2010 MLB offseason

There's a fairly good look at what the Blue Jays are going to do next season right here, but the basic gist is that the team isn't going to get the rumoured payroll increase, Halladay is probably going to get traded before the start of next season, and some other veterans will probably be shown the door.
I'll be sorry to see Halladay leave, but I can't begrudge the man a chance to go to a city where he'll compete. He's earned at least that much.

Phillies declined Pedro Feliz's option today. So it looks like they'll have a new 3B next year, although I'm sure there's a small possibility they fall back on Pedro for a little less money, too.

I bet someone looks at the RBIs and his fielding reputation, though, and pays him too much.

Cubs
Ricketts family is the new owners. Ticket prices and team payroll should increase slightly. Wants to get rid of the troughs and improve the mens bathrooms.

Harden is a goner via free agency.

For some reasons teams seem to want Milton Bradley.

Cubs got Rangers hitting coach Jaramillo.

How do Cubs fans feel about the proposed Vernon Wells for Bradley deal that was floated around last week?

The Pirates will have their 18th straight losing season while Bud Selig continues to defend the asinine Nero-like ownership.

We have enough bad contracts.

How hard would it be for baseball to set a Minimum/Maximum Spending salary cap? Tax those that go way over, and force some of the cheaper owners to re-invest in their product. Almost every team has (or will have in the coming years) a new stadium bringing revenue in. I can't get on the interstate and go 25mph without getting pulled over as I'm a danger to the other drivers. Grow a pair, Bud.

Knee-jerk reaction, small market owners would never allow it. They enjoy getting the luxury tax money and then not spending it on players. With a max/min not only would they lose the extra cash, they'd have to spend more.

Teams in need of power can always go after this guy:



He's rejuvenating (real picture, and not for Halloween, either).

ETA: It's Sammy Sosa. Really.

It looks like Bunnicula got hold of Sosa.

My Atlanta Braves wishlist:

1) Trade Derek Lowe without having to pay off a large portion of his contract.
2) Find a first baseman with some power with a contract that doesn't last any longer than 2 seasons.
OR
3) Move Chipper to first base like they should have 5 years ago
4) Find at least one outfielder with a little power.

If they can get these things done, the Braves will be in the Phillies' face all next season.

Out here in LaLa land all eyes will be on the massive shit storm brewing between Dodger owner Frank McCourt and his soon to be ex-wfie, Jamie. I wish McCourt would just sell the team already, but that's probably not gonna hapen.

Bud Selig works for the owners, and there are far more benefiting from the lack of a cap, through revenue sharing and luxury taxes, than are being hurt by it. Let alone the fact that all a cap does—financially—is suppress player salaries.

If you really want competitive balance, get rid of all of the regional sports networks and split TV revenue evenly across the board.

Yea, this is the answer. As much as I hate the overspending and underspending in baseball, a cap won't do anything. Making teams spend a minimum amount of money won't make them better unless they spend smart (which most teams in baseball don't do); making teams spend up to a certain amount will only hurt player salaries, like Girma said.

I would like a combination of splitting TV revenue evenly, and say something like teams can only sign one, or *maybe* two, Type A free agents in any given off-season. The latter would be the perfect way to combat the Yanks ridiculous monetary advantage.

Yeah, that'll never, ever work.

Poulson, I'll say it even though you won't want to hear it. There are owners of baseball teams with much deeper pockets. Pohldad was worth something like 3 billion when he kicked earlier this year. John Henry's bank account is about the same size as Steinbrenner's. The Yankees having the chutzpah to spend money on building championship teams may equate to a ridiculous advantage in your mind, but it really isn't, and if leveling the playing field is your actual goal, I don't see anything in your plan to prompt owners to reinvest the money in their teams.

Grats on Varitek, btw. He's a gamer.

You're right, Subotai. The Yanks have no financial advantage in baseball. What was I thinking?

The 'chutzpah' the Yankees showed by shelling out $450 million for 3 Type-A free agents (the top 3 available as well) this past offseason was legendary. The $300 million spent on one single player the year before was such a coup. Brian Cashman should be given a plaque in Cooperstown for his amazing ability to write bigger checks than everyone else. I don't know how in the world the Royals or Reds or Pirates or *insert any other team here* were outbid for these players.

Of course the Yankee fan only offers criticisms to any fixes as he doesn't think the system is broken.

It’s about payroll as a percentage of revenue. As of two years ago, 1/3 of MLB spent more than half of their revenue on payroll (and over 2/3 spend more than 40%), and that top 1/3 included teams like Kansas City, Oakland and Toronto.

This past season, the NY Yankees were third in this regard, so let's not act like the Steinbrenners are doing anything special.

Yeah, the idea that owners should dip into their own pockets and lose money just to keep up with a team that has a massive payroll and makes money isn't a good economic argument. That's still an advantage to the Yankees who don't need to be subsidized with outside revenue.

But, I agree, the ultimate solution is a leveling of revenues, not cap/floor/luxury tax gimmicks. And, frankly, I think the future is broadband which MLB already has as a shared pool. It will take time, but that's going to be the ultimate leveler.

Yeah, owners spending money to improve their teams - how fucked up is that.

Anyhow, Poulson, here's a sight to cheer you up.

http://www.nydailynews.com/entertain..._new_york.html

That's just it, Sub. Baseball is a business, first and foremost. The owner of a team isn't out to lose money. Why would he invest in his ball club when it's not financially smart to do so? No team rakes in the dough like the Yanks. Because of that, the Yanks have the biggest advantage in all of professional sports.

As far as the Jeter pic/article, I love it. I can't wait to see that. I've never had a problem with DJ and I loved him hosting SNL a few years back.

It's massively fucked up economically if the rewards don't equal the investment. Which it doesn't for any team not named the Yankees.

Basically, you're asking other owners to lose $100+ million a year just to keep up with the Yankees and claiming because they don't want to lose massive amounts of money they don't care about their product.

The rules are what they are and the Yankees are playing within the rules. That doesn't mean that the rules aren't slanted in their favor.

How are the rules slanted in their favour?

Inconsequential penalties for spending way above and beyond the 'salary cap' is the biggest one, and really, ties into everything that's wrong with baseball. The fine for going over the cap is a small amount of money, and the rational people know that money doesn't matter to NY because they have more of it than any other team. By a large margin. Large.

I read somewhere lately that the Yankees spend around 50% of all money paid to free agents in MLB.

I would say it's mind-boggling that you think it's a level playing field, but I've known a lot of Yankee fans in my life, and they all use the same silly arguments - why don't they win the WS every year, and every owner is as rich as or richer than Steinbrenner. Lame, lame, lame.

I was in the grocery store last night and had my traditional 'B' Red Sox hat on. I saw a guy with a brand-new-Abe-Lincoln-style Yankee hat and hoped like hell he wouldn't see me. Sure enough, he did, and said to me 'Your hat's broken. Hah.' Ugh. That's what gets me. Sure, your team won, but so? They were supposed to. Congrats. It took you 6 games to beat a team you outspent by over 80%! The stories about how the Yanks came together as a team, so much adversity, yadda yadda. Sure. Didn't make the playoffs in '08 (for the first time since 1995, by the way), so go out and spend $450 million on the three best players available. Shocker! The team full of All-Stars and HoF'ers won!

Again, I honestly don't give a shit that the Yankees won. If I sound bitter, I assure you I am not. My whole point to all of this is that the Yankees have the biggest advantage in all of professional sports, and something should be done about it. I honestly think it hurts baseball, and the only people who think everything is OK are Yankee fans. 5 World Series titles, 11 AL East titles, and playoff appearances every year but one since 1995 would do that. I'm sure that ridiculous run of dominance could be achieved by any team if they'd only open up the checkbooks like ol' Georgie Boy!

Two things - I meant to say 'since 1994' in regards to the Yanks' playoff run (they won the WC in '95).

and

I've been struggling a lot with that picture of Sammy Sosa. He's not a favorite player or anything, it's just so bizarre.

Poulson, don't worry, you never sound bitter. No more than any other Sox fan I know, anyhow.

Anyhow, I'm not going to argue the point anymore - I just caught up on Bill Simmons' recent podcasts and he did it for me, so it's all good.

I do love his podcasts.

You congratulated me about Tek exercising his player option...don't forget, the Sox traded for Jeremy Hermida 8 days ago! In your face, Evil Empire!

The NY Yankees competitive advantage is in their ability to extract value out of their franchise in areas that aren’t shared with the rest of the league, which has nothing to do with caps, and everything to do with a series of shrewd investments. I don’t begrudge them these advantages, and the opportunity for owners to reap such rewards is probably a good thing for baseball overall (everyone who opines the decline of baseball forgets to look at its revenues over recent years, as the sport is well on its way to outgrossing the NFL once again), but I can see curtailing these advantages over time through revenue sharing.

That way teams would still be rewarded for investing in their team, but that advantage wouldn’t exist in perpetuity.

I think that ignores something else. Like the size and wealth of the Yankee market. (A market which is protected from competition through an antitrust exemption and league rules.) A KC regional sports network won't generate a significant fraction of what the Yankees generate, even with a comparable investment.

At some point though, this is the owners' problem to fix if they're really worried about balance, rather than complaining about it and pocketing revenue sharing money. And, for the most part, this is really an AL East problem more than a baseball problem. The NL is much more balanced. Last I checked, St. Louis is a small market, and they've been built smartly and have developed suffient revenues to compete. The Brewers have done a good job too as 3 million fans in attendance goes a long way as demonstrates good marketing. Miami is actually a large market. As is Houston. And Washington. I have very little sympathy for Pittsburgh and Cincinatti who have a long string of incompetence behind them with little done until recently to correct that.

The thing is, you can build your market. Sure, some markets have higher ceilings than others, but the teams that are “failing” are nowhere near exploiting their market’s revenue potential. And the teams that aren’t have, from what I can tell, done pretty well for themselves over the past decade.

But it looks like we basically agree, so, back to hoping the Mets don’t do something stupid, like sign Chone Figgins.

Just as another strike against Pittsburgh, prior to his Cubs interest, Mark Cuban sent "feelers" out to see if he could buy the Pirates (which he saw a team in a city ready to support them, just no money). The Pirates sent the message back that they had no interest in dealing with him.

Because who wants to sell their team to a guy who will overpay and will spend the money to bring the team back to relevance?

Part of me loses how bad the Nats are, just because I love going to the stadium and the lack of crowds just make it that much better, but if they could get a couple more players (and Riggleman to manage well), that place will be packed fast.

I have to say that it also helps NL teams that Omar Minaya and Jim Hendry run two of the richest clubs. That Soriano contract alone should be enough to cost a GM a job. Not to mention how easily Hendry drops in multi-years and no trade clauses. He's always paying retail for guys that don't add a whole lot of value.

Granted the division isn't great. I'd think the Cardinals will have a tough time getting as much out of the pitching staff in 2010, the Brewers have to find pitching and there's no guarantee that Braun and Fielder will be quite as good as they were in 2009, or that the Brewers will get as much out of 3B and 2B, so the Cubs might bounce back into the playoffs anyways. But it likely will be despite Hendry.

Increased ticket prices combined with the club's decision to tank the upcoming season probably means I'll stop going to Blue Jay games as often as I used to. Which is a shame, considering I'd probably go to around 20-25 any given year.

Boo to the most deserving guy on winning AL MVP. Jeter should have won for having above-average/great season should always win the Best Offensive Player player the toughest position.

(Even us Yankee fans know that if Jeter won the award it would have been horseshit)

How serious was Troy Glaus’ injury? He would seem like the perfect fit for this Mets team (and no, I’m somehow not making a smart ass injury related joke here), assuming he’s fully recovered. I ask because, well, I’ve heard almost nothing about his status, and for a player with his track record, I can’t for the life of me figure out why.

Jesus, the Jays better ask for someone better than Bucholz if they trade Halladay. That guy is the worst. I don't care about any no-hitter he threw against a team with a 40-man roster. He was in Pawtucket for half the year. Anthopoulos better pull his head out of his ass.

Well, given that Glaus was out about 4 months longer than expected and never really demonstrated any return to form, I'd imagine his injury was worse than expected. Of course, with Glaus you kind of half to assume he'll be injured half the time and hope it's just not when you really need him. He'll probably be decent next year though.

I'd also encourage the Mets not to go for Piniero, he's not a great pitcher (no matter how well he did during most of the 2009 season).

I would say I don't get the hate for a 25 year old prospect, but it's simply a Yankee thing. You even had to qualify the no-hitter, as if it was somehow less impressive. I suppose Jon Lester's no-hitter wasn't real either because it was against the lowly Royals.

The world just isn't right if Sub isn't bitching about the Sox.

Or if Sox fans aren't bitching, period.

Buchholz is hardly a prospect. He's had three years to sort his shit out. The Jays deserve better in return for Halladay. I don't want to see him gift-wrapped like Cliff Lee or Adam LaRoche.

None of the rumoured offers for Halladay have really blown me away, but I'm intrigued by the apparent offer from the Cubs, which would include prospect Starlin Castro. Reading the scouting report from Baseball America, it seems the kid has a huge upside to him and the Jays could use a shortstop to study under John MacDonald.

I'm just glad Alex Anthopoulos learned something from JP Ricciardi's attempts to trade Doc and hasn't turned it into a circus.

That guy's apparently pretty good - I just like ballplayers named Castro because you hear the name in a different context.

Trivia note: Tony Fernandez, the Jays' sublime shortstop during their salad days, real last name was Castro.

Yes, we certainly want to make it fair. We wouldn't want any team having an unfair advantage in MLB.

Clay's problem is between his ears. Maybe pitching somewhere less stressful than Boston is the answer. He's very young still and his talent started to shine through at the end of last year (finally). #2 or #3 potential. Plus he isn't the only piece the Jays will ask for or get if this happens. Some rumors have them asking for Casey Kelly as well as others. Who knows, though. They're just rumors and will drive you mad if you pay too much attention.

Halladay is also worth less than he was during the regular season. The offers are gonna be different.

Letting teams work out a contract extension with Halladay before any possible trade should work out in the Jays' favour. If I were a team like the Cubs, I would never trade a prospect like Castro unless I knew I wasn't just renting Doc. I'm glad Halladay has been with the Jays so long, but the guy deserves a chance to win. I wouldn't feel bad if he went to a team like Boston or New York, just so he could have a chance to play a meaningful game at some point.

I've only seen Clay pitch a couple of games, so I'm far from an expert on him, but what I've seen hasn't impressed me. It's probable he was just having off games, but he seemed to dig himself into a hole and get behind in the count fairly quickly.

Good pickup by the Jays on Gonzalez, solid shortstop.

It'll be good to have his glove up the middle, since the pitchers are going to need as much help as they can get. I'd like to be optimistic and say that the young guys are going to be fine, but I'd rather prepare for the worst at this point. Combined with Johnny Mac (oh, if he could only hit) and Aaron Hill, I like the way the team looks there. I'm not too fussy with what they have at third, but I'm not even sure how the team is going to look there at this point.

I don't know which teams are still in the market for a shortstop, but a team could do a lot worse than signing Marco Scutaro. I can see him being a good back up for a team like Boston, if they're willing to give up a couple of draft picks to sign him. Watching him play almost everyday, I saw a lot that I liked. He gets on base, works the count fairly well, has a solid glove and plays the game in a great, sneaky manner. His steal of second on a walk was one of my favourite plays of the year.

I sure as shit hope the Sox don't give up any draft picks for a 34 year old backup SS. That's lunacy. Plus Scutaro's gonna want a 3 year deal or so, after the year he had, and the thought of giving up picks and signing him to an extension makes me gag. That is, if Toronto offers him arbitration, which I'm sure they will. The Sox need to worry about getting Jed Lowrie healthy and bridging the gap to Jose Iglesias. Or empty the farm for Hanley Ramirez, like Theo's been supposedly trying to do for years now.

I'm not sure what the Jays were thinking with the AGon pick. I suppose taking that option away from Boston and making Scutaro seem more attractive? Who knows.

Jays' big holes were at shortstop and catcher. One of those is solved, and at a relative bargain.

Shortly after I posted that, I found out he was asking for a contract around $5 million a year, so you're right, nuts to that. I thought he'd be asking for significantly less, which I thought would take the sting out of the draft pick part of the equation.

Lol, they filled a big hole by signing AGon? That's priceless. AGon's not very good - quick hands, but diminished range and a weak arm. Plus he can't hit worth a shit. Don't they already have a great defensive SS in John McDonald? Signed cheaper? Which brings me to...

Why sign AGon so quickly? What was the rush? Again, to create a market for Scutaro is my guess, but even that doesn't make sense (at best, AGon was the Red Sox's Plan B). Who really needs a 34 year old SS that's gonna require a 2 or 3 year contract and cost draft picks? The Astros? Giants? A's? I honestly can't think of any team that makes sense.

So, if there's no market for Scutaro, why didn't the Jays try to bring him back at a discounted rate? He's obviously a great fit up there and plays well with the Jays.

Another thing that I feel bad for Jays fans is the Toronto management. Ricciardi obviously wanted Scutaro back, or he would've traded him at the deadline. The new GM's first move was to go in another direction and sign AGon as the new starting SS. And possibly get nothing at all for Scutaro. Ridiculous.

You can cut the guy down if you like - his stats weren't impressive, but yeah, they filled a hole at shortstop.