Given all of the speculation regarding Iwamura today, I thought I would lay out the free agents for people to see. Here are the players up for free agency in 2010 according to Cot's Baseball Contracts.

A = type A free agent; B = type B free agent; *means club option

Second Basemen
Marlon Anderson NYM
Ron Belliard LAD (B)
Jamey Carroll CLE
David Eckstein SD
Orlando Hudson LAD (A)
Akinori Iwamura * TB
Omar Infante ATL
Felipe Lopez MIL (A)
Mark Loretta LAD
Placido Polanco DET (A)
Freddy Sanchez * SF (A)

Shortstops
Orlando Cabrera MIN (A)
Juan Castro LAD
Alex Cora NYM
Bobby Crosby OAK
Adam Everett DET
Alex Gonzalez * BOS
Khalil Greene STL
Ramon Martinez LAD
John McDonald TOR
Marco Scutaro TOR (A)
Miguel Tejada HOU
Jack Wilson * SEA

Third Basemen
Adrian Beltre SEA (B)
Geoff Blum HOU
Craig Counsell MIL
Joe Crede MIN
Mark DeRosa STL (B)
Pedro Feliz * PHI
Chone Figgins LAA (B)
Troy Glaus STL (A)
Jerry Hairston NYY (B)
Mike Lamb MIL
Melvin Mora * BAL (B)
Juan Uribe SF


Starting Pitchers
Brandon Backe HOU
Josh Beckett * BOS
Erik Bedard SEA (B)
Daniel Cabrera ARZ
Bartolo Colon CWS
Jose Contreras COL
Doug Davis ARZ (B)
Justin Duchscherer OAK (B)
Adam Eaton COL
Kelvim Escobar LAA
Jon Garland * LAD (B)
Tom Glavine ATL
Mike Hampton HOU
Rich Harden CHC (B)
Livan Hernandez WAS
Tim Hudson * ATL
Randy Johnson SF (B)
John Lackey LAA (A)
Cliff Lee * PHI (A)
Braden Looper * MIL (B)
Jason Marquis COL (B)
Kevin Millwood * TEX
Brett Myers PHI
Vicente Padilla * LAD (B)
Carl Pavano MIN (B)
Brad Penny SF
Odalis Perez WAS
Andy Pettitte NYY (B)
Joel Pineiro STL (B)
Sidney Ponson KC
Jason Schmidt LAD
John Smoltz STL
Tim Wakefield * BOS (B)
Jarrod Washburn DET
Brandon Webb * ARZ (B)
Todd Wellemeyer STL
Randy Wolf (A)

Since the list itself is a little dull, how about I spice it up with a question. What are the chances we could pry Omar Infante from the Braves as our second baseman? He's not a type B player, but has a career hitting line that isn't too bad for a 2nd baseman ( .264 .310 .391 .701 ) and still has good defense.  Those offensive numbers aren't great, but then again he's only 27 and the average for his last three seasons is about .285 .340 .390 .730.  Not bad.  His 2009 contract was 1.85 million.

According to MLB.com, Mike Redmond is determined to try his hand in the free agent market this winter in hopes of continuing to play somewhere in major league baseball.  I am not in any position to analyze his worth over Morales or Butera or Ramos so I'll leave that to the heavy lifters here on this site.

Apparently Redmond brought a lot of good energy to the clubhouse, and every team needs some veteran leadership.  In addition, it sounds like Redmond is interested in coaching and might be an effective coach for the organization, so it might be beneficial to keep him around.  Nonetheless, I find it hard to believe he is worth keeping after a season where he "batted a career-low .237 with two doubles, seven RBIs and a .588 OPS in 135 at-bats. He also threw out only five of 40 runners while behind the plate."  

No matter how raw Morales is, its hard to imagine he wouldn't be a significant upgrade over that.

Twins put Matt Tolbert on disabled list, activate Brian Buscher. I suppose this should be a fanshot rather than a fanpost as I don't have any real analysis to provide here, but I find this a bit discouraging.

Tolbert had really been getting some pretty good wood on the ball lately and had been playing well enough defensively that 3rd was no longer the twilight zone that it was for awhile after Crede went down. I have always liked Buscher and Harris, but let's face it, they are backups.

I've played enough competitive games to know how players can really rally when they are suddenly short-handed. That uphill battle can create a 'band of brothers' type mentality amongst those of you who are still strapping on the pads in the locker room. I think we witnessed this when Morneau and Crede went down. Suddenly our team turned it up another notch on the focus and intensity meters.

Nonetheless, its pretty hard to win when you have no choice but to field 2 or 3 backups every single night.