Rangers have some decisions to make on Lewis and Gallardo. If not it could be another down April. They basically have three LH starters.
This is more appropriate over here... Take your pick of Free agents in the off season, if you want someone else then you will have to make a trade... I'm not sure about this list cause it doesn't have Colby on it...
Starting Pitchers and their ages...
Brett Anderson (28)
Scott Baker (34)
Brandon Beachy (29)
Chad Billingsley (31)
Joe Blanton (35)
Clay Buchholz (31) – $13MM club option with a $245K buyout
Mark Buehrle (37)
A.J. Burnett (39)
Trevor Cahill (28)
Chris Capuano (37)
Wei-Yin Chen (30)
Bartolo Colon (43)
Johnny Cueto (30)
R.A. Dickey (41) – $12MM club option with a $1MM buyout
Marco Estrada (32)
Doug Fister (32)
Gavin Floyd (33)
Yovani Gallardo (30)
Jaime Garcia (29) – $11.5MM club option with a $500K buyout
Dillon Gee (30)
Zack Greinke (32) – can opt out of remaining three years/$71MM
Jeremy Guthrie (37) – $10MM mutual option with a $3.2MM buyout
J.A. Happ (33)
Aaron Harang (38)
Dan Haren (35)
Rich Hill (36)
Tim Hudson (40)
Hisashi Iwakuma (35)
Scott Kazmir (32)
Kyle Kendrick (31)
Ian Kennedy (31)
John Lackey (37)
Mat Latos (28)
Mike Leake (28)
Cliff Lee (37) – $27.5MM club option with a $12.5MM buyout
If Gallardo does not sign (he likes being home) and Lewis gone, our rotation is then rounded out by Gonzalez and Martinez.
If Gallardo or Lewis signs (think Colby bolts or retires) then we have 4 with either Gonzalez or Martinez.
So a 5 man rotation.
To get to your 6 man rotation I believe we need another veteran arm. Either a Cueto or Masterson. When Yu comes back we keep the best of the RH pitchers for the remainder of the season.
You might want to add Rua to the list of departing players... Guess he decided not to go play Fall ball kinda like Martin refused to go to Arizona to stay in shape in case he was needed...
Now they clarify the situation with Rua, somewhat... Says he declined the Fall League because of a wedding, but they didn't say if it was his or someone else's... Hmmmmm...
Maybe we need to post the pitfalls of marriage and hope he reads it before it's too late... LOL...
Also remember Donaldson used to get lippy with Yu when playing for the A's. Yu used to pitch him a bunch of off speed stuff and made him look like a little leaguer.
Yu used to pitch him a bunch of off speed stuff and made him look like a little leaguer.
When Yu throws the "screwgy" to RHed batters it has a way of making them look that way.
Start it out slightly above the knees out over the middle of the plate and it will run back inside about 12-15" and end up about ankle height, nothing Donaldson is gonna do with that pitch except look wayyyyyyyy overmatched...
Yeah Sherrington the guy who spoke of Hamels as a bad deal.
So he wants to drain the farm for an even bigger risk.
Plus there are questions if Sonny Gray is healthy. Interesting how the A's limited his outings in the last month. Probably to keep his trade value up.
Who knows. Fraley seems to think the Rangers are now a big market team and have money to burn. I thought different.
Saw a piece on MLB trade rumors on Crush Davis and his FA value. Yes the Ks really hurt but he bats around .256 and crushed the ball well against LH and RH pitching. He also has power to all parts of the field. So if one is looking for a power bat that can play corner OF and corner INF Crush may be who the Rangers want back. He's 30 and in power prime. If Fraley is right and the Rangers have $ then taking on another $100+ million 6 year deal is no problem:)
So that leaves Mitch trade fodder to get the RH pitcher we need.
I got to looking closer at the payroll and it looks like somewhere around 35M is coming off the payroll when everything shakes out... (And if Moreland gets traded that's another 3M, and Martin leaving would be another 4.75M)...
So they need to acquire/resign 2 RHed pitchers and 1-2 RHed bats at a minimum (one I'm assuming will be Napoli). They probably will go after a few RPers and might decide they need an upgrade at catcher. (If you extrapolate Chirinos and Giminez stats out to a full season you will get somewhere around 20HRs and 70/75 RBIs, I can handle that at the catchers position for 2M dollars)...
Another thing will be arbitration with some players and some of the younguns will also get a pay raise...
I think one of the first things they need to decide is do they go thru arbitration with Martin to resign him and let him compete again next year for a spot on the team or sign/trade him or just flat out release him??
Then will they put a qualifying offer on Gallardo to ensure they get a draft pick if he walks, which I assume he will... But what if he accepts the offer will they sign him or just cut him loose??
Then how much do you want to pay Colby because I would just imagine he's going to ask for a lot more this time around, home town discount time is over I think especially since he won 17 games this year...
Then you have to figure out what Napoli is worth if you plan on resigning him. He averages 57 RBIs per year in his career, is that worth 16M a year??? (I say no but that's me)...
All good points and questions. We won't see much movement until the winter meetings in December.
However the Rangers did outright Corporan, Blanks, and Strass and another I think to AAA. Corcoran and Blanks will go to FA of course. Remember Blanks was doing well with the long ball in his few starts until his injury.
There are plenty of misfit toys out there in FA market which will no doubt make Oakland's Beane salivate. Then again he took a "promotion" and is no longer GM.
However the Rangers did outright Corporan, Blanks, and Strass and another I think to AAA.
Antoan Richardson was the other.
Also the Dodgers claimed Lisalverto Bonilla from the Rangers on a waiver claim. Speaking of Dodgers Mattingly is gone, am wondering who will be their new head coach. Sounds like getting to the playoffs (with an overpriced mish mash of never have ever accomplished anything players) wasn't good enough for the new owners. You could trim close to 200M off that payroll and still be competitive with the new faces...
I got to looking at some stats and one jumped right out at me Leonys Martin's batting average is all over the place. When he's on he's on when he's off he's really off. I'm betting they bring him back and see if the new batting coach can "fix his stroke". He's 27 has lots of talent but can't quite get his head around what he really needs to be doing, (like his little temper tantrum during the playoffs) maybe they need to introduce him to Josh's shrink to see if he/she can "fix his head"...
