Japanese reliever Kazuhisa Makita, who was quietly posted along with the far more hyped Shohei Ohtani on Friday. While Makita has pitched to a 2.83 ERA over 921 1/3 professional frames in his homeland, the submariner’s success has come in spite of a paucity of strikeouts (five per nine innings). It’s unclear how much interest the 33-year-old will garner from MLB teams, then, and Trezza relays (via reports from Japan) that Makita will consider staying put if he only draws minor league contract offers.
  • The Padres are hiring Josh Johnson as their infield coach, Dennis Lin of the San Diego Union-Tribune tweets. The 31-year-old Johnson, who managed the GCL Nationals from 2016-17, isn’t to be confused with the former major league pitcher of the same name. In his new role, Johnson will take over for Ramon Vazquez, whom the Padres parted with after the season. With Johnson’s hiring, San Diego now has its full coaching staff for 2018.

AL West Notes: Astros, Iwakuma, Angels

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A few notes from the American League West:

  • With the unreliable Tony Sipp representing their only established left-handed reliever, there’s an argument that the Astros could stand to add another southpaw to their bullpen. But, as he looks to improve the reigning champions’ relief corps, general manager Jeff Luhnow isn’t discriminating based on handedness (Twitter links via Brian McTaggart of MLB.com). “It’s really about finding the best upgrades to our pitching staff we can find to give us depth and quality we need to get through long season,” said Luhnow, whose team’s righty-heavy bullpen actually held its own against lefty-swingers in 2017. Luhnow noted, though, that the market is currently “stalled,” which suggests nothing is imminent on Houston’s end.
  • Mariners GM Jerry Dipoto told KJR-AM this week that right-hander Hisashi Iwakuma won’t be ready to pitch again until late May or early June, per Greg Johns of MLB.com (Twitter link). Iwakuma, who re-signed with the Mariners on a minor league contract on Wednesday, threw just 31 innings in 2017 as he dealt with shoulder problems. The 36-year-old underwent surgery in late September.
  • Angels left-handed pitching prospect Nate Smith will miss the 2018 season after undergoing anterior capsule surgery in September, Jeff Fletcher of the Orange County Register reports. The 26-year-old Smith is now facing a 12- to 14-month recovery period, which is particularly unfortunate for a pitcher whom injuries limited to a mere 15 innings in 2017. For now, MLB.com ranks Smith as the Angels’ ninth-best prospect.

Giancarlo Stanton Rumors: Saturday

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Both the Cardinals and the Giants have recently been given permission to speak with NL MVP Giancarlo Stanton’s representatives. As we get deeper and deeper into the Stanton Saga, we’ll keep track of today’s rumors in this post.

  • Stanton was actually present with his lead representative, Joel Wolfe of Wasserman, at meetings with the Cardinals and Giants last week, according to Jon Heyman of FanRag. Both teams’ GMs attended those summits, adds Heyman, who suggests that Stanton’s presence shows he’s serious about joining either club. Indeed, neither the Cardinals nor Giants have been eliminated from the Stanton derby, Bob Nightengale of USA Today tweets.

Earlier…

  • In a detailed piece, Heyman references a number of different anonymous sources in expressing skepticism that Stanton would approve a trade to St. Louis. Five different people close to Stanton apparently told Heyman that they believe he’d choose the Giants over the Cardinals if given a choice, and with a full no-trade clause on his side, Stanton has a big say in the matter. One of Heyman’s sources states that the West Coast would be the outfielder’s first choice, the East Coast would be his second choice, and the Midwest would be his last choice. Of course, as Heyman also notes, it’s worth mentioning that talks with St. Louis have progressed to a point at which their front office reps were invited to meet with Stanton’s camp; it seems unlikely that would happen if a trade to the Cardinals was a firm “no” from the reigning home run champ. According to another one of Heyman’s sources, the Marlins believe a trade agreement can be reached with the Giants. However, the Dodgers (who are reportedly Stanton’s first choice) are “not disinterested”. If that’s indeed the case, he could simply choose to wait out the trade process and hope L.A. and Miami can work out an agreement.
  • Buster Olney of ESPN reports via Twitter that the Marlins are more focused on moving as much of Stanton’s salary as possible than they are on maximizing their prospect return. As Derrick Gould of the St. Louis Post-Dispatch and Tim Healey of the Sun Sentinel both point out in their own tweets, this news is considerably in the Giants’ favor. The Cardinals have far more to offer in terms of prospects, but they don’t have a history of doling out enormous contracts to free agents. The Giants, on the other hand, are payroll juggernauts, and although they have nearly $190MM in payroll guarantees for 2018 already, that number could drop considerably next year with the potential departures of Hunter Pence and Denard Span. This doesn’t mean a deal with the Giants is imminent, but it does seem to make them a better trade partner for the Marlins.
  • Giants manager Bruce Bochy was apparently not present at the meeting between the San Francisco brass and Stanton’s representatives on Thursday, according to a tweet from Henry Schulman of the San Francisco Chronicle. It’s a fairly minor detail, but it does seem to decrease the likelihood that a trade is truly on the brink of taking place.

Taijuan Walker Switches Agencies

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Diamondbacks right-hander Taijuan Walker has changed agencies and is now a client of Excel Sports Management, Robert Murray of FanRag reports (on Twitter).

Still just 25, Walker debuted in the majors in 2011 as a highly touted prospect with the Mariners, who used a first-round pick on him the previous year. Walker didn’t quite live up to expectations during his time in Seattle, which dealt him to Arizona a year ago in a blockbuster that also featured Jean Segura, Mitch Haniger and Ketel Marte.

In his first season in Arizona, Walker rode a highly effective fastball to a 3.49 ERA over 157 1/3 innings, thereby aiding in the playoff-bound Diamondbacks’ unexpected resurgence. Walker also notched 8.35 K/9 against 3.49 BB/9 and recorded a 48.9 percent groundball rate, which helped him tamp down home runs. After giving up homers on 17.6 percent of fly balls in his Seattle swan song, he cut the number to a much more palatable 11.3 in 2017.

Walker’s output last season was worth $20MM, according to FanGraphs, making his $2.25MM salary a serious bargain. MLBTR’s Matt Swartz projects Walker to earn more than double last year’s amount ($5MM) in 2018, his second of four potential arbitration-eligible seasons.

Shohei Ohtani Rumors: Saturday

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The latest on game-changing Japanese ace/slugger Shohei Ohtani, whom the Hokkaido Nippon Ham Fighters posted on Friday and who’s at the beginning of a three-week window to work out an agreement with a major league team:

  • The Ohtani sweepstakes is seemingly on the verge of picking up in earnest, as Jeff Passan of Yahoo Sports reports that the 23-year-old CAA Sports client will meet with various teams in Los Angeles next week (Twitter link). The Mariners are among those clubs, suggests Passan, who relays that team brass has asked multiple members of its roster to clear their schedules for a potential meeting with Ohtani. That comes on the heels of general manager Jerry Dipoto’s revelation last week that the Mariners are preparing an aggressive push press for Ohtani. “We’re not joking around. We’re bringing the big guns,” declared Dipoto (Twitter link via Greg Johns of MLB.com).
  • Ohtani’s camp will notify certain teams this weekend if they’ll remain in the mix to sign him, according to Dennis Lin of the San Diego Union-Tribune. The Padres are hopeful they’ll advance to the next round. “As a group, we’re prepared, and I think he’s a player that obviously we’ve scouted and have history with,” GM A.J. Preller told Lin. “You try to see what the fits are and why he’s a good fit for us and why we’re a good fit for him. We’re kind of down the path of doing that work.”
  • The Red Sox will also chase Ohtani, per president of baseball operations Dave Dombrowski, who told Michael Silverman of the Boston Herald via text: “Would acknowledge our interest. Beyond that, all would be confidential.” Ohtani joining Chris Sale and David Price would make for a rather enticing top of the rotation, needless to say, and he could also factor in as a designated hitter for a Boston club that received uninspiring production there last season in the first year of the post-David Ortiz era.
  • Count the World Series-winning Astros as yet another team that will court Ohtani. Owner Jim Crane told Brian McTaggart of MLB.com that the Astros will “put a full-court press on” to sign Ohtani, adding that they’ll “probably send the A-team out there.” He also noted that the Astros “need a left-handed DH, so there you have it.” In addition to having the ability to demonstrate his offensive prowess in Houston, Ohtani would add another potential front-end starter to a rotation that already includes past Cy Young winners Justin Verlander and Dallas Keuchel.
  • While the Rays are obvious long shots to land Ohtani, they have an advantage over other teams with the presence of two-way prospect Brendan McKay, Marc Topkin of the Tampa Bay Times observes. McKay, the fourth overall pick in last year’s draft, could be both a pitcher and a hitter in the majors. “We’re hopeful (McKay) can do it,” Rays GM Erik Neander said. “We want to give him the opportunity to do it because he’s shown he deserves that opportunity and we don’t want to take that away from him prematurely.” Citing McKay’s presence, the Rays will emphasize to Ohtani that they’re open-minded about developing and employing a two-way player, per Topkin, who also expects them to pitch Tampa Bay’s “relaxed” lifestyle during the recruiting process.
  • The Marlins, MLB’s other Florida-based organization, are unlikely to make an effort for Ohtani, Tim Healey of the South Florida Sun Sentinel writes. The cost-cutting Marlins are wary of the financial commitment it would take to reel in Ohtani, who won’t require much from a salary standpoint but will cost a $20MM posting fee. While that looks like a relatively minor amount for a possible franchise face like Ohtani, the Marlins simply aren’t in position to fork it over in their current financial state, Healey explains.
  • While the Indians only have $10K in international bonus pool space, they’re expected to partake in the Ohtani derby, per Paul Hoynes of cleveland.com. He’d slot into an already loaded rotation, one which features two-time Cy Young winner Corey Kluber and Carlos Carrasco; additionally, Ohtani could DH for a team at risk of losing Carlos Santana in free agency.
  • All things considered, the Yankees may be the favorites for Ohtani. There’s a general “fear” coming from other franchises regarding the Bronx Bombers, tweets Passan, given the talent on hand, the market they’re in and their strong relationship with CAA Sports. They also have the second-biggest international bonus pool.

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