Uncategorized News & Rumors

The title of MLB's new International Talent Committee sounds global in scope, but there's no doubt of the central role the Dominican Republic will play in the committee's upcoming discussions about a possible international draft. It was appropriate, then, that MLB Player's Association executive director Michael Weiner spoke to the press in the Dominican capital of Santo Domingo yesterday, just hours after introducing the committee stateside. Weiner and other MLBPA representatives outlined a number of goals focusing on protecting and helping Dominicans and other Latino players, but they face a growing rumble of criticism about the committee's makeup and its perceived plans for Latin America.

"We're analyzing things to see what is the best solution," Weiner said, as reported in Spanish* by Dionisio Soldevila at the Dominican daily Hoy (link in Spanish). "If it was up to the owners, they'd do it right now. The players are open to that same discussion."

This statement in particular led some in the Dominican press to label the draft "practically a done deal," though some MLB executives sound less categorical than Weiner. "Some teams are for it, while other teams are not," Padres senior vice president Omar Minaya told Andy Martino at the New York Daily News. "For a draft to go into effect, a lot of things would have to be in place." Minaya isn't on the committee, but his Mets successor Sandy Alderson is, and Martino had this to say about the Mets GM:

"People involved with the committee describe Alderson as not quite as avid a proponent of the international draft as he once was. Although he is said to remain open-minded about the issue, Alderson is not expected to play the role of fiery advocate for the league's pro-draft position."

Along with Weiner and Alderson, the committee includes MLB executive vice president Rob Manfred, MLBPA director of player relations Tony Clark, MLB senior advisor Rick Shapiro, Kim Ng from the Commissioner's Office, Rays GM Andrew Friedman, and Stan Javier, a Dominican-born former player who now works as a special assistant for the MLBPA. When the lineup was first announced on Wednesday, several writers in the Spanish-speaking press made note of the fact that Javier is the only Latino. Among the most critical was Arturo Marcano, an ESPN Deportes contributor and co-author with David Fidler of a number of articles and a book that take issue with MLB's history of managing Latino talent. In a column yesterday on ESPN Deportes (link in Spanish), Marcano called it "absurd" not to include more international representation on the committee, writing:

"There is just one Latino in the committee, in spite of the clear fact that the principal objective is to study a market that is largely centered in Latin America. I find it hard to believe that the only available Latino prepared to take part in this committee was Stanley Javier." Marcano pointed to the the objectives the committee laid out in a recent press release, noting that most deal specifically with issues related to the Dominican Republic, Venezuela, Puerto Rico, Cuba, and Mexico. But there's also the simple matter of language, he wrote:

"The only way that the members of the committee can properly analyze many of these issues, including the legal aspects and socioeconomic realities of countries like Venezuela and the Dominican Republic, is to have a full mastery of what has happened up to now, and to speak Spanish, since many of the affected and interested parties don't speak English. Unless Google Translate is an honorary member of the committee."
 
As if in response to such concerns, two Dominican players, Miguel Batista and Jose Veras, accompanied Weiner, Clark, and Javier at the event in the Santo Domingo. Batista told Soldevila, "The players are trying to protect the interests of all these young men. There are many things we're trying to achieve to help latino muchachos, including better educational programs, not rejecting 18-year-old Dominicans like happens now, and that they have more opportunities."

An additional concern for the committee is that, as Minaya concisely put it, "countries do not want to be Puerto Rico." The island was absorbed into the American/Canadian draft in 1990 and has produced declining numbers of players ever since, which Weiner addressed at the press conference, saying, "With the draft in Puerto Rico, some precautions weren't taken, and for that reason the number of signings decreased dramatically. Now, with this committee, we're going to watch so that the flow of players from the Dominican Republic, Venezuela, and other countries doesn't decrease."

Once the committee starts meeting in January, Puerto Rico will finally begin to be more than just a cautionary tale. One of the group's objectives is to discuss whether the nation should be absorbed into an international draft, or stay on equal footing with the US and Canada.

* In lieu of a transcript or video of the press conference, which the MLBPA informed MLB Trade Rumors it does not have, Michael Weiner's quotes here are re-translations of quotes that were translated from English into Spanish by the Dominican press. Thus, they may differ in minor ways from the original English. The quotes will be changed here as appropriate should such a transcript become available.

Major League teams non-tendered multiple former All-Stars last night and it won't be surprising if some of the 29 players re-establish themselves as Major League difference makers. For now, however, they're free agents, cut loose because their former teams didn't believe they would have been worth retaining through arbitration.

Here's a detailed explanation of what it means to non-tender a player and here's a link to our non-tender tracker. What follows is a position-by-position listing of the new arrivals on the free agent market:

Catchers (5)

• Chris Gimenez, Koyie Hill, Ronny Paulino, Eli Whiteside, Jason Jaramillo

Second basemen (2)

• Jeff Keppinger, Will Rhymes

Shortstops (1)

• Pedro Ciriaco

Outfielders (5)

• Mike Baxter, Cole Garner, Jeremy Hermida, Luke Scott, Ryan Spilborghs

Utility infielders (2)

• Brooks Conrad, Ryan Theriot

Starting Pitchers (2)

• Jo-Jo Reyes, Joe Saunders 

Right-handed relievers (7)

• Fabio Castillo, Dan Cortes, Willie Eyre, Clay Hensley, Peter Moylan, Micah Owings, Andy Sonnanstine

Left-handed relievers (5)

• Rich Hill, Hong-Chih Kuo, Aaron Laffey, Jose Mijares, Doug Slaten

Two fifths (41%) of all non-tenders were non-closing relievers. Saunders and, to a lesser extent, Reyes will likely draw substantial interest as free agent starters.

From an offensive standpoint, the 15 position players were a feeble bunch in 2011. None of them exceeded a .271 average (Keppinger), a .325 on-base percentage (Conrad), a .402 slugging percentage (Scott) or nine homers (Scott) this past season (minimum 50 plate appearances).

MLBTR has the best free agent tracker around, as it allows you to filter by position, team, type, signed or unsigned, contract years, contract amount, and any combination of those.  Yesterday's non-tenders are now part of the tracker.  Bookmark MLBTR's free agent tracker today!

At least 50 transactions were completed during the winter meetings this week, including 16 free agent signings, eight trades, three waiver claims, and 14 minor league signings. A total of eight first round picks were involved in those transactions, not including Jeremy Hermida and Andrew Miller, former first rounders who were designated for assignment by the Padres and re-signed by the Red Sox, respectively. Let’s recap the first rounders that changed addresses during the last five days…

• Ian Stewart, Casey Weathers & Tyler Colvin – Stewart was the 10th overall pick in 2003, Weathers the 8th overall pick in 2007, and Colvin the 13th overall pick in 2006. Stewart and Weathers were traded by the Rockies to the Cubs for Colvin and DJ LeMahieu.
• David Purcey – 16th overall in 2004, signed a minor league deal with the Phillies.
• Jarrod Parker – 9th overall in 2007, traded by the Diamondbacks with Ryan Cook and Collin Cowgill to the Athletics for Trevor Cahill and Craig Breslow.
• Nick Schmidt – 23rd overall pick in 2007, traded by the Padres to the Rockies for Huston Street. Street was the 40th overall pick in 2004, a compensation pick for Miguel Tejada.
• Ryan Perry – 21st overall pick in 2008, traded by the Tigers to the Nationals for Collin Balester.
• Sergio Santos – 27th overall in 2002, back when he was an infielder. The White Sox traded him to the Blue Jays for Nestor Molina.

Interestingly enough, three of the four largest contracts handed out this week were given to players selected in the 5th round (C.J. Wilson), 13th round (Albert Pujols), and 38th round (Mark Buehrle) of the draft. The lone exception is Jose Reyes, who signed with the Mets as an international free agent.

MLBTR's 24-hour coverage of the the Winter Meetings has come to an end, as most team executives, agents, and reporters catch flights out of Dallas. With the week's action winding down, it's time for a recap of the major moves and rumors from the meetings:

• The Angels made the biggest news of the week, committing over $330MM to Albert Pujols and C.J. Wilson. Pujols signed a ten-year deal, while Wilson inked a five-year pact. So much for the Angels' budgetary limitations. And so much for the club's agreement with LaTroy Hawkins being their major move of the week.
• While the Halos dominated headlines today, it was the Marlins who made a splash earlier in the week, signing Jose Reyes to a six-year deal north of $100MM and agreeing to a four-year contract with Mark Buehrle. Hanley Ramirez reportedly isn't thrilled about moving to third base, but the Marlins expect to have him playing alongside Reyes going forward.
• Teams that missed out on Wilson and Buehrle got some good news — another top arm became available this week, as Yu Darvish was posted by NPB's Nippon Ham Fighters.
• Prince Fielder rumors didn't really heat up this week, with Scott Boras exercising his usual patience, but here's the latest on the biggest bat left on the market.
• The Mets gave new meaning to the term "arms race," striking three deals for pitchers in the span of about an hour on Tuesday. Frank Francisco and Jon Rauch join the club as free agents, while Ramon Ramirez arrives along with Andres Torres as part of a trade that sent Angel Pagan to the Giants.
• A pair of AL East teams looked to solidy the back of their bullpens, as the Blue Jays acquired Sergio Santos from the White Sox, while the Red Sox unsuccessfully attempted to land Andrew Bailey from the Athletics.
• David Ortiz, Francisco Rodriguez, and Kelly Johnson were the only three free agents to accept arbiration offers from their current clubs, so they'll remain with the Red Sox, Brewers, and Blue Jays, respectively.
• In addition to re-signing Matt Capps, the Twins also proposed a three-year contract to Michael Cuddyer, and dealt Kevin Slowey to the Rockies.
• Huston Street will make the best ballpark move a pitcher could hope for, as he heads from the Rockies to the Padres in a trade.
• The Rockies made another deal as the meetings neared an end today, sending Ian Stewart to the Cubs in a four-player swap.
• The Dodgers continued to add free agents to the fold, signing Aaron Harang to bolster their rotation and adding Jerry Hairston Jr. on a two-year deal.
• Although the Yankees won the rights to negotiate with Japanese infielder Hiroyuki Nakajima, his odds of spending 2012 wearing pinstripes don't look great.
• The Pirates may have landed themselves a nice bargain in Erik Bedard, who inked a moderately priced one-year deal.
• The Brewers reached an agreement with Alex Gonzalez, which should put them out of the running for Jimmy Rollins. Rollins appears likely to return to the Phillies.
• His departure from St. Louis wasn't quite as publicized as that of another longtime Cardinal, but Jeff Luhnow will certainly be missed by the club. The Astros, the Cards' division rivals for one more year, hired Luhnow to be their new general manager.
• The Athletics' Gio Gonzalez and Mets' Jonathon Niese drew plenty of interest in Dallas, but neither pitcher was close to being moved by the end of the meetings.
• Manny Ramirez has filed for reinstatement, though he'll have to serve a 50-game suspension before he sees big league action.
• The Orioles acquired Dana Eveland from the Dodgers.
• The Diamondbacks will sign Lyle Overbay.
• Octavio Dotel agreed to a one-year deal with the Tigers.
• Here are the results of today's Rule 5 draft.
• For more in-depth recaps of Monday, Tuesday, and Wednesday, check out MLBTR's Steve Adams' Day in Review posts.

December 8: No teams posted a bid on Sanada, writes Newman. Sanada becomes the third player to be posted and not receive a bid, following Akinori Otsuka in 2002 and Koji Mitsui twice, most recently in 2009.

November 22: The Yokohama Bay Stars have agreed to post right-handed reliever Hiroki Sanada this offseason, according to a report passed along by Patrick Newman of NPB Tracker. It will be the first time Yokohama has used the posting system, though they have lost Takashi Saito and Kazuhiro Sasaki to MLB via free agency.

Sanada, 28 in February, posted a 4.22 ERA in 49 innings this season. He struck out just 18 batters while allowing 74 baserunners (66 hits and eight walks). Newman doesn't expect Sanada to be a hot commodity in part because his velocity has declined, suggesting that he could be in line for a minor league deal following a minimal posting fee.

Steve Adams contributed to this post.

Our Baseball Trade Rumors iPhone app is available in the iTunes store for $2.99; you can check it out here.  The app was recently revamped to allow filtering of the news page by team and transaction, and of course you can customize it to receive push notifications for news on your favorite teams and players.  We released version 2.0.1 this week, which allows users to receive player and team notifications for transactions only.  Keep up with the Winter Meetings madness with the Baseball Trade Rumors app!

MLBTR has an excellent free agent tracker that allows you to filter by team, position, signing status, contract years, and contract amount.  We recently added totals when you filter by team, so for example you can quickly see that the Dodgers have spent $37.050MM this offseason.  Also, hyperlinked player names lead you to MLBTR's post on the signing.  Keep up with the Winter Meetings madness with our free agent tracker!

Well, it's official: Bobby Valentine will be the next manager of the Boston Red Sox. Lost amidst the stories of fake mustaches and real candor is the reality of just how long it's been since Valentine filled out a major league lineup card: ten years.

That may be surprising, given the extent to which Valentine stayed in the national conversation, but even more odd is how infrequently a Major League manager waited longer than Valentine's ten years between gigs. By my unofficial count, this has happened just seven times, not including Rip Van Winkle, who managed the Washington Catskills to uninspiring finishes, with a 20-year pause between them.

A closer look at the seven gap-happy managers provides insight into the challenge Valentine faces. Let's examine them for signs of a foot-long beard, shall we?

The first manager to experience a decade-plus time off was Burt Shotton, and he certainly managed to trade up in terms of talent. He finished his sixth year as the Philadelphia Phillies' manager in 1933, with a team that posted just a 60-92 record. Outside of Chuck Klein's typical Hall of Fame season, and outstanding offense from outfielder Wes Schulmerich and catcher Spud Davis, Shotton didn't have much to work with. The Phillies fired Shotton, traded Klein… and finished 56-93 in 1934.

Other than a single game in charge of the Cincinnati Reds in 1934, Shotton didn't manage again until taking over the 1947 Dodgers. As gigs go, this wasn't the most typical opening. The job was only available because incumbent manager Leo Durocher was suspended by Major League Baseball for consorting with known gamblers. And Shotton's roster included Jackie Robinson, who broke baseball's color barrier and incited a possible mutiny among some on the roster. All Shotton did was lead Brooklyn to the 1947 National League pennant before, as was the style at the time, losing to the Yankees in the 1947 World Series.

Shotton took over permanently in 1948, after Brooklyn fired Durocher for getting off to a 35-37 start. Shotton held his own in 1948, took Brooklyn back to the World Series in 1949, and came full circle on the final day of the 1950 season, losing the NL pennant to the Phillies. Clearly, if Valentine's tenure matches that of Shotton, it will be a successful time in Boston.

As for Durocher, he went on to have quite the long rest himself. Not from Brooklyn, however — he quickly joined the rival New York Giants, leading them to two NL pennants and the 1954 World Series title — but once the Giants fired him in 1955. Not until the Cubs came calling in 1966 did Durocher take another team's helm. By the Cubs' standards, Durocher was a success.

He finished 59-103 in 1966, well beneath the 80-74 with the 1955 Giants that got him fired. But while Durocher's final Giants team had Willie Mays, pitcher Johnny Antonelli and little else, his Cubs team had peak Ron Santo and Billy Williams, and decline-phase Ernie Banks (the Cubs had absolutely no pitching besides Ken Holtzman in '66). A year later, the team added Ferguson Jenkins and Joe Niekro to the staff and finished 87-74. By 1969, the Cubs finished 92-70, spent 156 days in first place, and lost the inaugural National League East race to a New York Mets team that won 38 of its final 49 games.

That would be as close as Durocher would come to Chicago glory. After another two-and-a-half seasons hovering just above .500, the Cubs fired Durocher in 1972. If Valentine merely comes close in Boston but fails to make the postseason, it is unlikely that Red Sox fans will think of him fondly. If he fails as Paul Richards did — a 64-97, one-season stint with the 1976 White Sox fifteen years after quitting as Baltimore manager to assume the role of General Manager with the newly-formed Houston Colt .45s — Boston sportswriters should have enough material for a lifetime of books.

Two more recent examples are less encouraging models for Valentine. Frank Robinson, fired after a 13-24 start with the 1991 Orioles, took over the 2002 Montreal Expos. In five years in Montreal, Robinson's Expos finished second, fourth and, for the final three seasons, last in the NL East. Then again, his Orioles only finished higher than fifth once in his three-plus seasons in Baltimore. Hard to blame him for that — he took over a Baltimore team that started 0-21 in 1988, and left a team in 1991 that would go on to see just one starter top 130 innings pitched or pitch to below a 4.84 ERA — the immortal Bob Milacki.

As for Cito Gaston, manager of a pair of World Series winners in Toronto, it is clear he never read much Thomas Wolfe. Fired in 1997, Gaston returned to the Blue Jays' dugout in 2008. Three consecutive fourth-place finishes followed, though when talent drops from Roberto Alomar, Tony Fernandez and Pat Hentgen to Joe Inglett, David Eckstein and A.J. Burnett, one should adjust expectations accordingly.

Two more current managers join Bobby Valentine in the extended time off category: Terry Collins of the Mets, who took over in 2011 after getting fired by the 1999 Angels, and Davey Johnson of the Nationals, who left the Dodgers after 2000, then jumped in for the departing Jim Riggleman midway through the 2011 season. The jury is still out on these two.

So with fully ten percent of current managers in a category occupied by so few in baseball history, what follows will be fascinating. Will they wander into town, unsure of why everyone looks so different? Or will they find acceptance and respect as Rip Van Winkle did, celebrated for his innovative way of avoiding his shrewish wife? History suggests the answer will be similar to how all managers throughout time have been evaluated — it depends, to a huge extent, upon the players on the field.

Looking to reach diehard baseball fans, many of whom are 18-34-year old males?  December is a massive month for MLB Trade Rumors, and our ad rates are much more affordable than mainstream sports sites.  Email Tim Dierkes at mlbtradvertising@gmail.com if you're interested in advertising your business with us.