Archive for Teams

A Blue Jays team without Jose Bautista feels a bit dirty. It’s theoretically possible — and, given the fact that the Blue Jays existed before Bautista donned their uniform, it’s verifiably possible, too. Yet fate seems to have conspired to reunite the bearded bringer of dingers with the Jays. Bautista is reportedly going back to Toronto after finding that his age and rejection of the qualifying offer have dampened his market far more than expected.

After at one point reportedly seeking a contract in the neighborhood of five years and $150 million, Bautista is signing for one guaranteed season at an $18 million clip, with two options that could bring the total of the deal to $60 million. Regardless of whether or not those two years get picked up, he’s beaten the initial $17.2 million qualifying offer. Mutual options are almost never exercised, of course, but Jeff Passan did mention yesterday that Bautista is turning down bigger money to come back to the Jays.

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I’ve encouraged you to believe in Keon Broxton before. In baseball-game terms, that wasn’t even very long ago. So you could accuse me here of being unoriginal, but I’ve prepared a counterargument. For one thing, it’s January, shut up. For a second thing, I bet a lot of you missed my previous summary. And for a third thing, now there’s some new information. This is a Keon Broxton article, and I’ll tell you why I think he’s already the best player on the Brewers, headed into 2017.

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Even on a deal as short as the one to which the Phillies and Michael Saunders agreed this week — he’ll reportedly get $9 million for one year and the club will have the option to re-up him at something like $11 to 14 million — two relevant questions emerge immediately. One: is Saunders healthy enough to believe in? And two: will the power he exhibited last year reappear in 2017?

Well, is he? And will it?

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For the better part of the off-season, the Dodgers and Twins have reportedly been trying to strike a fair deal for Brian Dozier. The Twins second baseman is a highly valuable player, but with only two years left of team control, he’s probably a better fit for a contender than a rebuilder, and right now, the Twins are still in the latter category. But, for whatever reason, the two sides seem to value Dozier differently, and as of last week, it appears that both teams have decided there isn’t a fit, at least not right now.

Sources: #Twins, #Dodgers at impasse on Dozier. No momentum toward deal. 1/2

— Ken Rosenthal (@Ken_Rosenthal) January 10, 2017

Impasse on Dozier does not preclude future talks, but #Twins had wanted to give Dozier heightened peace of mind on status with club. 2/2

— Ken Rosenthal (@Ken_Rosenthal) January 10, 2017

So, with Dozier potentially off the table, let’s see if we can find the Dodgers another second baseman.

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John Coppollela hasn’t been as swap-happy as Jerry Dipoto this offseason. As Dave Cameron and Jeff Sullivan have recently written, Seattle’s general manager has dominated the transaction log. That doesn’t mean Coppolella hasn’t been busy. The Atlanta GM has made several moves of his own, acquiring both oldsters — hello R.A., hola Bartolo — and a passel of youngsters.

Four of the prospects the Braves have brought on board came over from the Mariners. In late November, Coppolella and Dipoto swung a deal that brought 2014 first-round pick Alex Jackson to Atlanta in exchange for Max Povse and Rob Whalen. A few weeks later, left-hander Tyler Pike, a 2012 third-round pick, came to the Braves as the PTBNL in that transaction. Last week, Coppolella’s club moved Mallex Smith and Shae Simmons to Seattle, and got a pair of southpaws in return — 2016 fourth-round pick Thomas Burrows, and 20-year-old Brazilian Luiz Gohara.

Coppolella discussed the acquisitions of the four prospects, including a planned position switch for one of them, over the weekend.

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Coppolella on Atlanta’s previous interest in the players: “In 2016, we had Tom Burrows’ folder in a group of folders at our draft table, so we literally had our pockets picked by Seattle. In 2014, we didn’t draft until pick No. 32, and Alex Jackson was in the mix to go No. 1 overall, so we didn’t waste time discussing him, though we had admired him for years. In 2012, I remember Dom Chiti — now our Director of Pitching – had mentioned Tyler Pike because he was from Winter Haven, where Dom lives. But as a scouting department we never followed up on the player. We are happy to have him now and, ironically, the first person he met with from the Braves was Dom. Finally, when Luiz Gohara signed in August 2012, we had a couple of reports, which were very impressive, but he had already made a deal with Seattle.”

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The phrase “Keeping up with the Joneses” originated in an Arthur R. “Pop” Momand comic strip in 1913. For better than a century, the phrase has characterized the attempt by many Americans to match or exceed the assets and social status of those in close proximity to them, namely their neighbors. (Of course, now you can keep up with all the Joneses on social media.)

The Chicago Cubs have created much envy in the NL Central. They are the neighbor with the new infinity swimming pool, the shiny new luxury car parked in the three-car garage, and the remodeled kitchen complete with a $10,000 range. They had a lot of parties last summer and generally seemed quite popular.

There cannot be a greater feeling of envy toward the Cubs than in St. Louis. The Cubs are a threat to the Cardinals’ sustained excellence over the last decade, perhaps the most impressive run in the sport since the Atlanta Braves’ MLB-record 14 consecutive postseason berths in the 1990s and early 2000s.

We know the Cubs are coming off a World Series title and a 103-win regular season. The Cubs retain their core and have few weaknesses. The Cardinals won 86 games last season, missing the postseason for the first time since 2010.

With a passionate fanbase that’s unaccustomed to watching a rival neighbor accumulate such wealth, now would seem the time to act boldly and irrationally and emotionally if the Cardinals front office were ever to operate in such fashion. On the contrary, the Cardinals have been cautious, having made a total of zero 40-man roster transactions since December 12. While the Cardinals did raid the Cubs for a significant asset in Dexter Fowler, St. Louis has otherwise operated in a relatively low-key fashion this offseason.

Cardinals general manager John Mozeliak has been asked one question over and over again this offseason, MLB.com’s Jenifer Langosch reports: has he done enough to catch the Cubs?

“I always feel like it’s sort of dangerous to simply chase your neighbors,” Mozeliak said. “That phrase — ‘Keeping up with the Joneses’ — can be dangerous, right? I think the best strategy is try to build a club that you think has a chance to win your division, get to the postseason. Obviously, a lot of things have to happen along the way, and part of that’s good fortune. Part of that is playing well. You look back to last year, some of those things we just didn’t do that well.”

By taking on too much debt, by making extravagant purchases, and trading too much of tomorrow in a quest for immediate satisfaction, Keeping up With the Joneses can have dire consequences. The Cardinals, probably wisely, are apparently not willing to try and keep up with the Cubs via a dramatic and bold offseason. It’s perhaps why the Cardinals remained on the “periphery” of the Chris Sale talks, according to Jon Heyman. Moreover, baseball is crazy and unpredictable. The Cubs might suffer some serious regression in 2017.

But right now the Cubs are a heavy favorite and the Cardinals – and every other team in the division – have a significant gap to bridge.

So what to do?

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I recently took a vacation, which meant I recently missed some Mariners trades. The trades weren’t conditional upon me being somewhere else; they were conditional upon the passage of some amount of time. The Mariners subtracted from the pitching staff to add to the outfield. They then subtracted from the outfield to add to the pitching staff. Later, they subtracted from the minors to add Mallex Smith, then they subtracted from Mallex Smith to add Drew Smyly. I was asked last Friday why the latest pair of moves didn’t go down as a three-team maneuver. I don’t know, but, this way, Jerry Dipoto gets to double-add to his tally.

In general, baseball fans are mostly preoccupied with the goings-on surrounding their own favorite teams. Plain and simple, it can be hard to know much about everything else that’s taking place. Dipoto, though, is transcending that, developing an active trader reputation that fewer and fewer can ignore. It’s become a punchline, Dipoto sometimes resembling a caricature of himself. It’s tempting to compare Dipoto to a hummingbird, but as luck would have it, a hummingbird has recently taken up temporary residence outside our bedroom window. A picture:

Even a hummingbird can sometimes be seen sitting still.

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It’s no secret the Royals have been facing a challenging offseason. They came in with so many critical players entering their contract years, and they’re also a lower-budget operation with a mediocre farm system. A month and a half ago, I wrote an article entitled “The Royals’ Last Ride.” Some sort of transition appeared inevitable. The Royals would need to work incredibly hard if they wanted to have a chance to win down the line, without sacrificing too much from 2017.

Now, there’s plenty to like about how the transition has gone. The overall situation is still difficult, to be sure, but the Royals got four years of Jorge Soler for one year of Wade Davis. They got four years of Nate Karns for one year of Jarrod Dyson. And now, maybe most significantly, the team has extended Danny Duffy, with a five-year deal covering four years of would-be free agency. Duffy is the best starting pitcher in the organization. He has it in him to be one of the better starting pitchers in the league.

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After having typically appeared in the very famous pages of Baseball Think Factory, Dan Szymborski’s ZiPS projections have been released at FanGraphs the past few years. The exercise continues this offseason. Below are the projections for the Miami Marlins. Szymborski can be found at ESPN and on Twitter at @DSzymborski.

Other Projections: Arizona / Atlanta / Boston / Chicago AL / Chicago NL / Cleveland / Detroit / Houston / Kansas City / Los Angeles AL / Los Angeles NL / Milwaukee / Minnesota / New York AL / St. Louis / San Diego / San Francisco / Seattle / Tampa Bay / Toronto / Washington.

Batters
In every season from 2011 to 2014, right fielder Giancarlo Stanton (484 PA, 3.8 zWAR) produced the highest WAR total among Miami’s field players. In 2015, he produced the second-highest WAR total on the club — less due to his own shortcomings, however, and more to the .383 BABIP that allowed Dee Gordon (606, 2.1) to record a career-best offensive season. Stanton was almost unassailably the club’s top position player for a period of five years.

The 2016 campaign marked a departure for Stanton, however, from the top of the club’s leaderboard. Limited by injury to just 470 plate appearances, Statnton also produced the worst offensive season of his career. He finished sixth on the team in wins. At the same time, Christian Yelich (638 PA, 3.8) recorded his second four-win season over the last three years. Now the two receive the same win projection, is the point of these whole two paragraphs.

One note: Yelich is located at center field on the depth-chart image below, Marcell Ozuna (602, 2.5) in left — because that seems like the club’s probable alignment in 2017. The two are projected at the opposite positions, however. Generally speaking, there’s about a 10-run difference in the positional adjustment between left and center over the course of a full season. That would render Yelich (projected for +6 runs in left) about a -4 defender in center; Ozuna (projected for -3 runs in center), a +7 fielder in left.

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The signing of Eric Thames and the projections subsequently produced for him represent two of the more interesting, if lower-profile, developments of the offseason. Since Thames took his quick left-handed swing across the Pacific, he’s become one of the top sluggers in the hitter-friendly Korea Baseball Organization.

If you have 30 free minutes you can watch all 47 of his 2015 home runs thanks to YouTube:

Despite having already played in the majors, Thames is something of a mystery, a curiosity, in transitioning from a foreign professional league. If the projections are accurate, however – and his Davenport translations are pretty close to other, former international unknowns like Jose Abreu, Yoenis Cespedes and Jung Ho Kang – then the Brewers have themselves a steal.

In the cases both of Cespedes and Kang, who played in foreign leagues that draw fewer scouts, analytics played a considerable role in the decision to sign them. Analytics and projections also played a significant part in the Thames signing, as Brewers GM David Stearns told David Laurila in the latter’s Sunday notes this weekend.

Kang was the first KBO hitter to make the jump directly to the majors. There were no direct comparisons. But plenty of South Korean stars had played in the Japan’s Nippon Professional Baseball Organization, so the Pirates looked at their production in Japan and then studied the more sizable sample of NPB position players who have played in the majors.

Back in 2013, the A’s were also creative in projecting Cespedes, then a trailblazing Cuban defector, as detailed by Ben Reiter in Sports Illustrated.

“[Farhan] Zaidi built a model that analyzed not just the grades the scouts had given to Cespedes on the usual eight-point scale, but also the scouts themselves. Say three guys have a six power on him, three guys have seven power on him. What kind of minor leaguers or major leaguers do those guys have those grades on?”

The A’s did not miss a chance to scout Cespedes when access was available. The Pirates did send scouts over to evaluate Kang in addition to video analysis (though Kang’s off-the-field issues were apparently not discovered). Still, recent success stories of players signed from foreign pro leagues are analytics-heavy because they’ve had to be. There are few scouting resources committed to South Korea and Japan. Cuba has been difficult to scout due to political reasons.

But what are MLB clubs missing at the professional and amateur levels by not having more of a scouting presence in places like South Korea? And why are such areas not heavily staffed?

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