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Nationals, Rays, Padres Interested In Eric Chavez

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The Yankees aren’t the only team interested in free agent infielder Eric Chavez. The Nationals, Rays and Padres are among the other clubs interested in the Scott Leventhal client, tweets Jon Heyman of CBSSports.com.

Chavez, 34, posted a .263/.320/.356 line in a reserve role for the Yankees last year, backing up at third and even appearing at first base. The Yankees, who failed to reach an agreement with Japanese infielder Hiroyuki Nakajima, have interest in re-signing the six-time Gold Glove winner. This is the first time the Nationals, Rays and Padres have been linked to Chavez this offseason.

Prince Fielder Rumors: Thursday

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Nationals GM Mike Rizzo says his position on Prince Fielder has not changed since the Winter Meetings, according to Amanda Comak of the Washington Times. Washington is committed to Adam LaRoche and first base is “settled,” the GM said. Rizzo acknowledged Fielder’s value, saying he’ll help any club he’s with, but pointed out that the Nationals are often bandied about as a possible suitor for unsigned Scott Boras clients. Here are the details on Fielder:

  • The Nationals appear to be “deep in the mix” for Fielder and as many as eight other teams are showing some level of interest, according to Jon Heyman of CBSSports.com.
  • Some Marlins executives have said they aren’t going to pursue Fielder, but it appears some front office members are intrigued, according to Heyman.
  • The Cubs and Blue Jays don’t appear to be willing to offer more than five years, according to Heyman.
  • ESPN.com's Jerry Crasnick previews what lies ahead for Boras’ many remaining unsigned clients, including the ‘PF Flyer.’ Crasnick says we can’t count out the Cubs, who are lingering on the fringe of the Fielder sweepstakes.
  • One GM called the Mariners a "darkhorse" for Fielder and suggested GM Jack Zduriencik may feel pressure to respond to splashy moves by the Rangers and Angels.

Olney On Fielder, Zambrano, Rays, Garza

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There’s been lots of buzz about a possible deal between Prince Fielder and the Nationals this week, so ESPN.com’s Buster Olney asked some talent evaluators about the impact the free agent first baseman would have in Washington. One evaluator says adding Fielder would make the Nationals “an immediate threat in the NL East” and another guesses Fielder would boost the organization's revenues. Here are the rest of Olney’s rumors, starting in the NL East:

  • Some Marlins people aren’t convinced Carlos Zambrano’s stuff is good enough for him to be a frontline pitcher again, Olney writes. However, the Miami front office believes he’s worth the risk at $2.5MM.
  • Olney wonders if the Rays have interest in Daniel Murphy of the Mets. The Rays need a first baseman and the 26-year-old posted a .320/.362/.448 line in 423 plate appearances last year while playing first, second, third and left field.
  • Many talent evaluators consider Matt Garza a middle-of-the-rotation starter, which may contribute to the gap between the Cubs’ asking price and what rival teams have been offering in trade talks, Olney writes.

Quick Hits: Fielder, Vazquez, Trumbo, Rockies

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Links for Thursday night, starting with a pair of notes on the offseason's top remaining free agent… 

Minor Moves: Jacobs, Gaudin, Delaney, Fields, Mather

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We'll keep track of today's minor moves right here..

  • The Pirates announced that they signed right-hander Logan Kensing to a minor league deal that includes an invitation to Spring Training.  The 29-year-old spent the 2011 campaign with the Yankees' top affiliate after recovering from elbow surgery in 2010.
  • The Reds signed catchers Brian Esposito and Brian Peacock to minor league deals, tweets Matt Eddy of Baseball America.
  • The Tigers signed utility player Eric Patterson to a minor league deal, tweets Eddy.
  • The Mets signed right-hander Jeff Stevens and utility player Corey Wimberly to minor league deals, tweets Eddy.
  • The A's signed right-handers Travis Schlichting and Merkin Valdez and left-hander Fabio Castro to minor league deals, Eddy tweets.
  • The Yankees signed right-hander Adam Miller and outfielders Cole Garner and Dewayne Wise to minor league deals, Eddy tweets.
  • The Diamondbacks signed first baseman Mike Jacobs to a minor league deal, tweets Eddy.  Before playing, Jacobs still must serve a 50-game suspension for positive a HGH test in August.  He was cut by the Rockies following the test.
  • The Marlins picked up right-handers Chad Gaudin and Rob Delaney on minor league deals, Eddy tweets.  In nine big league seasons, Gaudin has a 4.63 ERA with 7.1 K/9 and 4.2 BB/9.  Delaney spent most of 2011 with the Rays' Triple-A affiliate, posting a 1.86 ERA with 7.6 K/9 and 2.3 BB/9.
  • The Dodgers signed third baseman Josh Fields, according to Goldstein (via Twitter).
  • The Cubs signed Joe Mather as Triple-A outfield insurance, according to Goldstein (via Twitter).  Mather spent 36 games on the Braves' major league roster in 2011.
  • The Nationals have signed right-hander Dan Cortes, according to Kevin Goldstein of Baseball Prospectus (via Twitter).
  • Speaking of the Braves, Atlanta released former Rangers draftee Marcus Lemon, Goldstein tweets.  Lemon was acquired in a March trade for a PTBNL.
  • P.J. Phillips, the younger brother of Brandon Phillips, agreed to a deal with the Reds, tweets Goldstein.  The younger Phillips' career never got going due to plate discipline issues.
  • The Blue Jays signed former Angels/Braves relief prospect Stephen Marek, Goldstein tweets.  The right-hander was outrighted by Atlanta in November and underwent Tommy John surgery in May.
  • The White Sox signed 2000 first-round pick Corey Smith, Goldstein tweets.  The 29-year-old has never reached the Majors.

Nationals Emerge As Favorite For Fielder?

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5:11pm: The Nationals’ local TV revenue is about to “double, triple or more,” a source tells Ken Rosenthal of FOX Sports.  Owner Ted Lerner is already the wealthiest in MLB, according to Forbes.  One of Rosenthal’s sources expects the Nationals to sign Fielder, though the first baseman will want a full no-trade clause.  LaRoche’s presence on the roster wouldn't stop the team from making a move, Rosenthal writes.

2:17pm: Adam Kilgore of the Washington Post has quotes from the always-colorful Scott Boras:

"As I’ve told many, there’s a lot of passengers on the PF Flyer.  I keep having discussions with teams, and they keep coming back after those discussions. We are having a very robust and constant communication with many teams.  We’ve had an opportunity over the last 10 days to certainly get more definition, I would say. Normally in free agency, after a period of time you have teams that move to the background. When we think that’s happened, those teams have called back and they’ve changed their position."

The Lerner family's stance against a big-money splash has thawed, writes Kilgore.  Who better to pursue than a man Boras describes as "a combination of Henry Kissinger and Frank Howard?"

10:34am: One MLB official told Tom Haudricourt of the Milwaukee Journal-Sentinel recently that "word is spreading in the industry that the Washington Nationals have emerged as the favorite" to sign Prince Fielder.

What to make of this rumor?  Haudricourt is reliable, but he made it clear that he is relaying the opinion of "the industry" as passed through one MLB official.  So the source doesn't appear to be from Scott Boras' camp, nor from the Nationals.  Still, the rumor echoes something ESPN's Buster Olney wrote on Thursday: "Some rival executives strongly believe that Washington will be the eventual landing place for Fielder."   That same day, a Nationals player suggested to Jon Heyman the team was in the mix.  

The biggest obstacle to the Nationals signing Fielder seems to be having Adam LaRoche under contract for one year, which did not seem like a major impediment prior to the offseason.  GM Mike Rizzo left the door open a crack for Fielder last Wednesday when talking to Mike Ferrin on MLB Network Radio, speaking at length about LaRoche but adding, "As far as, are we going to dabble our toe in that [Fielder] water?  Those are decisions that we make early on in the process and we've more or less decided that Adam is going to be our first baseman unless something extraordinary, out of the ordinary happened, that's how we're going to go to Spring Training."

Extension Candidate: Tyler Clippard

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Icon_6756808The Washington Nationals are clearly a team on the rise, combining a young rotation (Jordan Zimmermann, Stephen Strasburg, Gio Gonzalez) with an improving offense (Ryan Zimmerman, Mike Morse, Danny Espinosa, Wilson Ramos, eventually Bryce Harper) and a solid bullpen. Part of that bullpen is setup man Tyler Clippard, who's been one of the game's best relievers since the Nats moved him to the bullpen full-time in 2009.

Clippard, 27 in February, was acquired from the Yankees for Jonathan Albaladejo in December 2007. A starting pitcher with just a half-dozen big league starts to his credit at the time of the trade, the Nats kept the right-hander in Triple-A for the majority of the 2008 season. He struggled, pitching to a 4.77 ERA with 7.9 K/9 and 4.2 BB/9 in 143 minor league innings that year, making a pair of unspectacular spot starts for Washington in June. The Nationals moved him to the bullpen full-time in 2009, and after a 24-game trial in the minors, he was called up in late-June and has been a bullpen force ever since.

Since that June 2009 call-up, Clippard has pitched to a 2.52 ERA with 10.6 K/9 and 3.7 BB/9. His arm has proven to be resilient after working 91 innings in 2010 (78 appearances) and 88 1/3 innings in 2011 (72 appearances), and his fastball velocity has actually increased the last two years. He also cut his walk rate from 4.3 BB/9 in 2009-2010 to just 2.6 BB/9 in 2011. Clippard's biggest flaw is his utter inability to get ground balls, which makes him homer prone. His 25.6% ground ball rate since the start of 2009 is easily the lowest among all pitchers (min. 200 IP), and his 1.05 HR/9 is the third highest among relievers during that time. He did make his first All-Star team in 2011 despite the long ball problem.

Clippard qualified for Super Two status by just two days of service time this offseason, so he'll be arbitration-eligible four times instead of the usual three. Our system projects him to make $1.7MM in 2012, which puts him in uncharted territory for non-closing relievers. Fellow Super Two relievers like George Sherrill ($900K in 2008), Brandon League ($640K in 2009), Rafael Perez ($795K in 2010), and Nick Masset ($1.035MM in 2010) all received considerably less their first time through arbitration while Brian Wilson ($4.4375MM in 2010) received considerably more thanks to his saves total. Clippard falls somewhere in the middle, an elite setup man without enough saves to pad his salary.

You don't see many teams locking up relievers to long-term contracts that buy out arbitration years for a number of reasons, namely the risk involved. Relievers are more volatile than just about any other position in the game, plus their salaries generally remain affordable through arbitration anyway. Wilson, Masset, Manny Corpas, and Jonathan Broxton all signed multi-year contracts that bought out some (but not all) arbitration years and no free agent years. A similarly structured contract could benefit both the Nationals and Clippard.

A two-year contract in the $4-4.5MM range or a three-year contract around $8MM seasons reasonable, though that is just my speculation. A relatively short-term commitment like that would put some guaranteed money in Clippard's pocket while allowing him to maintain the earning potential of his later arbitration years and free agency. The Nats would get some financial certainty and save a few bucks before he starts approaching closer money through arbitration. Most relievers don't get the luxury of multi-year contracts, but then again Clippard isn't most relievers. Washington is improving every year, and a multi-year deal for their star setup man could help ensure that he's still affordable when they're ready to contend.

Photo courtesy of Icon SMI.

Quick Hits: Oliver, Cubs, Nationals, Byrd, Aviles

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Some Quick Hits for Friday night..

  • The Rangers never made a formal offer to Darren Oliver before the reliever agreed to sign with Toronto, writes Drew Davison of the Star-Telegram.  The 41-year-old's deal is for one-year with a club option for 2013.
  • The Cubs have made a good deal of moves so far this offseason but they've quietly made major changes to their scouting department as well, writes Jon Paul Morosi of FOXSports.com.  The team hired former Red Sox major league scout Kyle Evans to oversee Chicago's revamped video and advance scouting.  President of Baseball Operations Theo Epstein also plucked amateur scout Matt Dorey from Boston but subsequently agreed not to hire any other BoSox front office personnel until December 2014.
  • Yesterday, ESPN.com's Buster Olney suggested that the Red Sox and Nationals could have interest in Cubs outfielder Marlon Byrd.  Eric Seidman of Fangraphs believes that Olney was right to link the Nats to the veteran outfielder but argues that the club should be thinking bigger.
  • Cuban outfielder Guillermo Aviles is a name to keep in mind down the road, writes Ben Badler of Baseball America.  Aviles, 19 in January, stands at 6-foot-1 and scouts say he shows a good deal of promise.  The left-handed outfielder remains a resident of Cuba and its not known when or if he might look to make the jump to the Majors.

Prince Fielder Rumors: Thursday

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Nationals GM Mike Rizzo said yesterday on MLB Network Radio that there's every reason to expect Adam LaRoche to play first base in Washington next year. "We've more or less decided that Adam is going to be our first baseman unless something extraordinary, out of the ordinary happened," Rizzo said. However, reports continue to link the Nationals to free agent first baseman Prince Fielder. Here's the latest on Fielder with the most recent updates up top:

  • A Nationals player told Jon Heyman of CBSSports.com that the club is on on Fielder. "We're in the market. We're still shooting for him," the player said. It's possible the player knows something Rizzo isn't saying publicly, but it's just as possible that the player spoke out of turn about a topic he hasn't been fully briefed on. We can be reasonably sure of one thing — that the unnamed player wasn't LaRoche himself.

Rizzo On Center Field, First Base

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Nationals GM Mike Rizzo joined Mike Ferrin on MLB Network Radio today; here are a few key comments.

On center field:

We see the 2013 free agent class at center field is much stronger than it is for the 2012 season.  With that in mind we know Jayson [Werth] can handle the center field position.  It's not a perfect world for us.  He's a good defender out there and is ready, willing, and able to take on the responsibility to play center field.  We recognize that we need a true gliding, defensive, rangy center fielder out there in a perfect world. As far as the 2012 season we're not going to make a kneejerk reaction and lock ourselves into anything long-term if it doesn't make sense for us.  

MLBTR's 2013 free agent list can be seen here.  Viable candidates for the Nationals could include Michael Bourn, B.J. Upton, and Shane Victorino, or perhaps Angel Pagan or Grady Sizemore if they have strong 2012 seasons.

On whether Rizzo will monitor the Prince Fielder situation:

Adam LaRoche is under contract for us, we're paying him a lot of money to play first base for us next year.  We feel that he's going to have a bounceback season.  We just want him to have his career norms: .265, 25, 85-100 RBIs and play great defense.  We feel that his shoulder is rehabbed, he's 100%, and talking to him just recently he feels great and he's ready to contribute to us in 2012.  As far as, are we going to dabble our toe in that water?  Those are decisions that we make early on in the process and we've more or less decided that Adam is going to be our first baseman unless something extraordinary, out of the ordinary happened, that's how we're going to go to Spring Training.

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