2021 Misc. MLB News

[TURBO]

I guess we need a new thread for 2021...

 

Nationals signed INF/OF Hernan Perez to a minor league contract with an invitation to spring training.

 

Perez was with the Cubs in 2020 but appeared in only three major league games. The versatile 29-year-old holds a career .252/.281/.386 batting line in 1,825 total plate appearances at the big league level.

 

SOURCE: Daniel Alvarez on Twitter

Jan 21, 2021, 10:33 AM ET

[markedman5]

[Ron Robinsons Beard]

 

It's too bad that the only teams dumping good players seem to be NL Central teams. I take that back ... good that these players are out of the NL Central, bad that the Brewers never seem to be players for them.

[jjgott]

Gotta think Gregory Polanco is next. His $10 million salary is costing the owners precious profit margin.

 

All these NL Central moves dumping players makes me wish Attanasio was more willing to throw some cash around this offseason. If we had a semi-competent corner IF and maybe 1-2 more SPs we would be favorites for the division.

[nate82]

Gotta think Gregory Polanco is next. His $10 million salary is costing the owners precious profit margin.

 

All these NL Central moves dumping players makes me wish Attanasio was more willing to throw some cash around this offseason. If we had a semi-competent corner IF and maybe 1-2 more SPs we would be favorites for the division.

 

The rotation is fine with Woodruff and Burnes at the top maybe the Brewers need a #3 but if they do nothing with the rotation they should be fine.

 

At 1B or 3B is probably the biggest question marks and other than Turner at 3B there isn't much out there worth spending a lot on.

[JosephC]

Like the Marlins, the Pirates are really close to becoming a real embarrassment to the league. With the arbitration cases now settled, they have 11 players under contract and those 11 players total 29.405 million dollars. Note that Vasquez is suspended and not getting paid, so he doesn't factor into this. So 15 more players to fill out the bottom of the roster at 650k each (minimum is $570,500 in 2021) would bring the payroll total to 39.155 million.

 

I know Cherington is saying they will add some players so it won't be surprising if they end up adding a couple 3 million dollar type free agents. But if they don't they could end up with a sub-40 million dollar payroll and IMO, that's just terrible. According to Cots, the Marlins didn't drop below 45 million during their last teardown. The Brewers last ran a payroll like this back in 2005, which was just after Attanasio bought the team.

[jerichoholicninja]

The Pirates were just about an embarrassment before they traded everyone. Spending money to tread water is stupid.

[MadThinker88]

Yankees & Red Sox make 1st trade in 7 years.

 

NY gets: PTBNL

Bostons gets: Adam Ottaino, Frank German (RHP prospect), $850k

 

That speaks volumes about the market on various levels...

 

https://www.mlbtraderumors.com/2021/01/yankees-trade-adam-ottavino-red-sox.html

[MadThinker88]

Sounding like CLE & Cesar Hernandez are close to a return. Cesar has left his winter league team to return to US & get final steps completed.

 

1 yr plus club option pending physical. Sounds like he would be a bridge piece, covering 2B until Tyler Freeman (or another prospect) is ready to take over..

 

https://www.mlbtraderumors.com/2021/01/indians-nearing-deal-to-re-sign-cesar-hernandez.html

[nate82]

I found this interesting on The Athletic.

 

https://theathletic.com/2343230/2021/01/26/mlb-agent-survey-part-1/

 

Apparently the teams that agents and players don't like the most are the Pirates and the Orioles and the city that is favored the least is Detroit. Not surprised by Detroit being the least favorite city for anyone to go to. Some other obvious things are that the players dislike the facilities that the Rays and A's have which is something they have in common with MLB.

 

As for if there would be a work stoppage after 2021 8 said yes and 14 said no. I agree with the responses for the no as I believe both sides would see a work stoppage as career and earnings suicide. Any work stoppage for baseball will be the death kneel for the sport at least economically which is already hurting financially. The only other sport that is hurting as much as MLB is the NHL both the NBA and the NFL are fine due to their tv contracts that they have. The other leagues maybe losing money but they are not losing as much as MLB and the NHL are both of which depend heavily on ticket purchases versus leaning heavily on TV revenue.

[JosephC]

I found this interesting on The Athletic.

 

https://theathletic.com/2343230/2021/01/26/mlb-agent-survey-part-1/

 

Apparently the teams that agents and players don't like the most are the Pirates and the Orioles and the city that is favored the least is Detroit. Not surprised by Detroit being the least favorite city for anyone to go to. Some other obvious things are that the players dislike the facilities that the Rays and A's have which is something they have in common with MLB.

 

As for if there would be a work stoppage after 2021 8 said yes and 14 said no. I agree with the responses for the no as I believe both sides would see a work stoppage as career and earnings suicide. Any work stoppage for baseball will be the death kneel for the sport at least economically which is already hurting financially. The only other sport that is hurting as much as MLB is the NHL both the NBA and the NFL are fine due to their tv contracts that they have. The other leagues maybe losing money but they are not losing as much as MLB and the NHL are both of which depend heavily on ticket purchases versus leaning heavily on TV revenue.

 

I am one former big NFL customer that has completely moved away from that league. I watched about 10 snaps of the first Packer/Bear game this year and that was it. I will no longer be buying any NFL merchandise. My reason for this has nothing to do with COVID or social justice messages or anything like that, I just think their product completely sucks. I like blocking and tackling and really don't see much of this in the NFL anymore.

 

So what does that have to do with MLB? Well it just goes to show that big professional sports leagues can lose once very loyal customers. Yes, there was an era where these guys could do almost anything and their customers would eventually come crawling back because they had nothing better to do. In an age with On Demand TV viewing, and more and more people given a real option to just dump sports programming by picking steaming services, I think these professional sports leagues have to look at the realistic possibility that a good chunk of their current audience just might not care 10-15 years down the road.

 

What is really interesting is that with so many people ordered to stay at home, that the common sense assumption would be that sports viewership on TV would go through the roof. But the numbers I've seen for the NFL indicate that viewership was down 10%. Some excuses have already popped up, like it was an election year. But think about it....one would think that with all those people stuck in the house that there would be no way that viewership would drop?!

 

I didn't watch any MLB games this year but that was entirely due to COVID and I just didn't have any interest in a 60-game season. But I intend on watching in 2021 and am really looking forward to a full season that I am hoping will happen (and it looks like it will). But in all honesty, I really didn't miss watching games that much at all. And frankly, if Manfred comes up with some more dumb ideas or the league starts doing a bunch of dumb stuff that I don't like, I really think it would be easy to get me to turn off MLB just like I have already turned off the NFL. A work stoppage that would be 100% about greed as both sides are making billions of dollars, while so many Americans are struggling financially, could very well end my relationship with MLB. And while I'm sure MLB would have the attitude of "don't let the door hit you on the way out," I kind of get the feeling that there are millions of others just like me. I think the professional sports world really needs to be careful. This environment just isn't the same environment that existed just 10 years ago.

[Lathund]

Part 2 of that agent survey has been posted, and among the questions were which team executives were the toughest negotiators. Among the replies was this: "It could also be taken as a compliment. This was an agent’s scouting report on David Stearns, the Brewers president of baseball operations: “Stearns is tough, brilliant, fast. He’s honest. It’s hard to find people who are that smart and honest. If he wanted to use his powers for evil, he could.” It was also mentioned, though not in connection with Stearns, that most GMs/PoBO don't negotiate directly themselves.

 

And a different question was which GM/PoBO you trust the most., only Friedman and Neander got more mentions than DS.

 

I recall seeing (From a Buster Olney piece IIRC) similar sentiments about Stearns maybe a couple years ago as well from an agent, that he's a tough negotiator and sticks to his valuations, but is straightforward and professional. Easy to deal with, but hard to get a good deal from.

[sveumrules]

Former Astros front office employee Kevin Goldstein is back on the internet writing about baseball at FanGraphs & had this Brewers-centric nugget in his chat today...

 

fake baseball fan: Welcome to Fangraphs! What was your favorite and least favorite transactions that the team made in your tenure?

 

Kevin Goldstein: I pushed hard for the deal in which we acquired Carlos Gomez and Mike Fiers. I think when you work in baseball, you are more obsessed with the mistakes than what you are right about, and I think about that one a lot. I was right in telling the group not to worry about Brett Phillips, who I saw as a fourth outfielder, and I was right in saying Josh Hader was ‘only’ going to be a reliever, but I certainly didn’t say we are trading away one of the most dominant relievers in the game. Ooooof.

[MadThinker88]

I think this is placed in the right thread... (Mods can relocate if appropriate)

 

Interesting article coming out tonight on the Athletic.

https://theathletic.com/2360126/2021/02/01/mickey-callaway-mets-lewd-behavior/

 

Obviously LAA & MLB need to investigate & (if facts are verified) I would assume Callaway will get canned.

I wonder how many others (with LAA/ with NYMets/ with CLE) have their employment status impacted.. It sounds like multiple organization knew about the issue and didn't handle appropriately..

[adambr2]

I can't wait for the annual "we're all out of touch" pissing match between the owners and players. Seems like they're ready to kick it into full gear again after an entire spring and partial summer of eye-rolling negotiations last year.

[JosephC]

What, no talk about the big Alex Cobb trade?

[markedman5]

[DuWayne Steurer]

https://www.espnfrontrow.com/2021/02/remembering-espn-sportscenter-reporter-pedro-gomez/

 

RIP to longtime ESPN baseball reporter Pedro Gomez. One of the ESPN guys I genuinely liked. 58. Very young.

[markedman5]

[nate82]

[sarcasm]Sad day for MLB today Tebow has retired. The greatest player to never play in MLB![/sarcasm]

[jjgott]

[sarcasm]Sad day for MLB today Tebow has retired. The greatest player to never play in MLB![/sarcasm]

 

Sadly he is also stealing the spotlight from Nate Orf who also retired today

 

From Twitter:

#Athletics INF Nate Orf has voluntarily retired.

[adambr2]

Ian Desmond opted out again. At this point with an effective vaccine which should be available to pretty much everyone by opening day, if you're still not comfortable playing your best bet is probably just to retire. It ain't just going away probably ever.

[JohnBriggs12]

Ian Desmond opted out again. At this point with an effective vaccine which should be available to pretty much everyone by opening day, if you're still not comfortable playing your best bet is probably just to retire. It ain't just going away probably ever.

 

Cain next? Anyone that opted out last summer with a 60 game schedule would be a possibility with a 162 game schedule. Mistrust of the vaccine seems to be a real issue in the African American community. I've gotten the vaccine as a senior. It was about the same as a flu shot. It's a great feeling knowing I've got a high level of protection against this thing. I'll continue to wear a mask in public, but I just don't get the reluctance. Getting the vaccine is liberating. There was a disturbing report that up to 70% of African American athletes will refuse to get vaccinated. That just exacerbates the problem.

[markedman5]

[ThisIsMyCrew]

Sounds like Albert Pujols is calling it quits after this year. Via his wife’s Instagram. 100 War payer. He is in last year of contract at $30 mil.