Trevor Plouffe’s agent (Nez Balelo at CAA) has been in Minnesota recently, but Plouffe and the Twins haven’t been discussing an extension, 1500ESPN’s Darren Wolfson tweets. Plouffe can become eligible for free agency following the 2017 season. Wolfson describes him as an extension candidate, and maybe he is, since the Twins are frequently loyal to their players. The Twins do have another potential long-term answer at third base in Miguel Sano, however, and Sano is younger and cheaper, as well as being an outstanding hitter. Trading Plouffe might ultimately make more sense. Here are more notes from the Central divisions.
- The Twins also had interest in Edwin Jackson before Jackson signed with the Braves, Wolfson tweets. The Braves were prepared to offer a big-league deal, however, and the Twins apparently were not.
- The Indians’ contracts for Michael Bourn and Nick Swisher didn’t turn out well, but the team would have been in even worse shape had it extended Justin Masterson, Terry Pluto of the Plain Dealer writes. In Spring Training in 2014, the Indians reportedly offered Masterson about $45MM over three years, which at the time looked like a lowball offer, given Masterson’s impending free agency and excellent 2013 season. Since then, though, Masterson has struggled in Cleveland, St. Louis and Boston, ultimately being designated for assignment by the Red Sox last week.
- The Brewers’ farm system looks significantly improved after last month’s trades and the June draft, Tom Haudricourt writes for Baseball America (subscription only). In trading Carlos Gomez, Mike Fiers, Gerardo Parra, Aramis Ramirez and Jonathan Broxton, the Brewers got a solid group of prospects that includes Brett Phillips, Domingo Santana and Zach Davies. Many of the players they acquired are in the high minors, too, which now-former Brewers GM Doug Melvin suggested might shorten the amount of time the team needed to rebuild. Davies, who is relatively small and isn’t a hard thrower, doesn’t fit the pitcher type the Brewers usually like, but Melvin says the team’s analytics department lobbied for the Brewers to acquire him in the Parra trade.
Cleveland’s other free-agent options at the time of the Swisher/Bourn signings turned out just as bad. I recall them competing for Edwin Jackson, Kyle Lohse, and Shane Victorino.
Can we just call that the year of the bad contract?
Throw Hamilton, Cody Ross, Kevin Youk, Joe Blanton and Mike Adams with Bourn, Swisher, EJax, Lohse and Victorino and you have a pretty bad set of contracts.
Victorino got 3 years 39 million. He earned that entire contract with his performance in 2013. I don’t think a single Red Sox fan ever complained about that contract.
Doesn’t matter if no one complains about it. 39M for 1 great year isn’t a good contract.
Well based on WAR, they got 44MM in value because of one year. It mightn’t be as great as getting value throughout the whole contract, but it is certainly a stretch to consider it a bad contract. With the production they got from him, albeit from one year, I’d consider it a very good signing for them.
Actually 1 great yeae can make a contract, especially a world series year. Keep in mind these huge contracts handed out are with the intention of paying out a couple peak seasons and then all the decline years. Also there is more than just good and bad contracts.
Shane didn’t have a GREAT year in 2013, but it’s everything they could have expected. He has disappointed the last two years. Not a complete bust (see Choo, Shin-Soo) but not what the BoSox hoped for either.
He had 5.9 fWAR that year. It certainly was a great year for him, and per fWAR, the best of his career.
12th in position player fwar in 2013
Lohse wasn’t a terrible signing, I’d take 2 good years for every bad one for a guy in his mid 30’s
I would think Plouffe will have a nice market at the winter meetings
A guy like him with an ability to hit for power and possibly play SS or 3B will have a lot of teams interested.
I agree that he has value as an OK third baseman with a slightly above average bat, but he is not a SS. If he could even fake it over there the Twins wouldn’t consider trading him.
I know this is COMPLETELY O/T but there aren’t many Padres posts, this just happened, and this is the newest post, so..
I just wanted to extend my Congratulations to Matt Kemp, and the Padres, for the first cycle in team history.
Now that, THAT is out of the way and the official congratulations have been extended, as they should be, it’s time for the back of the hand…
We can also say that this is one more straw in the hat of the Padres organization, and one less thing we now have to make fun of them about.
They never mention cycles unless its a complete side note in the introductory paragraph, and even that is a rarity.
If they had to mention it every time a player has a ridiculous game, it would become a daily thing.
You won’t see much about JBJ’s game today unless a well known writer writes an article on why its significant. Its not significant because JBJ isn’t an everyday player, at least not on the Sox moving forward.
Masterson is a classic example of why agents and players are quick to sign on to extensions when offered. It’s a gamble not to take the money when they can cause injury and/or poor performance is always a possibility.
I was really surprised on Masterson. Cleveland really balked on him and his medicals were sketchy even in the public domain.
Cleveland would have happily signed him had he taken the money. His agents were comparing that offer to what he Reds had overpaid a starting pitcher the previous year, and they wanted more. The Indians were maxed out and couldn’t meet the offer.
The Indians did not balk on signing him, nor were they terrible concerned about his medicals. They were the ones pushing for an extension. It had everything to do with his agents telling him that he was worth more money.