I know, but you know us Orioles fans… we’re optimistic idiots… or idiotic optimists. One or the other.
Ron Santo has died. What a horrible day for Cubs fans. :( :( :(
Ron and Pat Hughes were my favorite broadcasting duo in sports. He will be missed terribly.
RIP Ron Santo, you’ll be missed :(.
Barajas ain’t much, but if you read between the lines here you get a good idea of what the Dodgers think of Martin’s prospects for recovering from a severe hip injury are. Martin’s offense had already fallen off the charts over 2009 and 2010, and with him recovering from a fractured hip…well, I think $6m was more than the Dodgers were willing to spend on a .697 OPS guy who might not be able to catch 100 games for them next season.
Sad that Santo didn’t live to see himself get into the HoF. He probably deserved to be there as much as a lot of folks, and he’ll probably get elected by the veteran’s committee this year.
Condolences Cub fans. He truly was the heart of the franchise.
Scott Linebrink was shipped off to Atlanta! Hooray!! That’s worth about 5 wins right there. I hope he does better in the NL.
The Dodgers weren’t particularly interested in Russell Martin as a player. However Colletti did say that it really hurt him personally not to tender him. Russell suffered a severely broken hip, and his averages were way down from his first two years. Maybe some other team will give him the money he wants but he’s a high risk. It’s really unfortunate that he did not rest his body as he was repeatedly requested to do in the first two years of playing in the MLB.
The Padres signed Aaron Harang, but the big news is that apparently San Diego and Boston are seriously talking about a deal that would send Adrian Gonzalez east for prospects.
Something to watch.
Should have made you guys take Kawakami in return.
Hell, you gave us half of his salary as is.
if I had my business, I’d have had you guys throw in Rios, and we’d throw in Lowe and McLouth. That’s a heaping helping of bad contract right there for each side.
Rios actually has positive value at this point, though probably not quite $15m of it unless he bounces back to his 4.5+ WAR days in Toronto.
The Adrian Gonzalez to Boston deal is now down to a physical, so that could be official soon. And the Yankees look to have finally come to terms with Jeter on a contract that isn’t really that much more then their 3 years/$15m per rumor from earlier.
…and St. Louis brings in Fat Elvis for a season at $8m per. I’d be turning carwheels on that deal if I thought Berkman could still play OF at all, but I guess we’ll see.
Berkman to play OF in St Louis just means that they can can trade Rasmus up here to sunny Minneapolis!
Sounds like the Adrian Gonzalez to Boston trade is falling apart since he and the Red Sox can’t agree on a long-term contract.
And Jayson Werth signed . . . with the Nationals. Seven years, $126m reportedly.
7 years seems a little long for Werh. But, that’s probably what the Nats needed to do to land him.
Eh, doing this stuff in public is dumb.
And Jayson Werth signed . . . with the Nationals. Seven years, $126m reportedly.
That’s a crazy contract to give a 31-year old without a stellar history. Part of his value is also his athleticism, which will surely deteriorate over the next few years as he ages.
Heyman just tweeted that the Gonzalez deal is back on. Not sure if the extension is part of it or not.
According to multiple sources, the Nats deal was so far and above anything Boras was expecting for Werth that he didn’t even bother to shop it around and told his client to jump on it immediately.
Yep, that’s right: Scott Boras, the agent who is the king of shopping offers-in-hand around the league, didn’t shop this one.
Put it another way: 32-year-old Jayson Werth is locked up through age 39 at $18m per year. Makes the $17m/year the Cardinals have guaranteed Matt Holliday through age 37 seem like a fabulous bargain, especially if you compare the stat lines of both guys.
The MLB.com article says they don’t have an extension but that the Red Sox felt confident enough that it was close that they were willing to go through with the deal anyway. Padres fans aren’t happy, obviously, but they got a pretty good package - the Red Sox top pitching prospect, a #1 pick from a couple of years ago, and a 1B prospect that hit 25 HRs at AA last year.
Buster Olney:
Scott Boras will often make extraordinary claims – and make almost unbelievable comparisons. The perception of some executives is that he will present really high numbers in speculation about his clients so he can make the eventual terms look more palpable to interested teams.
At the outset of this offseason, Boras compared one of his clients, Jayson Werth, to Matt Holliday – whose seven-year, $120 million deal stunned baseball officials this past winter – and many executives viewed the link of Werth and Holliday as more super-agent rhetoric.
And on Sunday, Werth got more than Holliday; for the first time in history, Boras might have underestimated what his client would get.
Werth’s seven-year, $126 million contract immediately drew anger from rival officials who were furious about the terms. “Absolutely crazy,” said one high-ranking AL official.
“You’re kidding me,” a general manager screamed into the phone. “What could they have been thinking?”
Mets executive Sandy Alderson offered this, dryly: “I thought they were trying to reduce the deficit in Washington.”
To put this in perspective: The Nationals spent more money on Werth than all the free agents the franchise had signed in the previous 20 years combined.