{"id":3090,"date":"2011-11-25T16:22:50","date_gmt":"2011-11-25T21:22:50","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.nationalsarmrace.com\/?p=3090"},"modified":"2013-10-10T13:24:03","modified_gmt":"2013-10-10T17:24:03","slug":"nats-off-season-news-items-wrap-up-112511-edition","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.nationalsarmrace.com\/?p=3090","title":{"rendered":"Nats Off-season News Items Wrap-up 11\/25\/11 edition"},"content":{"rendered":"<div id=\"attachment_3171\" style=\"width: 263px\" class=\"wp-caption aligncenter\"><a href=\"http:\/\/www.nationalsarmrace.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2011\/11\/thanksgiving_turkeybaseball-via-bloguin.com_.jpg\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" aria-describedby=\"caption-attachment-3171\" class=\"size-full wp-image-3171\" title=\"thanksgiving_turkeybaseball via bloguin.com\" alt=\"\" src=\"http:\/\/www.nationalsarmrace.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2011\/11\/thanksgiving_turkeybaseball-via-bloguin.com_.jpg\" width=\"253\" height=\"199\" \/><\/a><p id=\"caption-attachment-3171\" class=\"wp-caption-text\">Happy Thanksgiving! image via bloguin.com<\/p><\/div>\n<p>A shortened Thanksgiving edition, with me being on travel for the holidays visiting family in Dallas.<\/p>\n<p>Unfortunately they&#8217;re not really baseball fans down here, so conversations about whether or not the move of the Houston Astros and forthcoming rivalry with the Texas Rangers fall mostly on deaf ears.<\/p>\n<p>After watching the last couple versions of this post get really bloated and difficult to read, i&#8217;m dividing this one up by topic.<\/p>\n<p><em><strong>Nationals In General<br \/>\n<\/strong><\/em><\/p>\n<ul>\n<li><strong>Cole Kimball<\/strong> <a href=\"http:\/\/www.natsinsider.com\/2011\/11\/nats-re-claim-kimball-from-blue-jays.html\">is back<\/a>, two days after we lost him on a waiver gamble.\u00a0 Clearly the team values him, though now <a href=\"http:\/\/www.nationalsarmrace.com\/?p=3073\">my post questioning the move<\/a> and all the subsequent arguing in comments is moot and seems over-reactive.<\/li>\n<li>Nats add four players to the 40-man &#8230; but <a href=\"http:\/\/www.nationalsarmrace.com\/?p=1996\">only two that I predicted<\/a>.\u00a0 More <a href=\"http:\/\/www.nationalsarmrace.com\/?p=3101\">thoughts\/opinions here<\/a>.<\/li>\n<li>MLB&#8217;s <strong>Jonathan Mayo<\/strong> put up his <a href=\"http:\/\/mlb.mlb.com\/mlb\/prospects\/watch\/y2011\/#list=was\">Nats top-10 prospect list<\/a>.\u00a0 Its a list that does not include any 2011 draftees, so it differs widely from Baseball America&#8217;s and Fangraphs.\u00a0 He also has some odd rankings, includes <strong>Cole Kimball<\/strong> and has <strong>Rick Hague<\/strong> above other more promising candidates such as <strong>Robbie Ray<\/strong> or <strong>Steve Lombardozzi<\/strong>, given that both are pretty big question marks going forward due to injury.<\/li>\n<li>No surprise here; <strong>Shairon Martis<\/strong> <a href=\"http:\/\/www.washingtonpost.com\/blogs\/nationals-journal\/post\/shairon-martis-signed-by-the-pirates\/2011\/11\/22\/gIQARhZPlN_blog.html?wprss=nationals-journal\">signed a minor league deal with Pittsburgh<\/a>.\u00a0 Clearly he wasn&#8217;t going to make it in this organization; good luck to him moving forward.\u00a0 He&#8217;s very young and could still have an impact.<\/li>\n<li>The new deal probably delays <strong>Bryce Harper<\/strong>&#8216;s debut, due to new changes in the super-2 status.\u00a0 This is pretty much the exact OPPOSITE of what the two sides needed to do; we want to see these star rookies sooner, not later.\u00a0 Frankly at this point despite it being essentially a useless delay, I&#8217;d be in favor of completely scrapping the &#8220;super-2&#8221; status and just go to a hard 3-years of arbitration.\u00a0 If players are kept down artificially for a week in April, that&#8217;s still much better than wasting them til mid-June.\u00a0 Here&#8217;s additional links from <a href=\"http:\/\/www.washingtonpost.com\/blogs\/nationals-journal\/post\/bryce-harpers-major-league-debut-and-the-new-cba\/2011\/11\/23\/gIQAVUp5oN_blog.html?wprss=nationals-journal\"><strong>Adam Kilgore<\/strong><\/a> and <a href=\"http:\/\/www.natsinsider.com\/2011\/11\/could-new-cba-delay-harpers-debut.html\"><strong>Mark Zuckerman<\/strong><\/a> both discussing this same topic.<\/li>\n<li>Here&#8217;s some welcome news: <strong>Matthew Purke<\/strong> struggled early but finished strong in Arizona due to a <a href=\"http:\/\/www.masnsports.com\/byron_kerr\/2011\/11\/adjustments-to-purkes-delivery-led-to-outstanding-arizona-finish.html\">quick adjustment<\/a> by Nats pitching coaches.\u00a0 By the end of the AFL he was hitting 95 with good life on his breaking pitches.\u00a0 That&#8217;s fantastic news; if Purke can continue showing this kind of velocity coming from the left-hand side with good secondary pitches, he&#8217;ll clearly be closer to the #1-starter potential he showed two years ago.<\/li>\n<li><a href=\"http:\/\/www.csnwashington.com\/blog\/nationals-talk\/post\/Nats-wont-get-revenue-sharing-in-future?blockID=600422&amp;feedID=6358\">As pointed out by Zuckerman<\/a>, The Nats won&#8217;t be getting any more revenue sharing under the new CBA.\u00a0 And frankly, nor should they, being in the 6th largest market and owned by a billionaire.\u00a0 This is one small modification in the new CBA that makes 100% sense.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p><em><strong>Free Agents\/Player Transaction News<\/strong><\/em><\/p>\n<ul>\n<li><strong>Yoenis Cespedes<\/strong> apparently <a href=\"http:\/\/hardballtalk.nbcsports.com\/2011\/11\/18\/yoenis-cespedes-expects-a-deal-in-the-35-50-million-range\">expects a deal<\/a> in the neighborhood $35-50M.\u00a0 Wow.\u00a0 Thats a lot of risk for a player who won&#8217;t be MLB ready in year one and who most people only know by his <a href=\"http:\/\/www.youtube.com\/watch?v=kREZHmOR1bg\">incredibly odd youtube scouting<\/a> video.<\/li>\n<li>At one time <strong>Scott Kazmir<\/strong> was an &#8220;Ace&#8221; in this league; a guy easily within the best 15-20 arms in the league.\u00a0 The Angels gave up on him and released him this summer, eating $9.5M.\u00a0 Nobody else even sniffed the guy.\u00a0 Now he&#8217;s <a href=\"http:\/\/hardballtalk.nbcsports.com\/2011\/11\/19\/scott-kazmir-to-pitch-in-dominican-winter-league\">set to play in the Dominican Winter League<\/a> to try to re-invent himself.\u00a0\u00a0\u00a0 I agree with the comments in this article mostly; he isn&#8217;t even 28 yet.\u00a0 Someone may take a flier on this guy and really get themselves a diamond in the rough.<\/li>\n<li>Here&#8217;s <strong>Jon Heyman<\/strong>&#8216;s <a href=\"http:\/\/sportsillustrated.cnn.com\/2011\/writers\/jon_heyman\/11\/21\/free.agents\/index.html?eref=writers\">predictions on salaries<\/a>, with some thoughts on possible locations for the top free agents this off-season.\u00a0 Not destinations; amounts.\u00a0 He has Nats sniffing around on <strong>Fielder<\/strong>, <strong>Buehrle<\/strong> and <strong>Madson<\/strong>.\u00a0 Nothing really earth-shattering there.<\/li>\n<li><strong>Tim Dierkes<\/strong> reporting that the <a href=\"http:\/\/www.mlbtraderumors.com\/2011\/11\/nationals-visiting-buehrle-at-his-home-today.html?utm_source=feedburner&amp;utm_medium=feed&amp;utm_campaign=Feed%3A+MlbTradeRumors+%28MLB+Trade+Rumors%29&amp;utm_content=Google+Reader\">Nats are visiting Buehrle<\/a> at his home, and that he&#8217;s the #1 priority for this team.\u00a0 We&#8217;ll see; I still have my doubts that Buehrle would come to Washington.\u00a0 But signing him pretty much spells the end for <strong>Ross Detwiler<\/strong>.<\/li>\n<li>The Rangers made an interesting FA signing, getting closer <strong>Joe Nathan<\/strong> for 2yrs\/$14M.\u00a0 The signing isn&#8217;t as much interesting b\/c of Nathan (and $14M for what Nathan put up last year coming back from injury is a huge risk).\u00a0 But it does imply that <strong>Neftali Feliz<\/strong> is going back to the rotation, and THAT would imply that the Rangers aren&#8217;t really that interested in re-signing <strong>CJ Wilson<\/strong>.\u00a0 Fair enough for me; starters are far more valuable than closers, and if the Rangers make the world series again in 2012 having lost their #1 pitcher in each off-season, the GM should get a gold star.\u00a0 They&#8217;ll go into 2012 presumably with this rotation: Feliz, <strong>Ogando<\/strong>, <strong>Harrison, Holland<\/strong> and <strong>Lewis<\/strong>.\u00a0 They could also slot in <strong>Scott Feldman<\/strong> in place of an injury, as a former starter who struggled in 2011 due to injuries.\u00a0 Do you think the Nats would ever consider doing this with <strong>Drew Storen<\/strong>?<\/li>\n<li>The Nats may be chasing Buehrle, but here&#8217;s an interesting note: <strong>Roy Oswalt<\/strong> was <a href=\"http:\/\/www.mlbtraderumors.com\/2011\/11\/examining-teams-arbitration-decisions.html?utm_source=feedburner&amp;utm_medium=feed&amp;utm_campaign=Feed%3A+MlbTradeRumors+%28MLB+Trade+Rumors%29&amp;utm_content=Google+Reader\">NOT offered arbitration<\/a> by the Phillies, so signing him would cost us no picks.\u00a0 And, more importantly, we wouldn&#8217;t surrender our unprotected 1st rounder.<\/li>\n<li><a href=\"http:\/\/insider.espn.go.com\/mlb\/blog\/_\/name\/olney_buster\/id\/7278641\/biggest-positional-lineup-holes-fill-baseball-mlb\">The Angels need a catcher<\/a>.\u00a0 We have catcher depth.\u00a0 Maybe we can work a trade?<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p><em><strong>New Labor Deal Items<\/strong><\/em><\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>Not many details at first, but the announcement came on Friday 11\/18 that the two sides had reached an agreement for a <a href=\"http:\/\/msn.foxsports.com\/mlb\/story\/MLB-labor-deal-owners-players-union-bud-selig-111711\">new 5-year labor deal<\/a>, per <strong>Ken Rosenthal<\/strong> <a href=\"http:\/\/msn.foxsports.com\/mlb\/story\/Baseball-labor-deal-free-agent-relievers-will-not-cost-high-draft-picks-111911\">breaking the story<\/a>.\u00a0 <strong>Tom Verducci<\/strong> is right though in complaining that there are precious few details right now on how the Houston move <a href=\"http:\/\/sportsillustrated.cnn.com\/2011\/writers\/tom_verducci\/11\/18\/astros.wild.cards.interleague\/index.html?eref=writers\">affects the schedule<\/a>.\u00a0 Here&#8217;s a nice <a href=\"http:\/\/bizofbaseball.com\/index.php?option=com_content&amp;view=article&amp;id=5513:mlb-labor-agreement-expected-to-be-announced-monday&amp;catid=26:editorials&amp;Itemid=39\">Labor agreement overview<\/a> from a good Business of Baseball blog that covers the business-side of the industry, and also a <a href=\"http:\/\/bizofbaseball.com\/index.php?option=com_content&amp;view=article&amp;id=5521:inside-mlbs-new-5-year-labor-agreement&amp;catid=30:mlb-news&amp;Itemid=42\">detailed review<\/a> of the new CBA.<\/li>\n<li>Apparently one feature of the new agreement is the <a href=\"http:\/\/www.mlbtraderumors.com\/2011\/11\/teams-signing-type-a-relievers-wont-forfeit-picks.html?utm_source=feedburner&amp;utm_medium=feed&amp;utm_campaign=Feed%3A+MlbTradeRumors+%28MLB+Trade+Rumors%29&amp;utm_content=Google+Reader\">elimination of free agent compensation for relievers<\/a>.\u00a0 This is a welcome move and is refreshing to see, in that this particular rule was clearly broken and wasn&#8217;t in the best interests of either the clubs or the players.<\/li>\n<li><strong>Matthew Pouliot<\/strong> reports that the new agreement could have a &#8220;<a href=\"http:\/\/hardballtalk.nbcsports.com\/2011\/11\/18\/report-mlb-could-tax-low-spending-clubs\/\">low-payroll&#8221; tax<\/a> on clubs that don&#8217;t spend a certain amount.\u00a0 I struggle with this concept to a certain extent.\u00a0 Clearly teams that pull the plug on free agency and start over have shown that they can be successful in this league.\u00a0 Tampa Bay and (to a certain extent) Texas in recent times have won playoff series with payrolls in the bottom 5 of the league.\u00a0 Meanwhile teams like Pittsburgh and Kansas City may not have big MLB payrolls but are investing heavily in the draft ($17M by Pittsburgh last year).\u00a0 So any such tax would have to be implemented in a way that it allows teams to &#8220;start over&#8221; without incurring such a tax.\u00a0 I think the last thing we want is to see poor free agent signings and millions of dollars in payroll wasted just to reach an arbitrary level.\u00a0 The bigger problem in this league is not at the payroll bottom, but at the payroll top.<\/li>\n<li>Rosenthal calls the new deal a &#8220;<a href=\"http:\/\/msn.foxsports.com\/mlb\/story\/MLB-deal-unfair-to-small-market-teams-112211\">dagger<\/a>&#8221; to small-market teams.\u00a0 Hard to disagree.<\/li>\n<li><strong>Scott Boras<\/strong> says the new deal hurts &#8220;<a href=\"http:\/\/content.usatoday.com\/communities\/dailypitch\/post\/2011\/11\/mlb-labor-agreement-scott-boras-bud-selig-draft-rules\/1?csp=34sports&amp;utm_source=feedburner&amp;utm_medium=feed&amp;utm_campaign=Feed%3A+UsatodaycomSports-TopStories+%28Sports+-+Top+Stories%29&amp;utm_content=Google+Reader\">all of baseball<\/a>.&#8221;\u00a0 I realize he&#8217;s quite biased, but I don&#8217;t disagree with him either.\u00a0 It really seems that Selig and his little band of millionaire owners paid little attention to the growth of the game and competitive balance achieved by smart teams building through the draft, and were more interested in saving a few million dollars annually in the draft.\u00a0 Really disappointing.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p><em><strong>General Baseball News<\/strong><\/em><\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>Some <a href=\"http:\/\/www.foxsportswisconsin.com\/11\/17\/11\/Selig-has-made-all-the-right-moves\/landing.html?blockID=606846&amp;feedID=5059\">career-reflection comments<\/a> from the Owners meetings in Milwaukee from commissioner <strong>Bud Selig<\/strong>.\u00a0 Like him or not, his tenure has resulted in a lot of significant events in the history of baseball.\u00a0 Some good, some bad.\u00a0 Expansion, Wild Card, Divisional play, steroids.\u00a0 Its all in there.<\/li>\n<li>Apparently there&#8217;s some movement in the <a href=\"http:\/\/msn.foxsports.com\/mlb\/story\/Oakland-Athletics-San-Jose-move-decision-accelerated-by-MLB-111911\">A&#8217;s relocation to San Jose<\/a> possibility.\u00a0 There&#8217;s some direct parallels here to the plight of the Washington Nationals, and I&#8217;d guess that the Giants will get a similar sweetheart regional sports network deal in order to &#8220;relinquish&#8221; their San Jose territorial claim.\u00a0 For me though, the difference between the Baltimore and Washington markets is much more distinct; there&#8217;s really only one road between Washington and Baltimore, and a realistic trip to reach Baltimore&#8217;s inner harbor from the Northern Virginia area on a week night in traffic would take more than 2 hours.\u00a0 San Jose is a comparable distance from San Francisco, but with multiple interstate-speed routes between the two cities (I-280, California 101 and I-880) the San Jose market is less distinct from San Francisco.\u00a0 People regularly commute between the two cities.<\/li>\n<li>Interesting article from <strong>Mike Silva<\/strong> about possible future expansion in the MLB.\u00a0 He thinks two more teams would make sense, one in New Jersey and the other in, wait for it, Montreal.\u00a0 I <a href=\"http:\/\/www.nationalsarmrace.com\/?p=1787\">posted on more or less this same topic<\/a> in July, concluding that two new teams (San Antonio\/Austin and Portland) would make a ton of sense.\u00a0 Of course, what would make MORE sense is two new teams in the two massive markets of New York (perhaps in Jersey somewhere as is suggested) and Los Angeles (specifically in Riverside\/Valley area that&#8217;s 1.5 hours on a good day from either Anaheim or down-town).\u00a0 But baseball has allowed these owners to have territorial claims that are somehow gifted by god (see the previous San Francisco\/San Jose argument) and thus making expansion into these markets an impossibility.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>A shortened Thanksgiving edition, with me being on travel for the holidays visiting family in Dallas. Unfortunately they&#8217;re not really baseball fans down here, so conversations about whether or not the move of the Houston Astros and forthcoming rivalry with the Texas Rangers fall mostly on deaf ears. After watching the last couple versions of [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[6,5,534],"tags":[111,1264,164,365,53,242,100,286,52,478,302,475,312,339,301,303,1165,166,481,288,183,476,18,51,297,313,180,305,477,76,142,264,441,393],"class_list":["post-3090","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-nonnatsbaseball","category-natsgeneral","category-weekly-news","tag-adam-kilgore","tag-alexi-ogando","tag-bryce-harper","tag-bud-selig","tag-cj-wilson","tag-colby-lewis","tag-cole-kimball","tag-derek-holland","tag-drew-storen","tag-joe-nathan","tag-jon-heyman","tag-jonathan-mayo","tag-ken-rosenthal","tag-mark-buehrle","tag-mark-zuckerman","tag-matt-harrison","tag-matthew-pouliot","tag-matthew-purke","tag-mike-silva","tag-neftali-feliz","tag-prince-fielder","tag-rick-hague","tag-robbie-ray","tag-ross-detwiler","tag-roy-oswalt","tag-ryan-madson","tag-scott-boras","tag-scott-feldman","tag-scott-kazmir","tag-shairon-martis","tag-steve-lombardozzi","tag-tim-dierkes","tag-tom-verducci","tag-yoenis-cespedes"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.nationalsarmrace.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3090","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.nationalsarmrace.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.nationalsarmrace.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.nationalsarmrace.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.nationalsarmrace.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=3090"}],"version-history":[{"count":30,"href":"https:\/\/www.nationalsarmrace.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3090\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":7938,"href":"https:\/\/www.nationalsarmrace.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3090\/revisions\/7938"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.nationalsarmrace.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=3090"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.nationalsarmrace.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=3090"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.nationalsarmrace.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=3090"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}