Every team in the American League East came into the offseason with unsettled situations behind the plate. The Orioles have been trying to figure out whether nor not to deal Matt Wieters. The Yankees made a huge addition by adding Brian McCann. The Blue Jays just made their own improvement by replacing J.P. Arencibia with Dioner Navarro. That left the Red Sox and Rays, each of whom already had a nifty backstop, but a nifty backstop incapable of handling the bulk of the workload. That is, after the Rays re-signed Jose Molina, anyway. Tuesday, the teams have made their additions, with the Sox picking up A.J. Pierzynski and the Rays dealing for Ryan Hanigan. Jarrod Saltalamacchia’s still looking for a home, but he’ll at least be going to a different division.

Initially, this was going to be a straight-up comparison of Pierzynski and Hanigan, since they have few things in common, but one important thing shared. Then reality made things more complicated, with Hanigan being part of a three-team trade, and with Hanigan agreeing to a three-year contract. No longer is this just about 2014. But despite the complicating circumstances, I do still think it’s worth examining why Boston and Tampa Bay did what they did, and how the moves are pretty alike.

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Most rumors, of course, are nonsense, or at least things that won’t come true. We all know this to be the case, but a lot of the time, it’s difficult to tell from the outside what’s part of the signal and what’s part of the noise. Then there are the rumors that are just immediately, obviously ridiculous. This is the way I choose to feel about the chatter that the A’s have strong interest in Nelson Cruz — Cruz looks like the opposite of a free-agent bargain, he’s going to cost a draft pick, and the A’s have a full outfield. There’s no part of my rational mind that would link Nelson Cruz to Billy Beane’s ballclub. Not one bit of it seems logical, so the rumor’s dismissed.

I had a similar reaction when I first saw word that the A’s were interested in trading for Jim Johnson. Johnson, like Cruz, has his uses, but he’s a Proven Closer due to make eight figures next season. Closers tend to be the most overpaid players on the market, so I didn’t see Beane falling for this, in reality. Then Beane actually traded for Johnson, giving the Orioles Jemile Weeks and a little bit else. The A’s deliberately acquired an eight-figure Proven Closer, and now the more I think about how it happened, the more I see how it makes some sense after all.

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J.P. Arencibia was the kind of bad that finds you. A year ago, the Blue Jays looked like competitor darlings, primarily because of a host of additions. Arencibia was hardly one of the guys to watch, and then before long it became apparent the Blue Jays were hardly one of the teams to watch. It didn’t take long for me to concentrate my viewing elsewhere, but still, I kept hearing about Arencibia’s death spiral. You didn’t have to follow the Blue Jays to be aware of Arencibia’s inability to get on base, and his final line was something borderline legendary. Arencibia hurt me, without my having watched. I weep for those who did.

Now Arencibia’s time in Toronto is just about up. From the free-agent market, the Jays have snagged Dioner Navarro for two years and $8 million. With Josh Thole as the backup, the Jays will now either trade Arencibia or non-tender him, leaving him a free agent. Unsurprisingly, league interest is reportedly limited. Teams won’t fall all over themselves to get a guy whose most recent OBP was lower than Pedro Alvarez’s most recent batting average. From here, it’s unclear where Arencibia’s career is going to go.

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While many of you probably spent the long holiday weekend with the family you already had, the Twins spent theirs building a new one, signing Ricky Nolasco for four years before signing Phil Hughes for three. While this post is being published much later than the reports, many haven’t been looking at their computers, and these transactions are too interesting to outright ignore. Without stepping on Mike Petriello’s toes, these moves are notable for a variety of reasons.

(1) The Twins aren’t good. Obviously, the Twins aren’t good, and while the Twins might become good in the near or less-near future, they’re not good now, and their division already has talented teams, and free-agent acquisitions are usually short-term improvements. You don’t usually expect lousy ballclubs to make multi-year commitments on the market. Not like this.

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Since 2008, PITCHf/x has collected six years of detailed pitch information. A raw search I just did shows 1,991 pitches over that span thrown at at least 100 miles per hour. Of those, 469, or just under 24%, were thrown in 2013. That one season represents just under 17% of the data. That’s…kind of interesting, and a little bit meaningful, but I probably shouldn’t have started with this. I probably should have started with this:

This year’s postseason was littered with hard-throwing starters and relievers. It seemed like bullpens were trotting out hard-throwing reliever after hard-throwing reliever, and if you’re at all active on Twitter, you might’ve noticed a few conversations taking place among certain big-leaguers. Prominent among them was Brandon McCarthy, who noted a few times that the landscape didn’t used to look like this, even just a few years ago. The feeling now is that every team has a handful of flamethrowers. The feeling used to be that a flamethrower was something special, something extraordinary to be cherished. The feeling, basically, is that yesterday’s 92 is today’s 96.

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The official 2013 National League Most Valuable Player is Andrew McCutchen, who was terrific. From what anyone can tell, he’s a very deserving winner, but the voting still came with a few little controversies. For one, Paul Goldschmidt didn’t pick up a single first-place vote, and all season he was incredibly clutch. For two, a pair of first-place votes went to Yadier Molina, both of them coming out of St. Louis. One of those writers put Matt Carpenter second, and it’s easy to write that off as simple bias. If you’re the only people to vote for a guy, and it’s a guy on your hometown team, and everyone else votes for another guy, that’s going to be pretty conspicuous.

My first impression, though, was that, even if they followed the wrong process, they might well have stumbled upon the right answer. Or at least, a good answer. Those people in St. Louis see Molina more than anybody else, and Molina, more than anybody else, seems to have value that’s tricky to measure. Catchers are hard, and Molina might be the best one, and he’s a leader who has the pitching staff’s full respect. Pitchers don’t shake Molina off. They say he’s the heart and soul of the ballclub, and I’m open to the idea that a bunch of Molina’s real value is basically hidden in other numbers. But I wasn’t satisfied with just a belief.

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As expected, Miguel Cabrera just won the American League Most Valuable Player award, and he won it by a landslide. Compared to a year ago, Cabrera gained a first-place vote. Compared to a year ago, Trout lost a first-place vote. Things played out the same, precisely because things played out the same, and so no one’s shocked by the outcome. Everyone has had his or her own opinion, but last year set the precedent and there was no way this year things were going to flip. For some of you, it’s the right outcome. For others, it’s the wrong outcome. My belief is that it’s the wrong outcome, but right now I’m left considering three things — two facts, and one line of speculation.

One factual consideration: Trout and Cabrera were both absolutely amazing. Cabrera trailed off, but for understandable reasons. Trout didn’t play for a contender, for understandable reasons. Trout just posted the highest AL WAR of the past decade. Cabrera just posted the highest AL wRC+ of the past decade. In a few ways, both players are coming off seasons that were historically great, so as much as this announcement feels like one guy beating another, this vote decided between the best of the best. The right response isn’t to celebrate Cabrera only, or to put Trout down. It’s to count our blessings that these players are alive today and performing as they do. The voting recognized the best players in the AL, and you can appreciate more than one guy at a time.

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It was my initial intent to write something about Tuesday’s trade rumor that involved Domonic Brown and Jose Bautista. The rumor, presented straight-up, was absolutely fascinating for the implied processes and implications. But, two things: Firstly, Dave wrote a couple thousand words on the rumor, touching on a lot of what needed to be touched on. Secondly, the rumor was thoroughly discredited Wednesday. That’s not to say the teams haven’t had talks — which isn’t to say such a deal is impossible — but it’s pretty evident nothing’s going to happen soon. No sense writing more about something that’s purely hypothetical.

But something within Dave’s post grabbed my attention. Brown just had himself a breakout season at 25 years old. The way we think of these things means Brown has achieved a new level, and going forward he’s going to be an excellent hitter. Dave presented a few counter-examples — young players who had breakout seasons in 2012 before largely taking a step back. The suggestion is that breakout seasons might not mean what we think they mean. Dave’s sample size was woefully small, but I wanted to dig a little deeper. It was a point potentially most intriguing.

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Just a few years ago, in 2011, the two Most Valuable Player awards were given to Justin Verlander and Ryan Braun. They were fine choices, both, but just according to WAR, the two best players in baseball that year were Jacoby Ellsbury and Matt Kemp. Ellsbury, at 27, was a nine-win everyday center fielder. Kemp, at 26, was an eight-win everyday center fielder. Both of them had the look of long-term franchise players, but both stumbled in 2012 and still haven’t returned to that previous level. Now, during the 2013-2014 MLB offseason, both Ellsbury and Kemp appear to be available. And they are, naturally, two of the biggest available names.

Ellsbury, of course, is available as a free agent, and Scott Boras has drawn parallels to the Carl Crawford contract. Ellsbury could be looking at something like six years and $130-140 million. Kemp is available as a trade target, as the Dodgers are said to be shopping Kemp, Crawford, and Andre Ethier in order to better accommodate Yasiel Puig and clear some payroll space. Kemp’s under contract for another six years at $128 million. The Kemp and Ellsbury money could be very similar. Somebody is going to pay that amount to Ellsbury on purpose. Kemp, though, probably can’t be moved without the Dodgers eating some cash. As similar as the two players might look, it’s probable that, at this point, Matt Kemp’s trade value is negative.

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