SB Nation - Adam Kennedy

Twitter Is Ridiculous Applesauce - Omar Meets The Agents, Juan Pierre Is Available And Nonsensical Rumors

James Kannengieser — Tue, 08 Dec 2009 14:05:48 -0000

It seems reporters/"journalists" are neglecting to consider source bias and failing to corroborate rumors with multiple sources before posting on Twitter or a blog. All in the name of page hitzzz I suppose.

Meet the Mets

Omar Minaya met with the agents for various players last night, including John Lackey, Jason Marquis, Bengie Molina, Joel Pineiro and Randy Wolf.

In an interview with Daily 'Stache, Adam Rubin says the Mets should focus on pitching this offseason, namely Lackey. He also says Jeff Francoeur is the most reliable provider of good quotes.

Steve Henson says that 3-4 teams are interested in Dodgers OF Juan Pierre. A trade for Pierre would likely include a bad contract player, AKA Luis Castillo. No thanks on Pierre. Speaking of undesirable players, Jerry Crasnick reports that Elmer Dessens will likely re-sign with the Mets. If it's a major league deal you better get ready for Dessens Avenue.

Ken Davidoff tweets that Yorvit Torrealba is on the Mets radar. Interesting, considering the bizarre chain of events involving the Mets and Torrealba two offseasons ago.

Joel Sherman reports that a John Maine for Corey Hart trade is being discussed. Hart is just 27 years old and two years removed from a 4+ win season but I'd rather hold on to Maine. Will at BlueAndOrange agrees and thinks the deal is plausible, especially considering Omar Minaya's affinity for bad corner outfielders.

Mets Fever is also a fan of Adam Kennedy. If Castillo can be moved, Kennedy is the way to go.

LOL Rumors of the Day

Early yesterday it was reported that Pat Burrell had been traded to the Mets. This story was debunked almost immediately and the original story has been taken down from PhillyBlurbs, the website with the original report. Folks, cool it with your bogus anonymous sources, you're not providing a valuable service and it's annoying. No one is impressed.

Ed Price of Fanhouse tweeted the following yesterday:

Rumor that #Mets acquire Edwin Jackson

This was followed shortly by a clarification tweet from Price:

To be clear: #Mets and Edwin Jackson not confirmed. Heard in the lobby.

Why not get confirmation before posting the rumor? Does "heard in the lobby" count as a reliable source nowadays?

Around MLB

The Nationals gave Pudge Rodriguez 2 years, $6 million for some reason.

Randy Wolf reportedly signed with the Brewers for 3 years and an unknown dollar amount.

Chuck Brownson at The Hardball Times discusses swaps for bad contracts, including Dontrelle Willis, Milton Bradley, Gil Meche and Kevin Millwood.

Tim Marchman thinks an intra-Chicago trade between the Cubs and White Sox involving Milton Bradley makes sense.

Matt Murton, a notorious ginger and player good enough to start on many major league teams, is going to play for the Hanshin Tigers in Japan. I wonder if Murton realizes he's good enough for MLB.

Off topic link of the day: Tom Tango reviews the incredibly enjoyable movie Taken and heaps justifiable praise on Liam Neeson. I agree with him, Taken is fantastic.

Edwin Jackson and/or Adam Kennedy to Arizona?

Jim McLennan — Mon, 07 Dec 2009 23:41:37 -0000

FoxSports.com reports, "The Tigers are close to trading right-hander Edwin Jackson, according to major-league sources. The identity of the team is not known, but both the Diamondbacks and Mariners are known to have interest. The discussions have been more serious with Arizona than Seattle, according to one source."

The same story also goes on to say, "The Mets and Diamondbacks are the teams showing the most interest in free agent Adam Kennedy, major-league sources say, viewing him as a potential starter at second base." However, Nick Piecoro poo-poohs the latter report: "We’re told this isn’t true. A year ago this time, Kennedy would have made sense. Not now. They’ve got too many holes with too little money to be worrying about second base." Piecoro also reported earlier today that Arizona were "not close" to acquiring Jackson.

The official line from Josh Byrnes is that Arizona is "spending time in trade discussions with various clubs at this time," but Byrnes wouldn't go into any specifics such as players.

My Dreams Come True: Mets Pursuing 2B Adam Kennedy

Sam Page — Mon, 07 Dec 2009 20:59:11 -0000

More photos » by Tony Gutierrez - AP

Browse more photos »

From Rosenthal:

The Mets and Diamondbacks are the teams showing the most interest in free agent Adam Kennedy, major-league sources say, viewing him as a potential starter at second base.

The Mets, if they traded Luis Castillo, could sign Kennedy as a less expensive option than Orlando Hudson. The Diamondbacks, who traded Felipe Lopez to the Brewers last July, also are looking for help at second.

Kennedy is a big favorite of mine. He plays a great 2B (8.2 career UZR/150), and would be a huge boon to our defense and a good complement to a Joel Piniero signing. A career .317 wOBA hitter, Kennedy hit .337 (wOBA) last year. I bet the Mets (and the market) think Orlando Hudson is the better player, but that's arguably not true.

Free Agent Friday: Second Base 2010

Justin Bopp — Fri, 13 Nov 2009 08:04:53 -0000

These charts tells me the Royals are now in the Luis Rodriguez sweepstakes.

Click to enlarge

Full data after the jump.

Second basemen	AGE	TYPE	CLUB OPTION	WAR	UZR/150	wOBA	ISO	PA
Felipe Lopez	30	B		4.6	7.6	0.356	0.118	680
Placido Polanco	34	A		3.1	11	0.321	0.112	676
Juan Uribe	31			2.9	16.4	0.351	0.206	432
Orlando Hudson	32	A		2.9	-3.7	0.342	0.134	631
Craig Counsell	39			2.8	18	0.336	0.124	459
Adam Kennedy	34			1.7	-11.4	0.337	0.121	587
Mark DeRosa	35	B		1.7	N/A	0.327	0.183	576
Jamey Carroll	36			1.5	7.4	0.317	0.063	358
Ronnie Belliard	35	B		1.3	6.6	0.339	0.174	287
Jerry Hairston Jr.	34			1	4.1	0.312	0.144	433
Nick Green	31			0.4	-29.7	0.290	0.130	309
Alex Cora	34			0	-9.3	0.288	0.059	308
Mark Loretta	38			-0.2	0.7	0.311	0.085	204
Luis Rodriguez	30			-0.5	-23.7	0.268	0.058	251

Click for Free Agent Fridays 2010:

1B | 2B | SS | 3B | LF | CF | RF | P

Data Source: FanGraphs.com

FA/Age Source: mlbtraderumors.com

RL & Lg. Avg wOBA Data: Jeff Zimmerman

My Maudlin' Career

the red baron — Wed, 04 Nov 2009 19:29:27 -0000

View full size photo »

I didn't really realise it last week, but just the other day it sort of hit me when I looked at the date: I just celebrated two years of writing for this wonderful site. My very first front page post was on Halloween of 2007, and seeing as how we are now in the glorious month of November in Year of Our Lord 2009, that's two damned years I've been cluttering up the interwebs with my peculiar ramblings. And so, seeing as how I am the sort of person who simply cannot resist nostalgia or making lists of things, I thought I would go back through all the things I've written here at VEB and pick out my favourites. It also doesn't hurt, of course, that very little is actually going on in Cardinal land at this particular moment.

So I started rolling back through all my past posts, and something began to become apparent as I did: I'm sort of a depressing dude. Most of my stuff I think is really pretty good tends to be of the wistful, sad, and slightly bitter emotive variety. Don't get me wrong; the idea I am a bit of a bummer is not exactly news to me, as people have been telling me that my whole life. However, it was a bit surprising to see the proof staring me so clearly in the face.

Regardless, I am proud to bring you my personal Best Of collection out of sheer arrogance and hubris. (And also maybe a little because I was interested to see if I've gotten any better at this, but mostly the gigantic ego thing.) In reverse chronological order (I think):

Reflection -- recent post about the end of our season
Talk Talk Talk-- the very first chat I tried
Drafting a Masterpiece-- reviewing the first day of the 2009 draft
Swingin', and Not Just Dick-- there is, in fact, a toaster involved in this post
Life Lenses-- in which I discuss the departure of Adam Kennedy
God Bless Us, Every One -- Christmas 2008
The Team Stripped Bare By Its Suitors, Even-- an interesting hypothetical, and my favourite title
Good Bye, Halcyon Days -- mourning for last summer, and my second favourite title
Not With a Bang, but a Whimper-- Jason Isringhausen
Saturday Morning Coming Down-- a discussion of Mark McGwire and me forgetting how to spell the word rhythm

And, just for funsies, my first main page story, and the very first diary I ever put up here.

Hopefully you don't find this too very self-indulgent, though I'm certain it probably is.

As for the current news of the day:

I am of the belief the Yankees' strategy of using only three pitchers and throwing them on short rest is going to backfire on them. We already saw A.J. Burnett get crushed pitching on three days' rest, and I'm honestly expecting something similar from Pettitte tonight. I still expect the Yankees to win in seven, because I do believe CC Sabathia will roll pretty much no matter what and Cole Hamels seems a bit lost in the wilderness to me, but I also think New York has made the series much tougher than it needed to be. Historically we can see pitchers tend to struggle on short rest, regardless of the era in question (relatively speaking, of course; if a pitcher is usually going on three days' rest, then two days' rest hurts hime), and I think Girardi has weakened his team's position unnecessarily. What do all of you think? I know this concept of only needing three starters in the playoffs has been Fritz' pet peeve for a while now; we now get to see just how viable such a strategy really is.

I don't much care for the Iwamura deal from the Pirates' side of things; it just seems like they're still treading water. Dave Cameron disagrees with me, for whatever it's worth.(I also forgot Jack Wilson got traded to the Mariners; the perils of writing in a hurry, you know.) I do wish like hell whoever it was who started stumping for Ben Zobrist a couple years ago had more pull with the front office; the guy could have been had for a song as recently as last season, now he has to be considered untouchable. Interestingly enough, VEB has been right in wanting to acquire both Jayson Werth and Zobrist at various points in time before they broke out. I know there were some here last year (myself included), who would have liked to see Johnny Mo try to pick up Huston Street on the cheap while he was struggling. I remember the advocacy of several posters (again, myself included), for a deal that would have brought Cliff Lee to the Cards after his disastrous 2007 campaign. (In fact, Lee was one of my personal crusades that offseason.) I believe the idea was to move Scott Rolen for Lee and possibly try to get Jhonny Peralta involved somehow with other inducements going from St. Louis to Cleveland. I was a big fan of Carlos Quentin, and I know jillsinmo (who seems to have largely disappeared, sadly), stumped for him for awhile as well. My point? If you happen to work in the Cardinals' front office and are reading this (and I know you guys are), you may want to take a good hard look at any buy-low guys we come up with this offseason. Our track record is remarkably good.

Of course, if you had listened to us last year, we might very well have signed Ben Sheets for a lost season, so at least make sure you look at the X-rays first.

My predicition, guaranteed to be right, for Game 6 tonight: Phillies 7, Yankees 3. Pedro goes 5 inning, giving up 2 runs on 6 hits and a walk. JA Happ relieves him and holds the Yankees down. Pettitte gets knocked around, failing to get out of the third inning and giving up 5 runs.

Have a lovely day, everyone.

The Baron's Playlist for the 4th of November, 2009

"Lovelier Girl" -- Beach House

"Jesus Walking on the Water" -- Violent Femmes

"Mr. Tough" -- Yo La Tengo

"Pale Blue Eyes" -- The Velvet Underground

"These Days" -- Nico

Friday Roundup: All the links fit to print

davoag — Fri, 30 Oct 2009 19:32:33 -0000

More photos » by Bob Levey - AP

Happy trails, Doug Brocail.

Browse more photos »

What's that, you say...a discussion question and a links post, all in the same day? How do you find the time?

I'll answer that with a question of my own: It's Friday...would you rather be researching and writing an incisive and well-informed piece about something, or plowing through Season Three of LOST while at work and throwing together a couple of interesting posts where other people do the majority of the work?

Really? You'd choose the insight? Huh...

At any rate, here's a rundown of the day's interesting Astros news:

First, and most pertinent to the Astros, Doug Brocail's option was declined today, meaning he will be a free agent. As the story indicates, retirement is a possibility for him. No big loss for the bullpen and hopefully Drayton will spend the money elsewhere.

Here's a really interesting piece by Beyond the Box Score on the economy and free agency. Looking at the conclusions from this, it's kind of hard to buy Drayton's rhetoric about keeping the payroll down because of how the economy is performing, no?

One more link before getting into the Free Agency Speculation Hour...here's a long, yet cool documentary on the Hall of Fame as a museum. I've been to two different exhibits with material from the HOF; one was at the Museum of Fine Arts and one was at the Bush Library. Both were very neat and well-done. I've never been to Cooperstown myself, but hopefully once my little spud is a bit older, we can go enjoy it for the first time together.

So, now for a few stories where we speculate on the Astros offseason goals:

This story out of Denver talks about possibilities for Garrett Atkins. Given the discussion in the comments about the Astros and Orioles wanting similar types of players, could the Astros be interested in Atkins too? His home/road splits have been pretty terrible, but if they can get him on the cheap, is he worth taking a flier on?

Adam Kennedy is another interesting candidate for the swing infielder position the Astros need. He hit fairly well in the American League, so it's safe to say that while he'll be a year older and that his sample size wasn't that big in 2009, he'd have a good chance to maintain that level. At 4+ million, he's also not as expensive as some options and may take a one or two year deal.

Two trade possibilities that intrigue me are Kenshin Kawakami for the Braves and Mike Fontenot of the Cubs. Kawakami is owed more money that the Astros probably want to spend, but he was very good last season and doesn't really have a fit in the Atlanta rotation. Plus, the Braves have a couple other minor league arms that could be ready by next season, so they don't have to worry about depth. Would they take one of the Astros outfielders for Kawakami? Maybe even a guy like Koby Clemens?

As for Fontenot, he's cheap but doesn't really have a home with the Cubbies. I like his versatility and the fact that he had a higher road split than home the past two seasons shows he could probably succeed away from Wrigleyville. I also like his versatilty; he could play third passably and could fill in for Matsui when Kaz eventually gets hurt.

Just some things to think about...hope everyone has a good Halloween!

Billy Beane Exclusive Athletics Nation Interview: Season End 2009 Part II

Tyler Bleszinski — Tue, 06 Oct 2009 14:00:22 -0000

Yesterday was part one of the Beane season ending Athletics Nation interview. Today is part two. I won't set this one up, I'll just let the interview speak for itself.

Hope you enjoy and can start looking forward to 2010. I know I am.

Blez: The starting pitching has really matured nicely with quite a few early ups and downs which you said you expected. The overall team ERA is fourth best in the AL.

Beane: Is it really? I didn't know it was that high. We fluctuated back and forth.

Blez: Not the starting pitching on its own, the whole staff together. It includes the bullpen.

Beane: And the bullpen has been spectacular. Numbers-wise, we'll have somewhere around 113-114 games started by rookies, which is an incredible number. I'm guessing that's the highest in the major leagues.

Blez: I'm guessing no one else is close.

Beane: It has been as we expected and we've had some good days and had some bad days. If you look at the guys who've been in there regularly, certainly Brett, who has gotten progressively better there from the start of the season and certainly Trevor Cahill has as well. Particularly look at his last six or seven starts. You remember the kid is 21 years old. He would've been a junior in college this year and eligible for the draft and here he is in the majors with double digit wins in our league too. The American League is not a forgiving place for a rookie pitcher, so I think he's shown himself nicely. Gio (Gonzalez) who came up and had some really tough starts, but he's definitely shown flashes of what he can be. I think overall we have to be pleased with some of these guys. The thing that was tough was losing (Josh) Outman who was pitching very well and you saw what this kid could become.

Blez: I was just going to ask about some of the progress of the injured pitchers like Dallas Braden, Vin Mazzaro, Joey Devine and Michael Ynoa?

Beane: Yeah but finishing up on the starting pitching, we certainly expected some ups and downs with the young starting pitching, there have certainly been more ups than downs. All the guys have justified our faith in them from their time in the minor leagues. I think they have a chance to be even better this year. We've stretched them out a bit in September here. Some of the guys we lost, we had to patch a starting rotation together in an effort to reduce some of the innings of some of these guys and in Vinny Mazzaro's case we were just very conservative in shutting him down. In another situation if we were fighting for a division, Vinny would probably still be out there but we want to be very, very conservative in how we treat these young guys. Some of the success, and the fact that we're fourth in the league, the credit goes to the bullpen which as I said has been absolutely phenomenal. After taking arguably our best reliever out of the equation in spring training in Joey Devine, it gets us very excited with what that bullpen will be like next year to think we'll be adding Devine to it.

To address the injury situation, Joey is doing great. He's right on schedule to be on a normal routine from the first day of spring training on. So we have complete faith that he's going to be back and at 100 percent next year. In Josh's case, he had the surgery a little later but he's doing great. If anyone knows Josh, he's a real hard worker. As far as his timetable, it's a little early now, but it's almost a full calendar year. There are cases where some guys come back a little earlier, some a little later, but you have to assume it's going to be a full calendar year. All indications are Josh is on that timeline.

Blez: It seems like it might be a little difficult to put a rotation together next year given all the candidates you have. Pleasurably difficult, if that makes sense.

Beane: Yeah definitely, it will be a good problem to have. I don't think you can have enough good starters with the injury factor and how difficult it is to go out and find them when you lose one. If it's a problem, it's one I welcome. In Dallas' (Braden) case it was just unfortunate with that infection in his foot, but when a starting pitcher has missed as much time as he has, there becomes a cutoff point where it becomes unrealistic that he can come back at any point during the remainder of the season. Dallas, in a very short time, established himself as a very good major league starting pitcher and one of the best ones we had on our staff so it's disappointing to lose him as he would've had a major impact on how we're finishing up now.

Blez: I was going to get into the bullpen, but it must be nice to feel like you already have one aspect of the team covered going into this offseason. You've got Ziegler, Bailey and Wuertz still around and if you throw in Joey Devine. That's four solid rocks of your bullpen already set for next year.

Beane: Breslow has also pitched very well for us and Blevins and Kilby have done very, very well in coming up. We've got a very good bullpen right now and looking ahead to 2010 it's one that could conceivably be better. We feel very good about that position.

Blez: You also add to that mix one of the starting pitchers that might not make the rotation because of all the starting pitching candidates you have.

Beane: These are all good problems to have and it isn't something we've had lately. Still you have keep injuries in mind and be careful. We do have high hopes that Joey will be 100 percent ready to go come the spring. The past few years have proven that you have to have depth if you're going to be successful for 162 games.

Blez: The situation with Justin Duchscherer is obviously very sad and it almost seems callous to talk about baseball in terms of him, but do you anticipate him being a part of the team in 2010 or is the situation too tenuous right now?

Beane: First and foremost, contractually, he's a free agent. It's not a unilateral decision we can make. In short, we hope he is doing well. We need to respect what he's going through right now and from a professional standpoint, also monitor it and deal with it when the time comes. But anyone who has seen Justin pitch for the five years he's pitched for us, it's pretty easy to recognize he's a really good pitcher and will be valuable to anybody. As to how we go forward, we'll know once we get into winter, but not one we can answer right now. I don't think there's any shortage of people around here who aren't fans of the person and also fans of the talent.

Blez: How do you feel about your draft this year? You drafted Grant Green and addressed the need for a shortstop. But when you're looking at Max Stassi, he slipped to later in the draft because of concerns over signability. Is that something that you're looking at to spend a little more of the organizations' dollars in terms of going after someone who other teams might have passed on because of the concerns of signability?

Beane: Yeah, that's why we were able to get him where we did. If you look at an organization that's trying to rebuild from within, it's one area you can improve yourself, it was a conscious decision this year to take some chances on guys who might be difficult signs but we thought were very talented players. We had not done that in previous years and we're a little bit behind the curve because of it. If you look at the lifeblood of an organization like ours, it's going to come from within. If we're going to compete, we're going to try and bring in as many good young players as we can because that's really where the bulk of our future lies. In Max's case, this is a really impressive 18-year-old kid. We thought that and a lot of teams did as well. We weren't unique there. But based on what I've seen so far, we couldn't be happier that not only did we draft him, but we signed him. We think he could be a really good major league player and that it could happen quicker than most people think for a high school kid. He's really impressive and has been since the first day he put on our uniform.

Blez: Do you think he was ultimately first round talent?

Beane: That's what we saw him as is a first round talent. We did and hence why we had to compensate him as he had a full ride to UCLA. I just feel fortunate we were able to get him and able to sign him.

Blez: You said the lifeblood of a small market organization comes from building from within, but the 2009-2010 free agent season is right around the corner. I know you can't really talk about any upcoming free agents or anything, but if you had to look at your shopping list for next season what are areas you'd like to improve for your team?

Beane: Free agency usually starts five days after the World Series and it isn't really an area historically we've been involved in. In understanding what we're trying to do here especially long term, when you sign free agents, you're giving up draft picks. We have to be cognizant of that in that whenever you're bringing players in it isn't just cost, but what you're giving up in terms of standing in the way of long-term development of a younger player who might be there for a long time. Historically, we haven't been in the free agent market early. It doesn't mean that we don't go through the exercise of looking at the club needs and how they will addressed either short term or long term. We usually start a little earlier than people think, at least internally, but we will be looking at it over the next month or month and a half. I would expect us to try to continue what we've been doing here, particularly in the second half, which is creating a young team that has a chance to get better and better each year and one that can stay around for a while.

Blez: Speaking of free agents, Adam Kennedy is going to be a free agent at the end of the year. He obviously came in and did some amazing things for the team. Is he someone you're interested in bringing back, especially as he has already expressed interest in coming back? He seems like he'd be a good stop gap solution at third base until Brett Wallace is capable of taking over that position.

Beane: There are some things that you have to address pretty quickly. I agree with you in that Adam Kennedy has just been outstanding for us this year. If you consider the fact that he'd never played third base as we put him over there when Ellie (Mark Ellis) came back and he was learning the position at the major league level, we're very happy with not only what he's provided on the field but in the clubhouse too. He's a grinder and he brings a certain mentality to the game that I think is very positive. That's going to be one of the things I'm going to have to deal with pretty quickly after the season. The best thing I can say is that we've been very pleased with Adam and he's been great to have around. As far as him coming back next year, it will definitely be a topic of conversation. But from Adam's end, Adam is a free agent and he has the ability to choose where he wants to go. Rest assured we'll be having conversations internally and we'll be having a conversation with his representative as well as Adam himself.

Blez: What about Jack Cust? The team is seemingly pretty desperate for power and that's one thing that Cust does well.

Beane: You have to respect what Jack has done and the fact that he does have power on a team that doesn't have significant power. Once again, I'm not sure we could answer that question now. But he's arbitration-eligible so it isn't like he's a free agent. You have to respect Jack has hit 30 plus homers for us in a year and he probably isn't going to reach that this year but he's still our leading home run hitter. He and every other player on the team will be subject to evaluation going forward, not just for next year but for many years ahead. These are the things we get to do in October and November.

Blez: There was a lot of discussion heading into the season that Jack was going to try and cut down on the strikeouts so he could hopefully bring up the batting average. It didn't seem to work out. Do you think the focus on cutting down on those strikeouts wound up hurting his performance?

Beane: It would be better for Jack to answer that one. Jack is going to hit home runs. He's going to strike out. He's going to take his walks. The other thing about Jack is that 99 percent of the season, on a team that has more than its share of injuries over the past few years, Jack is ready to go out there every day. He keeps himself in good shape. There has rarely been a day that Jack has been here when Bob can't put him in the lineup. With the situation we've had the last three years, it's been nice that he's been healthy and available.

Blez: This is year three of the five-year rebuilding plan if you count the rebuilding starting after the 2006 season, but this would be the third year of the remaking of the team (Beane corrected me stating that the rebuilding actually started with the trading of Haren in late 2007). I know it's really early because we haven't even finished 2009 yet, but how do you feel about the team, especially because teams like Texas are on the rise and Anaheim remains a good team? Do you think the team will take that giant leap forward in year four of this rebuilding process?

Beane: I don't think you can really say until you start to go into the offseason and formulate next year's team. I think in the last couple of months, I've seen us put in some building blocks for a team that's going to be good. There's still a lot of areas that we need to improve on and some of that improvement will come by adding players from the minor league system but also just through these players getting better over time. I think it's hard to put a timetable on it, but anyone who follows this team on a regular basis can look at some positions, whether it be the pitching staff or in the field and say, this guy is a good young player and he has a chance to get better. As far as the timetable, it's tough to do. We're putting together a team that has a chance over the next few years to continue getting better and better. At what rate is hard to predict because sometimes young players will surprise you and develop quicker than you think, particularly when there is a lot of them that have a lot of confidence, but in some cases they can disappoint. When you take a guy like Brett Anderson over the course of a full season and chart his improvement, I think everyone is excited to see how good he can actually be next year after having a full year under his belt. And if you multiply that by say 25 guys, sometimes they can surprise you. The building blocks are in place and when that happens I certainly couldn't predict. I'm definitely very excited about what they could become.

Blez: Do you think Bob Geren is an ideal manager for this team simply because one of his strengths appears to be working with younger talent?

Beane: Absolutely. If you look at going into August in last place and you've traded away some of the most experienced and in some cases the best players, it's impressive to do what this team has done over the last couple of months. Case in point is this past weekend in Anaheim. The Angels had a chance to clinch the division and these guys never let up. I think that's the best indication in getting these guys to play the way they're playing in the month of September when other teams have more to play for than you do. He's been a young player himself at the major league level. He's managed at every single level. He's coached at every level. So he brings a lot of experience and a lot of it comes from dealing with younger players. It's been very much a positive that's revealed itself over this transition for us.

Blez: Is it the type of situation where maybe he grows up as a manager as the team grows up? Meaning that he becomes more comfortable in being a manager and dealing with veterans and veteran personalities as the team heads towards being more competitive.

Beane: Everybody in any position usually grows a lot the more you deal with those different circumstances. I'm sure there are some things Bob might do different today that he might not have done his first year. I think that comes with experience. Bob is gaining that and gaining it on the job. He's organized and guys are playing hard for him. He's prepared and Bob has all those things.

Blez: As usual, thanks so much for all your time.

Also, in case you're interested in a little more Beane, I did a more general interview for SBNation.com that ran yesterday. And please remember to participate in giving on behalf of AN to the Donor's Choose Social Media Challenge. It's for a great cause. Thank you.

Muppet Thoughts

grover — Wed, 30 Sep 2009 06:30:14 -0000

The minor league season is over and the Arizona Fall League has yet to begin. Baseball America has begun their League Top 20 lists but they haven’t hit anywhere where the A’s have qualifying individuals. Winter ball is months away (although today it seems as if winter itself is close at hand) and the A’s are being their typical tight-lipped selves regarding the goings on in Instructs. So don’t expect much in the way of minor league discussion in today’s write up. What will I talk about?

Glad you asked.

Next year’s Free Agent options, the current 2010 payroll and some interesting service time tidbits, why using FIP or any other metric to argue Cahill’s place in Oakland’s 2010 rotation is missing the point, a moment of praise to Rajai Davis’ base running skills and… I don’t know… whatever I bloody well want.

If that sounds interesting to you then I’ll see you on the flip side.

Let’s talk about money.

Money, money, money, money, money, money.

Let’s face it, we live in a capitalist society and (most of us on AN, anyways) in a country with a WTF?!?! economy that makes risky investments a rather unattractive idea. The San Diego Padres, the Texas Rangers and the Chicago Cubs are just 3 recent examples of how quickly an organization’s financial situation can change. The 2009 A’s opened up the season with a $62.3 million payroll and we know that Wolff and Fisher don’t consider the team to be a public philanthropy. The Oakland A’s are a business, and businessmen expect to turn a profit. It is difficult to turn a profit when you have no customers (I learned that in my college economics class) and the A’s have drawn fewer paying customers than any other team in major league baseball. While revenue sharing and national media deals will provide a solid chunk of money for 2010 the A’s do not draw a great deal of income through local TV or stadium licensing, meaning the loss of approximately a quarter million attendees could have an impact on the amount of money the A’s have to spend on player payroll in 2010.

Looking at the current roster and trying to anticipate the arbitration cases of 8 different players, it appears to me that the A’s have $38 million committed in salary to next year’s roster. (Keep in mind that I’ve tried to pad that figure, ‘cause it’s always easier to pocket any left over cash than it is to find more cash when the bills are due. Also, I’ve got a bit of a thing for round numbers and counting by quarters.) Let’s look at those arbitration eligible players. Eric Munson and Edgar Gonzalez might be best described as fringe level big league players, but the only way the A’s could insure that they could retain their services for next season would be to offer them arbitration. Otherwise, the A’s would need to release them and try to bid for their services as free agents. I think that is the more likely scenario, as the A’s should be more interested in finding cheap vets they can sign to minor league deals than in keeping replacement-level talent at inflated rates.

Santiago Casilla is eligible for arbitration for the first time but the combination of his injuries, his ineffectiveness and the depth of power RH arms in the A’s farm system leads me to believe that AKA Jairo Garcia will be moving on to another team. Joey Devine is coming back from season ending elbow surgery and that will probably keep his 2010 salary down, although I am still penciling in a raise to $750K. Michael Wuertz is due a huge pay bump, at least doubling his $1.1 million 2009 salary. He didn’t get many opportunities to close and arbiters tend to be distracted by shiny things like saves, so I’m figuring he’ll earn a $2.5 million salary for next year. Before I move on to the arby-eligible hitters, I want to point out that Dana Eveland is no longer looking at arbitration for next season. His early season demotion hit his service time tally very hard and he simply doesn’t have the days in to qualify for arbitration. This means the A’s have the option to bring Eveland back at $420K next season. The only downside is it looks like (assuming I’ve counted things right) that the A’s used Eveland’s last option in 2009 and if he doesn’t pitch well enough to make the Opening Day big league roster next year the A’s would have to expose him to waivers before they could send him to the minors. Which wouldn’t be a great loss, but it is a factor to consider before deciding to invest the time and effort in giving Eveland another chance next Spring. Perhaps the coaching and innings would be better served going to another option?

Scott Hairston hasn’t performed like the A’s had hoped since they acquired him from the Padres but his early season numbers will insure a pay increase for next season. I think his late season injuries and his struggling 2nd half performance will prevent him from doubling his salary but I can see him collecting $2 million next year. Rajai Davis has only a half season of excellence to make him some money and I don’t think that UZR gets factored into the arbitration process but 40 SB is sexy and shiny. I expect Davis to more than quadruple his 2009 salary and earn a $1.75 million payday. Jack Cust leads the A’s in HR and BB but also in K’s and is a distant 2nd in RBI. UZR might not factor in the decision making process but general defensive suckitude does. I think Cust goes from $2.8 million to $4.25 million next season, although I wouldn’t blink twice if that figure went up another half million. But my official guess is 4 and a quarter.

Altogether, a $38 million commitment to the 2010 payroll.

That means the A’s have some spending money next year. But where to spend it and how much is there to spend? I doubt the A’s are going to bump the payroll beyond the $62.3 million figure from 2009 and in fact I expect to see it drop by roughly $10 million. Where am I getting that low-50’s number? Call it a gut reaction to the state of the team and the AL West, plus the lack of intriguing free agent options. The A’s are looking at a serious influx of position talent by the end of next season and it seems unlikely that the team would invest heavily in free agent vets that could potentially block the young talent and/or become expensive bench options. There are obvious holes in the roster but little in the way of value to be had in the current free agent crop.

One of the places where a major investment and change would be welcomed (by the fans, anyway) is at 3rd base. Eric Chavez is in the last guaranteed year of his contract and has barely made it on to the field over the last 3 years. There are at least 4 credible options on the free agent market that could give the A’s an immediate boost at the hot corner. Troy Glaus, Mark DeRosa, Adrian Beltre and Chone Figgins all offer the right mix of offense and defense that teams demand at 3rd base these days. DeRosa offers some defensive versatility and enough bat that his team will be looking to find a place to play him. The downside to DeRosa is he’s a Type A free agent and he turns 35 next February, meaning his decline could come swift and soon. Glaus is coming off a shoulder injury but should be ready to go next Spring and at 33 might be looking for a 1 year deal to re-establish himself before going for 1 last big payday. He’s got enough glove to handle 3rd base should Chavez be unable to make it onto the field and his bat would play well at 1st base in the unlikely scenario that Chavez is healthy.

Figgins is intriguing because of his versatility and out of all the big ticket 3rd base options he’s actually healthy! He’ll be 32 next season and is probably looking for a 4 year deal. The cool thing about Figgins is you don’t have to worry about him blocking some stud prospect’s path, he’s got the athleticism and experience to play almost anywhere on the field. The downside is he’s a Type A free agent (yeah, me loving that 2nd round pick) and his name has been mentioned with so many teams that if even half of them are truly interested in him the A’s would be in a bidding war to land him. Beltre is battling injuries this year but he doesn’t turn 31 until the beginning of next season. Still, he picked a bad year to hit like crap. His glove is still top notch but the reality is the A’s gave up on Jack Hannahan (a quality defender at 3rd base and according to UZR a near equal to Beltre) to keep Adam Kennedy’s bat in the line-up. It’s going to take at least a 3 year deal to land Beltre (I’m guessing 3/$27 million but I could be way off) and when you think about it, the A’s would be paying all that cash for Beltre’s bat. Another thing to consider, if you believe in Brett Wallace the 3rd baseman at all, signing Beltre creates a problem. Adrian earns most of his value via the glove; his bat doesn’t play well at 1st base. You could, of course, slide Wallace to 1st base but that defeats the whole idea of him playing at the hot corner. You better decide where Brett Wallace fits in the field before paying Adrian Beltre serious coin.

There are a couple other 3rd base options that get brought up around AN on occasion. Adam Kennedy made a decent stop gap option at 3rd base this season and the A’s have already said they’d consider bringing him back. Akinori Iwamura is one of those under-rated gems that everyone knows about and thus the pursuit will resemble a piranha feeding frenzy. Joe Crede is on his way out of Minnesota but he’ll be 32 and is heading towards his 2nd back surgery and are you out of your fucking mind?! 32 and double back surgery describes Eric Chavez, that’s not a pairing we should wish the A’s to make.

If the A’s are looking to make a free agent splash, the value looks to be in the starting pitching ranks. If the D’backs decide to bid bon voyage to Brandon Webb I say the A’s need to go all in and offer him a big money deal to bring him to Oakland. Yes, he hurt his shoulder and missed almost the entire season but there was no damage to the labrum and forget about any loss of awesomeness due to changing leagues… his groundball and strike out tendencies will play well in the AL. Barring that admittedly less-than-likely scenario, Justin Duchscherer and Brett Myers might make great candidates for 1 year deals to re-establish themselves in 2010. I mean no disrespect when I say that Duke needs to get his head on straight before trying to pitch again next season. They have said they’d be interested in bringing him back next season but the onus is on Justin getting his life in order. Myers needs to get healthy and I’m guessing a change of scenery would do him good. At 29 he’s still young enough to have more than a few solid seasons if he can get his act together.

But do the A’s really need to invest potentially limited funds into the starting rotation? I mean, adding a healthy Brandon Webb is pretty much a no-brainer, especially if you can get him for a discounted rate and not the $20+ million annual C.C. Sabathia is getting from the Yankees. The answer seems to lie in how you feel about Trevor Cahill. If you hear his name and think rainbows and puppies than you’re probably disinclined to spend free agent dollars on a big ticket pitcher. If hearing "Cahill" causes you to grind your teeth than you’re probably wondering why I didn’t list Jason Marquis as a viable free agent option. Me? I think puppies.

I’ve heard the arguments for sending Cahill down to AAA to start next season. I personally feel that the best place for Cahill to work on his breaking stuff is at the big league level, however if the coaching staff disagrees then I’m more than happy to yield to their wisdom. But I’m willing to bet Curt Young isn’t spending his time on AN arguing about how Trevor Cahill needs AAA seasoning. The principle argument on AN in demoting Cahill centers around his FIP (or tRA but either number will do) courtesy of Fangraphs. FIP, for those who have ignored this discussion so far but are now drawn in by my dulcet tones, is essentially what we could expect the pitcher’s ERA to be if we could factor out team defense. Fangraphs lists 77 starting pitchers as throwing enough innings/pitching enough games to qualify for their statistical leader board. Hit the button to compare FIP and proceed to the last page, ‘cause as of 9/22 Trevor Cahill ranked last in baseball with a FIP of 5.30.

It’s a fairly simple logic stream. You’ve got a young pitcher whom we all knew was being rushed posting the worst luck-independent numbers in baseball. Why waste his service time watching him get his butt kicked when we can send him down to AAA where he belongs? My problem with that logic is, that while Cahill’s FIP score is an accurate interpretation of his 2009 season performance it doesn’t actually reflect how well he pitched this year. We knew that there were going to be days when Cahill was going to get his head handed to him on a platter. The guy had barely any experience outside of A-ball and his mechanics where inconsistent. His minor league performance carried indicators (BB/9 rate) that his game needed more polish. We knew all this and still the A’s put him on their 2009 Opening Day roster.

So why are folks so intent on punishing Cahill for living up to our expectations? I looked at the box scores of the 30 games Cahill had pitched in this season, and in 9 of those contests he either allowed 5 or more runs (earned/unearned, doesn’t matter on the scoreboard) and/or failed to pitch a full 5 innings. I don’t care what metric you choose to believe in, there isn’t a baseball fan among us who wouldn’t say that those games represent a failure on the part of the pitcher in giving his team a chance to win. Cahill earned his bottom feeding FIP in those 9 games. When you look at his record of performance you see a wide variation in outcomes and all FIP does is draw a line and say "this is the average outcome". And there’s nothing wrong with that except that it doesn’t provide a full, detailed picture of what Cahill did this season. So I asked a second question: How good did Trevor Cahill pitch this year?

Unfortunately, before I could answer my question I had to figure out how I was going to answer my question! A few years back someone (I don’t care whom) started talking about Quality Starts. The basic premise was a SP got credited with a QS anytime he lasted a minimum of 6 IP and gave up no more than 3 ER. This would help balance out those days when a pitcher just got crushed and his numbers would (unfairly?, undeservedly?) drag down his overall line. I don’t know if this was in response to Coors Field or maybe because it was the Steroid era, but while the basic idea had some merit the parameters sucked. 3 ER in 6 IP? That’s a 4.50 ERA, not exactly what I call quality from my SP.

So I decided to apply the same basic concept to the 77 SP on Fangraphs’ leader board pages, only this time I made the rules more strict. No more than 2 runs (earned/unearned count the same on the scoreboard) over a minimum of 6 IP. Then I decided to add an extra tier, so 3 runs allowed over a minimum of 7 full IP would also count on the Good side. Then I went over the game logs of every qualifying SP (further explaining the 9/22 cut-off date) and simply added up how many HQS (High Quality Starts… yeah, I expect a point deduction from the Russian judge for my lack of creativity) to see how well Mr. Worst-FIP-in-Baseball pitched.

Trevor Cahill pitched 14 HQS, tying him with 8 other SP including Cole Hamels, John Lackey, Scott Feldman and Yovani Gallardo.

14 HQS is also higher score than the performances from Andy Pettite, Barry Zito, Brett Anderson, Carlos Zambrano, Clayton Kershaw, James Shields, Rich Porcello, Roy Oswalt and 18 other big league SP who posted better FIP than Trevor Cahill.

I am not saying that this means Trevor Cahill is a better pitcher than all these guys. I am saying that on the days when Cahill’s talent outweighed his inexperience he pitched like a legitimate big league SP. And here’s the thing about inexperience, it goes away after a time. The 174 (and counting) IP that Cahill has accumulated this year with the A’s has been an invaluable learning experience for him and it should make him less prone to the epic disasters he created 9 times as a raw and unready rookie. Trevor Cahill is far from a finished project and it may be that next year the A’s will decide that the best place for him to work on his breaking ball or his mechanics or his interview clichés is in Sacramento and I’ll be fine with that.

But don’t tell me his FIP dictates the A’s purchase his bus ticket 6 months in advance.

One last things as this post has gone far longer than I intended… I mentioned this in another thread but I feel it bears repeating. With a little over half-a-season’s worth of playing time Bill James ranks Rajai Davis as the 4th best base runner in all of baseball. This is counting Davis’ stolen base and base running performance, and on a team lacking in power those skills are very important (even in a non-starting role) to help create runs.

Alright, I’ve rattled on long enough. Sorry for the lateness of today’s Front Page write up but folks seemed to be enjoying the Davis and Holliday themed articles already up. Besides, you can’t rush greatness.

Or in my case… my typing.

And thank you for your support.

Matt Kemp Is Smarter Than You Think

Eric Stephen — Tue, 29 Sep 2009 14:00:30 -0000

More photos » by Jeff Chiu - AP

Plays like this anger Paul Oberjuerge

Browse more photos »

Matt Kemp has been the Dodgers' best player this season. A hitter with power, who hits for average too, while playing a mean center field. He is hitting .301/.356/.499 with 26 home runs, 34 steals, 100 runs batted in, and 96 runs scored. He leads the club in Wins Above Replacement, with 5.4, according to our friends at the fine website, Fangraphs. He leads all centerfielders with 13 assists.

I believe Kemp is easily the Dodgers' most valuable player this season, but I'm willing to entertain other arguments. Andre Ethier has been amazingly clutch with his six walk-off hits, and I can understand if his poor rating in ultimate zone rating is viewed with skepticism. Randy Wolf has been the horse of the rotation, Clayton Kershaw leads the club in ERA, and Jonathan Broxton has been dominant as a closer this season.

If anyone wants to put forth an argument that one of those players has been better than Matt Kemp in 2009, I won't agree with them, but I'm willing to listen to a compelling argument. However, I implore you, please don't resort to writing drivel like this, from Paul Oberjuerge:

Matt Kemp is the Biggest Dodger Dolt

Okay. Right off the bat, we see where Oberjuerge, who "spent nearly 31 years as a sports editor, sports columnist and metro columnist for Gannett and MediaNews while based in Southern California," according to his website, is coming from. This is not going to be a "nice" column. Oberjuerge continues:

Is there a dumber guy in baseball than Matt Kemp? Not talking real-world IQ (but maybe we could), but "dumb plays involving a guy who no longer is a kid." Baseball IQ, that is.

And on that scale, is anyone dumber than Matt Kemp?

Did Kemp run over Oberjuerge's dog or something? There seems to be a lot of vitriol spewing from him so far. Who knows? Maybe Kemp thought Christine Daniels was attractive, and was offended by Oberjuerge's blog post from two years ago.

Oberjuerge goes on, outlining why he thinks Kemp is dumb:

Search your mind, for a moment, and consider how many times you have seen Matt Kemp thrown out on the bases. Yeah. A lot. Not as often as you’ve seen Juan Pierre ground out weakly to second (that’s a number in the hundreds), but a lot. Somebody somewhere must have that stat, Matt Kemp outs-made on basepaths …. and I will bet you $5 that (subtracting caught-stealing) no one in baseball has been tagged out on the bases more often than Matt Kemp.

Kemp, including today, has made seven outs on the bases this season. Plus, he has been picked off six times as well. That is 13 total outs on the bases. There are 10 players in baseball who have made more outs than that, plus six more that have made as many outs:

Player	PO	OOB	Total Outs
Chone Figgins	11	11	22
Carl Crawford	7	12	19
Denard Span	9	10	19
Dexter Fowler	6	10	16
B.J. Upton	10	6	16
Scott Podsednik	11	5	16
Nyjer Morgan	9	7	16
Jacoby Ellsbury	7	7	14
Brian Roberts	5	9	14
Yadier Molina	3	11	14
Pablo Sandoval	1	12	13
Adam Kennedy	2	11	13
Elvis Andrus	3	10	13
Michael Cuddyer	3	10	13
Alex Rodriguez	3	10	13
Matt Kemp	6	7	13
Juan Pierre	6	7	13

Mr. Oberjuerge, you owe me $5. He continues his Bison hate-fest:

Matt Kemp tries to take extra bases all the time. And often doesn’t make it. He gets doubled off a base. He strays too far off the bag and gets picked off. He’s just a disaster out there. And this has to do with a really low baseball IQ.

The amazing Baseball-Reference.com tracks just about everything, including percentage of extra bases taken. They define XBT% as "percentage of times the runner advanced more than one base on a single, or more than two bases on a double, when possible." Matt Kemp has taken the extra base 52% of the time. The league average is 39%. Kemp comes out ahead of the curve here.

Bill James Online tracks base running, both while stealing bases and running the bases. In just base running gain, Chone Figgins leads MLB with a +30, meaning he has gained 30 more bases than an average player just while running the bases. The top ten in base running gain include players at +19 and above. Kemp is at +18, meaning he has gained 18 bases more than the average player just while running the bases (not while stealing). Does someone in the top 11 or so in this category seem like a dumb base runner to you?

Oberjuerge rambles on, and even blames Monday's 11-1 loss on Kemp's baserunning error. He also adds this finishing nugget:

I’ve been thinking about this for some time, while watching Matt Kemp play. And marveling at what a complete dope he is.

That's funny, because I've been thinking of how great it is to have one of the very best players in baseball playing for the Dodgers. While I and other Dodger fans enjoy the exploits of The Bison, let the ill-informed continue to hate the Dodgers' best player.

After all, ignorance is bliss.

Minnesota Twins 2010 Roster & Payroll (Part II)

Jesse — Thu, 24 Sep 2009 22:48:55 -0000

Thanks for some fantastic coversation on Tuesday! Milt on Tilt, Eric In Madison, Seth Speaks, clutterheart, Fetch9, ajmargarine and everyone else who contributed made for a great discussion, helped clarify some things while running some good back-and-forth over dollars and stats.

We'll start where we left off, which was discussing how internal options would help flesh out the depth chart. All players who aren't either under contract or arbitration-eligible (serfs) will be in italics. Serfs, simply because of how much they're being paid, their options and their experience, are the easiest players to theoretically replace with free agents. Some players will be listed on the depth chart at more than one position, but we should see pretty quickly which positions have talent and depth, and which positions have flexibility but not necessarily reliability.

Catcher: Joe Mauer, Jose Morales
First Base: Justin Morneau, Michael Cuddyer
Second Base: Nick Punto, Brendan Harris, Alexi Casilla, Matt Tolbert, Steven Tolleson
Third Base: Brian Buscher, Brendan Harris, Matt Tolbert, Nick Punto, Daniel Valencia, Luke Hughes
Shortstop: Nick Punto, Brendan Harris, Matt Tolbert, Trevor Plouffe
Left Field: Denard Span, Delmon Young, Jason Kubel
Center Field: Carlos Gomez, Denard Span
Right Field: Michael Cuddyer, Denard Span, Jason Kubel
Designated Hitter: Jason Kubel

Starting Pitcher: Scott Baker, Kevin Slowey, Nick Blackburn, Brian Duensing, Francisco Liriano, Glen Perkins, Anthony Swarzak, Boof Bonser
Relief Pitcher: Joe Nathan, Matt Guerrier, Jose Mijares, Jon Rauch, Jesse Crain, Pat Neshek, Brian Duensing, Glen Perkins, Boof Bonser, Francisco Liriano

You can make an argument for another player or two being on this list somewhere, but realistically if the Twins went into next season without picking up a single free agent, this would be the essential core of players. From this group you'd need to choose 25 players.

Before we get our estimated payroll figure for those 25, we have to update our estimates for what our nine arbitration-eligible players could be worth next year. 117 comments from Tuesday's post, and using a healthy cross-section of responses as guidelines we'll alter our estimates to the following.

Player	Original Estimate	Updated Estimate
Boof Bonser	$500,000	$900,000
Carlos Gomez	$600,000	$1,000,000
Brendan Harris	$600,000	$1,100,000
Francisco Liriano	$550,000	$1,500,000
Pat Neshek	$500,000	$700,000
Glen Perkins	$550,000	$900,000
Delmon Young	$1,750,000	$1,750,000
Jesse Crain	$2,300,000	$2,300,000
Matt Guerrier	$2,100,000	$2,600,000
Totals	$9,450,000	$12,750,000

We've added $3.3 million dollars in arbitration raises. Add this new total to the committed $62,267,000 and your contractual and arbitration players are making an estimated $75,017,000. Add another eight players at the major league minimum plus a little change, and right now I have to believe that without adding a single free agent the Twins will go to Opening Day with a minimum of $78.5 million dollars. We'll call it an even $80, just in case I've been too conservative in any estimates.

That would constitute a $15 million dollar bump from Opening Day 2009, and it's far and away a franchise record. But what will the front office's limit be for spending this off-season? Will they be allowed to add another $5 million? $10 million? Some on this site have speculated the organization could go so far as to raise payroll to $100,000, even before the team has played a game in its new stadium. I tend to this that's pretty high. I also think this team will be hesitant to reach to $90 million, if only because it's so far removed from any ceiling this club has ever seen.

For now, today, until we hear something different we'll just throw out the number of $87,000,000. Some will think that's too high and a lot will think it's too low, but it's a fair number.

One look at the above depth chart and it's pretty easy to point a finger, run it across a few names and say Okay, So This Is Where We Should Start. Those places, in no particular order, should be starting pitching, shortstop, third base and second base. Check here for a current list of potential free agents, but here's a list of players who could potentially cost $7 million or less per season.

Starting Pitchers: Erik Bedard, Daniel Cabrera, Doug Davis, Josh Fogg, Jason Marquis, Brett Myers, Vincente Padilla, Carl Pavano, Brad Penny, Mark Prior, Jarrod Washburn, Randy Wolf

I purposely left a few names off this list, but this is still fairly exhaustive. Which one of these guys, if any, would constitute enough value for the Twins to shell out millions of dollars with the hope that their additional wins would be worth the value over in-house, cheaper, more familiar options? If you only have $7 million to spend, are you willing to blow it all on one veteran starter? Or maybe the gambling type, and would bring in Prior on a one-year, incentive laden deal? Hell, he'll only be 28.

Third Base: Adrian Beltre, Joe Crede, Bobby Crosby, Mark DeRosa, Nomar Garciaparra, Troy Glaus, Miguel Tejada, Juan Uribe

See anyone you like here? Crede likes it in Minneapolis, would he take another incentive-laden deal based on plate appearances or games played? Or does your gamber's mentality take you to Glaus?

Second Base: Ronnie Belliard, Jamey Carroll, Mark DeRosa, Jerry Hairston Jr, Adam Kennedy, Placido Polanco

Carroll is having a good season for a bad ballclub. Belliard is awful. Do you like DeRosa's versatility enough to pay your entire $7 million stipend? Because he'll come at a cost. Polanco's got a big head, so that's fun.

Shortstop: Orlando Cabrera, Alex Cora, Bobby Crosby, Adam Everett, Khalil Greene, Marco Scutaro, Miguel Tejada, Omar Vizquel

The reality is that no matter where you look in these four positional categories, a vast majority of what you see are either retreads trying to make a comeback, older guys hanging on, younger(ish) players who really aren't very good or other warts-ridden profiles. Keep in mind that this is a list of guys who could make $7 million or less per season, but even those who could make more than that aren't all that great. The few diamonds in the rough will be snatched up, quickly, and will likely be overpaid due to simple economics. So long, Jamey Carroll.

It's not a good free agent class, but in some ways this organization doesn't have a choice going into next season. Not signing a free agent will seem, to the masses (ignorant or not), like just another "stingy" move by a "stingy" front office, although there's been nothing stingy about this organization for years. It's a new stadium being filled with a handful of star players, and the public will expect the Twins to make a splash. Right or wrong.

How would you handle it? It's a complicated decision, and for a team that has more than its share of needs there won't be endless millions to throw around. Unless, of course, you want to make trades or cuts...but that's another story for another day.

I'll leave you to ponder for the time being, on the final off-day for the Twins as we head into the season's final trio of series. Let's enjoy some fall baseball tonight, cheer on the Indians, and I'll see you tomorrow.