The Angels signed outfielder Scott Schebler to a minor league deal. He’s another of these guys who have a history of shoulder injuries so I am not going to get too excited over this. It’ll probably turn out about like the Ryan LaMarre signing did. The Toronto Blue Jays have joined the Angels and the Rangers in the pursuit of J.A. Happ.
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Wrigley Field was named a national historic landmark on Thursday. The Cubs just signed five guys to minor league deals, including Jake Jewell. Sam McWilliams, who has never pitched at the major league level, got a free agent contract with the Mets at one year $750,000 and he’s guaranteed a spot on their 40 man roster. The MLB minimum salary in 2021 will be $570,500, an increase of $7,000 per year.
Brandon Martin, the former Rays prospect who murdered three people with a baseball bat, got life in prison without possibility of parole. Jake Diekman thinks MLB should just ban Robinson Cano for life and be done with it. Kevin Cron and Dovydas Neverauskas have each signed one year deals with the Hiroshima Carp. Brian Cashman slept outside in Yankee Stadium to raise awareness about youth homelessness. Finally, Congratulations to Bryce and Kayla Harper.
Worth a shot to sign Schebler, he has some pop and is capable. He is on a non-guaranteed contract so there is no risk.
The Cano thing really bugs me. I’m sure this was talked about already, but it sure seems convenient for the Mets. Half of me wishes we had this timely way out of paying our cripplingly expensive, underpruducing veteran.
Being less than truthful about age may not carry as big a penalty as per use, I suspect. (Going off of the oft-made obs that Pujols always denied drug use vehemently, but never strenuously refuted speculations about his “real” age.
MLB is screwing over the (soon-to-be-Low-A-instead of) AAA Fresno Grizzlies big time.
(Conflict of Interest disclaimer: My nephew used to work for the Grizzlies in 2013. See my travel story from back then on the old site).
Way too large of a facility and market for low A ball. That’s a AAA club all the way.
It’s a great facility. Like I said, they’re getting screwed over.
Sell outs, but good food on the CUBS farm. In-N-Out would never do that, always fresh not frozen.
Props to Cashman. Lots of people cut checks, dedicated people spend time.
And congrats to Harper on the best day of his life.
No reference to Tamin? Seems like a really significant hire, IMO. He’ll be second in command to Minasian, and his pedigree is rather impressive – 7+ years working for the Dodgers FO, then transitioned to the Braves, where his primary role was game planning and run prevention, so to speak.
Absolutely huge hire, IMO.
Everyone was really worried about who we would hire in GM (Dombrowski, for example) and how far it would set us back.
I’d argue that Minasian is a grand slam hire, in terms of hiring an “unknown.” We are quietly assembling a FO that has extensive Dodgers/Braves/Blue Jays roots – basically, a combination of a great analytics team AND a great scouting team, too.
I’m really excited about our future.
Brent is cooking up a front office article. The hiring came after these were up and most of us were offline for the evening.
Again?
You said that back at the other place…..20 months ago. Analytics works great in business, but not in a real time situations or situations where intuition and good eyeballs are needed. Andrew Friedman gets way too much credit for the Dodgers. He said all the right things at his introductory presser…….and he’ll need to prove himself to me.
Building a World Series team in Tampa Bay while competing against clubs with 4 times the payroll then building the best top to bottom organization in all of baseball doesn’t prove anything to you?
With all due respect, I don’t think you realize how analytics work. They are about marginal success time and again over a long time. Any small sample size can make them look brilliant or laughable. But any large sample will prove they work.
Yeah, I mean, that’s just a ridiculous comment. Prove himself? The dude is basically considered the #1 executive across the league. He built a winner with no budget in Tampa, and now has built the best organization in baseball now that he has a good-sized payroll to operate with, that is built to win for many, many, many years.
The fact that teams actively poach from his tree .. I mean, I guess everyone has their detractors no matter how good they are at what they do, but I think basically most people in baseball and fans alike recognize that Friedman is very, very good at his job.
2002 – are you Mike Scioscia? Come on – be honest with us.
I don’t think Andrew Friedman would worry about proving himself to you. He has proven himself time and time again. He is likely the best baseball executive of the 21st Century.
We can disagree regarding the import of analytics. But there is no dispute that in the age of analytics, Friedman is the complete package.
Speaking of building a FO. I soundly remember a bunch of us were so hung up on this PoBo title and format (including myself to an extent) that we HAD to get with the times and create this sort of FO structure.
Turns out, that’s all it really was. Just a title.
Yeah, and I am fully cool admitting I was wrong about it.
My concern was that it was a sign that we weren’t willing to invest in our FO and have it competitive with other FOs in terms of size, structure, etc.
But it appears I was 100% wrong, and I am very happy to say that. I have to imagine that Minasian (and Tamin) wouldn’t have agreed to come to the Angels if they felt they would be severely limited in building out the FO. At the very least, it is a promising sign.
I’m really excited about seeing how the remaining hires turn out.
Same. Especially with an extra 30 mil after pujols is retired.
The fact he has some Dodger genes, I won’t hold that against him. In Perry I trust.
Ban Cano for life? Caught once should cost a full season, second time is for life. Why do we cut slack to cheaters?
A metric crap ton of union dues would have come out of that $24 million. I’m sure Tony Clark will miss it.