Good morning.
First, a brief comment:
It was probably Saturday morning when my head finally stopped spinning from all of the transactions that took place at MLB’s Winter Meetings in San Diego. If I recall correctly, 79 players changed teams during the week.
Some deals made perfect sense. For example, the Dodgers traded to the Padres a surplus outfielder – the sometimes-MVP candidate Matt Kemp — and got an upgrade at catcher in the name of Yasmani Grandal in return. The Cardinals signed Mark Reynolds, a masher of left-handed pitching, primarily to provide insurance at first base for Matt Adams, who has often looked lost against southpaws.
Others, not so much.
My head-scratcher of the week was the decision of Royals’ general manager Dayton Moore to replace his departed designated hitter Billy Butler, who signed a $30 million, three-year contract with the A’s, with Kendrys Morales, who, despite not being able to latch onto a team in 2014 until June, signed a $17 million, two-year deal.
Kansas City could have merely exercised Butler’s option at one year at $12.5 million. Instead, the club paid him $1 million in order to decline the option. While a Moore defender might claim that Kansas City wanted to have an upgrade at designated hitter — in OPS+, the Royals ranked a lowly 24th in the bigs last season — but Morales is a curious choice. While neither player had a 2014 to remember, Butler clearly had the superior campaign (.271/.323/.379; -0.3 fWAR vs. .218/.274/.338; -1.7 fWAR). Also, he’s three years younger than Morales (28 vs. 31).
Sure, Morales may not have been a bad bet at one year and $5–7 million for a team that had no other options at the position. Except that the Royals merely could have stuck it out with a fan favorite, someone who had spent his entire career with KC, stayed healthy, and posted a .351 wOBA, but instead sent him packing.
With that out of the way, here are several links from the past week that will make your Monday at the office a bit more bearable:
- Which of the 2014 postseason entrants is most likely not to play October baseball next season? According to ESPN SweetSpot’s David Schoenfield, it’s the __________. (Okay, okay, here’s your hint: See my brief comment above.)
- Contrary to popular belief, writes Matt Swartz in the Hardball Times, the ill-advised contract extension given to Ryan Howard isn’t the reason the Phillies are a mess of an organization today, nor is it the byproduct of the win-now trades:
Instead, the issue was a series of terrible drafts that have yielded almost no fruit for the last eleven years. This is even more shocking when juxtaposed against their incredible success in the draft during the eight years prior.
The Phillies’ total career WAR among all drafted players from 2004 through 2014 is only 27.8 compared to a league average of 100.0. This is not just league-worst, it is less than half of the second-worst Blue Jays at 60.5. The following chart shows the total WAR by drafted players for each organization, ranging from the Phillies up to the Red Sox at 169.1.
- The White Sox had a busy week during the winter meetings in San Diego, but GM Rick Hahn remained busy over the weekend, reaching an agreement with free agent Melky Cabrera on a three-year deal worth $42 million. Jim Margalus of South Side Sox looks at the impact the deal will have on the roster.
- As a way of showing his approval of Boston’s acquisition of Rick Porcello from Detroit, Marc Normandin of Over the Monster points out that the 26-year-old pitcher is “younger than that prospect you keep dreaming on.”
- Now that the Cubs bagged one of the big-game free agents on the market, Jon Lester, Bleed Cubbie Blue has the urge to ask of 2015: “Could The ‘Back to the Future’ World Series Become Reality?”
One interesting thing about mentioning a Miami team in the 1989 film is this: There was no approved expansion team for the Miami area until December 18, 1990, and since the film was shot and completed before release, the filmmakers would have had to be prescient to think a team was even going to be awarded to the Miami area. There were a number of other contenders, including Tampa–St. Petersburg, Orlando, Denver, Buffalo and Washington, D.C., several of whom got teams in future expansions or by franchise moves. (I still think my realignment proposal [which included, among other things, having the Marlins move to the AL East] would have worked better than the one they eventually did.)
That’s not why I’m writing this, though. With the Cubs’ signings and trade this week, bringing Jon Lester, Jason Hammel and Miguel Montero to the North Side, they’re in strong position to contend for at least a wild-card spot, if not the division title. The Cubs played near-.500 ball for four months last year (60-62 after a 13–27 start), and while 90-plus wins might be a pipedream (though other teams have gone from 73 wins to 90-plus in one year with moves like the ones the Cubs have made), playing at an 85-win pace for much of the season will get the team into the wild-card conversation.
- According to Fangraphs’ Jeff Sullivan, writing at Fox Sports’ Just a Bit Outside, the Reds had the best week of all during the meetings, considering the “difficult waters [GM Walt Jocketty had] to navigate.”
- Via the Associated Press: Alex Rodriguez isn’t quite at spring-training weight, according to Brian Cashman. It’s a relief to learn that the Yankee GM isn’t too hot and bothered, given that A-Rod’s not due in Tampa for another two months. Also, it’s not as though he had freaked out during the days of Derek Eater. . . .
That’s it. Have a walk-off week!