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March 13, 2013 SobsequyNotable AL Minor-League Free Agent Signees
In this second, American League installment of the two-part notable minor-league free agent signee series (the National League is here), the discoveries were less player-specific: for numerous teams, it was hard to make a strong case for a single candidate. Instead, two other revelations: First, you have to act fast on these marginal players, because they can be gone for good before the season even starts. One candidate from the National League article two weeks ago, injury comeback returnee Kelvim Escobar, has already been released by the Brewers, due to yet another injury. Many other players, especially former major-leaguers, have opt-out clauses that activate on March 26. As a result, some of the considerations below are more theoretical than actually predictive. Secondly, this exercise has manufactured an opposition of sorts to a position I’ve been espousing for a while about replacement-level talent. Scanning the fringe ranks for overlooked gems, or comparing projected major-league rosters to projected Triple-A rosters, you discover that there really are very few players in the lower level who seem like they’d actually be better than the guys ahead of them on the depth chart (would you really rather have Brian Bixler than Justin Turner?). And the difference is often significant. AL EAST The Orioles are an unusual case, of course, given Dan Duquette’s gin-rummy tendencies. Any of Russ Canzler, Chris Dickerson, Lew Ford, Travis Ishikawa, Conor Jackson and Steve Pearce could break through the Triple-A wall, especially if, along with injuries to McLouth or Reimold, projected DH Wilson Betemit makes the letters stand for Doesn’t Hit. Note how many 1B/OF/DH types the Orioles brought into Triple-A. That could be a clue to what they think is likely to happen in the majors for them in 2013. Boston Red Sox: I’m going with Terry Doyle simply because he grew up in Massachusetts and went to Boston College. In fact, the Red Sox signed few minor-league free agents, and to my mind they shouldn’t need them: They’ve relatively quietly put together a pretty good-looking team for 2013. The Jays and Rays (and, for lamentable reasons, the Yankees) grabbed more press with splashier deals or worse problems, but I like the unassuming way in which Ben Cherington & Co. went about reconstructing the team. The David Ortiz injury is worrisome, but the starting pitching should improve and the bullpen looks sound. A lot would seem to be riding on Clay Buchholz. New York Yankees: For obvious historical and sentimental reasons I wanted to select Dan Johnson, but I’m not as bullish on the Great Pumpkin as I once was, and the Yankees have grasped at so many platoon-type power- Tampa Bay Rays: Luke Scott has already suffered a hamstring injury during spring training, and even though he has recovered and is playing again, it’s hard to imagine him staying healthy all year, something he rarely does. The Rays signed Jack Cust as insurance, and he could at least do a Brandon Allen impersonation next year for a few games. Allen had a couple of nice moments during the Rays’ injury-plagued spring in 2012. Toronto Blue Jays: If the Jays are reduced to trawling their own minor-league free agents for help this year, then they’ll have turned out to be the 2013 version of the 2012 team they raided for parts this past offseason: a Marlins-like disaster of Titanic proportions. They don’t have a new stadium like the Fish did, but they are relocating their Triple-A affiliate to Buffalo, and what happened in Vegas stayed in Vegas: The Jays signed a whopping 25 minor-league free agents, enough to roster the entire Bisons franchise. Yet none of those 25 makes you sit up and beg. If Ryan Langerhans, Andy LaRoche, or Ramon Ortiz starts more than a game or two in the majors, it’ll be a sign of serious problems in Toronto, and headlines that borrow from Mark Twain won’t be far behind. I decided on Justin Germano anyway because he once threw a perfect game in Triple-A. AL CENTRAL Cleveland Indians: Scott Kazmir has become such a popular pick that the depth chart has recently swapped him in for Daisuke Matsuzaka, who is now “outside looking in.” This compels me to make the case for Matsuzaka himself, perhaps even as a crafty long reliever. No, he rarely tops 90 mph anymore, and if he’s indeed toasted sesame it would be no surprise—he could follow Hideki Matsui into the Land of the Setting Sun—but let’s not give up on him just yet. He has a March 26 opt-out, which means we’ll know much more in two weeks about the Indians’ plans for him, and for Kazmir. Detroit Tigers: Obviously, Prince Fielder would have to get hurt and all kinds of other misfortune would have to befall Detroit for Danny Dorn to play first base for them in 2013, and this one isn’t quite fair because Dorn was actually signed by the Tigers last summer, then resigned in January. The Tigers’ depth chart doesn’t list Dorn at all. He gets the nod here only because it points to an interesting article about minor-league park effects that appeared recently on the Minor League Baseball web site. Ashley Marshall importunes us to “spare a thought for Danny Dorn”: Toledo's Daniel Dorn batted .252 with 14 homers and 49 RBIs in 116 IL games in 2012. With 50 walks and 41 extra-base hits, Dorn posted a .344 on-base percentage, .777 OPS and tied for a team-best 170 total bases. His offensive numbers were around 2012 league averages, but it's worth noting that Fifth Third Field has regularly been one of the most pitcher-friendly parks in one of the most pitcher-friendly leagues […]Before playing in Toledo, he spent three-and-a-half years in the Bats infield. Louisville Slugger Field has been another notoriously difficult park for hitters. Much attention is paid to the skew of the hitter-friendly PCL, but less, it seems to me, to the pitcher-friendly International League. Do major-league front offices take that into account sufficiently? Kansas City Royals: The fun here is in choosing between Endy Chavez and Xavier Nady. They’re outfielders who are about the same age and can both request their release if not added to the major-league roster by March 26. Probably it’s adios to both, unless the $100,000 retention bonus for agreeing to go to Omaha is attractive enough for one of them to hang around. So it then becomes fun to choose between Sugar Ray Marimon and Atahualpa Severino, a pair of Royals farmhands with absolutely wonderful names. You’re choosing between the names here—both warrior/fighter-related—not the players’ big-league chances, which are basically nil, although Jason Parks was at least mildly interested in Sugar Ray last season in A-ball. I would like to know whether Marimon’s given name is Sugar Ray; please advise if you know. I did just become his 255th Twitter follower and will try to work up the nerve to ask him myself. Severino had a café con leche with the Nationals in 2011, but the Royals have a good bullpen, so don’t get excited. Minnesota Twins: Utility infielder Ray Olmedo made his triumphant, long-time-coming return to the majors last year for the White Sox, as this BP Unfiltered post by Ben Lindbergh commemorates. In the offseason, he signed on with the Twins, because who wouldn’t? The depth charts proposes that their shortstops are Pedro Florimon, Jr., and Eduardo Escobar. That is nice for the following reason: Olmedo got called up last year because the White Sox needed a bench infielder after they traded to the Twins… Eduardo Escobar, in the Francisco Liriano deal. So perhaps Olmedo’s signing indicates that the Twins are planning to follow the White Sox’ trade plan and call up Olmedo after they deal Escobar midseason. Or that they just want to keep an older Venezuelan mentor around for the younger Venezuelan. Tough times in Minneapolis, in any case. AL WEST Los Angeles Angels of Anaheim: It’s Bill Hall, of course! In 2006, Hall and Vernon Wells combined for 67 home runs and 8.4 WARP for Milwaukee and Toronto, respectively. Seven years later, the depth chart projects them to share bench space near Mike Scioscia. Hall struck out in 38 percent of his Triple-A at-bats last year, but if people forget to throw him only breaking balls, he could hit a bunch of home runs, play six positions, and keep Matt Young in Salt Lake City. Athleticism like his is always seductive. Oakland A’s: Maybe Japanese comeback pitchers are just too tempting, but Hideki Okajima is lurking among Oakland’s free-agent ranks. The A’s have already expressed optimism about Mike Ekstrom, seeing him as a replacement for Jim Miller for, say, 30 innings (PECOTA thinks 34 2/3), but Okajima (projected for exactly one inning more, as it happens) had excellent numbers in Japan last year (e.g. 0.94 ERA, almost 7:1 K/BB rate). And like any 37-year-old player, he’s the kind of guy you wouldn’t think the A’s (or anyone else) would bother with unless they planned either to use him in the majors fairly quickly or jettison him into the slipstream. Surely they’re aware that Okajima isn’t much interested in hanging around an organization’s Triple-A affiliate for long. Seattle Mariners: Jeremy Bonderman and Jon Garland have thrown 3,259 major-league innings. Now they share spring training uniforms and duke it out for a job with the Mariners. One of them is likely to get one. John Perrotto thinks it might be Bonderman, who has the home advantage, as he is from Kennewick/Pasco, Wash. But Garland, when he is not lamenting the ban of the third-to-first pickoff deception move, is having the better spring. Here is more on him from an optimistic recent Rumor Roundup, plus Garland’s own optimism following his latest March outing. And if both pitchers flame out, there is always another NRI candidate to make it to the Rain City: Mike Jacobs, who lies in wait with his 100 career major-league home runs should the Mariners finally relieve the underachieving Justin Smoak of his duties. Texas Rangers: They’re looking good and probably going to win the division. Blasphemy! But they will, and when they do, it won’t have been because of their minor-league free agents, who don’t inspire much excitement and are, overwhelmingly, right-handed pitchers. (And you thought Nolan Ryan was losing his influence in Arlington.) One of them is Collin Balester, whose web site we don’t have permission to visit. In no way is this to suggest that Balester is likely to help Texas this season. On the contrary, it’s to see Balester in the stark and definitive context of the Rangers’ very recent signing of another minor-league free-agent righty, Derek Lowe. The depth chart projects Lowe as the team’s long reliever, a role for which, in some other, kinder, wider universe, Balester might be suited. But in this one, the Rangers’ late inking of Lowe—part afterthought, part zero-hour patch—is a reminder to us and to all the Rangers’ aspiring right-handed hopefuls that there can be, at times, an enormous distance and forbidding difference between the replacements and those who hold the places.
Adam Sobsey is an author of Baseball Prospectus. 3 comments have been left for this article.
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Sugar Ray Marimon's given name is, indeed, Sugar Ray. First name Sugar, middle name Ray.
Sweet.