Baseball Historians

Baseball America unveiled their list of the top ten Cardinals prospects and topping the list was outfielder Colby Rasmus.  The 2005 first round draft pick tore up Double A and belted 29 homers with a .931 OPS.  He’ll start at Memphis, but I wouldn’t be surprised if he pulls a Hunter Pence and not only [...]

The Astros signed the heir apparant to Craig Biggio at second base and the rumor is they’ve given Kaz Matsui a three year, $15 million deal.  These days, that’s not a ton of money for a guy who was the regular second baseman on a pennant winning team.  Matsui had a solid season at the [...]

The Rays made a nice signing today by signing Troy Percival to a two year, incentive laden deal.  The base salary is $8 million but Percival could make as much as $12 million if he hits all of the incentive marks.  Percival will most likely take over as the teams closer but with Al Reyes [...]

This is one of those deals I like.  The Nationals traded reserve outfielder Ryan Church and catcher Brian Schneider for centerfield phenom Lastings Milledge.  Once a top prospect, Milledge was solid for the Mets at the plate last year but he’s a centerfielder at heart and he had Carlos Beltran blocking his progress there.  He [...]

Third time is the charm, at least it looks that way as far as the Mets starting catcher goes.  First it looked like Yorvit Torrealba would get the job but his injuries still haven’t been unveiled.  Then it looked like Johnny Estrada when they traded for him with the Brewers but then it looked like [...]

The Tigers have Kenny Rogers for one more year and that pretty much takes care of four of the five rotation spots.  I haven’t seen the numbers yet so I’ll hold judgement as to how good of a deal it is but having Kenny Rogers in the rotation is a solid option and I’m glad [...]

It looks like Latroy Hawkins is that latest player to enter the Tigers sight.  The Tigers have started talking to Hawkins’ agent but it looks like the right hander is interested in coming to Detroit.  He’s a former closer and while he’s not a big strikeout guy anymore, he can still punch them out at [...]

For the third straight year, Tiger bloggers have voted and this year, the results for the three DIBS awards were pretty much unanimous.  Magglio Ordonez was player of the year, Justin Verlander was pitcher of the year and Curtis Granderson was breakout player of the year.  The only close vote was breakout player of the [...]

The Winter Meetings kick off next week in Nashville, TN and the Twins and Rays completed their big deal prior to the winter blowout.  A lot of bloggers have gone to past winter meetings but to date, I haven’t had a chance to go down to one.  Hopefully in the next couple of years I [...]

The Twins made what was probably the biggest deal to date this offseason when they traded Matt Garza, Jason Bartlett and Eduardo Morlan for Delmon Young, Brendan Harris and Jason Pridie.  The best analysis of the deal was over at Aaron Gleeman’s blog.  I tend to agree with him in that the deal works out [...]

The Rays made a big splash in the off season by trading their fiery outfielder, Delmon Young, along with Brendan Harris and Jason Pridie to the Twins for Matt Garza, Jason Bartlett and Eduardo Morlan.  While you hate to see a player the caliber of Young get traded, it’s hard not to like this deal [...]

A rumor has come out that the Diamondbacks are pursuing Japanese hurley Hiroki Kuroda in an attempt to short up their rotation.  Kuroda is looking for around $10 million a year and while that’s a hefty price, it could be worth it if he’s the real deal.  With Brandon Webb and Doug Davis already in [...]

Leave it to Jason Beck to fill in a gap in Tigers news with another cool mailbag column.  He talks about why Curtis Granderson didn’t get the respect that Jimmy Rollins got with the MVP voters as well as what he thinks about the Johan Santana sweepstakes.

Baseball America recently unveiled their list of the top ten Astros prospects and catching prospect J.R. Towles tops the list.  Towles is ready and they’re even making Brad Ausmus a backup next year.  Hopefully Ausmus can teach Towles some of the finer points of the game behind the plate while Towles continues to rake with [...]

Kevin Goldstein released his list of top Twins prospects and the downer is, he has just one guy rated four stars or above.  The Twins have had a premiere prospect list, they’ve just all made it to the bigs.  This is indicated by the list at the bottom with the Twins having five guys on [...]

The Cubs re-signed Kerry Wood to a one year, $4.2 million deal yesterday.  I like the move because you know as soon as Wood leaves the fold, he’ll turn out to be the second coming of Dennis Eckersley or something.  It’s probably a little steep for a guy who’s pegged as a potential closer but [...]

The White Sox shored up their bullpen and a pretty hefty price as they picked up right handed relief pitcher Scott Linebrink.  The deal is four years, $19 million which seems a bit much for a pitcher who’s already 31.  He’ll definitely make the team better because he’ll fit in as a solid set up [...]

The Tigers got some bad news yesterday when the Tigers fifth round draft pick, Casey Crosby, found out he was going to need elbow surgery and he’ll likely miss the 2008 season. Crosby was one of those steal picks in the 2007 draft and he dropped all the way to the fifth round because of [...]

I am in total shock and awe – the Reds have spent big money on a bona fide free agent closer.  Cordero, a 9-year veteran, was 0-4 with a 2.98 ERA and 44 saves in 51 chances. He is a two-time All-Star, including in 2007.
In a way, it’s mind boggling; with one signing, the Reds [...]

Don’t look now, but the Reds have a real, bonafide closer because they doled out a ton of cash to sign Francisco Cordero for a healthy $46 million over four years.  There’s even an option for 2012 that would make it a five year, $58 million deal.
That’s a ton of money for a guy who’s [...]

To go along with the great news that Torii Hunter signed with the Angels is the fact that the Angels are still stacked down in the minors.  Kevin Goldstein came out with his top eleven Angels prospects and the Angels have four guys who he’s given at least a four star rating.  When you combine [...]

Baseball American unveiled their list of the top ten Reds prospects.  I ran down the list over at Reds Minors so be sure to check it out.

I wish you all a safe and happy Thanksgiving. 

While it’s hard to top what happened with Alex Rodriguez and the Yankees, the Angels came out of nowhere and scooped up one of the free agent gems of the Hot Stove League.  Similar to what happened when they signed Vlad Guerrero a few years back, the Angels kept things close to the vest but [...]

The Brewers didn’t waste much time replacing Johnny Estrada because as expected, they signed Jason Kendall to a one year for an unspecified amount.  Kendall is a career .297 hitter but his time with Oakland last year was pretty rough (he hit ju…

This is one of those minor deals but the Rangers signed utility infielder Ramon Vazquez to a one year deal for $810,000.  In the process, the Rangers will avoid arbitration and will get to keep the flexibility Vazquez brought to the team. He filled in when both Ian Kinsler and Hank Blalock went down and [...]

The Indians made their solid bullpen even better when they signed Japanese relief pitcher Masa Kobayashi to a two year deal for $6 million.  There’s also a $3.25 million option for 2010.  Kobayashi had over 200 saves over in Japan but if there’s a cause for concern, it’s that 2007 was all that great of [...]

The Brewers hopefully shored up their bullpen with the acquisition of Guillermo Mota from the Mets.  In exchange, the Brewers gave up journeyman catcher Johnny Estrada.  It’s unclear how much the dugout incident back in August had to do with th…

The good news is, more voters picked Matt Holliday at least second on their ballot then any other player in the National League.  The bad news is, only eleven of those 27 votes were first place ones and Jimmy Rollins 16 first place votes carried the day.  Holliday was a closer to Rollins in first [...]

For the second straight season, a Phillie walked away with the National League MVP.  In one of the most complete seasons by a player ever, Jimmy Rollins used his mouth, his glove and his bat to earn the prize.  It was a close race though as they nabbed just half of the first place votes [...]