Mariners Add Jose Flores In Rule 5
The Mariners used the second pick in the Rule 5 draft on relief pitcher Jose Flores out of Cleveland’s system. He was so highly thought of that John Manuel didn’t even write him up in his Baseball America Rule 5 preview. Ben Badler, also of BA, called it a “strange decision” on twitter a few minutes ago. Apparently, he has a decent fastball but no secondary stuff, and he’s only pitched in A-ball. He did have a nifty 51/7 K/BB ratio last year, but again, it’s A-ball.
We’ll see if the M’s find a spot for him at the end of spring training. I’d bet on no.
Game 93, White Sox at Mariners
Hudson vs Pauley, 7:10 pm.
These little blurbs become harder to write as the season wears on. I mean, I could spend a few minutes talking about David Pauley, but he’s a generic arm that probably won’t be in the organization in a few months, so what’s the point? So, instead, I’ll share a quick story.
Last week, I spent five days down in Anaheim covering the Futures Game and the All-Star Game for FanGraphs. The Wall Street Journal was kind enough to help me get a credential, so I milled with the media and did media stuff for a few days, hobnobbing with the likes of the great Larry Stone. It was certainly an interesting experience. The best part, though, was the Monday morning press conference when the managers announced the line-ups for the All-Star Game. Charlie Manuel, when announcing the NL line-up, said the following:
“Batting second, and playing second base, Martin Par-ough. Pair-doo. How do you say his name?”
Chuckles ensued, and then someone told Charlie how to pronounce Martin Prado’s last name. A minute or so later, he got to his starting catcher, who he called “Yeah-Dear” Molina. A few minutes later, he called his starting shortstop “Hansley”. Then, when a reporter asked him why he was starting Andre Ethier in center field (Ethier has the worst UZR of any outfielder in baseball this year and hadn’t played CF since college), he gave this incoherent rambling answer about Ethier having more votes. He then said something about not having a true center fielder, but that Ethier had played there recently, and so he could handle it. Of course, Ethier hadn’t played there recently; Manuel had either looked at the wrong player’s stat sheet (Corey Hart had played CF as recently as last year) or was just confusing the two players.
By the end of the press conference, I was convinced that Manuel knew less about the players on his team than every other person in that room, which is actually understandable. He’s pretty busy running his own team, after all. He’s 66 years old and one of the most country people involved in the sport (the word “bumpkin” was used to describe him several times last week), so I’d wager that he’s not exactly a wiz with the internet. None of the things he got wrong affect how he does his job. And, by all accounts, his players love him, so this isn’t any kind of criticism of Manuel’s qualifications to manage the Phillies.
But it was the most obvious indicator that if MLB wants fans to take the All-Star Game seriously, they should strongly consider just taking the players and managers out of the decision making process. Their job is not to effectively evaluate their peers, and when they try to do so, they’re generally terrible at it. Every time we get the results of some kind of player or manager voting, we usually have to strain to make it match reality. These guys are (mostly) good at what they do, but having a realistic perspective on the other 29 teams in the league is not what they do.
Give the votes strictly to the media – they’d do a much better job picking the All-Stars than the combination of players, managers, and fans. I stood in a room full of guys who knew that Ryan Howard had no business in Anaheim last week, and really had no business starting at DH against a left-handed pitcher, but they were the ones asking the question of “the insider” who didn’t know that. It was pretty interesting to watch. The media has gotten smarter at a much faster pace than the guys on the field.
Ichiro, RF
Figgins, 2B
Branyan, DH
Lopez, 3B
Gutierrez, CF
Bradley, LF
Smoak, 1B
Johnson, C
Jack Wilson, SS
Waiver claims
Jakubauskas goes to Pittsburgh, Robert Manuel to Boston, per press releases from their respective destinations. Who knows what it means, but losing those two doesn’t mean much. It could simply be clearing the decks for the 40-man roster additions, or maybe Zduriencik has bigger machinations in store.
Update: According to Geoff Baker, they’ve added to the 40-man everyone Jay covered earlier except for Peguero and Scott, plus J.C. Ramirez who I guess does need to go on after all. Also, Varvaro is going to start in the AFL title game.
Minor League Wrap (8/31-9/7/09)
The regular minor league season of 2009, with nearly nine hundred games in the books, is done, so this is the final wrap covering most of the teams. The Rainiers and the Mavericks both made the playoffs, the Peoria M’s won theirs, and the D-Jaxx end up on the out, looking in. I hope it’s been educational and at least somewhat entertaining for you all. Of course, the action never really ends, so I’ll be around with winter league stuff and other reviews in the offseason.
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Minor League Wrap (8/24-30/09)
This is the second-to-last wrap of the season, as the affiliates not playing into the post-season won’t be active after the seventh of September. In fact, the Arizona League playoff is tomorrow and Pulaski won’t play after this coming Tuesday, so the end of the recaps is already in wind-down mode.
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Minor League Wrap (8/17-23/09)
I’m around for questions this time, so if there’s anything important left over from last week, shoot.
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Minor League Wrap (8/3-9/09)
This week was one in which the hitters were actually hitting in most cases and the pitchers threw three complete game shutouts, which we’re lucky to see in a half a season let alone a week. So, I have quite a bit more to talk about this time than I have in the recent past.
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Minor League Wrap (7/27-8/2/09)
I don’t have much of an intro going as I spent most of Sunday at CitiField, about two hours of which was in rain delay. It was worth it for the field level tickets though, which a friend of mine scored. If you ever happen to be in that part of the country, I’d recommend giving it a look. It’s cheaper than Yankees Stadium, obviously, and plays better too, if you can get past the issue of planes taking off at LaGuardia every few minutes.
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Projecting The New 2010 Roster
After today’s move, the M’s plan for the next year’s team, and how they’ll continue making upgrades this winter, comes into a bit clearer view. Here’s the general overview of what the team has in house for next year as of now.
Catcher: Rob Johnson, Kenji Johjima, Adam Moore
First Base: Mike Carp, Chris Shelton
Second Base: Jose Lopez
Shortstop: Jack Wilson
Third Base: Matt Tuiasosopo, Jack Hannahan
Left Field: Michael Saunders, Ryan Langerhans
Center Field: Franklin Gutierrez
Right Field: Ichiro Suzuki
Designated Hitter: Brad Nelson
Johjima’s probably going away (either back to Japan or traded, with the team basically assuming the rest of his salary), so you can mentally cross him off the list. The middle infield is probably set, while you’d expect that the team will displace one of the kids at the corners with a veteran. I’d expect Branyan back next year, so Carp/Shelton would share DH and Nelson would keep hanging out in Tacoma. Whether the the M’s will hand third over to Tui and Hannahan probably depends on how much Beltre gets offered as a free agent.
Rotation: Felix Hernandez, Ian Snell, Ryan Rowland-Smith, Brandon Morrow, Jason Vargas, Carlos Silva, Garrett Olson, Nick Hill
Bullpen: David Aardsma, Mark Lowe, Shawn Kelley, Sean White, Chris Jakubauskas, Robert Manuel, Josh Fields, Phillippe Aumont, losers of the rotation competition.
The rotation got a necessary arm for next year today in Snell, who could give the team the mid-rotation starter they were lacking before today’s trade. The flyball lefties, Morrow, and Silva could fight to fill out the back of the rotation, while Hill could force his way into the discussion if he has a strong spring.
All told, the M’s currently have about $55 million in committed multi-year contract salaries for 2010, while the arbitration eligible gang (Felix, Gutierrez, Aardsma, Lowe) should command about $15 million between them, and the league minimum guys on the roster would push the total payroll to about $78 million. If the organization maintains a payroll of around $95 million for 2010, then Jack would have about $17 million to spend this winter – and that’s before he brings back any of the Beltre/Branyan/Bedard/Washburn gang.
With that kind of money available, the team probably can only afford to offer arbitration to one of Beltre/Bedard (bet on Beltre in that case), and bringing back either would limit the amount of money they could offer Branyan to ~$6 or $7 million for 2010.
Or, to put this another way, take the above roster, put Beltre and Branyan back on it in place of Nelson/Tui, and you’re probably maxed out in payroll.
This is the downside of today’s trade. The M’s picked up a shortstop and a starting pitcher, but it cost them $12.5 million out of the 2010 payroll. They chopped up about 30% of their estimated winter budget in today’s deal. That’s a bit of a blow, and means that the team won’t be able to retain all the guys on the current roster that it might want to.
It’s nice to have a league average shortstop and a starter with upside. The team needed both. I just hope that everyone realizes that part of the cost of acquiring these two is that we’re now significantly less likely to upgrade 3B/1B/DH/SP this winter, at least through free agency. We know Jack’s good at finding undervalued talent in trade, which is good, because he’s going to have to do it again this winter.
Wlad to Cincy
The M’s traded Balentien to Cincinnati for 25-year-old RHP Robert Manuel. Manuel’s fastball tops out at 87, but he has a decent change-up that’s let him destroy minor league hitters. There’s almost no upside here, though. At best, he’s a strike-throwing middle reliever. At worst, he’s a Triple-A arm who will get pounded in the majors.
I’m not a big fan of this deal either, but I guess we can hope he turns into Mark DiFelice 2.0.