In an appearance on MLB Network Radio on Friday, free agent right-hander Alex Cobb spoke highly of Cubs manager Joe Maddon and pitching coach Jim Hickey, as Patrick Mooney of NBC Sports Chicago details. Cobb spent the first seven years of his career in Tampa Bay, where he played under Maddon (2011-14) and Hickey (through 2017), which has led to speculation that the Cubs will pursue him in free agency. On the possibility of joining the Cubs and reuniting with Maddon and Hickey, Cobb said, “Obviously, if we move down the line and we’re able to have some discussions with them, I’d be very honored to be able to talk with them and hopefully come to a deal.”
Before Cobb’s eligible to sign with the Cubs or another team, he’ll have to reject the Rays’ $17.4MM qualifying offer, which he hinted he’ll do when he said, “You’re talking about, hopefully, a decision that’s going to impact the next five years of your life. Based on that comment, it seems Cobb is seeking a five-year deal (MLBTR is projecting he’ll land a four-year arrangement), though he insisted that he’ll prioritize team success over money. “I’ve been through both. I’ve been through losing seasons and I’ve been through winning seasons,” he stated. “And the amount of joy that winning brings to us – it can’t be replaced by a dollar figure.”
More from the National League:
- Joe Frisaro of MLB.com breaks down offseason trade possibilities for the Marlins, who are reportedly shopping right fielder Giancarlo Stanton, second baseman Dee Gordon and third baseman Martin Prado. To get a haul for Stanton, who’s owed $295MM through 2028 (or $77MM if he opts out after 2020), Frisaro suggests the Fish should pick up one-third of the tab over the next three years. Gordon’s contract is far less complicated – he’s due a manageable $37.9MM through 2020 – which should lead to widespread interest in him, Frisaro observes. The same isn’t true of Prado, who’s coming off a below-average, injury-plagued year and will rake in $28.5MM through 2019. The Marlins’ best hope to move Prado would be to package him with a real asset – center fielder Christian Yelich, for example – Frisaro opines. Otherwise, they’re going to be stuck with the 34-year-old heading into next season.
- While the Mets could be on the hunt for a second baseman, odds are they won’t be the team that acquires Gordon, Anthony DiComo of MLB.com writes. The Mets have neither the prospect capital nor payroll flexibility necessary to put together a deal for Gordon, reasons DiComo, who estimates that the club has around $30MM to spend this offseason with needs at second or third base, the corner outfield/first base, the rotation and the bullpen.
- The Reds plan to use star third base prospect Nick Senzel all over the diamond in 2018, general manager Dick Williams tells Mark Sheldon of MLB.com. “This is a guy that played shortstop in college [at Tennessee], played third base in college, played second base as an amateur,” Williams said. “We think he’s clearly athletic enough to go to left field or right field. He’s got the bat to do it.” The 22-year-old Senzel showed off his prowess at the plate in 2017, hitting a robust .321/.391/.514 in 507 plate appearances between Single-A and Double-A, and figures to open next season at the minors’ highest level.
I guess the Marlins (according to Joe…) are considering “blowing up the whole Team”…which is exactly what Jeter said “They wouldn’t do”.
If that’s what they intend to do…. then I guess “The Who”… really knew what they were talking about when they wrote the song that says……”Meet The New Boss…..Same As The OLD BOSS!!!!”
I understand they need to retool that team…… but if they just sell off all the decent ball players and go through a complete rebuild…… they’re going to have to move the team…. and pay back Dade County for the stadium….. because nobody’s going to go to the games if they do that again.
Wake up Derek Jeter….. for once in your life do the right thing!.
I’m curious and totally not trying to be condescending… What is the “right thing” to do with the Marlins at this point?
I agree that it’s not a simple answer. But if you live in So Florida, and you have been supporting the Marlins since they were the Florida Marlins…….I think you deserve a break.
Huizenga played us for every penny, then ripped the team apart.
John Henry did the same thing…..basically…but in a different way
Loria was…..well…..”considerably worse as an owner”. than the other two.
The hope was that “New Ownership” would finally “Take This Team Where It Needed to Go”.
We Were Very Close!!!!! We lost an Elite Starter, and needed to add a few pieces. THAT’s should have been “Job 1” for the New Owners.
“Finish The Job”…….Not …..”Rebuild…….. Again”
“The Right Thing” would be to take the Team that we have, and add a few pieces that make it a contender………It’s really NOT that far off.
Didn’t get try that a couple years ago? Beurle, Heath Bell, and Jose Reyes?
Blow it all up and try to set their sights on contending in 4-5 years when they have a blank slate on payroll assuming they can move Stanton.
Sign Arrieta, Darvish and Holland.
If it doesn’t workout then they can tear it down and rebuild.
They still won’t nail the payroll tax limit doing that. With the $60 million in revenue sharing they get every year along with everything else that rolls in nationally they can afford to do that.
If not, then MLB in Miami cannot work.
Go back to Kansas Dorothy
FOr once in your life? So, you know the guy and can swear all his decisions in life have been wrong?
You claim to understand they need to “retool”, but seem to think you can magically do that without trading.
Touche.
I’m a bit angry that this new group came into a situation (that they had ample time to examine) and they don’t have enough money to “Do The Right Thing”. They scrapped together the money to buy the team…..They don’t have the financial wherewithal to finance what needs to be done. They shouldn’t have been allowed to Buy The Team.
“Retool” is very different than “Rebuild”. Jeter sounds like he’s doing a “Rebuild” from the bottom up.
This team is very close to contending. We lost a Stud SP. Then they made a couple Bad decisions (Chen’s contract, Prado’s extension). If the new owners had “just a few bucks to invest”……they could move a few dead-weight contracts (Prado, Zielgler, Tazawa……Chen next season maybe)…..and turn things around.
Sounds like they aren’t willing to do that.
Even if Bill Gates bought the team, he’d still have to deal with the realities of small market baseball economics.
okay why do you put EVERYTHING in quotes and like 80 periods after every single word??? just a question
Miami is not a small market, it’s a mid-market, 16th in the country.
Jeffrey Loria made it look like a small market and Jeter sounds like he’s committed to keeping it that way.
I HATE the N.L. Least. Garbage.
The Marlins are not “Very Close to Contending.” They had -2.1 WAR as a team. Their batting numbers were slightly above league average, but their pitching stats were well below league average. You know how difficult it is to put a healthy, effective pitching staff together – rotation, relief corps, dominant closer? Very difficult. You need to get lucky on more than a few reclamation projects (which means you need top tier scouting and coaching). You need a core of young, inexpensive position player prospects under team control (hopefully enough to put together an infield, catcher, maybe an outfielder or two) who are under team control for several years. That young core is necessary so you as an owner think it’s worth it to shell out huge contracts/trade away star prospects (i.e., the team’s future contention) for one or two big name free agents to head the rotation and close out games. Oh yeah, about those star prospects. You need a deep farm system full of ‘em to swing those huge franchise-altering deals. According to Bleacher Report rankings, the Marlins have the 28th best farm system in baseball. Not great.
Who were the last three winners of the World Series? The Astros, the Cubs, the Royals. What did all three of them do to get there? Rebuild.
The Marlins have been doing one rebuild after the other since the 2003 season came to an end and they haven’t been in the playoffs since 2003.
If the team were decent, they’d have better attendance. It’s pretty straightforward. If you have firesales like clockwork, that alienates the heck out of fans.
Didn’t two of those owners get them a ring? As for “Wake up Jeter…..for once in your life do the right thing” that has to be one of the most blind comments ever posted! Research the mans life why don’t you cause it’s not hard…
I agree with kbarr. Maybe slashing payroll and trying to build a farm system is the right move, but nobody wants to sit through that again. Especially not if they engage in true salary dumping over scoring elite prospects. Something like packaging Ozuna or Yelich with dead money, for example, would be tough to swallow.
So what is the right thing Mr. Know It All.
And please explain how Jeter has never done the right thing in his life? What a moronic comment
If I was a Marlins fan, I would be hoping for a full rebuild or this team is going to continue to flounder in mediocrity. This has been a mid 70 win team the last few years with Stanton, Yelich, Ozuna, Gordon, etc… They now have come out and said they don’t have the payroll to keep Stanton and Gordon, who combined for 10 wins on a 77 win team. They also have one of the worst minor league systems so there won’t be anyone coming up to save them either. Keeping Yelich and Ozuna and Realmuto will only mean this organization continues to be a 70-75 win club. Right now, they are like the White Sox last year. A few good, valuable players at the top and a bunch of below average players everywhere else and no farm system. The White Sox broke it all down, added a huge influx of talent and now have one of the top systems in baseball. Obviously we don’t know if it will all pan out, but we do know they weren’t going anywhere with Sale, Quintana or Eaton. Just like the Marlins aren’t going anywhere with only Stanton, Yelich, Ozuna and Realmuto.
How Marlins deal with Prado will indicate how desperate they are to shed salary.
Yelich is a real asset given his production and contract who should net the Marlins some serious prospects if they deal carefully. Packaging him with Prado just to get rid of Prado’s salary would make no sense unless they are truly desperate to trim payroll. And if they are THAT desperate, then Jeter and co. would have bought a giant lemon of a franchise.
I think they can get a big return even if they include Prado.
Based on everything that has been reported, I liken these Marlins a lot to the Cleveland Indians in “Major League II”. By that I mean that the investor group did not have enough money to buy the team and run it, just to buy it. By all accounts it sounds like that for the forseeable future this will be a franchise that cannot exceed the 75 million mark for more than one year in a row. As much as fielding a competitive team matters, You gotta have the money to pay the team.
You have no.. you have no marbles.
Paying a third of Stanton’s salary over the next 3 years will at least get you something back. Not near what he’s worth but it’s will get something. This team is probably going to have to do a rebuild whether the fans like it or not. How much ” trust me” they have in the new owners is debatable.
$100 million for “something” (a prospect or two) is a bad investment.
You can get 4 or 5 years of a proven MLB star for that.
Not if you’re still paying all of Stanton’s contract.
They can give his contract away without asking for any real prospects in return and be better off than paying 1/3 of it for a few maybes.
I don’t think he was saying pay 1/3rd of the contract. 1/3 of the 1st 3 years is like $30 mil (10 mil x 3 years)
How about since kind of incentive based trade (for lack of a better term)? Marlins get a haul of prospects and if Stanton performs well the Marlins pay less and the receiving team pays more. If he performs poorly the Marlins pay more and the receiving team pays less.
Not sure if MLB allows that though.
I’d like to see the Pirates make an offer for Dee Gordon. Nick Kingham or Clay Holmes. Something like that.
The team is so lacking in power and figures to bring back most of the same players, so they might as well go full small ball. Get Gordon and move Harrison to 3B.
Whoever bought this team was going to have to fix this unbelievable mess. It just happens to be Jeter. He didn’t sign Stanton, Chen, and Prado to their contracts. He didn’t leave the farm system in a shambles. He sure is the one who has to fix it though. I would love for any of the arm chair managers to tell me they have a better solution than to tear it down and start from scratch. I’ve been living down here since the Huizenga days, so I’ve seen all the re-builds. The fans may not like it, but there really isn’t much in the way of alternatives. Let’s just hope he does it in such a manner that the fans see he has a legitimate plan in place.
Amen. I am not a Marlins fan, but they really have no choice.
If they hang onto Stanton, I suspect he opts out. He will get the same money in FA, if not better and wants to win.
Of course, that opens the whole argument that guys shouldn’t sign for that much, since it hampers building a team around them.
I’m a baseball nerd and a So. Florida Resident/Fan also……and I am frustrated with “the process” that we’ve been through over-and-over again. We really weren’t that far away from contending. Jose was a HUGE loss…….Talent-wise……and Team Spirit-wise.
I know they need to trade Stanton, but the rest of the guys should stay. If the new owners didn’t have enough money to “Buy and Run The Team”…….then they shouldn’t have been allowed to do that.
They built the stadium in the wrong place. Somewhere in Delray would have been MUCH better, so that “more fans would have access”.
So tired…….
Love that Dick Williams distinguishes between “college’ and “amateur”.
He knows what’s up.
Seriously. Almost as pathetic as moving Senzel all over the diamond. Let Peraza do that.
Kris Bryant, Ben Zobrist and Chris Taylor are kind of redefining a multi positional player. It’s chique now. It’s good to be able to play different positions well.
No doubt about it. Still, he is more likely to thrive in one position, then in multiple. Why do that with your 2nd pick in the nation? Peraza is good and Suarez is good. Both have shown they can roam. Let send Senzel settle in at 3rd, and with his upside, rebuild around this budding superstar.
Don’t think this has anything to do with how much money the new ownership has. It has more to do with how much revenue the team has the ability to generate. Yes, the stadium was a complete and total boondoggle. Again not the new ownerships fault. They also have the worst television contract on the planet. So what are they to do? Remember, Jeter has said he’s interested in moving Stanton, Gordon, & Prado. All the talk about Yelich and Ozuna is coming from everyone else. This team, as currently built, cannot win. You have to start somewhere.
Seriously. Almost as pathetic as moving Senzel all over the diamond. Let Peraza do that.
Why? So Peraza can hit .230 and eat up at bats a legitimate player could be getting?
Perhaps you should do some RESEARCH before spouting off. He’s a .300 lifetime hitter in the minors, a .275 lifetime hitter in the majors and has stolen plenty of bases with a modest amount of caught. Is entering his age 24 season Plenty of good years ahead… of course, not everyone is a superstar like you are.
Mets dropped $80M in payroll. Considering he’d fit at 2B and bat leadoff (filing two needs), I’m sure they can find enough pocket change to pay Gordon’s very reasonable salary.
The Mets are a small market team.
Oh wait……
It is difficult being a Met fan. All that money off the books yet we can’t afford to acquire Gordon and his 30 million?? Assuming the Marlins take less if a team is willing to absorb the entire contract it’s ridiculous that they don’t have the capability to acquire him
The Mets have the money to get both Gordon and Stanton, but Fred Wilpon is going to put that money in his bank account.
Not really. When the Wilpons had money, they spent it all the time. Santana, Beltran, Bay (yikes). They’re poor, not cheap. The difference in semantics doesn’t help the fans out.
If the cubs did sign Cobb , thats a nice solid rotation
Lester
Hendricks
Quintana
Cobb
5th spot to fill
It’s a good rotation for the regular season. Not so sure it’s great for the postseason, though.
What’s 5th spots 1st name ?
I think Jeter will trade Stanton, Yellich, and Gordon and get some key prospects to move forward while lowering salary. Stanton to the Cards for Flaherty and Alcantara. Trade Yellick to the Yanks for Frazier, Adams, Estrada, and Acevedo. Trade Gordon to the Padres for Gore and Tatis. That gives Jeter 5 top rated pitchers, a SS, 2nd, and Of.
If Cobb is 2 years younger than Arrieta, and Arrieta is in premier physical shape…..then aren’t these guys not all that far apart? I’d love to have Cobb on a 4 year 56m deal. These things usually end up more like 5yrs 85m. Point is this: Arrieta may very well have 4/5 dominant years left. I wish we could have them both. Lackey age 37? We did. Why not Jake?!!!? For me; the answer is Cobb AND Arrieta. No more Lackey though.
I’d like like To heard there opinions on this.