Nationals Arm Race

They did if you believe Murray Chass.  In his incredibly mean-spirited column today, he goes above and beyond to trash White Sox owner Jerry Reinsdorf, details the supposedly-secret voting process that resulted in baseball’s 10th commissioner Rob Manfred, and lists the teams that initially were voting against Manfred.  Though most in the industry have viewed Manfred as the odds-on heir apparent to Bud Selig, the voting process was apparently anything but smooth.

Personally I have no love for Reinsdorf; I feel like he’s a scrooge-like multi-millionaire who has pushed for years and years on all fronts to affect the industry in ways that lines his pockets even more.  He was the ringleader on the massive free agency collusion case and he was the impetus for capping bonus money for amateurs.  I can’t imagine the owners’ meetings being pleasant experiences right now, since Reinsdorf has basically ram-rodded into place policies that eliminated the advantages that small-market teams held in terms of player acquisition.

It was theorized elsewhere that a vote for his competitor (Red Sox chairman Tom Werner) was a vote for less revenue sharing, while a vote for Manfred was a vote for the continuation of Selig’s policies.  But that doesn’t make much sense if you look at the teams supposedly voting against Manfred (which included initially several smaller market teams).

I’ve read elsewhere that the Nats changed their vote and swung the election with tacit promises that the MASN situation would be resolved.  Which makes sense if its true, but I’m not sure how Manfred can do anything about the current lawsuits, injunctions and threats of MASN insolvency if the Oriole-owned RSN is forced to pay still-not-market rates for Nationals broadcast rights.

I have a long-in-draft mode post-morteming Selig’s tenure.  But I wonder if it is worth publishing, knowing that nearly every baseball writer out there will be doing the same, and they’ll be doing it with more time and better contacts in the industry.  We all kind of know the high and low points of his tenure.  A post for another day.

So, Manfred is set to take over in January.  I wonder what his impact will end up being.

We covered the 3 local area’s district tournaments and then the state tournaments.  Lets finish it off with quick coverage of the 3 state titlists regional campaigns.

Three local programs (Tuckahoe, West Salisbury and NW Washington) headed off to compete in Little League Regional tournaments earlier this month.  Maryland and DC’s champions moved on to compete in the Mid-Atlantic Little League Regional, comprised of DC,MD,PA,NJ,NY and DE, and this year held in Bristol, Connecticut.  Virginia’s champion moved on to compete in the Southeast Little League Regional, comprised of VA,WV,NC,SC,TN,GA,FL and AL, and this year held in Warner Roberts, Georgia (outside of Macon).  The Mid-Atlantic regional ran from 8/1/14-8/10/14 and the Southeast regional ran from 8/2/14 to 8/8/14.

Lets see how our local teams fared:

• Virginia’s champ Tuckahoe American (outside of Richmond): they dropped their first game to South Carolina 11-5, but dominated Tennessee 13-0 in their second game.  In the pool final, they got a come-back win over Alabama 10-5 to finish 1st in the pool and advance to the Regional Semis.  In the regional semi (which I just happened to catch on ESPN2) they had a pretty amazing 6-run come-back in the final inning to get a walk-off win (Georgia just flat ran out of pitchers and their guys were just lobbing in the ball in the inning) to get a re-match with Tennessee in the regional final.  Despite beating them handily earlier in the tournament, Richmond couldn’t repeat the feat, fell apart in the 5th and lost 9-4 with a berth to Williamsport on the line.
• Maryland’s champ West Salisbury got pummeled in its first two games in the mid-Atlantic regional, but then squeaked out a win over New York in the 3rd pool play game.  But they lost their last pool play game and finished 5th of 6 regional teams.
• DC’s champ Northwest Washington had a similar experience to West Salisbury, losing its first three regional games (one by slaughter rule) and leaving them eliminated before pool play was completed.  They went winless and finished last in pool play.

The mid-Atlantic regional got some national press thanks to the presence of Kayla Roncin on the New Jersey champs Toms River, and then even more press when 13-yr old Mo’Ne Davis threw a shutout in the regional final for the Mid-Atlantic champs from Philadelphia.

The US representatives for the 2014 LLWS will be:

• Mid-Atlantic: Taney Youth Baseball Association (Philadelphia, Pennsylvania)
• Southeast: South Nashville (Tennessee)
• Great Lakes: Jackie Robinson West (Illinois)
• Midwest: Canyon Lake (South Dakota)
• New England: Cumberland American (Rhode Island)
• Northwest: Lynnwood Pacific (Seattle, Washington)
• Southwest: Pearland East (Texas East) (who beat Lake Charles in the final, the hometown of my wife)
• Western: Mountain Ridge (Nevada)

Here ends the 2014 coverage; unpage.org and llbws.org have all the coverage  you need.

Souza was smiling even harder last week upon his MLB debut. Photo Nats official/Tommy Gilligan

So, this post is for forensicane, who wants to talk about the recent promotions of deserving Nats prospects, talk about September call-ups and some other happenings down on the farm. 🙂

Despite my own best intentions, I have fallen off the wagon a bit in terms of the monthly check-ins that I like to do for the rotations/pitching staffs (both major and minor leagues).  A tough work schedule and a pending job change have conspired against that (and, frankly, the new job probably will further restrict posting).  But I’ll definitely summarize the minor league seasons (which, believe it or not, end in like three weeks!) and do the full-blown reviews that I’ve done in years past.

In the past week we’ve seen two very deserving farmhands get their MLB debuts: Steven Souza and Michael Taylor.  Souza unfortunately got just twelve ABs before slamming into the outfield fence, damaging his shoulder and heading to the D/L.  Which paved the way for Taylor to now join the team, but likely does not help out the major league club much.  Souza had destroyed AAA pitching while Taylor has just 4 games above AA; i’d bet he sees rather limited action until either Souza or Nate McLouth returns from the injured list.  Nonetheless, both promotions were deserved.

Looking ahead to September call-ups, Chase Hughes on NatsInsider took a look at some players who likely get 9/1 call-ups and came up with the expected list of guys who have shuttled back-and-forth between AAA and the Majors this year (Blake Treinen, Taylor Hill, Aaron Barrett, Ryan Mattheus, Xavier Cedeno, Tyler Moore and Jhonatan Solano).  He also predicted one 40-man addition/call-up in Matthew Grace, which would be a great reward for his break-out season (and maybe spell the end of the 5.02 ERA Jerry Blevins experiment)?

Of the rest of the 40-man roster not already mentioned, Sammy Solis is on the AA disabled list, Felipe Rivero is also on the D/L (but is putting in re-hab assignments) but doesn’t merit a call-up, Sandy Leon has struggled badly this year and seems to be closer to a DFA than a call-up, Jeff Kobernus may also get a call-up to provide full-field utility needs and Eury Perez probably doesn’t quite need a call-up unless the Nats lose yet another outfielder.

The 40-man roster is full, but the team could easily re-call and 60-day D/L Solis (much like they did with Matthew Purke) to make room.  Solis hasn’t appeared since May 26th and at this point seems done for the year.

I havn’t done significant analysis of the roster moves that will have to happen in the off-season (re-adding 60-day D/L guys, cutting loose free agents, non-tenders and rule-5 additions), but I can see a bit of a glut coming.

• We have four 60-day D/L guys now and a full 40-man roster.
• We have four potential FAs … but three of them have options that are possibly attainable/possibly executable (Rafael Soriano‘s “games finished” option, Adam LaRoche‘s $15M mutual option for 2015 and Denard Span‘s decently affordable $9M 2015 option).  It doesn’t help that all three guys are having career years (Span now hitting above .300, LaRoche has the best OPS+ on the team and Soriano’s 1.79 ERA is nearly a career-low), making all these decisions rather difficult.
• We have a TON of arbitration-eligible guys (at least 12-13 if Cots is correct).
• We have more than a few guys in the minors who WILL need to be added ahead of Rule-5.  A.J. Cole is the biggest name, but there’s more than a few other names out there probably worth protecting too (scan the Nats draft-tracker for 2014 Rule 5 Eligibles).

A post for another day.

Anyway; have at it.

This year’s MLB trade deadline was crazy.  Never before have so many big-time names moved teams.  And certainly I cannot remember so many big-time pitchers relocating mid-season as well.

Lets look at the playoff contender rotations as they stand right now, with Trade deadline acquisitions highlighted in blue.

NL

• Washington: Strasburg, Gonzalez, Zimmerman, Fister, Roark
• Atlanta:  Teheran, Minor, Santana, Harang, Wood
• Milwaukee: Lohse, Garza, Gallardo, Peralta, Nelson
• Cincinnati: Cueto, Latos, Bailey, Leake, Simon
• St. Louis: Wainwright, Masterson, Lackey, Lynn, Miller
• Pittsburgh: Liriano, Morton, Locke, Volquez, Worley
• Los Angeles: Kershaw, Greinke, Ryu, Beckett, Haren
• San Francisco: Bumgarner, Hudson, Lincecum, Vogelsong, Peavy

St. Louis clearly did the most in the NL, acquiring two mid-rotation guys to help cover for the injured Michael Wacha and Jaime Garcia, but it is hard to look at their rotation and say they’d have the advantage over some of their potential playoff rivals.  San Francisco lost its ace (thought he hasn’t pitched like an Ace since signing his new deal) Matt Cain, and his replacement was not inspiring confidence (Yusmiero Petit), so they added former Cy Young winner Peavy (who is pitching better than his 1-11 W/L record .. but not a lot better).  Otherwise the NL playoff contenders mostly stood pat.  There was some small surprise that the free-spending Dodgers wouldn’t try to improve upon the suddenly underperforming Josh Beckett and/or the “fool-me-once” Dan Haren.  They’ll struggle to get through the #3 and #4 starts of their planned playoff rotation to get back to their co-aces Kershaw and Greinke (who was good but not shut-down in last year’s playoffs).  The home-town Nats may find themselves with an uncomfortable decision to make if they make the playoffs; which starter to send to the pen?  Roark is the least renound and the least tenured … but he has clearly been more effective than other rotation members.

It continues to amaze that the Braves are competing, given the losses they’ve faced in their rotation.  They are missing (arguably) their planned #2, #3 and #5 starters in Kris Medlen, Brandon Beachy and Gavin Floyd but are getting by thanks to two mid-spring acquisitions (Santana and Harang) and the surprise performances of youngsters Wood and David Hale (who didn’t merit his demotion to the bullpen).

AL

• Baltimore: Tillman, Norris, Chen, Gonzalez, Gausman
• Toronto: Buehrle, Dickey, Happ, Strohman, Hutchinson
• New York: Kuroda, Phelps, Capuano, Greene, McCarthy
• Detroit: Scherzer, Verlander, Sanchez, Price, Porcello
• Kansas City: Shields, Duffy, Ventura, Guthrie, Vargas
• Oakland: Grey, Samardzija, Lester, Hammel, Kazmir
• Los Angeles: Weaver, Wilson, Richards, Shoemaker, Santiago
• Seattle: Hernandez, Iwakuma, Paxton, Elias, Young

I didn’t include fringe playoff contenders such as Cleveland or Tampa Bay here; both of those rotations were purged and weakened, and their odds of catching one of these listed WC contendors is long.  Oakland completely re-made their rotation here, attempting to keep up with Detroit, who now features the last three AL Cy Young winners to go along with Sanchez (who finished 4th last year in a season where he led the league in both ERA and FIP).  That’s quite a lineup.  Meanwhile Seattle likely finishes 10 games back of the Angels and could end up facing them in the coin-flip wild-card game … and could end up throwing the best pitcher in the AL at them (which has been noted as a significant down-side to the 2nd wild-card matchup; who wants to see a team lose out to a divisional rival that they bested by so many games in a play-in game?).

New York is the “Atlanta” of the AL this year; they currently have four planned rotation members on the D/L and (likely) out for the year (CC Sabathia, Ivan Nova, Michael Pineda and Masahiro Tanaka).   Their 4th and 5th starters were a 14th and 15th round pick respectively.  They’ve been outscored by nearly 30 runs on the year yet somehow have a winning record.  It seems like just a matter of time before their luck runs out and they settle back below .500.

Who would you rather go to war with, Detroit or Oakland’s rotation?   Probably Detroit’s rotation, given its depth one to four.  But the ALCS could be one heck of a series.