Offseason Notes: All the Options

Japanese sensation Yu Darvish pitched in the NPB playoffs on Friday (i.e. Saturday). More info here.

Table of Contents
Here’s the table of contents for today’s edition of Offseason Notes.

1. Assorted Headlines
2. SCOUT Leaderboards: Arizona Fall League
3. Projection: ZiPS for New York (AL), Boston, Chicago (NL), Philadelphia

Assorted Headlines
Brewers Decline Options on K-Rod and (More Importantly) Betancourt
The Milwaukee Brewers declined Sunday to exercise the 2012 options for both Francisco Rodriguez and Yuniesky Betancourt, MLB.com’s Adam McCalvy reports. Rodriguez would have been owed $17.5 million in 2012; Betancourt, $6 million. The pair’s buyouts were $4 and $2 million, respectively. While the Brewers will no doubt miss the offensive production of Prince Fielder, replacing Yuniesky Betancourt with someone who’s not Yuniesky Betancourt will go some way towards mitigating the loss of Fielder.

Ramirez Declines His Side of Option
While the Cubs exercised their half of Aramis Ramirez’s $16 million mutual option, the third baseman declined his portion, Gordon Wittenmyer of the Chicago Sun-Times reports. Ramirez was worth 3.6 wins this season — or, roughly about a quarter of what future superstar Marquez Smith will produce in 2012*.

*Likely not true, although the author does entirely endorse Smith.

Indians to Decline Sizemore’s Option
The Cleveland Indians are likely to decline Grady Sizemore’s $9 million option, MLB.com’s Jordan Bastian reports. Sizemore, who posted the fourth-highest WAR in the league between 2005 and ’08, has dealt with considerable injuries in the meantime and was barely above replacement level in 295 plate appearances this season. Our man Eric Seidman wrote about Sizemore and the Indians just this morning.

Red Sox Exercise Scutaro’s 2012 Option
The Red Sox announced Sunday that Marco Scutaro’s $6 million club option had been picked up, MLB.com’s Evan Drellich reports. While Jed Lowrie began the season impressively, it was Scutaro who ultimately provided greater production at shortstop, hitting .299/.358/.423 (.312 BABIP), 110 wRC+ in 445 plate appearances, and finishing with a 2.9 WAR.

SCOUT Leaderboards: Arizona Fall League
Batting Leaderboard
Here is the SCOUT batting leaderboard for the Arizona Fall League. SCOUT represents an attempt to derive something meaningful from small samples and is the average of a player’s standard deviations from the AFL mean in three important (and regressed) stats: walk rate, strikeout rate, and home-run rate. (Click here for more on SCOUT.)

Name	Org	PA	xBB%	xK%	xHR%	BBz	Kz	HRz	SCOUT
Robbie Grossman	PIT	101	13.5%	15.0%	3.8%	0.68	0.67	0.44	0.60
Wil Myers	KC	72	14.4%	18.8%	3.1%	0.87	0.10	0.14	0.37
Jefry Marte	NYN	62	11.9%	16.8%	3.2%	0.37	0.41	0.18	0.32
Michael Choice	OAK	58	10.6%	18.0%	4.2%	0.12	0.23	0.61	0.32
Joe Panik	SF	55	10.8%	14.4%	2.6%	0.15	0.77	-0.07	0.28
Nolan Arenado	COL	76	7.2%	13.6%	3.7%	-0.56	0.88	0.40	0.24
Darin Ruf	PHI	50	10.5%	17.0%	3.3%	0.10	0.37	0.22	0.23
Jedd Gyorko	SD	57	11.2%	18.1%	3.2%	0.22	0.21	0.20	0.21
Anthony Seratelli	KC	48	12.6%	18.6%	2.7%	0.51	0.14	-0.05	0.20
Bryce Harper	WAS	61	10.5%	18.2%	3.5%	0.09	0.19	0.32	0.20

Notes
• Pirate outfield prospect Robbie Grossman has separated himself even more definitively from the rest of the AFL since our most recent look at the AFL last Monday. His worst individual SCOUT rating (0.44 for home runs) is still better than the next-best player’s (Myers’) overall rating.
• Giant infield prospect, 21-year-old (as of yesterday) Joe Panik, makes his first appearance on the batting leaderboard, largely by virtue of his excellent contact skills: in 55 plate appearances, Panik has walked seven times but only struck out three. His profile was similar at Low-A Salem-Kaizer this year. In 304 plate appearances for the Volacanoes, Panik walked 28 times (9.2%) versus only 25 strikeouts (8.2%). Though he played shortstop exclusively this season, Baseball America notes that his arm is fringy for the position, and that he might be more of an offensively oriented second base-type.

Pitching Leaderboard
For pitchers, SCOUT is the average of a player’s standard deviations from the AFL mean in (regressed) strikeout and walk rate.

Name	Org	G	GS	IP	BF	xK%	xBB%	Kz	BBz	SCOUT
Bradley Boxberger	CIN	8	0	10.1	43	25.8%	9.1%	0.90	0.00	0.45
Miguel De Los Santos	TEX	6	3	17.0	71	25.5%	9.7%	0.87	-0.13	0.37
Anthony Bass	SD	4	3	16.0	66	23.5%	8.4%	0.58	0.15	0.37
Kevin Munson	ARI	10	0	10.2	40	23.6%	8.6%	0.59	0.09	0.34
Chris Carpenter	CHN	8	0	10.2	41	23.4%	8.8%	0.58	0.06	0.32
Forrest Snow	SEA	6	1	10.2	35	22.9%	8.9%	0.50	0.04	0.27
Evan Reed	FLA	7	0	9.2	38	22.5%	9.0%	0.44	0.02	0.23
Aaron Loup	TOR	8	0	12.1	49	21.0%	8.5%	0.23	0.13	0.18
Tyler Lyons	STL	4	4	14.2	66	21.5%	9.1%	0.31	0.00	0.15
Terry Doyle	CHA	5	5	19.2	69	20.5%	8.5%	0.16	0.12	0.14

Notes
• In 20 minor-league appearances this year — 19 of them as a starter — Texas left-hander, 23-year-old Miguel De Los Santos struck out 142 of the 401 batters he faced (35.4%). Both Baseball America and John Sickels laud his changeup, while the former publication notes that his fastball sits in the low-90s and is decent, but not spectacular. Walks have been a problem for De Los Santos: he walked over 11% of the batters he faced in the minors this year, and has done the same to 14.1% of opposing hitters in the AFL so far.

Projection: ZiPS for NYA, BOS, CHN, and PHI
ZiPS Projections
Dan Szymborski has begun publishing his ZiPS projections for the 2012 season. Always shameless, Szymborski has started by shamelessly publishing the projections for baseball’s four most excitable baseballing markets. Below are some of the notable ones. (All numbers assume major league competition. OPS+ and ERA+ are park-adjusted. Click on each team name for complete team projections.)

New York (AL)
• Jesus Montero, C, 22: .271/.333/.486, 112 OPS+. Montero gets a “fair” rating as a catcher, which seems (ahem) fair. No catcher among these initial four teams approaches Montero’s offensive upside.
• David Robertson, Mariano Rivera, Rafael Soriano: 146, 143, 142 ERA+, respectively. Only two Yankee starters are projected to finish with ERA+s above the league average (for starters) of 96; however, the back end of the bullpen appears to be well equipped at this early stage.

Boston
• Adrian Gonzalez, 1B, 30: .297/.384/.526, 138 OPS+. Gonzalez’s OPS+ is the highest projected by ZiPS by far among these first four teams.
• Clay Buchholz, SP, 27: 116.2 IP, 83 K, 45 BB, 11 HR, 122 ERA+. Buchholz’s projected ERA+ outpaces Cole Hamels‘ (120) and Matt Garza‘s (116) — and approaches CC Sabathia’s (126).
• Chris Balcom-Miller, SP, 23: 111.1 IP, 71 K, 43 BB, 11 HR, 92 ERA+. Balcom-Miller, who features a heavy-heavy sinker, finishes above Felix Doubront, Tim Wakefield, John Lackey, Kyle Weiland, and Andrew Miller per ERA+. He was second overall on 2011’s preseason Team Joy Squad, and made his way pretty effortlessly through High- and Double-A this year.

Chicago (NL)
• Carlos Pena, 1B, 34: .230/.355/.480, 119 OPS+. Pena hit .225/.357/.462 (.267 BABIP), 119 wRC+ in 2011, so this projection isn’t particularly ridiculous, turns out. Pena’s a free agent this offseason, and whichever teams signs him is likely to end up with some value, per ZiPS.
• Brett Jackson, CF, 23: .254/.335/.419, 99 OPS+. Not only does this projection suggest that Cub prospect Jackson is likely to be a more productive major leaguer than both Tony Campana (72 OPS+) and Tyler Colvin (81 OPS+), but that he’ll also be more valuable than Marlon Byrd (94 OPS+). Byrd, for his part, is still likely to provide surplus value at only $6.5 millions in 2012.

Philadelphia
• Roy Halladay and Cliff Lee: 209.2 and 210.0 IP, respectively, both 140 ERA+. ZiPS basically considers Halladay and Lee opposite-handed versions of each other, with the latter striking out a few more batters and the former allowing a couple fewer walks and one fewer home run.
• John Mayberry, CF, 28: .246/.300/.427, 93 OPS+. Mayberry is the player most likely to take the injured Ryan Howard’s (117 OPS+) place at first base over the first couple months of the 2012 season. He (i.e. Mayberry) batted .273/.341/.513 (.293 BABIP), 133 wRC+ in 2011, but ZiPS doesn’t see him approaching Howard’s level of production.