February 27, 2015

Rumor Roundup

Diamondbacks Third Baseman is on the Bobbly Chair

by Daniel Rathman

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Yasmany Tomas struggles at third base in early spring workouts
When the Diamondbacks splurged on Cuban slugger Yasmany Tomas in late November, most teams viewed him as an outfielder. The Snakes were one of the few clubs open to giving him a look at the hot corner. That’s likely part of the reason they emerged as the high bidder in a race that culminated with a six-year, $68.5 million contract.

Since we’re just a few days into spring training, it’s too soon to determine whether Tomas can play third base adequately. But the early returns, according to Nick Piecoro of the Arizona Republic, suggest clubs that viewed the 24-year-old solely as an outfielder may have been right.

Piecoro wrote on Wednesday that Tomas “bobbled some balls, misplayed others, and at times did not appear to have proper technique.” Some of that can probably be written off as rust, considering he hasn’t worn an infielder’s mitt in a while, but at 6-foot-2, 230 pounds, Tomas will never be the league’s most graceful or rangy third baseman. The bar here might be set low, but Tomas has a long way to go before skipper Chip Hale can feel comfortable deploying him at the hot corner.

Before we go on, a little trivia: The five highest-paid players on the Diamondbacks (based on their 2015 salaries) will earn a combined $50.1 million this year. How many of them can you name without guessing incorrectly? Answer at the end of this post.

Hale’s alternative at third base is Jake Lamb, a 2012 sixth-rounder who tore up Double-A and Triple-A last year before faceplanting in a 37-game major-league trial. The 24-year-old batted .230/.263/.373, drawing only six walks and striking out 37 times in 133 plate appearances. Scouts questioned Lamb’s bat before 2014, wondering if a proneness to whiffing on pitches in the strike zone would be exacerbated at the highest level. While the University of Washington product’s upper-minors performance tempered those doubts, his debut emboldened them.

But Lamb’s ability to hold everyday value might not be the biggest question surrounding this Diamondbacks roster if Tomas is forced to the outfield. Hale already has a slew of outfielders at his disposal, with A.J. Pollock in center, Cody Ross and Mark Trumbo in the corners, and overachieving rookies Ender Inciarte and David Peralta lingering, too. If there’s a redeeming quality to this logjam, it’s that there’s an element of balance, with Inciarte and Peralta batting lefty, and the rest of the group hitting from the right side.

Still, if Tomas ends up in left or right field, the D’backs could be on the hook for an awfully expensive platoon in the other corner. If Inciarte and Peralta can build on the promise they showed in their opening salvos, Ross and Trumbo would become increasingly expendable while holding minimal trade value. That would leave this rebuilding club with a whole lot of dough on the bench.

How much dough? Remember that trivia question a few paragraphs ago? Well, here’s the answer:

1. Trevor Cahill — $12.2 million

2. Aaron Hill — $12 million

3. Bronson Arroyo — $9.5 million

4. Cody Ross — $9.5 million

5. Mark Trumbo — $6.9 million

That’s right: If you guessed Paul Goldschmidt or Tomas, you struck out.

And with Goldschmidt now healthy and entrenched at first base, if Tomas can’t play across the infield from him, Hale could be left with $16.4 million worth of deadweight outfielders on the pine.

Mark Canha could supplant Nate Freiman in Oakland
The A’s have had a knack in recent years for extracting platoon value out of players in whom other clubs saw relatively little.

Nate Freiman, who came to Oakland via waivers after the 2012 Rule 5 draft, is just one bullet point on that list. On the heels of an excellent Double-A season, Freiman earned short-end platoon duty at first base, as the Athletics kept him on their active roster for the full season to satisfy the Rule 5 requirement. A year later, Freiman was relegated to organizational depth duty, shuttling between Triple-A Sacramento and the big club, and logging only 93 major-league plate appearances.

Now 28, Freiman might be ticketed for a similar role in 2015. The flaw in his game is a level swing that precludes him from amassing the sort of power numbers teams demand from their first basemen. His usable thump falls far short of what you might expect out of a 6-foot-8, 250-pound behemoth, and that makes him eminently replaceable. There are much poorer candidates to be the 13th or 14th position player on a team’s depth chart, but it’s also relatively easy to find a better one.

Unfortunately for Freiman, manager Bob Melvin believes the Athletics might have done just that. The former Padres prospect’s time in Oakland might have ended almost the same way it began.

Like Freiman, Mark Canha was a mid-round college draft pick—the former going in the eighth round in 2009 out of Duke, the latter in the seventh round in 2010 out of Cal. Canha moved station-to-station up the Marlins’ farm system, performing well at the plate at each stop. But he never got a shot in Miami, and the Fish left him unprotected in December. Just like Freiman, he joined the A’s organization by way of a Rule 5 pick, with the Rockies serving as the middleman in a draft-day trade.

Canha is the same age (26) now as Freiman was when he got his start in Oakland. The former Golden Bear is a touch more versatile, with minor-league time in the outfield corners and at third base, but is best left at first. More importantly, he offers more playable power and better plate discipline, the two factors that matter most to the Athletics as they sort out their first-base situation after shipping Brandon Moss to Cleveland.

If Canha sticks, our own Jeff Moore believes he has a fair shot to be to Ike Davis what Freiman has been to Moss. The A’s will probably see a downtick in production versus right-handers, but assuming they’re right about Canha and free-agent addition Billy Butler, a boost against southpaws might balance out the position’s overall yield.

Daniel Rathman is an author of Baseball Prospectus. Follow @danielrathman
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