Santana Heading to the Mets

P Johan Santana (89/88) is on his way to the Mets for OF Carlos Gomez (70/82), P Philip Humber (65/71), P Kevin Mulvey (63/80), and P Deolis Guerra (45/81). All that is left is for the Mets to get Santana to waive his no-trade clause by signing him to a lucrative deal. Santana was worth about $14.5 million in my pay projector last season, but right now he holds all the bargaining power, and on top of that can legitimately claim that he will bounce back from an "off year," which was still pretty darn good. On top of that, inflation over the next several seasons also has to be considered. When it is all said and done, a deal worth between $20-$25 million a year is justifiable in the current market.

For the Mets, this is an epic deal. They acquired a premier starting pitcher for nobody on their major league team, and also did not have to give up their top prospect, OF Fernando Martinez (51/85). They already had a team that was going to be in the playoff hunt, but now the team is among the favorites to go to the World Series.

For the Twins, the deal is somewhat disappointing, but not quite as bad as some are making it out to be. Unless the Red Sox ever included OF Jacoby Ellsbury (76/84), or the Yankees P Joba Chamberlain (73/92), this deal is comparable to their offers. Gomez can be their starting center fielder this season and do a solid job. His best asset by far is his speed, which plays well in to their general team concept of offense. I don't think Humber is as good as most do, but I also think Mulvey is much better than most give him credit for. He just doesn't give up home runs. Deolis Guerra is still a long way from the majors, but the Twins have a knack for finding gems long before they are polished. David Ortiz and Francisco Liriano come to mind. To expect Guerra to be as good as either of them is unrealistic, but the important thing to notice is that he is probably much more than an afterthought.

In the end, though this is a better deal for the Mets, it is a good deal for both clubs. The Twins got more than any compensatory draft pick from losing Santana in free agency would have likely netted them, and the Mets now have one of the best pitchers in baseball. If I were Minnesota I would have pushed for one more prospect, a guy like P Jonathan Niese (48/76), P Carlos Muniz (63/74), or OF Sean Henry (49/74), but ultimately I probably would have done this deal too.

2007 Winter Meetings Predictions

The Winter Meetings are almost here, and with them will come some notable trades and free agent signings. This year could be especially good because there are some very big names being dangled by ballclubs. Here is my best attempt to provide some bold, yet realistic, predictions:

• The first big story is going to be Johan Santana, and if the rumors are true, a final decision on whether to trade him or not will come in the next 24 hours. It is being reported that the Yankees have submitted their final offer, and have told the Twins they must accept it by tomorrow or it will be rescinded. The Twins have been smart about these trade discussions, and have the Red Sox and Yankees in a bidding war that has reportedly brought Phil Hughes and Jacoby Ellsbury, both thought to be untouchable at first, into the discussion. However, it is clear at this point that both teams have submitted their best offers, and now it is up to the Twins to decide if either offer is worth pulling the trigger on. Of course, even if Minnesota agrees to one of the deals, Johan will likely only waive his no-trade clause if he gets a contract extension that makes him the highest paid pitcher in baseball history. I'm sure there are split opinions within the Twins organization on whether to pull the trigger or not, and between that and the difficulties of hammering out an astronomical contract in short amount of time, I think somehow or another Johan Santana will still be a Twin when the meetings are over.
• Miguel Cabrera will not be a Marlin by the end of the meetings. Not much has come out about him in the past week, but I believe a deal for him is far from dead. It sounded like the Angels had come all the way up to the Marlins' full initial asking price for Cabrera, and all of sudden the Marlins decided to ask for a bunch more to make the deal happen. This ticked off the Angels, but the two sides will likely strike up conversation again at the winter meetings. Personally, I think the Marlins are willing to take the Angels offer, but really like what the Dodgers could potentially offer. My guess is that Florida is trying to create a bidding war between the two of them to extract as much as they can out of one of the teams for Miguel Cabrera. It's good, hard negotiating, which is what the team should use with such a valuable player as Cabrera. The only question is if they were so hard that they turned the Angels off for good. It seems like the Angels are hell-bent on winning though, sparing no expense and guarding no prospect, so I think it would nearly be impossible for the Marlins to disgust the Angels so badly that they would lose all interest in Miguel Cabrera . Unless the Dodgers decide in the next few days that Clayton Kershaw and Matt Kemp can go to the Marlins, I expect to see the Marlins trade Miguel Cabrera to the Angels for Howie Kendrick, Jeff Mathis, Joe Saunders, and Reggie Willits.
• The Mariners will walk away from the winter meetings with a new starting pitcher. The rumor tonight is that they have given Hiroki Kuroda a 4-year, $44 million offer, and I believe he will accept that. In addition, Kuroda will be the biggest free agent signing that any team makes during the winter meetings (not a real bold prediction looking at the free agents available). Even if the M's don't land Kuroda, they will trade for someone. They are not leaving these winter meetings without a new starting pitcher.
• No one will walk away with either Joe Blanton or Dan Haren. Anyone who has read Moneyball and remembers Billy Beane's trading rules knows that he will never do a deal because he needs to. The Mets are the logical fit, but they do not have the pieces to get a trade done now that they got rid of Milledge, because I doubt the A's care about Carlos Gomez's speed all the much. The only reason Beane is entertaining offers for either pitcher is because the free agent pitching market is so weak, and so many teams seem desperate for pitching. Beane understands the principle of supply and demand, and that he has the kind of high ground that allows him to leave the bargaining table unless he gets everything he wants. The bottom line is that a team will have to blow away the A's to acquire either Blanton or Haren, which no team is willing to do.
• The Rangers will be rumored to be after Orioles starter Erik Bedard, but not come close to acquiring him. Admittedly, I am pulling this one completely out of thin air, but it makes too much sense and I am trying to make bold predictions. Texas desperately needs starting pitching, wants to make a splash this off-season, and has plenty of money to burn since Torii Hunter did not sign with them. There are already murmurs that Baltimore will listen to offers for Bedard, and even if Texas never actually inquires, at the very least some reporter will make this Bedard-Texas connection and spin it into an inside scoop.

There are five bold predictions for the winter meetings. Whether any of them are correct will be known by Wednesday.

The Baseball Writers Association of America Is Full of Tools

First of all, I have to congratulate Bartolo Colon on winning the AL Cy Young Award and having a great season. However, members of the Baseball Writers Association Of America (BBWAA) just proved they are a bunch of tools by voting him the Cy Young winner. There were two more deserving candidates, Johan Santana and Mariano Rivera. Take a look at these numbers:

			Colon			Santana			Rivera
W			21			16			7*
ERA			3.48			2.88			1.38
AVG			.254			.210			.177
OBP			.291			.250			.235
SLG			.407			.345			.230
K/9			6.35			9.25			9.19
K/BB			3.65			5.29			4.44

*It is incredible that Rivera had 7 wins considering he is a closer and converted 43 of 47 save chances.

Johan Santana and Mariano Rivera have better numbers than Colon in EVERY SINGLE CATEGORY except one: wins. I mean come on, wins? Wins? That's it? Offense has as much to do with a pitcher getting a victory as the pitcher's pitching does. Good pitchers generally win more games but there are much better numbers available for quantitative analysis. Another statistic as common as wins, ERA, indicates a pitcher's talent much better than wins (though if you want numbers that really quantify a pitcher's talent look at OBP, SLG, K/9, and K/BB). As good as Colon was, Johan Santana and Mariano Rivera were even better in 2005.

However, what bugs me even more is that 6 of the 28 members of the BBWAA didn't even list Mariano Rivera on their ballots. In other words, six "baseball experts" didn't think that Rivera was even one of the three best pitchers in the American League! What's even worse is that all of them probably left him off their ballots only because he is a relief pitcher. That would have been fine 20-25 years ago when bullpens were simply collections of want-to-be starters who weren't good enough to crack the rotation. Now bullpens are specialized and a premium closer, like Mariano Rivera, is just as skilled as a starter. In my opinion Mariano Rivera should have won the AL Cy Young not only because his numbers were jaw-dropping this year, but also because he has been the best closer in baseball for a decade and he is arguably the best closer of all-time. That is really hard for a Yankee hater like me to say, but it is the truth.

So, to those six pathetic excuses for experts that didn't even put Rivera on their ballot, I advise that you get out of your Model T Ford, throw away your pocket watch, and get with the times. Baseball has changed, so don't penalize closers just because they come out of the bullpen. As for the BBWAA members who did put Rivera on their ballot but gave Colon their first place vote, I'd like to ask what exactly made Colon better in their minds. And, if anyone voted Bartolo Colon first and didn't put Mariano Rivera on their ballot, I hope a monkey throws feces in their face. What a bunch of tools.