The Diamondbacks are aiming to improve their bullpen and have reached out to a pair of familiar free agent relievers, Brad Ziegler and Daniel Hudson, according to Nick Piecoro of the Arizona Republic. Ziegler previously spent parts of six seasons with the Diamondbacks, who traded him to Boston in July. New D-backs executive vice president and general manager Mike Hazen was the Red Sox’s GM at the time, of course, so he’s familiar with Ziegler. Hudson, meanwhile, has been with Arizona since 2010. The 29-year-old has recorded a 4.50 ERA, 9.07 K/9 and 3.3 BB/9 in 128 innings as a reliever over the past two seasons.
More from Arizona and a few other NL cities:
- Along with bolstering his bullpen, Hazen hopes to add left-handed hitters, he told Piecoro. “I think being a little more left-handed could certainly help us,” Hazen said. “Pigeonholing it into one specific focus, I think, would be too complicated to try to pull off. I think we can be opportunistic about that.” The Diamondbacks have four established or potential regulars who are either lefties or switch-hitters in third baseman Jake Lamb, outfielder David Peralta, catcher Chris Herrmann and infielder Ketel Marte, notes Piecoro. They could trade outfielder Yasmany Tomas in an attempt to become less right-handed, but there’s not much of a market for him, sources informed Piecoro. While Tomas belted 29 home runs in 2016, the 26-year-old’s .272/.313/.508 line wasn’t great overall; further, he doesn’t provide defensive or baserunning value and still has $48.5MM coming his way through the 2020 season.
- The Cubs made attempts over the past couple years to acquire right-hander Tyson Ross from the Padres and could pursue him in free agency, according to Bruce Levine of CBS Chicago. “The Padres were close to trading Ross to the Cubs for Starlin Castro,” a major league source who worked for one of the teams told Levine. “San Diego execs were mixed on asking for Castro or Javier Baez. The deal went down to the wire in late July of 2015 but never got to the point of exchanging medicals.” Ross was a front-of-the-rotation starter at that point, but he only threw 5 1/3 innings last season and is currently recovering from thoracic outlet syndrome surgery. The Padres non-tendered him Friday.
- The rebuilding Reds are committed to giving regular playing time to young middle infielder Jose Peraza in 2017, general manager Dick Williams and manager Bryan Price told C. Trent Rosecrans of the Cincinnati Enquirer (Twitter link). That’s particularly notable with two up-the-middle veterans – second baseman Brandon Phillips and shortstop Zack Cozart – in place. Cincinnati attempted to deal Phillips last offseason, but he took advantage of his ability to block a trade. Phillips, who has one year and $14MM left on his contract, is reportedly more open to waiving his no-trade clause this offseason. Cozart also has one year of club control remaining, and he nearly went to the Mariners prior to last summer’s non-waiver trade deadline. Seattle has since acquired Jean Segura, taking it out of the running for Cozart, but he could still interest other shortstop-needy teams looking for a capable and affordable stopgap. MLBTR contributor Matt Swartz projects a $4.7MM arbitration award for Cozart.
- With Jeff Mathis headed to Arizona, the Marlins are in the market for a veteran backup catcher, per Joe Frisaro of MLB.com. Free agents like Geovany Soto and Dioner Navarro are candidates to end up in Miami as the main reserve behind J.T. Realmuto, writes Frisaro.
Love me some Jeff Mathis
Don’t we all?
Here come the “Padres are idiots” comments.
But just a reminder, hindsight means absolutely nothing. Ross at that point was one of the top pitchers in NL and without the injury would have continued such. He was worth way more than Starlin or Baez at that point in time.
So again, hindsight…hindsight….hindsight.
Exactly and now they may lose him for nothing
The padres arent idiots but preller is
they are idiots for non tendering him
9.4 million is an awfully big gamble. How is playing it safe being idiots? It blew up in oaklands face last year when they gave alvarez a few million not to pitch
Meh… Alvarez specifically did not work out for Oakland, but overall those “small” gambles on pitchers with potential and question marks overall worked out. Because they also signed Rich Hill, and turned him (and Reddick) into a few very good looking prospects after getting half of a season of dominate pitching from him.
Thoracic outlet surgery is neither as common or as successful in that small sample, and recovery is harder to predict than with TJS and even shoulder surgery. Those may have been good enough reasons not to tender Ross.
The $2MM AAV that SD paid Brandon Morrow for 49 IP over two injury-shortened seasons or the 2 yrs/$8.5M that KC paid the more productive Kris Medlen are probably the “small” gambles many more teams are willing to make than the $8MM the last SD FO bet on Josh Johnson in 2014 or the 9.4MM or so that Ross probably would have been paid not to pitch in 2017.
Padres are idiots. But not for Ross. For not dealing JUpton for Michael Fullmer. For trading one of the best catchers in baseball for a useless Matt Kemp. For paying 60 million bucks to have Kemp, Olivera, shields and Melvin Upton play for other teams.
i hope you do realize melvin upton came over in the kimbrel trade which netted them margot guerra asuaje allen. so no upton means the kimbrel deal would of cost more from the pades side originally.
also melvin upton didnt have the trade value fans expected- the two deals were upton to orioles for 2 prospects in the 30 range and jimenez 13 mill and upton to the jays- both were very similar deals in what the padres wound up saving..
also the j upton QO became hudson potts and using 2 mill savings to give way over slot deals to lawson and thompson or what would have been an over slot deal to groome by shifting money around.
the shields deal and kemp deal has long been attributed to management above preller which they fired dee and friend. also- one of best catcher in baseball is a stretch..hes got power and pitch framing thats it.- he can walk but strikes out a ton. best aspect is hes cheap. outside his pitch framing his defense has been subpar average. his dwar without pitch framing was 0.7.
Pitch framing counts, and I’d certainly rather have Fullmer than Potts. Fullmer has already proven it in the majors. Grandal is very good; Kemp is garbage. Even his own GM admitted he was “out of shape,” and when have you heard a GM be that honest about a player?
Mel Upton wasn’t a key part of the Kimbrel deal – he was a salary offset for Quentin. I do love the return the Padres received for Kimbrel, but I’m still puzzled at the complete lack of return for Melvin.
Except you didnt originally say one of the best pitch framers. You said one of the best catchers. Hes not. He struggles to throw runners out in his career, struggles with other aspects outside pitch framing.
Also they didnt say melvin was a key part of the deal. They said melvin being included brought down the price of kimbrel. Had it been kimbrel they keep quentin and give up more than wisler and paroubeck in that deal. They got something from upton and nothing for quentin. And maybin cant stay healthy enough.
And it wasnt j upton for hudson potts…..they drafted hudson potts with the QO pick and saved roughly 2 mill dollars. Whatever players they were able to sign that year to overslot deals because of that huge savings they got more talent depth than just Fulmer. Its way too early to say oh youd rather have fulmer than potts lawson thompson and whatever else. If all 3 turn into regular contributors says potts is a super utility thompson and lawson turn into solid #3 rotation types or elite setup guys padres easily win the deal and did smart by not trading for fulmer because they will get more out of the cheap production from that than fulmer.
When Grandal gets more than 400 AB’s in a season get back to us.
I’d rather have 400 at-bats from a good catcher than the garbage Kemp was putting out there n a daily basis.
All things considered, and because TINSTAPP, yeah, I’d rather have Fulmer than those three guys you mentioned. This is a team that is going into 2017 with Luis Perdomo as its opening day starter.
The problem with the Padres/Ross situation was that basically everyone was calling them about Ross and almost everyone was saying they should trade him (especially after they blew it all up before last season, people were saying they should try to trade him after this past year at the latest). I’m totally with you about hindsight, but I think the Padres overplayed their hand and tried to extract more value out of Ross when his value was relatively high a year ago. The Padres aren’t idiots (at least in my opinion), they (or at least Preller) hasn’t been good with gambling.
The padres hosting the 2016 all star game and having no clear cut player to represent them besides Ross could have played into this as well. Also to casual fans trading Ross and then letting Justin upton leave would leave no familiar names on the roster, besides kemp. Plus the padres have such a weak causal fan base trading Ross would have been the end of the world, go look at their instagram everyone’s butt hurt about trading Derek Norris. The same thing happened with Chase Headley in 2012 he exploded with 31hr and 115rbis both twice as much as he’s had any season before or since, and with only two years left of control and they didn’t trade him and the team wasn’t contending. I guess what I’m trying to say is that’s it’s not easy for the padres to make what would seem like no brained trades due to the market they play in and the fan base that supports them. If you look at stadium attendance the padres usually fall somewhere in the middle but that’s mostly due to the fans of the visiting team, if you’ve ever been to a padres game where they host the dodgers or the giants you would think the padres were the visitors.
Padres aren’t idiots! LOL
Ross might have been a top of the line pitcher back then, but the question is if he would have been able to keep up that kind of production for the long term.
The Padres were not and are still not going to be contenders for years, so would it have been worth it to hold onto a player like Ross for all that time? By the time the team actually starts contending, would he have started declining, or have gotten his value hindered through injury (which is what ended up happening here).
Another Bonehead non move by Preller
So what kind of deal would Ross be looking at? A 1 year prove me deal like Cashner, a regular multi year deal, or a multi year deal with incentives/team options?
Ross is going to get like a 1 year/5 million deal. I think his arm is shredded wheat and he’s not ever going to throw another pitch in the majors. I hope I’m wrong, because he’s a fun pitcher to watch.
Boston maybe?
Cubs
It’s got to be at least 2 years because his health status is way up in the air at this point. Those thoracic outlet surgeries can linger for long periods of time. Any contract he gets would be backloaded with incentives, I would guess.
Could land between the 2 yrs./$8.5MM that Medlen received from KC two winters ago and 2 yrs./$10MM, maybe with additional health and performance incentives in the second year.
He will get 1 year $8MM from someone. The amount the Padres did not exercise at is very close to market in my opinion.
Depending on how much money the reds are willing to eat, the Angels could be a good looking fit for BP.
I think Dbacks could probably get Ziegler for a good price. He’s an underrated late innings pitcher.
I’m thinking Ross in Boston for 1 yr, 5 or 6 Mil
The Red Sox will make a huge mistake if they don’t resign Ziegler. He was very good in Boston but Farrell wouldn’t let him pitch to lefties. They need a reliever who can close and also pitch middle innings
Reds announce we are going to give Peraza regular playing time. But wait you have two good experienced middle infielders. So basically you’re announcing to the world: we’re desperate to get rid of Phillips and Cozart. If the other teams know you’re desperate you’re going to get less for them.
Why would any team even want to sign geovany Soto. He’s been awful since his fluke rookie year. The worst catcher in all of baseball. The guy allowed benji Molina steal second.