2017-2018 Hot Stove

Eric Hosmer, coveted all winter by the San Diego Padres, now has another surprising small-market team going head-to-head for his services.

Yes, his old team.

The Kansas City Royals have offered Hosmer a franchise-record seven-year, $147-million contract, persons close to Hosmer told USA TODAY Sports on the condition of anonymity since negotiations are still undergoing.

Hosmer also has a seven-year, $140 million offer from the Padres, people close to Hosmer say, which is $1 million less a year than the Royals’ deal.

this does not seem like a good small market move

he's been one of the most durable players in baseball since he came in the league so there's maybe a better than average chance that this isn't one of those long term deals where the guy is a shell of himself physically like halfway into it (especially when compared to 1B specifically). but idk how you feel good at all about giving a guy who has put up 2 replacement level seasons in the last 4 years that kind of money. it feels like the sequel to the jason heyward contract waiting to happen.

and even the heyward contract in the grand scheme of how these things can go... i'm still more optimistic about his deal than like jacoby ellsbury or shin shoo choo. nonetheless...

Barves lookin to pick off the last Marlins

https://www.talkingchop.com/2018/1/3/16847768/atlanta-braves-trade-rumors-free-agency-christian-yelich-jt-realmuto-miami-marlins-hot-stove

the nonrush to sign free agents could be here to stay

https://www.fangraphs.com/blogs/mlb-teams-have-learned-to-wait-on-free-agents/

The best thing I can say about a Hosmer contract is that by the end, it might not look so bad due to continuing salary inflation throughout MLB. But you could say that about all contracts, so...yeah. Take him back, KCR!

I didn’t realize the braves rebuild was already in the go for it stage?

the royals have given LHP richard lovelady a non-roster invite to spring training

I wonder what the point is where the money the owners save through collusion is cancelled out by a loss of fan interest in the sport after a dead offseason

— Patrick Dubuque (@euqubud) January 9, 2018

idk, i don't think fans care nearly as much as writers with nothing to write about do

anyway, the pirates are sending gerrit cole to houston momentarily

yeah, i agree. only the diehards about this stuff, and they'll be raring to go for spring training, regardless

only the diecards ^care^ about this stuff

oh no, don't diecards

i should just go back to bed

not so fast?

https://www.fangraphs.com/blogs/gerrit-cole-may-or-may-not-become-an-astro/

Weird story

http://www.espn.com/mlb/story/_/id/22027027/mlb-agent-jason-wood-fired-reportedly-filmed-clients-showering

jay bruce back to the mets (3 years, $39 million)

Christ

whatever

i guess the 'transformed' flyball approach is key

https://www.fangraphs.com/blogs/jay-bruce-is-fine-and-so-is-his-contract/

Mets trying to reassemble 2015 team?

https://www.amazinavenue.com/2018/1/12/16883488/mets-lucas-duda-rumors-free-agency-infield-new-york

Cole to the Astros, supposedly for realsies this time. for waaaaayyy less than i would have expected, if this is correct: Musgrove and Colin Moran.

looks like there's two more throw-ins going to Pitt – but those two are the main pieces.

that is a shitty return

ffs

oh good, some 25yo quad-a guys

An array of thoughts on the Gerrit Cole trade from 4 people whose baseball opinions I respect. pic.twitter.com/oSQdt4HAbf

— James Santelli, An All-Nonsense Guy (@JamesSantelli) January 14, 2018

Story Musgrove

oof. at least they didn't deal him to the cubs (who they were apparently talking with re: cole)

what happened to the Bucs and their Big Data?

plus now pirates fans can say "get a brain, moran" after he messes up! you can't put a $ figure on that kind of fan service

McCutchen to the Giants.

idk what the giants are doing

My condolences to Pirates fans, who like us are watching their championship team be scattered to the winds, only without the championship. Or even an NLCS appearance.

— Rany Jazayerli (@jazayerli) January 15, 2018

From 2013 through 2015, the Royals went 270-216 (.556), with 1 division title and 1 wild card.

From 2013 through 2015, the Pirates went 280-206 (.576), with 3 wild cards (all at home).

There but for the grace of God go us.

— Rany Jazayerli (@jazayerli) January 15, 2018

selling tickets. xpost

I know the Pirates did not get much from Cole and McCutchen* but what is the situation with prospect/young players? I have been under the uninformed impression that they got some good talent coming up and that they are not too far away from perhaps contending.

*making that assumption because the Giants have nothing in return to give.

Nationals signed Howie Kendrick to a two-year deal.

The Mets have agreed to sign free-agent first baseman Adrian Gonzalez, pending a physical, according to USA TODAY Sports.

MLB Network insider Jon Heyman also reported a deal was pending. The club has not confirmed an agreement.

Gonzalez, 35, was traded from the Dodgers to the Braves in December as part of a five-player deal, and then released. As a result, the Mets would only need to pay him the league minimum salary of $545,000 in 2018, with the Braves responsible for the rest of the $21.5 million owed to him for the 2018 season under his previous contract.

https://www.mlb.com/mets/news/mets-agree-to-deal-with-adrian-gonzalez/c-264684246

diving deep on the Bucs

https://www.fangraphs.com/blogs/how-the-pirates-are-forced-to-value-players/

28 days to pitchers & catchers. No landing spot yet for Darvish, Arrieta, JDM, Hosmer, Cain, Moustakas, Lucroy, Lynn, Cobb, Escobar (x2), LoMo, CarGo, Greg Holland, Chris Tillman, Ichiro and approximately 185 other guys who were on major league rosters in 2017

no collusion, no collusion, you're the colluder

https://www.baseballprospectus.com/news/article/37107/rubbing-mud-evidence-price-fixing-far

https://sports.yahoo.com/heres-baseballs-economic-system-might-broken-224638354.html

It definitely does seem like the draft and young player development is becoming more a conversation of fans.

Teams are in on the numbers and just don't want to give up young, cheap talent up for anything. That's where you win or lose. I thought it was interesting even in doing those couple of trades, the Giants still held on to a couple of their top prospects.

If that is all Pittsburgh or the Rays can get for players of that caliber, can't really blame a team like the Reds for not dealing some of their topped out players. You can't get any decent return and it's just cheaper to let them play and maybe try again in July. They got Duvall, Hamilton and Scooter tied up for 2-3 years still to deal them at another point.

The local TV deals pretty much will keep baseball from evening out things money wise. Unless cord cutting causes the contracts to bomb, I don't see any change to this anytime soon.

^^ this

It's been said countless times, but front offices are smarter now and won't pay big money in free agency for one-dimensional players, especially on or near the wrong side of age 30. Mark Trumbo led MLB in homers in 2016 but went unsigned for most of the offseason last year. That would have been unthinkable even three years earlier. Teams don't want to get stuck with the Ryan Howard/Josh Hamilton 4-5 year disaster deals, which is why the market is so cool on JD Martinez and Eric Hosmer.

But I don't think that teams are less interested in winning than ever before, as Passan's article implies. MLB has never been a parity league. Right now the gap between the best and worst teams might be higher than in most years, but multiyear rebuilds are nothing new.

Addison Reed to Twins for 2 years

(xpost) Heard on the way home that the Red Sox offered, or are about to offer, $100m/5 years to J.D. Martinez. The Red Sox and the two or three other usual suspects still get to play around with Monopoly money. (Maybe that's less than what they would have thrown at him three years ago, though.)

more on the cold stove:

https://www.fangraphs.com/blogs/the-mlbpa-has-no-leverage/

i agree that no team wants to wind up with late-era albert pujols, and that all the teams are smarter about paying big bucks for guys in their 30s. but there's a difference between being smart and being cheap, and with the staggering amounts of money teams are making and are worth, crying poor is bullshit.

But I don't think that teams are less interested in winning than ever before

with revenue sharing, mlbam money, artificial salary cap, free stadiums, etc., teams' financial success is less tied to their on-field performance than ever. i don't think the pirates or a's or marlins, among others, prioritize winning very much at all. in europe, those clubs would have been relegated to lower leagues by now, but that's not how things work here.

. . . Nutting is a billionaire who owns a newspaper conglomerate and is the chairman of a ski resort in Pennsylvania. Keep in mind that, before the 2017 season, Forbes valued the Pirates as being worth $1.25 billion. Keep in mind that the Pirates are revenue sharing recipients, and that their $109 million payroll in 2017 was 25th in the league, some $50 million below the MLB average. Keep in mind that, in 2010, the AP reported that Pittsburgh—which opened that season with the lowest payroll in baseball at just $39.4 million—made $29.4 million in ’07 and ’08. And keep in mind that, at some point this year, every MLB owner, including Nutting, will receive $50 million from the league, no strings attached, as part of its sale of a majority stake in BAMTech to Disney (on top of the $33 million each already received in 2016 for a minority stake sale).

Does that sound like a team that needs to be counting every penny, or that can’t find a way to put the pieces around McCutchen and Cole to compete for a World Series? Those two players will make just under $22 million combined in 2018, a pittance in today’s market, yet Pittsburgh decided that was a financial bridge too far. And from the way Nutting makes it sound, nothing would have changed that. A team worth a billion dollars and with nearly $300 million in revenue last year chooses to hide behind cries of poverty. A billionaire complains about how the game is rigged against him and chooses to cut payroll, deal away stars, and play next season on the cheap (the Pirates have a mere $70 million on the books for 2018). In the battle between the fans and the bottom line, the money won.

https://www.si.com/mlb/2018/01/16/pittsburgh-pirates-andrew-mccutchen-gerrit-cole-bob-nutting

most of the individual moves the pirates made over the last several years made sense, e.g. giving up in 2016 and dealing mark melancon to get felipe rivero. but the grand strategy behind them was helplessness. they had a window and did almost nothing to maintain it -- they never traded for a zobrist or a cueto, they never signed any decent free agents (sorry david freese and john jaso), whenever they bought low and rehabilitated guys' careers, those guys immediately went elsewhere.

mike ilitch eventually drove his team into the ground with bad contracts, but he definitely wanted to win. these other teams don't seem too interested

with revenue sharing, mlbam money, artificial salary cap, free stadiums, etc., teams' financial success is less tied to their on-field performance than ever.

Yeah, but there have always been bad teams with cheap owners. In the old days when the team was bad, fewer fans would buy tickets to the games (when that was the main source of revenue), which gave the owners an excuse to cut salaries and trade players. Lower revenue meant lower costs, and the owners still made money. It's bullshit, but it's not new. It's just a multibillion dollar business now instead of a multimillion dollar one. But there's no real way to force an owner to spend money, it's just the way it is. I say this as someone who fully shares in your frustration, seeing how the Jays are also owned by a cheap ass media conglomerate (who also own the network that broadcasts the games to the entire country). Toronto has a metropolitan population of about six million, but ownership still claims we're a small market team who can't compete with Boston and New York.

I have to say that the league offices also have to share the blame here, say what you want about the NFL, but they have a league-first mentality and if you win, they'll promote the shit out of you (and the media happily follows along). Despite the record profits, revenue sharing, and franchise valuations, in baseball there's still this mentality that only about 6-10 teams really matter on a national level, and the rest are local chumps that nobody wants to see playing in the World Series. So I can kind of understand why teams are cheap sometimes when the growth potential beyond your local market isn't there.

Ha remember when they gave 240 millions // 10 years to Albert Pujols lol.

I think a lot of GMs and owners are going to look really bad when their rebuilding don't yield a Bryant or a Correa. There is only so much of these really good prospects to go around, especially considering some of them are already snatched by the contending teams. The Church of the Young Player, as Brisbee baptized, is not going to work for everybody like it did for the Cubs and Astros.

I keep thinking of the White Sox who had 3 players that are good enough to build around: Sale, Quintana and Eaton. They got really good returns for trading these. + they have Abreu that they might ship at any moment. We all love Moncada and Jimenez but still what are the odds they produce has many wins in their first 5 seasons as Sale and Quintana did? Tim Anderson was a top 20 prospect if I recall? He projects 82 wrc+ at age 25. I understand that Anderson is a draft pick, not a trade, but my larger point is that some GM gave an incentive to known asshole owners like Reinsdorf to rip their rosters for profit. And that perhaps the next competitive advantage is what the Giants have been doing, getting 3-war caliber veterans players for prospect they see no value for.

randal grichuk to blue jays for dominic leone and conner greene

jays fans, i hope you really enjoy watching people swing at offspeed pitches in the dirt

on the plus side, grichuk is good for 25+HR and it's really fun to say "randal!" in the most ridiculously exaggerated texan accent as possible when he does good

also he's the kind of player who has a chance of turning in a 2013 colby rasmus kind of season, but just as equally could be a perma-4th OF the rest of his career

whoa Colby Rasmus has accumulated 20 WAR through his career, which is about twice as much as i would have thought.

I don't know about Grichuk--that lifetime OBP looks scary.