Bucco Blog Winter Meetings Update
Bucco Blog has a new podcast with a Winter Meetings update. Interesting points within:
The White Sox and the Pirates are the teams that "have the arms." GMs looking for pitching will go to the Sox for experienced guys and the Pirates for solid 0-3 guys.
Many are speculating that a Devil Rays/Pirates deal would fit well. The D-Rays are desperate for pitching, the Pirates would like a young slugger. How about Duke for Dukes?
GMs are targeted the following Pirates: Zach Duke, Tom Gorzelanny, and Mike Gonzalez. Will Dave Littlefield part with them?
Two first basemen who have been connected to the Bucs are Daric Barton and Casey Kotchman. Jake questions the Kotchman possibility – if he was over his mono, how come he didn’t play winter ball to prove it?
UPDATE: Reader Tom points out that Kotchman is indeed playing winter ball in Puerto Rico.
Drew, Roberts, Aurilla, and Dunn
SI reported yesterday that the Red Sox are close to signing JD Drew.
Are sign’s of desperation starting to appear? Gregg Zaun‘s agent has been in ‘consistent’ contact with Cashman and Julio Lugo has already talked to the Cubs and agreed to play CF.
Speaking of Zaun, Mercury News is reporting that Zaun’s agent is having ‘consistent’ contact with the Giants, that the Giants are close to signing Dave Roberts and Rich Aurilia, and that they haven’t closed the door on re-signing Pedro Feliz or second baseman Ray Durham.
I hope Zaun’s agent gets paid by the hour.
The Pittsburgh Post-Gazette is reporting that all the market value craziness might benefit the Pirates. When pigs fly, you say?
Anyway, the article mentions that the Pirates front office had considered acquiring Adam Dunn. That tidbit sent Pirate bloggers into overdrive —
Honest Wagner said that if the Pirates got Dunn he ‘would become the team’s best or second-best hitter‘, I suppose forgetting that Sanchez and Bay were on the same roster. At Where Have You Gone Andy Van Slyke Pirate blog, Pat said Dunn ‘would look awfully nice protecting Jason Bay’, but possibly forgetting Dunn NEEDS protection – he doesn’t offer much, especially playing at PNC Park.
My take? I said the same thing I said back at the July trade deadline in 2006 – we don’t need a $10m Adam Dunn to whiff all year for us. What did you expect me to say? hehe
Dan Perry at Fox Sports talks about how the Cardinals have a great deal of work to do now to compete in 2007.
Humbly I report that a list has finally come out that does not include anyone from Pittsburgh – The Goggle Gang by Bill Madden at the New York Daily News.
And yes Jeff, the Brewers getting rid of Davis for Estrada was a great move – I agree.
By Jake at Bucco Blog
Turkey Day Tidbits
Happy Thanksgiving from MLB Trade Rumors!
Grab your shopping list — Bucco Blog has posted the Pirates top 10 prospect list.
I initially thought one of the collateral consequences of the increased market value of players this year would be that arbitration values would go up over the next few years, but Jim Callis at Baseball America said he doesn’t think that will happen since arbitration contracts are compared to people with similar service time. Interesting.
Did anyone else see ProTrade’s reaction to the 2006 MVP awards? Talk about blowing out the industry – whew!
USA Today has a couple of nice articles — on the Royals rebuilding plans and the other on the Brewers potential to return to respectability.
Will Steinbrenner’s potential desire to name son-in-law Steve Swindal as the next CEO be sidetracked with Swindal becoming the next operator of the New York’s three major thoroughbred racetracks — Aqueduct, Belmont Park and Saratoga?
By Jake
Pirates Not Interested in LaRoche?
Bucco Blog is reporting this morning that the Pirates and Braves talked about a trade that would have sent Adam LaRoche to the Pirates.
Evidently, all that David Littlefield was willing to ante up was John Grabow and Nate McLouth and the Braves passed.
By Jake
Tim Getting Married? Oh my..
Tim invited me to post a few comments while he is off on his honeymoon. I suppose my first post should be titled "Why, Tim?" but I’ll leave that alone. Instead, I’ll throw you a few general tidbits today so you have some reading material over the weekend.
The Rockies and Marlins have had some interest in acquiring Chris Duffy from the Pirates but word out of Pittsburgh is, Duffy isn’t available.
I posted a new article at Bucco Blog: Marginal $/Marginal Wins: 1999 – 2006 which tends to show the front office efficiency of MLB teams over the last eight years.
David Pinto has started to release his year-end PMR (Probabilistic Model of Range) defensive stats based on ball in play data.
Dan Syzmborski is also starting to release his 2007 offensive player ZIPS projections at The Baseball Think Factory.
David W. Smith presented a paper titled "Effect of Batting Order (Not Lineup) on Scoring" at SABR’s 2006 national convention. It’s a great read. You can look through some of the better SABR papers at Retrosheet’s research section.
Baseball-Reference has added a lot of great features so far this off season including box scores for every game since 1957, batting and pitching gamelogs, and my favorite, splits. Here is Zach Duke’s splits to give you an idea.
Until next week, join me in sending Tim and his new bride congrats — *Jake toasts his Corona*.
By Jake at Bucco Blog
Bucs Considering Catalanotto For 2B?
Word via Bucco Blog is that Dave Littlefield is considering a creative option for second base: Frank Catalanotto. Catalanotto hasn’t played the position since 2002, but it could be a nice fit for a team looking for some left-handed sock.
Catalanotto will be 33 next season. He may have a bit of a platoon split, historically hitting righties much better than lefties.
If Catalanotto truly can play a solid second base, it might open up some opportunities with teams like the Mets or Cardinals.
Bucco Blog On Cubs, Pirates Payrolls
Couple of interesting notes just came in via the fine Bucco Blog.
First off, the Cubs may push payroll all the way up to $120MM. The author indicates that Lou Piniella wants Aramis Ramirez, Jason Schmidt, and Gary Sheffield for his 2007 Cubs.
Second, the Pirates are looking at a $65MM payroll for next season. Bucco Blog says that means at least $25MM to spend. With roughly $35MM tied up, the Pirates should be big spenders no matter how the exact math stacks up.
Lot of money flowing out of the NL Central this winter.
Bucco Blog On Luis Gonzalez
Over at the fine Bucco Blog, the author makes a case for the Pirates to sign Luis Gonzalez and move Jason Bay to right field. The argument is that Gonzo would be a perfect fit for PNC Park and would play better defense in left than Bay. He says:
"Littlefield might propose an incentive laden package to Gonzo.. 3 year deal at $10m with base incentives that could get him another $10m or more. Three years is the deal Gonzo wants and the Pirates are probably one of the few who would be willing to give it to him."
Teams Interested In Maholm
Spoke to a scout today who passed along some Pirates info. He mentioned that a couple of teams are expressing interest in 24 year-old southpaw Paul Maholm because of his easy mechanics and ability to keep the ball in the park.
Maholm posted a 0.97 HR per nine innings mark this season in 176 innings. If we are to adjust Maholm’s HR per flyball rate to average (10.7%), his HR/9 falls to 0.83 per nine innings. My own projections have Maholm posting a 4.62 ERA and 1.47 WHIP in 195 innings next season. I can see his control progressing a bit, and he’s a good low-risk, low-cost acquisition. Put a decent defense behind the guy and he might surprise you.
Pirates Agree To Deal With Yuslan Herrera
Dave Littlefield is in the process of an interesting move for the Bucs: he has offered Cuban defector Yuslan Herrera a three-year Major League contract. It seems that only formalities remain in completing the deal.
One scout pegged Herrera as a fourth starter in the bigs. He’s 25 years old and could be near Major League ready. However, he probably hasn’t pitched for quite a while competitively so no one really knows how this will go.
One blogger speculates that perhaps the Pirates would pair Herrera with Jose Contreras with a deal centered around Chris Duffy. Such a move could set up a trade of a young starter for a left-handed power hitter.