I don't know about that. Defense in centerfield is weighted heavily in value. If his career numbers are any indication, he might just grade out as just average at best.

Not to mention, if the goal is to win, putting a terrible defensive player in the second hardest defensive position to play is not seeing yourself up to win.

Shin-soo Choo was pretty bad defensively in cf with Cincinnati, but his overall offense was better than Cespedes, and accumulated 5 WAR. If that's what you could get out of Cespedes, than sure. But Choo also had better secondary skills on offense and Cespedes is literally just boom or bust. If last year was a career year, which it probably was, and he regresses all the while playing a position where his glove is overmatched, he's probably not going to be much more than average and not much in the way of an upgrade over a healthy Lagares.

<font color=goldenrod>But again, he's not going to exclusively play CF. He'd play in the corners against LHP most likely with Lagares starting in CF those days.

Besides, defense in CF was more of a concern for me going into last season when they had 3 flyball pitchers: Colon, Jon Niese, and Dillon Gee in the rotation. Now Colon is the only one left. The other 4 are all predominantly strikeout pitchers and by midseason you should have Wheeler joining them to complete the quintet of hard-throwers.

I still wouldn't want to commit to Yo long-term as a CF (not to mention the potential for decline as he gets older) but based on the current personnel a 1-year deal makes perfect sense AND he'd net them a draft pick after the year to boot, possibly giving them 2 extra picks since Walker is also a free agent. All it would cost is money for this year.</font>

Chris Davis is apparently getting the Bobby Bonilla treatment with his new contract.

He'll get $17,000,000 a season from 2016-2022. The rest comes in payments going all the way until 2037. He'll be 51 then.

Not bad.

The force is strong with Scott Boras. Clearly used the Jedi mind trick to fool Peter Angelos into paying Davis well beyond the point of reason. A brilliant win for the best agent in the world.

That would explain the huge splurging the Os did just for his contract. Something like the 4th richest ever for his position and around $90 million more than the previous Os record for a deal.

According to reports, former Cardinals scouting director who got busted for hacking the Astros databases is claiming the Astros did the same against the Cardinals. Would be almost impossible to prove due to the nature of the case.

Astros rumored to be waiting till after the court case is done to file an official grievance against the Cardinals. MLB is waiting till after investigators make some of their evidence publicly available before doing their own investigation.

Cardinals expected to get hit with two punishments by the MLB although might be able to avoid getting punished by loss of draft picks.

http://www.houstonchronicle.com/spor...witter-premium

<blockquote class="twitter-tweet" lang="en"><p lang="en" dir="ltr">Yoenis Cespedes process is intensifying and something could get done in the next few days.....hearing as many as... <a href="https://t.co/7BotMT70uM">https://t.co/7BotMT70uM</a></p>&mdash; Jim Bowden (@JimBowden_ESPN) <a href="https://twitter.com/JimBowden_ESPN/status/688758117841027072">January 17, 2016</a></blockquote>
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10 teams currently in the running to sign him with the Astros rumored as the possible front runner.

<blockquote class="twitter-tweet" lang="en"><p lang="en" dir="ltr">Thrice today I had execs say &quot;watch the Astros on Cespedes.&quot; 5th best HR park in MLB in '15. Good lineup. OK, I'm watching</p>&mdash; Peter Gammons (@pgammo) <a href="https://twitter.com/pgammo/status/688850738022354944">January 17, 2016</a></blockquote>
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Trumbo will be the DH and spell Davis at 1st if Davis DHs or plays OF. Last year Jimmy Paredes was the DH for the majority of the season because hecwas awful defensively

The Os only went 7 million over their supposed final offer of 154 and he was supposed to be in the 200 million range.

I think this was one of his failures considering he couldn't drum up any other teams interest and wasnt anywhere near the 200 million he was looking for.
His better deal was getting Wieters to take the $20 million qualifying offer because that is way more than he would have gotten anywhere

It's a win for Boras because there was one team left interested in Davis and he still got them to overpay. Also easy on throwing around the 200 mil mark. Not even Jayson Heyward is worth that......

In all seriousness, they'll get 2-3 good years out of him with the last 4 potential disasters. If they really think they can win right now, I guess. Gonna pay the troll toll sooner or later on this though.

Don't be a daft homer Droford. There was literally no market for Davis outside of Baltimore. None. They tried to play hard ball and instead ended up paying more money. Nobody was in the running except them. And they still, after giving their "final offer", spent more than they supposedly set a hard line. It's a complete pie in the face on the organization. Boras walked all over them like door mats. They don't look good at all in any of this. Especially when Davis turns into Ryan Howard 2.0.

Mark Trumbo-108 ops+, 0.8 WAR, -4 runs defensively

Jimmy Paredes-96 ops+, 0 2 WAR, - 5 runs defensively

Huge upgrade there. Great take, Droford.

Trumbo will be closer to his years for the Angels than last year..

Based on what exactly?

Well he missed half of 2014 with a fractured foot..

Plus he hits pretty well in AL East ballparks (ironically not Camden Yards though )
Camden Yards (10 games): 7-for-35, 1 HR, 3 RBIs, .200 avg., .256 OBP, .343 slugging
Fenway Park (10 games): 12-for-40, 3 HR, 12 RBI, .300 avg., .375 OBP, .550 slugging
Yankee Stadium (15 games): 13-for-53, 4 HR, 7 RBI, .245 avg., .322 OBP, .491 slugging
Tropicana Field (9 games): 10-for-33, 2 HR, 7 RBI, .303 avg., .303 OBP, .545 slugging
Rogers Centre (14 games): 16-for-55, 6 HR, 15 RBI, .291 avg., .298 OBP, .727 slugging

Theres no reason his Camden numbers continue to be that bad over a full season.

Davis / Jones / Machado / Trumbo should all hit above 30 HR.

I would be amazed if Trumbo hit over 30.....

OH SHIT THEMS FIGHTIN WORDS

Nicky Fives V. Droford in a steel cage

TRUMBO o/u 29.5 home runs in 2016

Stipulation: Loser is fired/has to sport an aviatar of the other's choice until Superbowl 51



It;s on baby it's on...believe the hype #once in a liftetime

I said Trumbo, not Davis.... I'd put money on Trumbo and the under, but no interest in betting Davis either way....

my bad...I meant Trumbo too but I was heated in the moment of passion

<font color=goldenrod>Lazaro Armenteros is approved to sign with a Major League team as soon as February 10th. He's meant to be the latest Cuban sensation. A center fielder who shows early signs of having all 5 tools. He's also only 16 years old, which makes me feel old as fuck.

He's already received a $15 million offer to play for Japan, but it's expected that multiple Major League teams will be in on him. Probably going to be the usual teams that get linked to him. Dodgers, Yankees, Red Sox.</font>

Wait wait wait ...you think he's gonna do well based on 58 games worth of at bats? Really?

I'll ask a better question. What had Trumbo done since his first full season that would lead one to believe he's going to get better instead of being the same boom or bust out machine or declining?

Read a follow up to his showcase from Keith Law that he was rather unimpressive at his open workout. Not that he was terrible, just not the upside play many expected.

We'll see what he signs for. He's definitely no Moncada.

<font color=goldenrod>Justin Upton to the Tigers on a 6-year deal at around $125 million.</font>

I CAN ONLY GET SO ERECT

<font color=goldenrod>Had to know Ilitch was going to open up the wallet again. He's 86 years old and his goal is to win a title before he passes away. I'd probably do the same thing.

Team could be a disaster in a few years as their core guys age but if they win a title nobody should care.</font>

I would care. A lot. No more 2003 seasons please.

<font color=goldenrod>Oh...Upton's deal includes an opt-out after 2 years at age 30. So it's really only a 2 year commitment for Detroit. Even better for them.</font>

<font color=goldenrod>Cardinals will emerge as a mystery team to sign Cespedes. Calling it now. Would be such a Cardinals move.</font>

Heh. Apparently Illitch was going to try and sign Chris Davis but Al Avila talked him out of it to go for Upton. Fucking love everything Avila has done this offseason so far.

Love Justin Upton.

Great deal for both sides.

The more I think about the signing the more I like it I think.

I'm cautiously super optimistic about the deal. As it is now, we get to field JD and Upton. JD isn't a free agent for another two years IIRC, and around that time Sanchez and VMart will be coming off the books. If Upton exercises his opt-out after two years, it's not like we'll be handicapped financially and should have plenty to pay JD. Moya and/or Collins should be "major league-ready" by that point so we should have an average/above-average LF to take over there too.

That, and after this year the luxury tax threshold is either being eliminated or expanded greatly, so it's not a huge deal to go over this year.

MLB Investigations Squad gonna take a look at Yu Darvish after his brother was arrested for being involved in an illegal gambling ring.

He'll probably be fine. But since there was a couple instances last season involing Jeff Locke and Jared Cosart, MLB's involved.

Padres kicking the tires on Cespedes. Not sure why, as he's not going to dramatically change their fate.

My thinking is he's free of draft pick compensation, is likely as good as Upton for at least a few more years, and because they're holding the all-star game and probably wanna save face by acquiring a big name and hoping he makes the club.

<font color=goldenrod>Mets sign LHP Antonio Bastardo. 2 years, $12 million.

Love the move. I know Sandy is against signing multi-year deals for relievers, but they badly needed one more arm to shore up the back end of the bullpen and it's not like he's making anything close to what Darren O'Day got. Bastardo was good against hitters from both sides of the plate, so I imagine he's going to be penciled in as the 8th inning guy with Addison Reed going to the 7th, Blevins as a LOOGY, and Hansel Robles filling in wherever.

Now just sign Cespedes (or at least a Pearce or Raburn type RH OF bat for the bench) and I think they'll be ready to roll.</font>

Aroldis Chapman won't be facing charges from his domestic dispute back in October.

<font color=goldenrod>FUCKKKKKKK sounds like Cespedes is going to be a National. They've put a 5 year offer out there worth over $100 million with a ton of deferred money like they did with Scherzer. Really don't see him getting a better offer than that this late in the offseason.

That's way more money and years than I would have been comfortable giving to him, so in that respect I'm fine with the Mets not getting him. But fucking christ why did it have to be the Nats?</font>

<font color=goldenrod>In a single offseason they'd have poached the #3 and #4 hitters from their top rival. That's surely never happened before.

Pretty sure the Cespedes deal will backfire on them long term. But for right now it probably pushes them past the Mets in terms of being the favorites in the East for 2016. Very tough lineup to navigate and still a strong pitching staff without Zimmermann.

Here's hoping the wheels fall off for them like they did in 2015.</font>

I'd have favored the Nats just based on them being healthy. Adding Cespedes is probably a 3 to 4 game swing in the win column over the all glove, no bat Michael Taylor.

Think Harper moves to cf if they do sign him.

National League close to adopting DH in 2017, will be keypoint in new CBA voted on this year

<font color=goldenrod>Yep. I don't think the Mets should overpay Cespedes. $100+ million for him is just too much given that he'd have to play CF and his skillset would deteriorate. But this really hurts the Mets' chances for this upcoming year. FanGraphs had them penciled in for 84 wins which felt low to me...but even if you give them a few more wins the Cespedes move for the Nats offsets that.

Just reading the reactions on Mets Twitter...holy shit I've never seen a fanbase THIS angry.

And to Droford's point, if the NL does get a DH in 2017, the failure to bring back Cespedes will hurt a lot more since him playing CF is the main reason the Mets don't want him.</font>