Archive for December 2009

The Baltimore Orioles addressed their two biggest needs in one fell swoop Wednesday, agreeing to a two-year deal with left-handed reliever Mike Gonzalez while plucking third baseman Garrett Atkins off the scrap heap pile. For this article, we’re going to look at Mike Gonzalez and why Baltimore felt comfortable inking him to a contract that […]

MGL gives us some great data. So the best defender of the decade, in terms of overall runs saved, is Andruw Jones, with 161 runs saved. If you look at runs saved per 150 defensive games, given at least 500 defensive games, the leader is… Andruw Jones, at +20 per. If you combine runs saved […]

In one fell swoop, the Philadelphia Phillies handed the Seattle Mariners the A.L. West title while giving the Toronto Blue Jays the kick in the pants their rebuilding phase needed. The particulars first: Philadelphia receives SP Roy Halladay and $6 million from Toronto in exchange for prospects in P Kyle Drabek, OF Michael Taylor and […]

The White Sox sent two prospects to the Dodgers today for the rights to Juan Pierre. While defending the acquisition of Juan Pierre may seem odd, depending on whom the White Sox sent to the Dodgers, this isn’t a bad deal for the ChiSox at all. They only have to pay Pierre $8 million over […]

There haven’t been a lot of on-line reviews of this year’s Hardball Times Annual, but I can point you to a couple: – TBO Sports calls it “the perfect offseason companion,” presumably because he hasn’t met Sofia Vergara from Modern Family. – Harvey Frommer calls it “the world champ of baseball annuals,” presumably because he […]

The Toronto Blue Jays have reportedly inked John Buck to a one-year, $2 million contract. While Toronto’s shopping may not be done at catcher, Buck is virtually certain to open the season as the starter. Why did the ex-Royal leave town? Why, because of Jason Kendall. Kendall is the new starting catcher for the Royals […]

Here’s something called the Rank-o-meter. I’ll start you out with one for Zack Greinke’s 2009 season, which shows his ERA ranking relative to other AL pitchers. At a glance, the Rank-o-meter looks like a graphic equalizer and gives a visual indicator of performance (from hot to cold) over the course of the season. I’ve also […]

In light of Alex’s Rule Five draft recap, I thought I’d take a closer look at the No. 1 overall pick in the draft, Jaime Hoffmann. To be honest, I had never heard of Hoffmann until just before the Yankees drafted him. In trying to find out more about Hoffmann, I found something interesting in […]

This morning the annual Rule Five draft took place in Indianapolis as part of the Winter Meetings. Baseball America has a complete listing of all the players selected today. I hope to give a quick overview of the notable prospects chosen. The Yankees obtained the rights to the number one pick outfielder Jaime Hoffmann from […]

The Houston Astros were a bit busy Wednesday at the winter meetings, completing a trade for Marlins reliever Matt Lindstrom while signing reliever Brandon Lyon and third-baseman Pedro Feliz to contracts. Lindstrom is coming off a rough 2009 campaign that saw his control issues worsen while suffering injuries. The injuries aren’t entirely to blame for […]