An Unordered List of Thoughts Regarding Colby

Bob Elliott is reporting that the Jays are offering Colby Rasmus for pitchers.  Let's get right in to it.

• As a relatively straight man, I'm not sure if it's weird to point this out, but trading Rasmus will almost certainly make the team more attractive, which is something that they're in desperate need of in the wake of the JP Arencibia non-tender if they would like to contend for the handsomeness Wild Card.  Of course, keeping Rasmus and signing Bartolo Colon should result in an early draft pick in next year's draft, especially with Dioner Navarro in the fold(s?).
• Joking aside, Rasmus has had one good year in the last three, offensively, and has one year of control left before hitting free agency.  Stoeten at DJF has already pointed out that Rasmus might very well be in line for a big payday, especially with a big 2014.  Jacoby Ellsbury did just sign for $153MM, afterall.
• Steamer projects Rasmus to be worth 3.3 fWAR, while Oliver projects 3.2fWAR.  Compare that to his 4.8 fWAR total from '13, which was fuelled by a career-best +12.9 runs above average defensively, and a career-best .356 babip.  We can expect those to regress, and that's reflected in the projections, but even those projections have Rasmus being a pretty clearly above average CF.  Certainly wouldn't hurt to hang on to him and get the draft pick after the season, but trading him now boosts his value slightly in that same regard.
• Just touching on his babip; Rasmus had an elevated rate of liners this past year, and an ever-so-slightly reduced rate of popups, so that elevated babip isn't entirely noise.  It's mostly noise, but guys who are hitting more liners and fewer popups are obviously going to have higher babips.
• It's definitely tough to say that Anthony Gose can come anywhere near that 3+ WAR area that Rasmus is projected to provide.  In fact, given Gose's offensive struggles, in terms of K's, walks or even contact, Gose's value is tied up pretty much entirely within his defense and baserunning-- both of which have graded negatively to this point in his admittedly very short big league career.  Steamer only projects 40 games and 162 plate appearances for Gose (which probably sounds about right if Rasmus stays), so it's probably best not to use that projection.  Oliver, however, offers their projection over 600 plate appearances, and likes Gose for a .225/.286/.342 line, with slightly above average running and defense.  I dunno, I just don't think Gose is ready, and, in the event of a Rasmus deal, would probably prefer a temporary replacement, rather than Gose everyday if he can't handle it yet.
• Left-handed power.  Defense.  Premium position.  Hair, sometimes.
• Ultimately, it depends on what the return would be.  It's pretty easy to sit here and say "I wouldn't trade Rasmus" since he's a known commodity coming off a really good year.  It certainly depends on what's coming back the other way, and obviously we shouldn't be making any harsh judgments on this until we hear the rest of the rumor.

Winter Meetingy Stuff!

The first thing I did after making my last post (about Roy Halladay) was google image search Bartolo Colon's name, and try to find an image of him at his most rotund.  That took about four minutes, because every picture of Bartolo Colon has him looking very rotund, and I just couldn't settle upon one.  Until I settled one this one.  So there he his, in his rotundy glory.

As for Colon the person, his name popped up in a Jays rumor today, and for some reason, it kind of surprised me.  I guess I just kind of assumed that Colon would go back to Oakland and I pretty much forgot that he was a free agent.  The idea of Colon on a one-year deal, coming off a 3.9 fWAR, 5.0 rWAR season kind of sounds way better than Ervin Santana, Matt Garza, or Ubaldo Jimenez on a 5-year deal.  I'm sure we all know that Colon's 6% HR rate in 2013 is a product of Oakland's spacious ballpark (and even Seattle and Anaheim's spacious parks if we look at his inside-the-division away games), but that's what your xFIP is for, and he performed better on the road this past season than he did at home, so he still presents a halfway decent option.  You could definitely do worse.

Speaking of doing worse, Eric Thames got released today.  By the Astros, of all teams.

The Jeff Samardzija talks are still a thing.  The Jays' name didn't come up, per se, but there are rumblings of a trade and the Jays certainly seem like a potential fit on this one.

The Jays, Rangers, and a mystery team apparently had a deal in place that would have sent Sergio Santos somewhere, but someone failed a physical.  If that sounds a bit vague, well... it is.  Jon Morosi and Ken Rosenthal are breaking that one out, and they say that it wasn't Santos who failed the physical, so at least that's good news.  Too bad Rosenthal and Morosi didn't name names, because that would make this a whole lot more believable, but I wouldn't mind seeing someone else take on that contract and have to make a tough-ish decision as to whether giving Santos $6MM is a good idea or not.

Santos is set to make $3.75MM this year, before becoming kind of expensive and optiony-- the Jays have three club options ($6MM in '15, $8MM in 16, $8.5MM in '17) that probably won't be worth it if he's not rackin' up them saves or whatever's important. Santos was fucking lights out in limited action this year, and if he doesn't get traded, I'll probably make a .gif of every breaking ball he throws this year, the way I was planning on doing this past year until he got hurt and I started drinking in the mornings.

Seems tough-- Casey Janssen is a free agent next year, and Santos, when healthy, is probably the next best pitcher in the bullpen at the moment, making him the most likely closer in the event of Janssen bailing.  Of course, he's fucking useless when he's on the shelf, as he's been for all but half a season or so during his two years in a Jays' uniform. $6MM is cheap for a closer on the free agent market these days, and even $8.5MM isn't too bad when it's a club option.  Hard to say what I'd do, but I guess the return is a pretty important factor.

Elsewhere, Shi Davidi is telling us that Thad Weber is going to be posted sold to the South Korean SC Dinos.

The Pirates are still apparently in on Adam Lind, especially after James Loney's pricetag is way too high, though there isn't a whole lot here, as that post turns in to a really big "Logan Morrison is getting traded soon" thing.  Hopefully he goes somewhere other than Pittsburgh.

Pat Hentgen on the FAN 590, talking about Roy.

Gregor Chisolm has Gibby's media scrum from this afternoon.

AA was interviewed today about some potential moves that he could make this week.  Might turn these last two in to it's own post with more details.

Doc, My Heart Hurts

My heart skipped a beat this afternoon when I got the notification on my phone.  I had a couple notifications when I checked it as I was going for lunch at work.  The first two were from the Simpsons' Tapped out game, the next from facebook or twitter or something stupid.  The next was from The Score's mobile app, and I quickly saw the words "Blue Jays" and "Roy Halladay", and for just an instant, I wrote my own headline, since those were the only words the I had happened to process to that point.  I had immediately assumed that the Jays had signed Halladay for pitching related purposes.  I can only assume that I saw/thought that because that's what my hearts has truly been yearning for for three years now.

As I finished reading the headline, reality set in, and it set in hard.  He wasn't just an awesome pitcher.  He was our awesome pitcher, and in a way, he still is.  In a more literal and actual way, he isn't, I guess, but the fact that he went ahead and insisted upon retiring a Blue Jay just kind of gives me the satisfaction of knowing that he loves us back, as much as we all loved him when he was our one bright spot in a smattering of dull ones.  Anyway, kinda ruined my day.

I would be totally cool with retiring the #32 right now, especially after retiring a Blue Jay, and, in fact, remember being sort of furious with both Aaron Laffey and Esmil Rogers at wearing that particular jersey these past few years.

I remember thanking Roy via ovation, along with 47,000 other people a few years ago at the Dome when Philadelphia stopped by for the Canada Day Weekend series, and I'm really glad to have finally seen him pitch live and in the flesh.  It was some pretty surreal stuff.  It was also quite warm that day.

I assume he doesn't read this, because not very many people do and why the fuck would he be one of them?  But on the off-chance he decides to do a vanity-check and scour Jays' blogs, I'd just like to go ahead and thank him one more time for everything.  Most of my baseball and Jays' related memories aren't anything overly special-- being a big baseball fan who watches multiple hundred games a summer will kind of force the days and games to melt together.  I honestly can't say that I remember a lot of individual games (though I definitely do remember a lot of them-- 10-inning shutout, the leg-break, the near no-hitter against Detroit in game 162 in 1998, etc.), but I can definitely remember sitting down with my grandfather (consult the picture in the "About Me" section on the right) and just talking about how unwatchable 4 of every 5 Jays games are, but how can't miss that Halladay start always happens to be.

The Blue Jays, and baseball in general, has really shaped who I am as a person. So with Roy Halladay being arguably the greatest Blue Jay ever, and not at all arguably the greatest Blue Jay of my generation, Roy Halladay has supposedly been an integral of my upbringing.  Sounds weird when I say it like that, but meh.

Thanks Doc.

Holding the Phone: Someone Wants Adam Lind?!?

I saw you, MLB Trade Rumors.  I saw you trying to sneak that little tidbit in there, knowing that I'd go ahead and make a big deal of it.  Clever.

If you have no idea what I'm talking about, I'm not terribly surprised.  Pittsburgh is apparently looking at James Loney to be their first baseman, as if he's actually good and didn't have an excellent season last year by accident.  Of course, the Tampa Bay turning-shit-in-to-strawberry-shortcake thing applies at least a bit here.

Anyway, Jayson Stark was mentioning that the Pirates have also reached out to the Rangers about Mitch Moreland's availability-- which, when you think about the whole Prince Fielder thing, makes a lot of sense-- and to the BLUE JAYS ABOUT ADAM LIND.

Sorry.  Things got out of hand there for a second.  Too excited.

The Jays don't necessarily have to trade Lind this offseason-- it would create a small, easy fillable hole in the lineup at 1B/DH, but it's not like there isn't an upgrade or forty available out there.  Lind is very serviceable against RHP, but doesn't really offer a whole lot else.  He's also making $7MM this year, and at least has $1.5MM more coming to him in the way of option buyouts.  There's no Mark DeRosa anymore, and there's probably no Rajai Davis around either to take his spot in the order when lefty pitchers are around.

Now watch how I spin this in the right direction.

James Loney is projected for 1 WAR in 2014, and is apparently seeking a three year deal.  Given that Justin Morneau signed yesterday for 2 years and $13MM, I think three years for Loney is looking like nothing less than $18MM.  Lind?  A practically free $7MM, with two options!  May as well be three 1-year deals!

Lind is one of those big cocksuckers who can hit the ball out of the ballpark.  Loney?  Walks.  Reasonable defense.  That's about it.  When's the last time you saw someone score a run by catching the ball?

Lind has been bad in the past, but it's not like Loney wasn't worth -0.4 WAR in 2012 himself, and never better than 2 WAR over a single season in his entire career.  At least Lind has a 3.4 WAR season under his belt, which is driven down thanks to a -22.4 run defensive tally, though he was playing LF then, and is a 1B now.

Loney just isn't all that good, and three years there would be shockingly bad, especially when Adam Lind is available for probably less than that on a 1-year deal with options.  The scary thing is that I'm kind of talking myself out of hating Adam Lind.

But really.  If James Loney is worth whatever he's going to be worth, three options of Adam Lind has to be at least somewhat attractive if you're Pittsburgh.  The only real benefit to Loney over Lind is health.and maybe relative defense.  I wouldn't classify Loney as "good" defensively, but he's practically a full win better than Lind is with the glove.  Lind obviously makes that up with the bat, and is coming off a bit of a comeback year himself.

Mitch Moreland is still probably a better fit for Pittsburgh if Texas chooses to move him, but holy crap... the pieces fit.  Maybe we can get Snider back.

December 3rd: Everybody in the Pool!

Holy shit.  This day.

First off, Alex Anthopoulos was on the Fan 590 with Elliotte Friedman and some other guy, having a minor chat.  The most interesting part, to me at least, was his answer to the question regarding whether or not he had a chance to match Washington's offer for Doug Fister, which, surprisingly, didn't even entertain the notion that Dave Dombrowski is on all the drugs.

Basically, some GM's like to have auctions for their players, while other like to keep things quiet.  Some like to make certain that the player that they're trading gets out of the division at least, and preferably out of the league, so as to not improve the competition (which he also touched on when Friedman's mystery partner asked about acquiring David Price).  He finally mentioned that sometimes you just don't match up well with the other team in terms of areas of strength and weakness, and that the Jays asked about, but never really had a fighting chance at acquiring Fister.

AA also mentioned that there was a small deal in the works-- one so small that we might not even notice it-- and boy howdy, he was not kidding.  Brad Lincoln to the Phillies for a guy that I've never heard of, and a guy that I've only heard of, but have never seen in action.  Eric Kratz is apparently a pretty good defensive catcher, but definitely can't hit (career .220/.281/.407 slash line, and 2013 .213/.280/.386 isn't terribly dissimilar to what JP Arencibia did, though Kratz only had 218 PA's).  He's listed at 6'4'', 255lbs.  Rob Rasmussen is 24 and seems destined to fail as a starter, but is left-handed, so we'll test him out in the bullpen and see what happens.

He also mentioned that the report that surfaced about the Jays being infatuated by Brett Anderson isn't necessarily true, since he doesn't tend to go around and tell people from other clubs that he's emotionally or sexually interested in other players (my words, not his).  That particular snippet stemmed from a report suggesting that Anderson will definitely be traded at some point this week or at the winter meetings.  Of course, the Jays are looking to bolster their rotation, so naturally...  I dunno, I'm not really all that stoked about Anderson.  He was a good enough pitcher in  2009 and 2010, but he's thrown about 160 innings since then, many of which not terribly inspiring.  I have no idea how healthy he is at the moment, but I'm not sure it matters either, given his history.  He doesn't seem to walk many guys, so that's a plus, I guess.

And he said that Brandon Morrow is throwing at full intensity and feels great.  OK!

Oh, and everybody lost their fucking minds today.  MLBTR links.

Red Sox signed AJ Pierzynski, the most not very Red Sox player there is (other than being a giant douche, I guess) for $8.25MM.  That makes the Dioner deal look a lot better, to me, but it's 1-year and not a whole lot can go so wrong to make a 1-year deal look overly bad.

Rockies traded Dexter Fowler for not very much to the Astros.  Fowler was really good two years ago, and totally reasonable this past year.  Astros' GM Jeff Luhnow is probably just going to trade Fowler for more youth at the deadline, and it will almost certainly be a better return than Jordan Lyles and Brandon Barnes.  Seems like a huge win for Houston, even if Fowler is now way the highest-paid player on the team, since the odds of him re-breaking out is probably better than the odds of Lyles or Barnes being worth anything for the Rockies, even if Fowler's 2 years from free agency.

The Marlins signed Jarrod Saltalamacchia for three years and $21MM.  I'd guess that Rob Brantly is going to be traded now, but he was really bad this year, so maybe they fancy him as a backup or would like to send him down to the minors for a while to figure some stuff out.  I can't help but think that Saltalamacchia is going to be traded somewhere at some point over the course of this contract too-- signing guys that aren't going to help them immensely and then trading them early in the contract just seems like the way the Marlins do their business and stock up the farm.  Not that that isn't a viable strategy.

Jacoby Ellsbury signed in New York for 7/$153MM.  Pretty reasonable, as far as I can tell, though there are obviously some health concerns.  I figured like 6/$120MM would get it done so I'm not too terrible.

Oakland is still playing MLB The Show, trading everyone for everyone.  Craig Gentry is the newest A, edging out Luke Gregerson in that particular contest.  Gentry and Josh Lindblom came from Texas for some minor leaguers, while Gregerson was swapped for Seth Smith.  Add that to the Jim Johnson deal from last night, and the forthcoming Brett Anderson trade, and the A's are going to have a pretty new look this year, though they're only really replacing some minor parts.  Gentry is a pretty underrated piece, in that he steals, runs, gets on base, and plays defense pretty well.  He was worth 3.6 rWAR over 106 games with the Rangers in '13, playing mostly in CF.

Finally, I guess, the Tigers signed Joe Nathan for two years and $20MM, which is probably more than what Doug Fister is going to make in his last two years of arbitration.  Chuckle at Dave Dombrowski all you want, but PROVEN CLOSERS DAMMIT.

Prospects!

Marc Hulet of Fangraphs has just released his Toronto Blue Jays version of his 2014 Top-10 Prospects list.  No huge surprises, but let's have a glimpse.  He starts the list off with a quick jab to the organization and their trades from this past offseason:

This Top 10 (+5) list is the weakest collection of prospects that Toronto has had in the minors for quite a while now. Most of the talent is in A-ball or Rookie ball with a noticeable lack of depth at the upper levels, thanks to the 2012-13 trades that were supposed to turn the Jays into a winning club.

Numbers 1 and 2 are of little shock; Aaron Sanchez and Marcus Stroman.  Some familiar stuff here; Sanchez has #1 stuff, but his delivery is cause for concern, while Stroman looks amazing out there, dummies minor league batters, and could probably have been in the majors this past season, but he's short.  Sounds about right.

Mitch Nay popping up at #3 was probably the biggest shocker for me, though it seems as though, based on his rankings that he would clump Nay in to a tier with Roberto Osuna and Daniel Norris.  Though he doesn't come right out and say it, it sounds like Nay isn't going to be able to stick at 3B, which is probably a minor issue, given Brett Lawrie's existence, but that problem won't likely arise for a few years.

Speaking of Norris and Osuna, things are starting to get a bit depressing-- Osuna is going to miss this season after having a delayed Tommy John surgery, and Norris is a bit of a wild card, given that he's only had one good half of a season over his 2 years as a pro.

AJ Jimenez at #7 is the last person with any real upside that is close to the bigs, at 23 years old and a likely AAA appearance.  Alberto Tirado, DJ Davis, and Matt Smoral are all in the top-10, and are all coming off seasons of rookie-ball, so are pretty far away.  Tirado is a possible reliever, due to Stroman-like size issues, but he crushed the Appalachian League this year in a small sample.  Davis is kind of like an Anthony Gose guy, with a bunch of tools and nothing really to do with them to this point.  Smoral is 6'8'' and left-handed, and is going to get an awful lot of chances to succeed, given his stuff that just hasn't come together yet.

The list rounds out with Sean Nolin, who, Hulet notes, was pointlessly added to the 40-man roster and had an option year burned for the sake of 1.1 IP.  Hulet calls Nolin a future No. 4 innings-eater, which has value.

Hulet calls Jairo Labourt and Franklin Baretto the wild cards that should move up in to next year's list.

My Triumphant Return: A Giant "Stuff" Post

Dioner Navarro looks like he is a big boy, despite being listed as 5'9'', 205.

But he's our big boy now, isn't he?  It's been pointed out around the internet pretty well all day that Navarro, by virtue of being not JP Arencibia, is a pretty huge upgrade for the Jays.  He was pretty damn awesome this past year for the Cubs in a backup role, putting up 1.7 fWAR over a fairly small sample of 266 plate appearances.  It seems a bit aggressive to give him 2 years, given that he hasn't been average ever, save for a nice season in 2008 with Tampa, and even then, 470 plate appearances that year remains a career high.  I'm not sure if I'm ready to anoint him as the everyday-ish (non-Dickey day) starter, given his apparent inability to stay healthy for a whole season, but I'm sure this is going to be refreshing, even if he does fall completely on his face.  Speaking of which, the contract calls for $3MM this year, and $5MM next year, which is really quite close to what JPA would have been paid had he gone through arbitration twice with Toronto.  Even if he does fall on his face, this money is better spent with Navarro, someone who has shown signs of being good, rather than JPA.

We're about to see a whole lot more Josh Thole than what we're used to, which, again, isn't JP Arencibia whiffing through pitch after pitch.  Between Thole and Navarro, we're bound to see a pretty significant uptick in walks, and thus, on-base percentage from catcher, all the while losing out on some power.  Navarro will help a bit in that regard, but making fewer outs and swinging through fewer pitches is truly excellent.  After all, Thole has a 9% walk-rate to this point in his career-- you could do worse, especially out of the guy that's going to be handling the knuckleballer.

We're still waiting to see what exactly happens with JPA; either a trade or a non-tender is looming any minute now, and might even end up being edited in to this very post if it's not finished by the time the result comes through.  Still, I'm pretty sure I can see in to the future on this one.  AA gets asked some inane question about Arencibia and stays pretty non-committal about the decision, hitting mostly at the fact that JP's a great person and is more than welcome to stay within the organization on a minor league deal.  JPA then gets his turn with the media somehow and lambastes the organization/media/city about something or other as if it comes down to anything other than putting up results on the field.  I'm sure he's a nice guy, but this is a business.

Obviously it's going to suck if this whole situation goes all Aaron Hill on us again, and it's certainly a possibility, albeit a pretty remote one.  The book is out on JPA, as far as hitting is concerned.  but there was some prospect shine there at one point, and there's some pretty legit power going on there when he can actually hit the ball.  Someone's going to take a flyer on him, and it will likely be one of those poor teams that need to find ways to win where others just don't care.  If someone can ever get through to him to not hack at everything, and to, you know, swing at strikes and not at balls... there can certainly be something there.  I mean he hit 21 HR's this year, imagine what he could do if he weren't always striking out.

Finally, I'd love to be a fly on the wall in Dave Dombrowski's office today, when he decided to trade an elite starter for not that much.  I just have so many questions.  Most of them are just slack-jawed gawking and some kind of awkward hybrid of the words "what" and "why", but I'd also really like to know whether anybody else had a chance at matching that with, say, anybody from the Jays' bullpen and anybody else from within the system.  There has been a lot of talk going around about Jeff Samadzija lately, and how a prospect haul centered around Stroman/Sanchez just aren't worth two years of him.  Now, I'm okay with saying that the Jays may have overpaid for Dickey, but I'd definitely be cool with giving up the same package for Fister.  We're talking about a top-15-or-so pitcher in the game, still with two years of cost-reduced control left.  If that means dealing one of Sanchez/Stroman and, say, a bullpen arm for him, then I'm for it.  If it means beating the package Washington sent?  Christ, I'm depressed just thinking about how easy that would have been.

If anybody is talking to AA in the next few weeks, I'd like you to go ahead and ask him about Doug Fister, and let him know that I'm heartbroken.