Kalapse

Obviously I'm not going to throw out an initial offer of 4/$30M but if I'm running a team that's in need of a 3B, have the money available and that's what the market dictates then yeah, I'd be willing to shell out $30M for Adrian Beltre and feel comfortable with it.

QUOTE (elrockinMT @ Dec 6, 2009 -> 04:50 PM) You do want to see some fire, but I am not sure Jones has much left beyond a back up role do you? He's only 33 years old and he did show the ability is still there in the first 4 months of the season in a limited role last year, it's not out of the realm of possibility that he could put up an .800+ OPS as a semi-full time DH in 2010.

It's really quite pointless to speculate about the lineup when we've yet to even reach the Winter Meetings and a free agent signed to a backup position saying he'd like to earn a starting job and the talkative player's manager stating it's a possibility because the team has yet to find their 'true' DH as of December 6th is basically a non-story. If you want to freak out about something from the Merkin article it should be this: Yeah, that's a double whammy of suck.

QUOTE (Balta1701 @ Dec 5, 2009 -> 08:56 AM) Beltre ought to get 1/2 that. I wouldn't hesitate to give him 4/$30M

QUOTE (JoeCoolMan24 @ Dec 4, 2009 -> 04:23 PM) I would not do the deal either because Alexei happens to be one of my fav players and Uggla costs more money, but in talent alone, I think Uggla is the better player. That was never the argument. You offered up a proposed trade of Alexei + Flowers/Danks for Uggla and since acquisitions are not made in a vacuum, Uggla's incredible price tag is coming along with him.

QUOTE (BFirebird @ Dec 4, 2009 -> 03:24 PM) If $35-$36M is what Figgins ends up getting. What does this mean for Beltre? What should he expect? I'm not even sure, they're just totally different kinds of players, I'm sure Boras will us this as an opportunity to push for $40M since you can make the case that Beltre is the more valuable player going forward. But what does the Market for a player like Beltre look like right now? I don't think there's incredible demand so I'd say there's a 30% chance he signs a ~$8M, 1 year deal and attempts to increase his potential earnings on the 2011 free agent market and if the does get a multi-year deal it'd probably be somewhere right around what Figgins got, maybe a little less.

QUOTE (JoeCoolMan24 @ Dec 4, 2009 -> 03:29 PM) I'll agree to disagree (about Alexei>>Uggla). So you truly believe Dan Uggla is $18M better than Alexei Ramirez (and his 2 arb eligible seasons in '12-'13)?

Eh, 4/$40M was about what I expected. Precedent set that as the price for a player of his stature. $35M is a good deal for the mariners, they really will not hesitate to throw big money around.

QUOTE (KyYlE23 @ Dec 4, 2009 -> 01:56 PM) MLBTR reporting Mariners on the verge of signing Figgins 4/$36 mil You mean Ken Rosenthal?

Gregg Zaun signed a 1 year, $1.9M deal with an option for 2011 with the Brewers Chad Moeller signed a minor league deal with the Orioles

QUOTE (KyYlE23 @ Dec 4, 2009 -> 09:33 AM) So Scutaro is on the BoSox, so now Pedroia is officially a SS? Generally you are moved from that position to second because your range is questionable, no? Scutaro played over 1200 innings of average shortstop for the Blue Jays last season and has been primarily a shortstop since 2005, he has over 3400 career innings at the position compared to only 2200 at 2B. I do believe Scutaro will be their everyday SS.

Rotoworld is on fire right now. from Dec. 1st: from today: Stay hot, Rotoworld.

QUOTE (KyYlE23 @ Dec 4, 2009 -> 12:17 PM) http://www.mlbtraderumors.com/2009/12/ange...atthews-jr.html I was surprised to read the portion of that blurb that mentioned his suspect defense. I thought that was his one redeemable quality. His entire game has gone to s*** since arriving on the scene in Anaheim. He no longer does anything well, he is 35 after all.

QUOTE (RockRaines @ Dec 4, 2009 -> 12:14 PM) I disagree. He may hit for more power, but thats about it. Alexei is a better defensive player, has better speed, hits for more contact and has more tools and ability to play around the order and the diamond. Uggla has a concrete glove, K's a ton and can only play one position badly. Uggla may end up striking out 3 times more than Alexei. He's no slouch and still appears to be improving, but Alexei is just a better baseball player IMO. It's simpler than all that. There's an $18M difference between the two through 2011 and there's really no argument anyone can make to prove that Uggla is $9M per season more valuable than Alexei. The Marlins are going to have a ton of trouble trading him, his value is absolute s*** right now due to arbitration pay raises. What team is going to pay him $11M in 2011? Right now there's a better than even chance that he's non tendered after 2010.

QUOTE (southsider2k5 @ Dec 3, 2009 -> 11:07 PM) So they blow off the Adrian Gonzalez stuff, but expect us to believe the guy who has been throwing at our players for years, to the extent that we banned to AAA a player who wouldn't retaliate back, and yet we are after him? What f***ing idiots. Did you see the original source? It's pretty f***ing funny. 1.) The information is coming from a close friend of Vicente Padilla's as if that weren't reliable enough . . . 2.) It's being reported in a Nicaraguan newspaper And as for the story itself; Padilla's friend says the Sox and EIGHT other teams have "shown interest." Meaning Padilla's agent calls up the club, asks if they're interested in his client, they say 'not right now but we don't want to rule anything out, perhaps we'll speak again closer to Spring Training' and BAM! they just showed interest. In other words it means absolutely nothing.

QUOTE (chw42 @ Dec 3, 2009 -> 10:28 PM) Alexei and Flowers/Danks? Get out of here, no way. Dan Uggla is barely good enough to warrant Alexei alone. I wouldn't trade Alexei straight up for Uggla. He doesn't bring nearly enough to the table to warrant his $9M price tag and he's a definite non-tender candidate for 2011 when you're looking at paying him $11M to be a homeless man's Adam Dunn and all the while he's not happy unless he's at 2B. Meanwhile Alexei will be paid $2.2M over the next 2 seasons with still 2 more years of arbitration coming after that, if he can get his wOBA up into the .335-.340 territory and play a good shortstop he's easily the much more valuable commodity.

The Boston Red Sox and Marco Scutaro have agreed to terms on a 2 year deal with an option for a 3rd year.

QUOTE (southsider2k5 @ Dec 3, 2009 -> 06:45 PM) Are any of these kids worth anything? Also it is funny to see the Cubs dumping salary like it is going out of style, and NO ONE in the Chicago media saying a word about it. There was a pretty big uproar last season when the Cubs dumped DeRosa and Marquis strictly for financial reasons. When you dump losers like Heilman and Miles the fans are more likely to applaud than boo. I don't think many people are upset to see Harden go either, he'll be overpaid by a club that loves his arm and he'll kill their pen like he did the Cubs', people like to complain that John Danks doesn't go deep enough into games, well he averaged significantly more IP per start last season than Harden did in a Cubs jersey.

QUOTE (iamshack @ Dec 3, 2009 -> 07:23 PM) Do people honestly believe that Jenks pitched in a significant amount of high-leverage situations more than Matt Thornton did last year? gmLI is the average leverage index when a pitcher enters the game. Their 2009 numbers: Jenks: 1.58 gmLI (17th highest in baseball) Thornton: 1.57 (19th highest in baseball, 3rd highest for a non-closer, Mark Lowe and Jeremy Affeldt were just ahead of him) Dotel: 1.10 Linebrink: 0.98 Carrasco: 0.63 (3rd lowest in baseball)

Trading Aaron Miles saves them $2.7M.

Henry Blanco signed a 1 year, $1.5M deal with the Mets.

QUOTE (b-Rye @ Dec 3, 2009 -> 05:29 PM) JAKE FOX/JIM THOME COMPARISON AVG .259/.249 AB 216/345 Plate appearances 241/417 SO 45/116 BB 14/69 HR 11/23 RBI 44/74 R 23/55 SLG .468/.493 OPS .774/.864 2B 12/15 Very similar numbers, even if you doubled Fox's numbers (and almost matched plate apperances) Thome would still have better numbers... but Thome batted cleanup all season and I believe Fox batted 6th-8th in lineup.. Except Jim Thome walked nearly 3 times more often than Jake Fox. I'm thinking that makes a rather large difference.

This is such a typical A's move.

QUOTE (JoeCoolMan24 @ Dec 3, 2009 -> 05:06 PM) Assuming Alexei is kept in any deal, and it's pitchers being dealt, he would be replacing Kotsay/Teahan in the lineup. I am certain he would produce more runs than both of them combined, regardless of defensive follies. Except then you still have to pay Teahen and give up a decent package of players to acquire Uggla, then you have to pay him ~$9M+ in arbitration. You're filling the position that isn't open with a severely flawed, expensive player while limiting your ability to fill other holes.

QUOTE (elrockinMT @ Dec 3, 2009 -> 04:52 PM) Foxsports via the MLB.Com blogs So it was speculation based on previous speculation based on the fact that the Sox are looking for an outfielder? Which blog was this? MLBlogs is a series of something like 35 blogs.