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Central Notes: Fister, Pence, Cubs

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A few items of note regarding teams from MLB's Central divisions, as the Cards fall behind the Phils in Game 1 of the NLDS.

  • The Tigers preferred Doug Fister to Ubaldo Jimenez when they were shopping for a pitcher before the trade deadline, according to Danny Knobler of CBSSports.com. Whether that's true, we'll probably never know, but Fister certainly pitched better for Detroit than Jimenez did for Cleveland after the deadline. The Mariners were originally hesitant to move Fister, according to Knobler, but Tigers GM Dave Dombrowski was persistent in pursuing the right-hander.
  • The Reds tried to acquire Hunter Pence from the Astros, according to Hal McCoy of the Dayton Daily News, and GM Walt Jocketty has said he thought he made a better offer to Houston than the one it eventually accepted from the Phillies. McCoy reports that the Astros wanted Devin Mesoraco and adds that lefty Aroldis Chapman was not available.
  • The Cubs remain in limbo while waiting to hire a new general manager, writes Paul Sullivan of the Chicago Tribune, who notes that the fates of manager Mike Quade, his coaches, and several players are up in the air until someone takes the helm. The Cubs are unlikely to spend lavishly this offseason, according to Sullivan.

West Notes: Dodgers, Mariners, Padres

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Clayton Kershaw will win the triple crown for NL pitchers and Matt Kemp homered and drove in three tonight in his quest for the batting triple crown. Here are some updates on MLB's West Coast teams…

  • Dodgers owner Frank McCourt could look to attack the credibility of commissioner Bud Selig by claiming that the Marlins and owner Jeffrey Loria have had preferred treatment from MLB, according Bill Shaikin of the LA Times. 
  • Geoff Baker of the Seattle Times shows that the Mariners' owners, many of whom are based out of Japan, are rarely heard from. Team president Chuck Armstrong is accountable for baseball moves, while financial decisions generally occur out of sight.
  • The Mariners may have money to play with this offseason, according to Baker. Depending on the timetable and direction of their rebuilding program, they could spend to varying degrees this winter, so Baker runs through some possibilities.
  • The Padres announced that they extended the contracts of Chris Gwynn, their director of player personnel, and Jaron Madison, their scouting director, through 2013.

Mariners Notes: Thieben, Montero, Adams

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The Mariners endured their 13th walk-off loss of the season at the hands of the Twins yesterday, setting a franchise record. Seattle which is tied with the Angels for the most walk-off losses in baseball this season, visits the Rangers tonight…

  • The Mariners are expected to sign Daniel Thieben, an 18-year-old right-hander who's the youngest member of Germany's World Cup roster, according to John Manuel of Baseball America. The deal will likely become official in early November, when international scouting director Bob Engle visits Germany. Thieben's best pitch is a curveball and his fastball sits in the mid or upper-80s.
  • Brian Cashman's comments about Carl Crawford made headlines today and his candor extended to the near-trade that would have sent Jesus Montero and others to the Mariners for Cliff Lee last summer. The GM told Ian O'Connor of ESPNNewYork.com that Montero "would've been by far the best player moved" in any of the three deals involving Lee.
  • Cashman told Larry Stone of the Seattle Times that he had Lee until the Mariners decided they didn't like the medicals on second baseman David Adams and moved on to the Rangers, who were offering Justin Smoak.

AL West Notes: Wells, Mariners, Young

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Brad Pitt says he now feels "a little bit romantic about the A's" after portraying GM Billy Beane in the Moneyball movie, according to Susan Slusser of the San Francisco Chronicle. Here's the latest from Oakland's division…

  • Vernon Wells, who could opt out of his contract this offseason, told Bill Plunkett of the Orange County Register that he doesn't expect to walk away from the three years and $63MM remaining on his deal. It will be a shock if he opts out given his .219/.252/.406 season line.
  • The Mariners named Joe McIlvaine an assistant to GM Jack Zduriencik. The 64-year-old former Mets and Padres GM has spent the last 12 seasons working for the Twins. When MLBTR’s Howard Megdal ranked every GM in Mets history last October, McIlvaine placed fourth.
  • Michael Young was the subject of near-constant trade rumors last offseason. He tells the Associated Press (link via ESPN) that he never really wanted to leave Texas, even after he requested a trade. The Rangers are glad they held on to Young, who has a .331/.374/.472 line with 40 doubles this year.

Arbitration Eligibles: Seattle Mariners

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The Mariners are next in our arbitration eligibles series.

Aardsma and Rodriguez are the primary non-tender candidates.  Aardsma's salary in arbitration would remain close to $4.5MM and can't go below $3.6MM.  Since he had Tommy John surgery in July, that wouldn't be good value.  Rodriguez is a $700K type player, but he hasn't done anything noteworthy this year.  Kelley also projects for $700K.  Fully recovered from Tommy John, I think the Mariners will keep him around for 2012.

Vargas and League should each land in the $4.2-4.5MM range for 2012.  They're both trade candidates, especially League having saved 34 games and counting.

If Kelley, Vargas, and League are retained, that should add around $9.4MM to the team's commitments, bringing the total to about $69MM before accounting for minimum salary players.  That'd be about $26MM short of the 2011 payroll, so the team has flexibility.

Front Office Notes: Pirates, Mariners, Orioles

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The Pirates and Mariners recently agreed to extensions with their respective general managers and it appears that the Orioles will soon have to look to replace president of baseball operations Andy MacPhail. Here are the latest front office notes from around MLB…

  • The Pirates announced six promotions in their baseball operations department. Former scouting director Greg Smith is now an assistant general manager, as is former director of player development Kyle Stark. Tyrone Brooks is the Pirates' new director of player personnel and Joe DelliCarri is now the amateur scouting director. The Pirates also promoted Larry Broadway to director of minor league operations and Kevan Graves to director of baseball operations.
  • The Mariners announced that they hired Pete Vuckovich as a special assistant to GM Jack Zduriencik. The former Cy Young Award winner had worked on and off of the field for the Pirates in various roles since 1992. Vuckovich, now 58, won the 1982 American League Cy Young Award with the Brewers.
  • Jon Heyman of SI.com is hearing John Hart's name as a possibility for the Orioles' GM job (Twitter link). Hart, the former GM of the Indians and Rangers, is close to Orioles manager Buck Showalter, which helps his candidacy.

Red Sox Notes: Fister, Harden, Adams, Orioles

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The odds say the Red Sox have a 94.5% chance of making the playoffs, but I'm guessing that's not going to console most Red Sox fans. Boston leads Tampa Bay by three games in the Wild Card race, but that gap might have been wider by now if they had made different moves at the trade deadline. Alex Speier of WEEI.com has the details on the deadline deals that didn't happen…

  • When the Red Sox made cursory inquiries about Doug Fister, it became clear that the Mariners were aiming high and looking for a right-handed bat. Since joining the Tigers, Fister has a 2.28 ERA with 7.2 K/9 and 0.9 BB/9 in 51 1/3 impressive innings.
  • The Red Sox were set to acquire Rich Harden from the A’s, but once they looked at his medical records, they were no longer willing to include both Lars Anderson and a player to be named. The PTBNL would have come from a list of high-upside players in the lower minors.
  • Raul Alcantara, an 18-year-old Dominican who signed for $500K in 2009 and Brandon Workman, a second round pick in last year’s draft, would have been on the list.
  • The Red Sox also kicked around the idea of acquiring Harden’s former teammate, Brad Ziegler, who ended up going to Arizona.
  • The Padres weren’t thrilled with Boston’s prospects, so Jed Hoyer and Theo Epstein never came close to completing deals for Mike Adams or other Padres relievers.
  • The Orioles and Red Sox never exchanged names regarding a possible Koji Uehara deal.

Quick Hits: Indians, Iannetta, Mariners

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The Tigers extended their winning streak to ten games tonight with a 14-4 victory over the White Sox. Here's the latest from around MLB…

  • Deadline deals played a significant role in this year's AL Central race, Paul Hoynes of the Cleveland Plain Dealer writes. The Tigers and Indians were both aggressive on the trade market in July and August, as our Transaction Tracker shows.
  • Chris Iannetta told Thomas Harding of MLB.com that he hopes to remain with the Rockies, though he has lost playing time to rookie backstop Wilin Rosario in recent weeks.
  • The Mariners announced that they promoted Roger Hansen, who is now a special assistant to GM Jack Zduriencik. The 50-year-old Hansen spent 18 years working for the Mariners in player development, most recently as the organization's minor league catching coordinator.
  • As Brian Costa of the Wall Street Journal shows, Jose Reyes of the Mets has raised his on-base percentage to .375 with a counter-intuitive method.

AL West Notes: Delabar, Seager, Trout

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On this date in 1998, Ken Griffey Jr. reached the 50-homer plateau for the second consecutive season. No one in the AL West will reach 50 homers this year – Nelson Cruz of the Rangers leads the division with 28. Here are today's AL West links… 

  • Geoff Baker of the Seattle Times tells the story of right-hander Steve Delabar, who was substitute teaching not long ago and has now joined the Mariners' big league pitching staff. 
  • Dave Cameron of U.S.S. Mariner would like to see the Mariners play Kyle Seager at third on a daily basis. Alex Liddi, another option, appears to need more Triple-A seasoning despite the 30 minor league homers he hit this year. 
  • Mike Trout is Baseball America's minor league player of the year and B.A.’s J.J. Cooper explains that the Angels outfielder stood out as a big league prospect when he was just 16 years old. Click through for old scouting reports on Trout, who’s still just 20.

Cafardo’s Latest: Fielder, Nathan, Hart, Mauer

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One major league source told Nick Cafardo of the Boston Globe that a lot of lefty relievers were blocked by teams and never got through waivers in August.  The price tag on most of them was steep so most teams bit the bullet and decided to go with what they had.  The Giants were one of those clubs as GM Brian Sabean opted to stick with Javy Lopez and Jeremy Affeldt.  Here are some other highlights from Cafardo's column..

  • The Mariners re-upped GM Jack Zduriencik this week and Cafardo wonders if Seattle will be in the mix with Prince Fielder this offseason, even though they already have Justin Smoak at first.  It's hard to predict how much the M's will be willing to spend and it's possible that the four-year, $36MM deal given to Chone Figgins in December 2009 could make ownership gun-shy.
  • The Twins didn’t seem to have anything major working for Joe Nathan at the deadline, but they asked him to waive his trade-veto rights just in case and Nathan declined.  Nathan's future with the club is uncertain as he heads into free agency but he has a shot at staying if he accepts a hometown discount.  It's unlikely that the Twins will pick up his $12MM option this winter.  The club can buy him out for just $2MM.
  • Cafardo writes that Brewers rightfielder Corey Hart would fit nicely with the Red Sox.  However, it seems likely that they'll lose Fielder this summer so they probably won't entertain a deal involving Hart. 
  • Twins GM Bill Smith says that Joe Mauer will be a catcher for the foreseeable future, but he continues to leave the door open for a possible shift of positions down the road.  There are also no plans for the Giants to move Buster Posey elsewhere, according to Sabean.
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