Three weeks ago today, the Chicago Cubs won their first World Series championship in 108 years. It still doesn’t seem real, does it? I’m not sure I’m ready to live in a world where the Cubbies are no longer the Lovable Losers. Anyway, I have some thoughts on things, so let’s get to ’em.
1. The Yankees have made one major move in the early going this offseason (the Brian McCann trade) but they’ve been involved in an awful lot of rumors. They’re checking in on every free agent and they’ve popped up in some trade rumors too. That’s unusual. Over the last few years the Yankees managed to keep things very quiet. Moves came out of nowhere. The Jacoby Ellsbury signing, Didi Gregorius trade, the Nathan Eovaldi trade, the Aaron Hicks trade … one day a press release showed up and that was it. There was no indication the Yankees were in talks at the time. There are always exceptions, but generally speaking, the Yankees keep things close to the vest. The opposite is true this offseason. They’re in on everyone and we all know it. I wonder what’s changed?
2. The McCann trade shows the Yankees have a lot of confidence in not only Gary Sanchez as the starter, but also Austin Romine as the backup and Kyle Higashioka as the backup backup. We’ll see what happens, maybe the team will sign a veteran backup or something, but I don’t think it’ll happen. I think it’ll be Sanchez and Romine to start the season with Higashioka waiting in the minors. Catcher is usually not a position where teams like to throw a young guy to the wolves without a veteran safety net. Managers like to have that experienced backup around to lean on in the tough times. The Yankees had Joe Girardi behind Jorge Posada for a few years, for example. A Sanchez/Romine catching tandem is definitely not a thing I thought would happen, yet here we are.
3. Is it weird I like the James Pazos trade more than the McCann trade? It is weird. I know it is. The Yankees traded McCann for two big Single-A arms and that’s exciting. You can’t teach triple digit heat and both Albert Abreu and Jorge Guzman have it. The Pazos trade, on the other hand, was a clear organizational upgrade. The Yankees turned an erratic lefty reliever into a starting pitching prospect in Zack Littell who figures to reach Double-A at some point next year. The Yankees took a sure thing and turned it into two lottery tickets (and some cash savings) with the McCann trade. The Pazos trade was one lottery ticket for another with a higher payout. I thought Pazos was a potential 40-man roster casualty — as in someone who might get designated for assignment — not someone who could fetch a solid prospect in a trade. Well done, Yankees.
4. I’m curious to see how this 26th roster spot will work, assuming it is indeed put in place with the new Collective Bargaining Agreement. Just about every team will use it to carry an extra reliever because starters are throwing fewer innings than ever before, which ostensibly means more pitching changes and a slower pace of play. At the same time, the last guy in the bullpen usually doesn’t pitch a whole lot anyway. Richard Bleier was on the active roster for 66 straight team games from May 26th to August 9th this past season, and in those 66 games he made only 13 appearances. At one point Ronald Torreyes appeared in seven of 37 games from May 21st to July 1st. The last bench guy and the last bullpen guy don’t play a whole lot as it is with 25-man rosters. How much action will that 26th man actually see? Managers will love to have the extra arm for blowouts and extra innings, and that’s about it. Good for the MLBPA getting those 30 extra full-time jobs though.
5. MLB still hasn’t announced the Comeback Players of the Year and basically no one has noticed or cared. The Sporting News and the MLBPA Players Choice announced their Comeback Players of the Year — both gave it to Mark Trumbo and Jose Fernandez — but those are different than MLB’s official award. They get confused often. MLB’s official Comeback Players of the Year are still a mystery. Conspiracy theory: One of the winners was popped for performance-enhancing drugs and the appeal process is still pending, and MLB doesn’t want to make the announcement. Another conspiracy theory: MLB doesn’t feel comfortable giving it to Fernandez posthumously. I dunno, just seems weird a pretty notable award has gone missing this year. I guess everyone is just going to pretend this didn’t happen if it comes back next year?
6. Did we see the anti-Yankee awards bias in action in the Rookie of the Year voting? Michael Fulmer winning the award was not egregious in any way, but he received 26 of the 30 first place votes, so it was a relative landslide. For a Yankee to win a major award, he usually needs to have a season that is so far better than anything anyone else did so the choice is obvious, like Alex Rodriguez and the 2007 AL MVP. If it’s close, like it was with Fulmer and Sanchez, the votes tend to go to the non-Yankee. Fulmer had a remarkable season that was slightly worse than Collin McHugh’s rookie season in 2014. Sanchez did things we’ve never seen done by a rookie before, and he did them as a full-time catcher. It was unprecedented.
7. I was pleasantly surprised Mike Trout was named AL MVP. He means far more to the Angels than Mookie Betts means to the Red Sox or Jose Altuve means to the Astros or Zach Britton means to the Orioles. He’s more important to his franchise than any other player. I do not think this means a sea change is coming to the voting though. A bunch of guys on non-postseason teams aren’t going to start winning MVP the same way pitchers with 13 wins didn’t start winning the Cy Young after Felix Hernandez in 2010. This was basically randomness at work. The 30 voters this year just so happened to vote Trout over Betts, and it was a close vote. Trout won by a mere 45 points (356-311). Pick some other random combination of 30 voters from the 600+ BBWAA members and Betts probably wins. Heck, give all 600+ a vote and Betts probably wins. By at least one measure, Trout is the greatest player in history through age 24. Having just one MVP after these five seasons would have been ridiculous. Two is much better.
8. The 2017 Hall of Fame ballot was announced earlier this week, and it includes some notable first-timers. Among them is Manny Ramirez, who is going to give us a decent preview of A-Rod’s Hall of Fame chances. Manny is the litmus test. Both Manny and A-Rod have first ballot Hall of Fame credentials, and they also both served suspensions stemming from PEDs. Manny served two, in fact. I don’t think either player will get into Cooperstown for that reason. If Ramirez gets, say, 10% of the vote in his first year on the ballot, he (and A-Rod) have basically zero shot at induction. If he gets something like 40% or 50% of the vote, there’s at least a small ray of hope. Assuming Rodriguez’s playing career is over, he’ll be Hall of Fame eligible for the first time in 2022. Will enough change between now and 2031, the final year of A-Rod’s ten years on the ballot, to get Alex in? Possibly, sure. I think he (and Manny) are facing long odds though.
Leave a Reply
You must be logged in to post a comment.