12.17.04
Offseason Manueverings
There has been a flurry of offseason activity over the past couple of weeks and not all of it makes a lot of sense. The most confusing moves to me have been
those of the Arizona Diamondbacks. The D-Backs have been considered baseball's most financially unstable team over the past few years, resulting from their
overspending and deferred payments of previous years (that netted them the 2001 World Series). They even went so far as to request that MLB forgive
something like $80M in debt. Last season they traded Curt Schilling to the Red Sox in order to cut down on payroll and the big rumors of this offseason have
been that they would trade Randy Johnson to the Yankees in order to further cut payroll. In both cases it was expected that they would receive young major
league players and prospects in an effort to rebuild the team. They also allowed Richie Sexson to leave this offseason via free agency without even offering him
arbitration. Sexson was their big pickup last offseason when they traded away a cache of young talented players to the Brewers in order to get a power hitting
first baseman. With Sexson being injured for most of 2004 and then leaving, they basically received nothing for that cache of players and the Brewers were
able to build a semi-respectable team. Then, in the first big move of the offseason, the D-Backs signed Troy Glaus to a 4 year, $45M contract. Glaus is a hell
of a hitter, but is somewhat of an injury risk, having missed most of the 2004 season to injury. And, while Glaus isn't old for a baseball player, he's 28, he
doesn't exactly fit the bill as a "re-building" piece. The D-Backs then sign 30 year old pitcher Russ Ortiz to another 4 year deal, this one worth $33M. Ortiz has
been a quality starter over the last several seasons, winning 21 games in 2003, but again, he really doesn't seem like a guy you build a team around. So, once
these moves had been made, a lot of people started to wonder if maybe the D-Backs weren't rebuilding at all, and that maybe they were going to keep Randy
Johnson and play to win in 2005. How they could afford these moves is another question altogether - one that no one quite knows the answer to, either. But
now we find out that the D-Backs are, in fact, trading Johnson to the Yankees in a three team deal that also includes the Dodgers. The D-Backs will get Brad
Penny, a 26 year old starting pitcher that has had somewhat of an up and down career, Shawn Green, a 32 year old outfielder/first baseman, and Yhency
Brazoban, a 24 year old middle reliever. These moves have left Arizona with a starting rotation of Ortiz, Penny, Brandon Webb, and Casey Fossum, and a
lineup that has Glaus, Green, and Luis Gonzalez as its centerpieces. To me, that sounds like a .500 team. They didn't get appreciably younger, but they did get
better - from horrible to average. But what is the point of being average with all of your players being at their peak, or slightly past their peak? For a team with
money problems that could have used a few years of youthful inexpensiveness, these moves don't make a lot of sense. It seems to me that this team wanted to
become competitive so as not to lose their fan base, but they have (again) sacrificed the future for that goal.
The Dodgers, meanwhile, have also been acting confusing. First they lose their big power hitter, Adrian Beltre, to Seattle in free agency, now they are making
this deal with the Yankees and D-Backs where they lose their projected #1 or #2 starter, their only power threat beyond Beltre, and a quality setup reliver for
Eric Gagne (who struggled somewhat last season after losing his main setup guy, Guillermo Mota). In return they got Javier Vazquez, a quality starter that the
Yankees are giving up on after one mediocre year in the Bronx, and two prospects that are probably not ready for the majors this year. The Dodgers, who have
some good talent in their upper minor leagues, seem to be the team that is rebuilding instead of the D-Backs, and Los Angeles made the playoffs last year. The
Dodgers will probably lose a lot of 1-0 and 2-0 games this year with the team they've got.
Finally, the Yankees have completely rebuilt their starting rotation after getting bounced from the playoffs by their hated rivals, the Boston Red Sox. Only Mike
Mussina and Kevin Brown remain from last year, and the Yankees would love to dump Kevin Brown. They have added Johnson, Carl Pavano - a guy that
always showed a lot of promise, but never lived up until last year when he won 18 games with a 3.00 ERA, and Jaret Wright - who was a young stud with
Cleveland in the late 90's, got injured and disappeared and then came back strong last year with Atlanta, winning 15 games and accumulating a 3.28 ERA. Last
year they added Brown, Vazquez, and Jon Leiber to their rotation and they were never able to perform up to the standards set by the rotations of 1996-2003.
Of the three added this year, only Johnson can be said to be a 100% safe bet. Wright's injury risk is always a factor, and Pavano may have been a flash in the
pan last year, when he was playing for his next contract. Most teams would love to have a repeat of the Yankees 2004 season, but if Pavano and Wright
perform like Vazquez and Brown, you can believe that The Boss will be sorely disappointed with the results.