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Yes I wondered when they would fully address their pitching but they started by drafting all pitchers in the latest draft and then going out and signing a big name free agent pitcher in Thor. I applaud this move because I think it was long overdue by the Angels orginization to get Trout some help specifically by bolstering the pitching rotation.Leave a comment:
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Though the consensus around the game remains that a reunion between Freddie Freeman and the Braves is something of a fait accompli, Jon Heyman of MLB Network reports that the two sides are still hung up on the length of the deal. USA Today’s Bob Nightengale had previously reported that the 2020 NL MVP had already rejected the Braves’ best offer ($135MM over five years), though it’s unclear if that’s the same offer the club had made when Heyman reported a “gap” between the two sides in September.
Freeman, who has played the entirety of his twelve-year big-league career in Atlanta, is reportedly looking for a deal that would pay him something closer to $200MM over six years. Whether or not the Braves have bumped up their dollar offer is unclear, but the first baseman, who cemented his place in the annals of Braves history during the club’s 2021 World Series run, appears set on receiving a deal that would take him through at least his age-37 season. It’s quite clear that a carbon-copy of the five-year, $130MM deal Paul Goldschmidt signed with the Cardinals ahead of the 2019 season won’t get it done. MLBTR projects that Freeman will ultimately sign for six years and $180MM.
Braves GM Alex Anthopoulos has already confirmed the club will run a higher payroll in 2022. To keep Freeman around, they’ll have to; following yesterday’s signing of Manny Piña, Cot’s Baseball Contracts estimates (including arbitration salary projections) that the Braves have already committed just shy of $133MM to their 2022 roster. This figure could decrease with a suspension of Marcell Ozuna (who’s slated to earn $16MM next year) or if the club chooses to non-tender a few of its arbitration-eligible players (Johan Camargo, Sean Newcomb, and Orlando Arcia are all non-tender candidates), but not by enough to accommodate the roughly $30MM Freeman will command on an annual basis without a significant payroll bump.
Beyond Freeman’s importance as the face of the franchise (a role he inherited from Chipper Jones), his career numbers justify a significant investment. Since debuting as a September call-up in 2010, Freeman has put together the numbers of a likely future Hall 0f Famer, compiling a .295/.384/.509 career slash-line while mashing 271 homers. His best year came in the abbreviated 2020 season, when he put together a monstrous .341/.462/.640 line across 60 games and won his first career MVP. A pillar of consistency, Freeman hasn’t posted an OPS+ below 132 since 2012 (his age-22 season) and has played in at least 147 games in all but two of his eleven full seasons. He’s not yet shown any signs of regression, as he followed up his MVP year with a .300/.393/.503 line (basically identical to his career marks) and an OPS north of 1.000 in the playoffs.
Among the many interesting wrinkles in the surprisingly drawn-out process of a reigning World Champion attempting to hold on to its best player is the Braves’ ownership structure. Because Liberty Media, the club’s owner since a complicated stock swap deal with Time Warner in 2007, is a publicly traded company, it must disclose a detailed account of its earnings on a quarterly basis, giving fans and followers of the industry a unique look into the team’s internal financial workings. Maury Brown of Forbes reports that the club posted baseball-related revenues of $222MM in the third quarter of 2021 (roughly the second half of the season) alone.
Heyman reported yesterday that the Yankees, who beat the Braves in both the ’96 and ’99 Fall Classics, have at least kicked the tires on Freeman — a development likely to send shivers down the spines of Braves fans. Though hardly surprising — every team with money and a need at first base is likely to at least check in — the news will only put further pressure on Anthopoulos to re-sign his team’s most consistent and recognizable player. Travis d’Arnaud, Ozzie Albies, and Atlanta-area native Dansby Swanson (an infant when the Braves last won a title) have already joined the chorus of fans demanding a speedy deal, calling on club management to “re-sign Freddie” during their speeches at Truist Park following the team’s championship parade.
Even if the Braves do wrap up a deal to keep Freeman in Atlanta into his elder years, Anthopoulos’ offseason business is unlikely to be done. Three of the four outfielders the club acquired in July (Joc Pederson, NLCS MVP Eddie Rosario, and World Series MVP Jorge Soler) are also free agents, and the fourth (Adam Duvall) is arbitration-eligible after turning down his half of a $7MM mutual option. With Ozuna’s future in Atlanta uncertain, Ronald Acuña Jr. still recovering from a major knee injury, and top prospect Cristian Pache a major question mark with the bat, the reigning champ’s outfield situation remains up in the air. They may also wish to add a veteran starter to a mix that includes Max Fried, Ian Anderson, Charlie Morton, and a stable of promising-but-unproven arms (including Huascar Ynoa, Kyle Wright, Tucker Davidson, Kyle Muller, and Touki Toussaint) with mixed records in the big leagues.Leave a comment:
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Jays sign Jose Berrios to a 7 year extension worth $131M. Very team friendly signing imo.Leave a comment:
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Utilityman Chris Taylor will reject the Dodgers’ one-year, $18.4MM qualifying offer and test the open market, reports Jon Heyman of the MLB Network (Twitter link). The Meister Sports Management client will presumably set out in search of a multi-year pact, be it with the Dodgers or another club.
That’s not at all surprising, since Taylor should be in plenty of demand. Even with draft pick compensation attached, MLBTR placed the 31-year-old sixteenth on this offseason’s list of top free agents, projecting him to land a four-year deal worth $64MM. Taylor’s ability to play essentially any non-catcher position on the diamond should make him a highly coveted player, with teams seeing him as a potential solution for weaknesses on their current roster at various positions.
While Taylor’s best known for his defensive versatility, he pairs that with strong work at the plate. The right-handed hitter strikes out a fair amount, but he also draws walks and hits for power at high clips despite spending his past few years in one of the game’s more pitcher-friendly home parks. By measure of wRC+, Taylor has been an above-average bat in each of the past five seasons. He slowed down in the second half of the 2021 campaign, but Taylor was scorching hot during the postseason to hit free agency on a high note.
If Taylor doesn’t re-sign with the Dodgers, they’ll stand to receive a compensatory draft choice. As a team that exceeded the luxury tax threshold in 2021, they’ll only add a pick after the end of the fourth round. Teams that sign Taylor (or any other qualified free agent), will surrender draft and potentially international signing bonus capital, with the extent of the forfeiture dependent on the signing club’s market size.Leave a comment:
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10 or more wins, holds, and saves.
Without a single start is incredible.
I'll go to Mr. Database later because I'm wondering if that's ever been done before.
E-Rod declines Boston's offer and signed with the Tigers.
Brilliant move by Detroit, they're (forgive the pun) players now.
The Tigers are in it to win it, and they're on record saying they're going to be active in the Correa sweepstakes.
Rodriguez is just hitting his prime, has a real live arm, a left arm at that.
Jumping from Fenway to Comerica for a lefty is a major upgrade for him.
Good on E-Rod, he's going to tough against KC.
KC and Detroit are going to relevant again in the AL Central again.
Can't wait for 2022.Leave a comment:
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The Marlins have acquired right-hander Louis Head from the Rays in exchange for a player to be named later or cash considerations. Miami has designated outfielder Brian Miller for assignment in a corresponding move to create roster space.
Head made his MLB debut in 2021 and impressed in terms of bottom-line numbers, posting a 2.31 ERA over 35 innings out of Tampa’s bullpen (with two “starts” but as an opener). Advanced metrics like a 4.03 SIERA and 23.9% strikeout rate weren’t as impressive and Head did benefit from a .216 BABIP, but he also did a very good job of limiting hard contact.
Perhaps moreso than his solid numbers, Head might be the poster child for the Rays’ penchant for shuttling pitchers back and forth from Triple-A. Head was called up and sent down a whopping 12 times last season, as the Rays constantly looked to move fresh arms in and out of their bullpen.
Head turns 32 in April, and was originally an 18th-round draft pick for Cleveland in 2012. After eight seasons in the minors with the Guardians and Dodgers, Head was on the verge of leaving baseball entirely before catching on with the Rays this past offseason. He’ll now go to Miami with presumably a better chance of sticking in the majors for a slightly more extended period of time, adding another live arm to a Marlins bullpen that was quietly pretty solid in 2021.
From the Rays’ perspective, they have the relief depth on paper to account for Head’s departure, and Tampa now also opens up another 40-man roster spot before Friday’s deadline to set rosters in advance of the Rule 5 draft. The Rays made another roster clearance-type of deal yesterday, sending utility infielder Mike Brosseau to the Brewers.
Miller also made his Major League debut this past season, receiving 11 plate appearances over five games. Miller was selected 36th overall in the 2017 draft, but a modest .284/.338/.360 slash line over 1759 PA in the Marlins’ system kept him from truly establishing himself as a part of the team’s future. Miller does boast plenty of speed, which has led to 119 stolen bases out of 155 chances and the defensive versatility to handle any of the three outfield positions.Leave a comment:
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Yeah but the man won 107 games with a team that was expected to win 75. He's a good manager and deserved the extension. The Giants offense was nowhere to be found in the playoffs without Belt but I'd still extend Kapler which they did because he did a great job with the team they assembled this past season.Leave a comment:
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Aaron Judge does not offer any two-headed equivocations when asked about his desire to remain with the Yankees long-term. Per MLB.com’s Bryan Hoch, Judge was pretty clear about his intentions, saying, “That would be a wish of mine, a goal of mine, to finish my career as a Yankee. If it was up to me, I would be a Yankee for the next 10 years, for sure.”
Of course, we’ve heard this sort of thing from players before. We’re not six months removed from Anthony Rizzo, Kris Bryant, and Javier Baez offering similar pull quotes about their time with the Cubs, and they’ve all now played home games outside of the Lakeview neighborhood of Chicago. As we learned from those Cubbies, the decision to stay in one uniform long-term isn’t strictly up to the player.
Granted, there’s no reason to think the Yankees would be in a position to deal Judge the way the Cubs sloughed off their stars, but he could be heading into his final season in the Bronx regardless. Judge will enter free agency after the 2022 season. And while the Yankees do not have any financial issues that should seriously threaten their ability to keep Judge, they do have a couple of hefty contracts on the books.
Gerrit Cole and Giancarlo Stanton have guaranteed contract for at least five years apiece beyond 2022, and if the winter plays out as expected, there may be another $100MM-to-$200MM deal on the books by the time spring training begins. It is largely assumed that, now that they’ve finally moved Gleyber Torres to the keystone, the Yankees will come away with one of the the winter’s top free agent shortstops,
Theoretically, reaching a long-term accord with the Yankees should be easy, though we know that’s hardly ever the case. The Yankees haven’t stayed successful by giving money away to every player that likes the cut of their jib in pinstripes.
Of course, Judge is a star by just about any measure. The 6’7″ outfielder has posted no worse than a 140 wRC+ in any season of the last five, including a 148 wRC+ mark last season. Sure, he has yet to replicate his 52 home run, 174 wRC+, 8.3 fWAR Rookie of the Year campaign that put him on the map in 2017, but in the four seasons since that breakout, Judge ranks 19th among all batters in total fWAR and tied for sixth by measure of wRC+.
Judge is also an underrated defender, an unequivocal plus in right field as well as a bit of an optical illusion because of his size. He racked up 11 defensive runs saved as a right fielder in 2021 while proving himself capable of manning the middle in a pinch. Judge played 158 innings in center, though with a mark of -2 defensive runs saved and -0.8 UZR.
The other drawback to a long-term deal for Judge is that the California native will turn 31 in April of the first year of any new deal that he signs. Judge has been durable in that he’s been a significant contributor in every season of his career. On the flip side, 2021 was just the second time Judge appeared in at least 70% of New York’s regular season games. There is risk, therefore, in signing Judge to a long-term pact, though if Judge is as enthusiastic as he seems, that calculation will certainly be part of GM Brian Cashman’s winter planning.Leave a comment:
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