Trade reviews
In a year when relatively few deadline moves happened, the M’s were fairly active — and reviews are starting to come in. Jayson Stark lists the M’s as one of two “sellers who did it right.”
It may be true that the Mariners dangled so many players on their roster, it was tough at times even for clubs dealing with them to figure out who was available for what price.
But in the end, Seattle did just fine — unloading three replaceable pieces (Randy Winn, Villone, Miguel Olivo) for two new catchers (Yorvit Torrealba and Miguel Ojeda) and a bunch of fresh arms (Bazardo, Flannery, Jesse Foppert and Nathaniel Mateo).
“I thought they did all right,” said one scout. “They got rid of some money. They cut their losses. They got kids back. And they got some arms back.”
The most intriguing arm is Foppert, who was once the Giants’ top pitching prospect and is inching back from Tommy John surgery. The jury is still out, but as one scout put it: “Everyone else comes back from that operation. I don’t see why he wouldn’t.”
Some reports from other bloggers are out now, too. Fish fans are happy to get Villone, even if they’re also high on Bazardo. Speaking of our man Yorman, check out Jeff Sullivan’s take on him if you haven’t already.
McCovey Chronicles on the Winn deal: “It isn’t often that a trade can help your favorite team, and still leave you discouraged.” Fair enough, if a bit Morrissey-inflected.
Rafael Palmeiro suspended
First top-tier player suspended for violating baseball’s new drug-testing rules.
Not much to say, really, except that while Mark McGwire was attacked for being evasive before Congress, Palmeiro was held up for his “angry” denials that he’d used steroids, as a contrast to McGwire (“”I have never used steroids. Period,” Palmeiro said. “I do not know how to say it any more clearly than that.” — CNN, March 17th) by Skip Bayless, in particular.
(Yes, comments are off here, and yes, off-topic posts on this in other threads are particularly prone to deletion. Steroid discussions take about ten, fifteen comments to descend into unmanagable horrors that won’t die, and I don’t have the time or resources to keep after them. Please either respect our wishes by not taking other comment threads off-topic. If you want steroid conversation, you could also pay us — up front — $50,000 to hire someone to work on the site full-time, at which point we’ll also build forums and who knows what else. Or you can vent about this travesty of site management by emailing us.)
Roster Shakeup
The M’s roster that takes the field tomorrow is going to be wholly different than the one that left the field yesterday. Corey Brock was the first to publish the news in the News Tribune, but there’s a big roster shakeup coming down.
Before tomorrow’s game, the Mariners will recall Felix Hernandez, Jorge Campillo, and Jeff Harris from Tacoma. Aaron Sele, Shigetoshi Hasegawa, and a third pitcher (unconfirmed right now, hearing several names) are going to be waived. Hernandez will start Thursday’s games, though will be limited to 80 pitches, and he may not stay in the rotation, as the team is going to be very careful with his workload.
Those won’t be the end of the moves, either. Chris Snelling is going to come up in time for Saturday’s game and take over as the regular (though not everyday) left fielder. Several other position players could be on the way out, as well, as the M’s cut the fat from the roster and, for the second year in a row, prepare to play the last two months of the season with the kids from Tacoma.
Moyer and other no-trades
We haven’t really talked about what didn’t happen, and what it means. Jamie Moyer was almost traded twice, and refused both trades. The PI has a high-level rundown.
And while reports vary wildly (as they will), I wanted to ignore some of the issues around this (Jamie wants to return in 2006? Home starter)(and also his no-trade decision) and focus on the deals.
No matter which version of the Astros deal you hear: Moyer and Winn for Chris Burke and Chad Harville, for instance, or Moyer for Fernando Nieve, or some variant of that — these are hauls. That’s a Freddy Garcia-level haul for a 42-year old pitcher who hasn’t been more effective than a league average starter.
Details on the Braves deal are scarce. The Braves seem to do less negotiation-through-the-media and general rumor-mongering than any other team, and it’s interesting nothing’s leaked from the Mariner side either. So not a lot to be judged there.
Reading accounts around the country, it also appears that Meche’s shoulder problem destroyed whatever trade interest there was. Teams are trying to spin the team’s asking price for Guardado as too high which is hard to verify: they’ve got a vested interest in selling a good reason they didn’t get him, but the Mariners (it would seem) weren’t willing to take the best deal on the table as the deadline approached. Without knowing the names offered, it’s hard to make any judgement on whether that was wise.
I do think the team’s a little too stuck on having an ace closer and all the related hangups, and Hargrove’s usage of Guardado is frustrating (for instance, his reluctance to use him in extra-inning games at home, which drives Dave batty). Guardado has a gaudy ERA and a shoulder that’s still torn, even if he’s pitching effectively with the injury now. I always argue that you’re better off taking the risk of trading these guys early (Halama after 2000, Franklin after 2003) if you can find a team willing to bite, and if once in a while they turn out well for the other side, so be it.
I’m not as excited about the Winn/Villone trades as others. Live arms, yay, roll the dice — bringing in some guys with fastballs at least helps balance an organization filled with pitchers with decent stuff, decent control, and little impact potential. I look at the collection and think “meh”.
But trading Winn to create space for Doyle’s a good move all by itself. Villone to Sherrill’s a good tradeoff. Both of those guys were reasonably expensive for a fair chunk of money, and the team’s replacing them with cheap internal options. This is what fans have been clamoring for: a commitment to the future.
And the Moyer deals, if nothing else, demonstrate both that the front office is good at getting value for their players and that they’re willing to trade beloved local figures if it’ll make a difference improving the team’s long-term chances.
Now we wait to see if they can pull off some waiver deals. Last year they made a couple of moves (Mike Myers waived, picked up by Boston, Borders traded to the Twins), and it’ll be interesting to see if they try and find homes for a pitcher like Pineiro, who they might still like to move but may have to pay part of his remaining contract. And while these last starts may make it more likely they’ll punt him, it also unfortunately makes it less likely other teams will take a chance… but then the Yankees are taking people off the street and turning them into emergency starters at this point.