A few recent transactions of note
-
- March
- 29
Chris Woodward signed a minor-league deal with the Phillies.
The Reds are going to pay off LHP Mike Stanton and release him.
INF Andy Phillips was assigned to minor league camp by the Reds.
Toronto granted C Sal Fasano his unconditional release.
LHP Mike Myers was released by the Dodgers.
It appears LHP Ron Villone will make the Cardinals and INF Doug Mientkiewicz is sticking with the Pirates.
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on Saturday, March 29th, 2008 at 2:44 pm by Peter Abraham.
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Peter Abraham
Maybe we could pay Myers to just travel with the team. Wang struggled after he left last year…
wait a minute Mike Myers was released didn’t Torre and I’m not taking shots at him, didn’t he say Mike Myers was the missing link to winning a championship I guess alot changes
whozat whoever you was argueing w/ in the other post here’s where he got it
AUGUST 1st, 2007 NEWARK STAR LEDGER
Torre has frustrated people in the front office with his loyalty to slumping veterans and his refusal to use the players (Shelley Duncan, Edwar Ramirez, Andy Phillips when he first came up) they have promoted from their system. He voiced strong opposition to proposed deals for outfielder Milton Bradley and infielder Morgan Ensberg — deals the Yankees eventually turned down in part because they believed those players would just rot on the bench. Duncan, who was a budding cult hero at Yankee Stadium a week and a half ago, played in just two games on the road trip that followed his big-splash debut weekend.
it’s a small sample but really sounds like the FO really was getting tired of him.
When is the opener? and who will throw out the first pitch?
Opening Day is Monday and the first pitch is Reggie Jackson.
Cairo made the major league roster in Seattle.
“whozat whoever you was argueing w/ in the other post here’s where he got it”
Fair enough!
To say “pay off” Stanton–sounds like they’re treating him like a criminal.
Sal Fasano seemed like a fascinating character, and he had a splendid moustache. Pete, what was the deal with that guy?
FYI the 10 day forecast now says PM showers so it may be ok for MOnday.
thankyou Andrea
INteresting re Chris Woodward were the Yankees not willing to offer him a minor league deal?? The Philies have as much of a pretty secure infield just like the Yankees so he would be a bench player there just like he would here.
“Pete, what was the deal with that guy?”
Your standard veteran back-up catcher, no? Can’t hit much, good guy, people like him, solid defender, calls a decent game.
On mustaches…I think that, rather than the facial hair policy _allowing_ only mustaches, it should REQUIRE mustaches.
I would pay bunches of dollars to see Wang, Cano and Melky with mustaches. Or, trying to grow mustaches. They could get cultivation and care tips from Pena.
“INteresting re Chris Woodward were the Yankees not willing to offer him a minor league deal??”
Thing is the Yanks are pretty much set with the infield at AAA too. Ransom/Duncan, the AG, Castro, Miranda/Duncan. He’d have had to fight Nick Green for the right to back those guys up. Maybe Phillie offered a full-time minor league job.
“Your standard veteran back-up catcher, no?”
I meant his personality. In the few postgame comments I saw, he seemed cerebral, even for a catcher. I agree with the rest of your post.
Baseball Prospectus had an interesting bit on forecasting their best bets to win the 2008 AL MVP. They did this based on their Wins Above Replacement Player (WARP) statistic.
Their top 5 candidates (with their estimated WARP’s) :
Alex Rodriguez, NYA, (9.0)
Miguel Cabrera, DET, (7.7)
Grady Sizemore, CLE, (7.0)
Robinson Cano, NYA, (6.8)
Evan Longoria, TBA, (6.8)
It’s interesting to see the type of company Cano is starting to keep in terms of his offensive value to the team relative to other players playing second base.
And his projections for this year IMO are underplaying the type of season he’s going to have. His first half last year was so horrendous and IMO an aberration that its skewing down his expected statistical performance.
It’s also interesting to see how 3 of BP’s top 5 MVP candidates are third baseman, including one rookie (Longoria - who just got sent down by the Rays). This really tells you how bad third base is as a position right now and how valuable it is to have a player like ARod at that position. ARod’s value is much greater than even what his statistics tell you because of the position he plays.
With ARod and Cano the yankees have two players who are so substantially better than other players at their respective positions that their value far outstrips what their numbers suggest.
This is also true of Jeter but to a much, much smaller degree - primarily because his defense has gotten so poor that it’s detracting from his strong offensive production.
Hey, did anyone else read Kitty’s rant on yesnetwork.com about starting the season in Japan? His point was that MLB talks about “growing the game” internationally to get more talent drawn to MLB, but that it seems hypocritical to talk about that when there’s also a well-documented problem here in America with baseball missing out on young african-american talent. If you’re going to go off the beaten path to popularize the game, perhaps there’re kids in Louisiana or Arkansas that would be inspired by seeing Prince Fielder or Ryan Howard or Dontrelle Willis. It seems that working to inspire those kids to play baseball would provide a much better return, since they already live in this country and would funnel right into the amateur draft here. Of course, going to Japan makes tons more dollars for MLB.
I dunno. I thought it was an interesting read. He was pretty passionate about it.
Canseco hates Arod bc he wouldnt let him be his agent.. It was all money not anything about roids or his ex-wife!!
http://tinyurl.com/2kfodl
“This really tells you how bad third base is as a position right now ”
That’s interesting. It’s traditionally been a pretty strong offensive position, no? Do you think teams have prioritized D over there a bit more? Perhaps because SS has become less of a defense-first position? Or that there are a lot of pricey vets blocking up the 3B these days (Rolen, Glaus, Nomah, Mora, Crede) and dragging down 3B performance across baseball?
“Interesting re Chris Woodward were the Yankees not willing to offer him a minor league deal??”
I believe Woodward actually asked to be released by the Yankees rather than go to Scranton.
It was woodward’s option. He had a good spring and I’d guess he figured he’s have a easier shot somewhere else.
Nick Green had the same option in his contract and he elected to stay. I think that’s because he didn’t have a very good spring and would have trouble attracting interest - when a player like that gets sent to AAA clubs remember what they did in spring. The yankees know Green.
I think Woodward may have gone to the Phillies in part because of the division. The NL East has a much stronger need for a player like Woodward. The NL in general substitutes way more because of the pinch hitting for the pitcher. Given the relatively good hitting in the NL East I’d guess they have more pitching changes and more need for substituting players into the game.
Aren’t the outfielders traditionally seen as the power positions? Or am I confusing them with non-Yankee first basemen?
“Aren’t the outfielders traditionally seen as the power positions? Or am I confusing them with non-Yankee first basemen?”
Corner OF and corner IF are generally considered power positions, I’m pretty sure. I think 1B and LF are considered the least-important defensive positions, followed by RF and 3B. But I’m not sure.
“Do you think teams have prioritized D over there a bit more?”
This is a really good question. It’s always interesting how baseball changes and third base has been a strange position recently.
Last year only 9 third baseman in all of baseball who had more than 400 at bats had an OPS over 800.
(By the way - Chipper Jones last year had one of the more unheralded terrific seasons any player had had over the past several years. Didn’t hear much about him but he had a better season than the much talked about David Wright)
For comparison there were 8 centerfielders who had 400 AB and had an OPS over 800.
That’s sort of eye opening.
Just a hunch but I think the physical demands of the position are being squeezed across the talent pool.
Third base takes tremendous agility, reflexes and a great arm. I think ARod’s defense at third shows you how difficult the position is. He was coming off gold glove seasons at SS. I thought he’d move over and be a great defensive third baseman. He’s not bad by any means. But he’s really not good - about average (that really surprised me - i though he’d be great).
Offensively, third demands power. On one hand many players with those defensive skill sets are now playing SS (or sort of playing SS - see JJ Hardy)
But on the other end I think as players have gotten bigger and stronger through lifting weights (and yes other means) some have gotten less agile they have increased their power potential but become less agile in the field (see Ryan Braun). I think this is part of why we’ve seen so many great first baseman over the past 10 years. This has made it more and more difficult to find guys with the defensive skills for a high demand position like third who also can hit for power.
It’s interesting to see how guys who are able to play third in college wind up not being able to hack it there in the majors.
Again - Ryan Braun - great example. This is also a big issue in the draft this year.
The best hitter in college (and perhaps best since Texeira) is Pedro Alvarez who is a third baseman. Absolutely mashes. But the question on him is can he stay at third. It looks iffy if he can. He’s still going to go very high (perhaps #1 overall) but whether he projects as a third baseman or 1st baseman changes his value a great deal.
“Offensively, third demands power. On one hand many players with those defensive skill sets are now playing SS”
Hm. I was saying that teams were perhaps prioritizing D a bit more at 3B because SS was, overall, becoming defensively weaker and they needed to compensate. But this brings up another option…that teams care a bit less about D at SS these days, and thus guys who can hit really well and field SS tolerably STAY at SS, whereas in the past they might have been moved to 3B in the minors.
This, then, relegates the 3B pool to guys who can hit really wall but can’t hack it AT ALL at SS, or guys who’ve been 3Bs since they were kids, I guess. Or, guys who are blocked by an already very good SS and move for that reason. Like, if the Phillies had a promising SS in AA or AAA, they’d move him to 3B perhaps because of Rollins.
“He voiced strong opposition to proposed deals for outfielder Milton Bradley and infielder Morgan Ensberg ”
wait, this is impossible. Pete said Torre would have chosen the exact same roster!
Wnag and Chamberlain
http://flickr.com/photos/chien-ming_wang/2370113102/
so who wants to bet on stanton being in dodger blue real soon?