If there’s been one fairly easy prognostication this winter, it’s that the Red Sox are going to sign one of the expensive free agent hitters available in this class. Dave Dombrowski has historically not been shy about spending big to upgrade his roster, and has also shown a propensity for building rosters around power. The Red Sox ranked 27th in home runs last year. This is probably not something he wants to repeat.
The other day, FanGraphs alum and MLB.com stalwart Mike Petriello looked at possible fits for Mike Moustakas. This author agrees with many of the potential landing spots.
Petriello boiled down the list to nine teams that could use Moustakas:
Giants
Pirates
Mets
Cardinals
Angels
Yankees
Royals
Phillies
Braves
Due either to payroll considerations (the Pirates) or their projected finish in 2018 (the Braves, Phillies, and Royals), a number of the clubs here might appear to be unlikely candidates to court Moustakas, although I argued on Monday that at least one of those teams ought to consider signing Moustakas.
Peter Moylan is known for being from Australia as much as anything. That and the tattoos and the fun-loving personality. The fact that he’s a pretty decent relief pitcher tends to get lost in the shuffle. It shouldn’t. The 38-year-old side-winder has just four career saves, but he’s 24-9 with a 3.00 ERA since debuting with the Atlanta Braves in 2006. This past season, he made a league-leading 79 appearances with the Kansas City Royals.
Moylan originally came over in 1996 when the Minnesota Twins signed him at the age of 17. That didn’t pan out. After two tumultuous years of Rookie ball, Moylan found himself back in Australia working day jobs. Unable to cut the mustard as a pitching prospect, he became a laborer, a glass installer, a pharmaceutical salesman. Baseball became more or less a hobby.
He turned the hobby into a second chance. Moylan attracted the attention of Atlanta scouts while pitching in the 2006 World Baseball Classic and was inked to a make-good contract. He did just that. Despite a plethora of surgeries — back, elbow, shoulder — he’s still wearing a big-league uniform a decade later. Does that mean he’s a household name down under? Not so much.
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Moylan on making his mark in MLB: “Am I surprised I’m still playing? No, but I feel like I’m playing with house money. In everyone’s eyes, I was never going to be a guy who comes over here and goes very far. I was 27 when I was a rookie. I came out of the World Baseball Classic and it was more of ‘Let’s take a chance on this guy.’ The fact that I’ve turned that chance into an 11-year career… I’m really grateful.
Pitch clocks are likely coming to an MLB stadium near you in 2018, according to a report by Buster Olney from earlier this month.
There’s a practical reason for the introduction of the clock and for the commissioner’s interest in it: the game keeps slowing down. In fact, in the pitch-tracking era — and likely in the history of the sport — the pace of game has never been slower than it was in 2017.
While pace of game and time of game aren’t entirely the same thing, they’re certainly connected, and the average length of game was a record three hours and five minutes last season. That’s up from three hours and 42 seconds in 2016.
| 12:04 |
: Happy Wednesday, everyone.
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| 12:05 |
: I’m gettting a little bit of a late start today, but we’ll fire this thing up in a couple of minutes.
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| 12:11 |
: Will Stanton be traded by the Winter Meetings and too what Team?
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| 12:11 |
: Since we’re dealing with a guy who has never run a team before, it’s hard to know what Jeter is going to do.
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| 12:11 |
: My guess is the teams that are interested will eventually tell the Marlins that they’re moving on if they don’t get an answer.
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| 12:12 |
: And I wouldn’t be shocked if that happened next week.
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The Rays need stars. It’s all well and good to come up with a bunch of league-average plugins, but without stars, a team is stuck. A team is trapped, being okay without being good, and there’s a reason people are beginning to wonder whether the Rays should tear it all down. Without enough stars, what chance do they have of getting over the top? What chance do they have of keeping up with the Red Sox and Yankees? There’s a certain amount of appeal in pressing the reset button. And no one could blame the Rays, given the reality of their circumstances.
I’m not sure if the Rays will throw in the towel. They understand the process better than most, and they’re forever thinking about the longer-term, but conceding the present is never easy. It’s a major decision that asks an awful lot of the roster and the fan base. So maybe the Rays will blow it up, or maybe the Rays will tinker. Should they opt to keep trying, that could reflect organizational confidence in the development of Blake Snell.
Dennis Sarfate is now 36 years old, and he hasn’t thrown a pitch in the majors since 2009. In terms of just the general profile, fans of every team have experience with their own Dennis Sarfates. It’s maybe the most familiar reliever profile there is: hard-throwing righty who doesn’t throw strikes. Most of the time, those pitchers don’t blossom. When they’re in the minors, they’re viewed as future closers, but the strikes never come, and they bounce around on waivers. They get replaced. There are always replacements.
Sarfate blossomed. He didn’t do it in the majors, nor did he do it with a major-league affiliate. You might argue that Sarfate blossomed quietly. But in fact, that would reflect a biased perspective, because Sarfate went and became a dominant reliever in Japan. Sarfate was so good he was just voted as his league’s MVP, and although it’s not often the true MVP works out of a bullpen, the results send a message. Pitching in another league, Sarfate has turned into something overwhelming. He set Japan’s single-season record for saves, and he worked three innings in the decisive game of the championship. I used to make fun of Sarfate, when I was younger and he was bad. Sarfate now has maximized his talent. He might be the best reliever available.
In the midst of a slow beginning to the offseason, the big slugger in Miami keeps hitting homers — at least when it comes to providing content. Even after I made the case for acquiring Giancarlo Stanton — particularly for a team like the Giants — and Craig Edwards pointed out how an opt-out lowers Stanton’s value, the NL MVP remains a source of inspiration. Because, while all of those posts regarding Stanton feature assumptions about his ability to produce years from now, none of them focus on how well or poorly he’ll age, specifically. How he ages, though, is super important to how one thinks about his contract. It’s a matter worth unpacking further, in other words.
Yesterday, I suggested the Blue Jays and Cardinals should consider making a swap centered around Josh Donaldson. Unsurprisingly, many of the comments felt the return for a true superstar was less than it should be. Historically, the public expectation of what elite players will return in trade is less than they actually bring back when traded. But beyond just a difference in expected market value for one year of an elite player, I think that the Jays might want to consider that, if things go south this year, they’ll be tasked with trading a third baseman in a buyer’s market.
Let’s start by just looking at the teams that we can reasonably expect to be buyers this summer. There are 10 teams that currently project for 84+ wins in 2018; here are their third base situations.
“This is maybe the most unique circumstance in baseball that I can recall. It is all about how you as a city, as an organization and as human beings appeal to an individual, rather than the final paycheck. In my lifetime, that’s really never been a thing.”
This author certainly cannot remember a more interesting courtship in the history of free agency. Once Shohei Ohtani is officially available — he’s expected to be posted Friday or Saturday after an owner’s vote on the posting agreement — he will have 21 days to make a decision. After that, the world will wait. Teams will recruit.
That recruiting effort became more interesting over the weekend, as Ohtani’s, agent, Nez Balelo of CAA Baseball, sent something of an exam to all 30 clubs, a development first reported by The Associated Press.
