MARCO'S BASEBALL BLOG-O-ROONIE 2018: FREE AGENT SCLEROSIS!

MARCO'S BASEBALL BLOG-O-ROONIE 2018: FREE AGENT SCLEROSIS!

Here's hoping you've all had a safe, sane holiday season and didn't get the flu like my wife. We spent the Xmas holiday quarantined in our home while I ran the Roku for her. I never got the foul virus but we didn't want to go visit the grandkids until we were sure we were non-contagious.

Of course, Our grandkids and their parents all got the flu the next week anyway so we couldn't even see them by New Years. Finally we're all healthy and our Daughter-in-Law is making Christmas dinner and we're taking the kids' presents down to San Antonio tomorrow for our long-delayed celebration.

With all this time in house it seems like I could have written a lot about the winter trade/free agent shocks and surprises but nothing happened at the winter meetings and almost nothing afterward. Everybody kept saying that once Stanton and Ohtani decied where they were going everything would start shaking out. But both signed a long time ago and still no break in the market.

The reasons for this are intricate and tied to many situations:

1/ None of the big market teams want to go far over the spending cap like in previous years. An obscure rule of the spending cap penalties is if you go over the cap three years in a row you have to pay an extra $50 million or so. If you stay under the cap in that third year, though, the fine resets at a much lower penalty for the next 3 years. Not even the Yankees want to pay $50 mil to the have-nots of the world, so Brian Cashman (GM of NY) very cleverly signed Stanton and ditched enough salary from other players to stay under. If he could find some poor fool to take on Jacoby Ellsbury (he gets $21+ mil a year no-trade contract til 2020 and is now a bench player exclusively) Cashman would go get Manny Machado from Baltimore. Or Cash could just wait til next year and get Machado anyway when he becomes a free agent. This would really be bad news for the other 29 teams but I'll talk about that later.

2/ Now that the big headline guys Stanton and Ohtani have signed, people are waiting to see who gets Hosmer and J.D.Martinez. Scott Boras reps those two and Boras is very good at waiting teams out until they panic and give his clients absurd 10 year contracts for multi-millions. Sometimes if only one team is bidding he'll lie and pretend another team is very interested and get the first team to bid against itself. Owners love him for this.

3/ Tied to my last remark, teams have finally figured out that 8-10 year contracts to players, expecially those over thirty, seldom work out well for them. Look it up: Ellsbury, Josh Hamilton, ARod's second big contract for NY. Werth, Tulowitzski, Heyward, Fielder, Wright, Ryan Howard... you know the sad litany, don't you?

Even big stars like Albert Pujols become a terrible drag on a team's ability to sign and keep other players. Pujols is a Hall of Famer to be. He still hits homers and drives in runs. But his feet hurt and he can't play even first base any more. He can't run. He can't hit for average. His on base last season was a scary .286. And he has 4 more no-trade years on his contract at which time he'll be 41. That last year, 2021, Albert will get 30 million smackers for his time. It's a good thing Angel owner Omar Minaya is made of money. (I take my hat off to him and the Angels. They wooed Ohtani to come to them for almost nothing and also picked up All Star Zach Cozart from the Reds to play third and Ian Kinsler from the Tigers to play second.)

Now lets go Deep State:

Over-30-year-old stars are only getting 3-5 year offers.

J.D.Martinez is 31 and doesn't play too well on defense. He's only played three seasons where he appeared in at least 120 games. (The guy is injury prone.) He had an insanely hot season last year, homering every 8 at bats for Arizona. He hit 45 dingers in only 119 games for Detroit and Arizona together!!! That's unreal! His slugging average was a league leading .690! Needless to say, Arizona wants him back. But they're still only offerring a 5 year contract. Boston is also bidding, and so is St. Louis and maybe a few other teams that are lurking in the back alleys.

St. Louis made a great trade this winter and got Ozuna from the Fire Sale Florida Marlins. They still need more hitting and more power, thus their interest in Martinez. They won't like his D in right field in big old Busch Stadium though. Hosmer might work better because they could move Carpenter to a swing man position at third, second and first and have a 4-time Gold Glover in Hosmer. (More on The Hoz below.)

Boston is everbody's choice to grab Martinez.

First of all, Dave Dombrowski, the GM of the Sox, is Mister Big Move. He loves the splashy trade or free agent get. The Sox were anemic power-wise last year. So what's the problem? Sic 'em Dave!

Not so fast. It turns out that Mr. Martinez hits most of his home runs to center and right center and right field. That worked great for him in Arizona, but Fenway is fairly cavernous in those directions. If he tries to change his swing to be a pull hitter, who knows how screwed up he could get?

Also, where to play him? You have the best defensive outfield in baseball in the B-boys Benintendi, Bradley and Betts. Seems counter productive to break that up. So put Martinez at DH and watch him rake. Well, what do you do with Hanley Ramirez? Hanley was hurt last year but he feels better and is a cinch 35 homer guy if he can stay strong. If he gets hot he can carry a team. He doesn't like to play defense anymore, but if Hanley could move around from DH to first to third they could keep Mitch Moreland and his gold glove at first most of the time and rest rookie third sacker Devers against lefties. (Both Devers and Ramirez are very suspect defensively at third.)

If they get Martinez they have to play him. Hard to trade Hanley, but maybe the Sox have a plan because they've made a 5 year offer to Martinez. One good thing about J.D. is that he won't cost them their draft choice. That's a big factor in why they went after him and not Hosmer.

The Hoz is one of my favorite players so I admit I'm in favor of him going to my Red Sox. But I see the limitations.

The Sox want homers and Hoz only hit 25 (with Yellowstone Kaufman Stadium as his home park, he still only hit 6 on the road and that's weak.) He's mostly a left center inside out hitter. That would make him a 50 doubles a year guy at Fens, but still wouldn't change the homer totals. But the Sox can use a first baseman more than another outfielder or DH. Expecially a Gold Glover. Also, Hosmer can run, is a smart player, hits for a high average (.318...third in the league... to Moreland's .244) and has a high on-base percentage. He's also a winner. He just has that something...he proved it in the World Series of 2014 and 2015.

The Sox figured out that Moreland could give them the same homers as Hosmer for 3 mil a year instead of 20. Also, Hosmer costs them their draft pick and a hit to their international signing money limit. (God forbid I should try to explain that.) But Moreland is always getting hurt, can't hit lefties and is 32. In two years they need another first baseman. And Hosmer will be gone. Plus, Hosmer is only 28...you can give him an 8 year contract and it probably won't burn you too bad. And for the next 8 years you have a real race horse to help you keep up with the Yankees.

Well, to keep up with the Yankees you might need Hosmer and Martinez and Moreland and Hanley Ramirez too...it's all hands on deck to keep up with the Bombers these days.

Hosmer could very easily resign with K.C. for seven or eight years. The Royals offerred him $147 mil. The Padres offerred $141 but if you're going to a rebuild team, why not just stay home?

New York General Manager Brian Cashman is well named. He has big money at his disposal, but now that the Yankees youth movement has been so successful so quickly he can shop til he drops. Aaron Judge, Didi Gregorius, Gary Sanchez at catcher, Greg Bird at first, plus this season's rookies Gleybar Torres, Miguel Andujar and Clint Frazier. Those young players all look like keepers or in Torres, Andujar and Frazier's cases, great trade bait for another stud starting pitcher. But most importantly, having half the lineup playing young and cheap gives the Yanks room to maneuver for stars like Stanton and Machado and another big name pitcher.

Toronto, Baltimore and Tampa Bay are being forced to retrench. Only Boston can compete with New York in the East.

The Yankees already have a pretty impressive starting staff if Sabathia and Tanaka can keep it together. Severino is a new Monster, and Sonny Gray, much coveted by nearly everyone, is merely an aferthought on the staff.

Their bullpen is the best in baseball. Chapman, Chad Green, Betances, Warren, Kahnle...they are very deep.

And look at their potential lineup if they get Machado:

Gardner LF (bats left)

Stanton DH (R)

Machado 3B (R)

Judge RF (R)

Bird 1B (L)

Sanchez C (R)

Gregorius SS (L)

Hicks CF (S)

Torres 2B (R)

That lineup hit 247 home runs last year. I'm not even counting what Torres might hit in his rookie season.

I can't see many teams who would be anxious to send their left-handed starters out to face that lineup, so the big beneficiaries would probably be Gregorius, Gardner and Bird who would get to face a steady diet of right-handers.

Reminds me of the old Brooklyn Dodger lineup of the 50's. Duke Snider got rich as the only left-handed hitter surrounded by dangerous right handed hitters like Robinson, Hodges, Campanella and Furillo. Between 1954 and 1957 when he was the best pitcher in baseball, Hall of Fame leftie Warren Spahn only made 2 starts against the Dodgers! That's the best pitcher in baseball and they wouldn't even risk him against that lineup!

I think we'll see something like that with the Yankees. Maybe the top lefties like Sale and Keuchel will take their turn against the Bombers, but who'd you rather take your chances against...Gardner, Gregorius, and Bird? Or Stanton, Judge, Sanchez and Machado?

This could get ugly.

Other free agents and their prospects are Jake Arrieta, the Cubs rightie who's trying to get rich with a big contract even though he's definitely gone south since his big year in 2015. He'll probably resign with the Cubs...who would be hard pressed to replace him without giving up a lot in a trade. The Cardinals are making noises about signing him, but that may just be to annoy the Cubs. The Texas Rangers have to sign some pitcher, so they may step in on Arrieta or else get Yu Darvish back.

The other two Royals stars on the market are third sacker Moustakis and center fielder Lorenzo Cain. Cain is a little old at 32 to expect a long term deal. Moustakis is a little fat to cash in on his one great season last year. Moose could return to KC if Hosmer signs elsewhere. Most teams seem set at third or will wait to try for Machado next year. Cain might go to the Giants.

The Giants also might add Jay Bruce. They have to get some hitters and they can't seem to sign the top guys. However, the Giants need to get younger...much younger. Cain and Bruce aren't the ticket for that. (Nor will Longoria, who they picked up from Tammpa Bay. Longo is great for the short term, but is also on the downside of his career.)

Watch for these developments in 2018…

NL:

The Atlanta Braves screwed up bad and lost thirteen of their international signees as a penalty for cheating on international player signing rules. They also lost a draft choice and two execs and a lot of money. This will set back their rebuild at least for this season.

The Marlins have punched their ticket for last place in the NL East. You can't help but think that they will do everything in their power to finish as the worst team in baseball so they can get the top draft choices available for the next two or three years. How do you like that spirit of competition, Florida fans?

The Philadelphia Phillies will finish second in the East and come very close to being the second wild card.

The Mets will continue fielding a triple A quality lineup to back up their fragile-armed pitching staff.

The Dodgers and Braves executed a strange trade centered on Kemp from the Braves for Adrian Gonzalez from the Dodgers. Then both players were cut by their new teams. This was a salary cap trade that saved both teams money. Strange, esoteric, weird trades like this will become common.

The Phillies, Cardinals, the Rockies and the Giants are all trying to get better fast. Everybody else in the National League seems content with the status quo or are tanking intentionally.

AL:

Baltimore and Toronto have illusions that they can still compete in the East and are reluctant to rebuild. Now they'll lose their star players to free agency and be dragged kicking and screaming into the bottom rungs of the East. Tampa Bay at least is realistic about their inability to keep their nucleus and is embarking on ...what? ...their fourth or fifth total rebuild in the last fifteen years? Thus die all small market clubs.

Cleveland has a great, great bunch of players. But they have a limited window because they don't have enough money to add some big stars to help them get over the top. I think they ought to make a big play for a front line starter and one more dynamic hitter to replace Santana and Jay Bruce. If they won a World Series, it would do so much to get fans to come back to Jacobs Field. Last year they only drew 2 million fans. Adn at one point they won 22 in a row! Spend money now, Cleveland! Make the big push to change the history of this franchise like the Cubs did. You have a great core...buy Hosmer or J.D. or trade for Sliding Billy Hamilton and win games with speed. Don't finish behind the Yanks and the Astros again. You only have a couple of years to cash in on this talented club.

Minnesota...I can't tell if they'll get better or regress again. Depends on their pitching.

Detroit will finish last this year. K.C. will finish next to last. Chicago will be much better but is still one year away from being a real competitor. The white Sox will win the Central in 2020.

California has really inproved their team, but without more pitching they still won't catch Houston. Their recent signees Upton, Kinsler and Cozart ( not to mention Pujols) are all passed their sell-by date. So two years from now the Angels will be on the way down again. They need pitchers NOW.

The Rangers and the Athletics will continue to suck. Oakland has lost their land to build a new stadium. MLB should step in and bitch-slap the Giants into backing off of their refusal to let the A's move into San Jose. SJ is the tenth largest city in America and is surrounded by other cities on the peninsula in easy driving distance of a nifty little park in San Jose. Go where the fans are!

Houston will probably add another starter before the season. I think they should also load up on relief pitchers. Their young everyday players are brimming with confidence now that they've won. I see the Astros and the Yankees as two super 105 win teams in 2018 with the rest of the league just pretending they can be relevant.

Happy New Year! Only a month until Spring Training!

--Your Humble Correspondent