Ben Lindbergh and Meg Rowley banter about a packed few days of post-lockout action, including news about the zombie runner and a ball-strike challenge system, Fernando Tatis Jr.’s fractured wrist and motorcycle mayhem, Pete Alonso‘s close call, Mike Trout’s vetoed position change, the Yankees and Mets potentially losing unvaxxed players in home games, and how nice it is to talk about non-lockout-related news. Then they discuss transactions, including the Braves’ bittersweet decision to move on from Freddie Freeman by acquiring and extending Matt Olson, the prospects the A’s got back, why Freeman’s departure isn’t like the Mookie Betts trade, the Reds’ trades with the Twins and Mariners, the difference (if any) between the Athletics’ and Reds’ teardowns, the Twins-Yankees trade involving Josh Donaldson, Isiah Kiner-Falefa, Ben Rortvedt, Gary Sánchez, and Gio Urshela, a taxonomy of Yankees Beef Boys, and what the Twins are doing, as well as moves involving Chris Bassitt, Yusei Kikuchi, Nelson Cruz, Andrew McCutchen, Carlos Rodón, Clayton Kershaw, Kurt Suzuki, and Willians Astudillo.

Audio intro: Ozzy Osbourne, “Zombie Stomp”
Audio outro: The Bats, “Busy”

Link to report about zombie runner
Link to Tatis news
Link to Alonso truck video
Link to story on pickup accidents
Link to Trout’s position story
Link to NYC vaccination story
Link to Judge video
Link to daylight saving time story
Link to Olson trade post
Link to Oakland prospects post
Link to story about Olson’s strikeouts
Link to Olson extension post
Link to data on Freeman comps
Link to WS winner roster research
Link to Mariners-Reds trade post
Link to BP on the Mariners-Reds trade
Link to Yankees-Twins trade post
Link to Rortvedt muscles story
Link to Cole-Donaldson beef story
Link to Rob Liefeld drawings
Link to Gray trade post
Link to Gleeman on the Twins trades
Link to Dan on 12-team-playoff odds
Link to current FanGraphs playoff odds
Link to Cruz signing post
Link to McCutchen signing post
Link to Kikuchi signing post
Link to Bassitt trade post
Link to Kershaw signing post
Link to Suzuki signing post
Link to FanGraphs trade posts
Link to FanGraphs FA signing posts

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If you think back through the mists of time to last October, the Braves had one calling card on their march to the World Series: a bullpen that answered the bell day after day and either kept them in games or closed the door, depending on the situation. The core four members of that bullpen – Will Smith, Tyler Matzek, Luke Jackson, and A.J. Minter – will return, but some peripheral members of the team’s pitching staff left in free agency, and you can always use more pitching. To that end, Atlanta signed Collin McHugh today:

#Braves Sign RHP Collin McHugh: pic.twitter.com/MjLGaejG0h

— Atlanta Braves (@Braves) March 15, 2022

As far as I’m concerned, the terms of the deal – two years and $10 million, with an additional team option for $5 million net of buyout – are an incredible deal for the defending champions. McHugh was one of the best relievers in baseball last year on a rate basis, and he’s getting less this year than Brad Hand, who bounced through three teams on his way to a below-replacement-level season.

I could just tell you that McHugh looks like a good bet to provide strong relief work, but I’ll do slightly better than that. As Jon Tayler noted in our free agent preview, McHugh made one key change to his pitch mix in 2021: he rediscovered an old friend. He threw his cutter 33% of his time, a rate he hadn’t approached since he was a full-time starter in 2016. In addition to that, he maxed out on slider usage; he threw it 52.9% of the time, by far a career high. He was essentially a cutter/slider pitcher, with the occasional four-seamer mixed in for the element of surprise.
Read the rest of this entry »

It would be fun, if you were running a team, to go out and sign the best available player at every position where you had even a specter of a question. Need a shortstop? Call Carlos Correa. First baseman? Freddie Freeman awaits. Second baseman? Science now allows us to regrow and clone Rogers Hornsby. If you’re spending at the completely fake top end of the market that I just made up, you might as well spring for the very best available.

Sadly, the real world doesn’t quite work that way. For one, teams don’t have infinite money; more importantly, cloning and reanimating technology doesn’t exist yet unless you’re interested in making Scottish sheep. Even good teams have to sign players who aren’t perennial MVP contenders, or even perennial All Stars. The Dodgers signed Jake Lamb and Hanser Alberto this week, and the White Sox signed Josh Harrison. None will be the best player on their team. None will be an MVP frontrunner. All three are interesting fits that will help their teams, though.
Read the rest of this entry »

The Atlanta Braves have decisively answered the questions about their newly acquired first baseman’s future with the team. On Tuesday, they signed Matt Olson to an eight-year, $168 million extension that will keep him with the club through the end of the 2029 season.

Olson still had two years of arbitration remaining, so the deal isn’t quite at the level he likely would have gotten as a free agent.

Breakdown on Olson: $15M in 2022, $21M in ‘23, $22M from ‘24 to ‘29. This is an extension, not a free-agent deal. Olson had two years of arbitration remaining. Gets roughly $140M to $145M in free-agent years.

— Ken Rosenthal (@Ken_Rosenthal) March 15, 2022

The speed with which the Braves signed Olson to an extension suggests that they wanted to avoid the sort of uncertainty they experienced with Freddie Freeman as his own long-term deal approached its expiration last fall. Read the rest of this entry »

Last year, the Brewers, buoyed by their phenomenal pitching staff, easily won the National League Central in what was their fourth consecutive postseason appearance. But those four playoff teams all had the same flaw, one that led to October frustration: a weak offense that struggled to score runs consistently. The Brewers 2018 roster was the last unit to post a wRC+ at or above league average (they were right at 100); since then, they’ve put up marks of 97, 89, and 91. To address those run scoring issues, the Brewers have been focused on adding some firepower to their lineup this offseason. They traded for Hunter Renfroe and Mike Brosseau before the owners’ lockout, and on Monday, they reportedly brought Andrew McCutchen into the fold. (The details of his deal have not been disclosed as of publication.)

From 2009-17, McCutchen made a name for himself as a member of the division-rival Pirates. Traded before the 2018 season, he spent time that year with the Giants and Yankees before signing a three-year, $50 million deal with the Phillies prior to the ’19 season. He accumulated 2.5 WAR during his Phillies tenure, a stretch that saw him deal with a torn ACL and the pandemic. Entering his age-35 season, McCutchen has clearly declined from his peak, but he should continue to provide solid production for the Brewers as they shore up their lineup.

Last season, McCutchen posted an almost aesthetically perfect .222/.334/.444 slash line that ended up being seven percent better than league average. A career 12.2% walk rate gives him a solid offensive floor and his power production bounced back a bit after a slight dip in 2020. His plate discipline is a clear strength that hasn’t deteriorated. His 18.6% chase rate was the seventh lowest among all qualified batters last year. He did just post the highest strikeout rate of his career, with a corresponding jump in his swinging strike rate (up to 10%). But those additional strikeouts weren’t the result of poor swing decisions; instead, he had trouble making consistent contact, particularly with two strikes. McCutchen struck out 43.6% of the time when a plate appearance reached a two-strike count, a huge jump from the 35% rate he had posted over the previous four years. Read the rest of this entry »

The Reds and Mariners both finished just outside their respective leagues’ playoff pictures last season, but they’re heading in different directions for 2022. Less than 24 hours after trading Sonny Gray to Minnesota, Cincinnati dealt left fielder Jesse Winker and third baseman Eugenio Suárez to Seattle in exchange for a four-player package headlined by 23-year-old lefty Brandon Williamson, who recently landed at no. 61 on our Top 100 Prospects list.

Also heading from the Emerald City to the Queen City are right-hander Justin Dunn, outfielder Jake Fraley, and a player to be named later. Via The Athletic’s Ken Rosenthal:

The SEA-CIN deal also includes a player to be named going back to the Reds, source tells @TheAthletic. Reds high on that player, believe it will enhance package

— Ken Rosenthal (@Ken_Rosenthal) March 14, 2022

This is an aggressive move for the Mariners, who haven’t made the playoffs since 2001 and who last year won 90 games, two fewer than the Red Sox and Yankees, the AL’s Wild Card teams. The gave up a substantial amount of young pitching in an effort to shore up an offense that scored just 4.30 runs per game, the AL’s fifth-lowest total, and managed just a 93 wRC+, tied for the fourth-lowest mark. The Reds… well, they saved some money and got some impressive, controllable pitching, but they also gave up their most impactful hitter over the past two seasons — and a prominent voice in the clubhouse — in order to dump the $35 million owed to Suárez. Read the rest of this entry »

While titans of industry like Matt Olson, Nelson Cruz, and Josh Donaldson were changing teams, a few other things happened in the baseball world. For example: Sean Doolittle, Brad Hand, Ian Kennedy, and Chad Kuhl all found new teams. Sure, they weren’t the headliners of the last few days, but they’re all interesting in their own way. Let’s run down these signings alphabetically and maybe tell a joke or two while doing so.

Nationals Sign Sean Doolittle

When the Nationals traded for Sean Doolittle in 2017, he brought much-needed bullpen stability to an already-competitive team. Things aren’t quite the same for either side in their reunion. Doolittle had a down 2020, then signed a one-year, $1.5 million deal with the Reds. With Cincinnati out of the running and Doolittle losing high-leverage opportunities, they put him on waivers, and he finished his season as a middle reliever in Seattle. Read the rest of this entry »

Today, the Oakland Athletics traded star first baseman Matt Olson to the defending champion Atlanta Braves (analysis of the Braves’ side of the deal, courtesy of Dan Szymborski, can be found here) for a sizable package of prospects, including two from baseball’s Top 100. Coming back to Oakland is catcher Shea Langeliers, center fielder Cristian Pache, power-armed relief prospect Ryan Cusick, and polished teenage righty Joey Estes. All four new A’s prospects have been added to the team’s prospect list, both in the article and over on The Board.

In our opinion, the best of that group is 24-year-old Shea Langeliers. Ranking 70th overall and eighth among the catching prospects on our recently published Top 100, Langeliers combines plus or better defense with a power-over-hit game when he’s at the plate as opposed to behind it. His raw power blossomed into game power during the 2021 season, and while Langeliers isn’t an especially instinctual hitter (he projects as a sub-50 bat with contact issues), he has the potential to deliver 20-plus home runs per year. He has Gold Glove potential, with great hands and mobility to go with a strong, accurate arm that shuts down the running game. He also earns raves for his catching intangibles in terms of managing the game and working with pitchers. Theoretically, he’s lined up to start the year at Triple-A, be added to the 40-man after the season, and debut in 2023. His future in Oakland is tied closely and directly to that of incumbent star Sean Murphy, who reaches his first year of arbitration in 2023. We think Langeliers’ presence makes it more likely that Murphy is traded in the next 18 months.

Read the rest of this entry »

I hope you’ll allow a quick personal story. In December of 2018, while I was still working for the Astros, I engaged in talks with then-free agent Nelson Cruz’s representatives. Like many teams, the Astros were hesitant to give anything more than a one-year deal to a designated hitter who had turned 38 during the previous season. Ultimately, there was no multi-year pact to be had, and the Twins ended up winning a fierce competition for Cruz’s services with a one-year, $14 million deal that included a $12 million 2020 club option. Cruz would go on to have one of the best seasons of his career in 2019, making exercising that option a no-brainer; following the 2020 season, he signed another one-year, $13 million deal with Minnesota. Heading into this offseason, Cruz was still a much in-demand bat, particularly after it became clear that the National League would adopt the designated hitter, with the rumor mill linking him to as many as six teams. On Sunday, he landed with the Washington Nationals on a one-year, $12 million deal that includes a mutual option (which in reality isn’t really an option at all, but we’ll get to that in a bit).

Cruz has been an ageless wonder. From 2015-20, his age 34-to-39 seasons, he posted wRC+ marks ranging from 133 to 164. He slipped to a 122 wRC+ in 2021, including a 96 wRC+ in 55 games following a trade to the Rays; while a partial season, that represented his first sub-100 mark since 2007. It’s difficult to figure out exactly what went wrong while he was with the Rays, but it feels silly to simply assume that father time suddenly caught up to him after a strong first half of the season with the Twins. Read the rest of this entry »