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It’s 2017 and there are still free agents to sign
Monday’s Say Hey, Baseball includes worthwhile free agents, David Price’s family, and early Hall of Fame results.
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It’s 2017, but it’s the same offseason we were dealing with when the calendar said differently. There are still plenty of free agents worth talking about who are waiting by the phone, hoping to sign well before spring training kicks off in February. There are the obvious ones, like Jose Bautista, who is still a free agent at this point due to a down 2016. There’s Mark Trumbo, who led the league in homers last summer, but was also traded for a backup catcher prior to the year — no one wants to get caught paying big dollars for that version of Trumbo. There’s Mike Napoli, who isn’t quite the offensive force he used to be but still hit 34 homers for the Indians. For pitchers, there’s uh, well, oh wow look Chris Carter led the National League with 41 homers last year and he’s just out there waiting to be signed.
Carter is a fascinating free agent. He went deep 41 times in 2016, and it wasn’t an anomaly: his previous career-high was 37 back in 2014, and he’s now averaged 33 homers per season since becoming a full-time player in 2013. He has his weaknesses, sure, as he also hit just .219 over that stretch while striking out one-third of the time, but consider that he hit all of those homers in spite of those issues, and also that his on-base percentage (.315) and OPS+ (113) were both just fine, too. He’s not an offensive standout at first, but he’s above-average, and he can hit both righties and lefties. Not only is he a free agent, but the Brewers non-tendered him in November to make him one: if an AL team can make him their DH, they will be very happy with the Brewers for making this possible.
Between Carter, Trumbo, Napoli, and Bautista, there are a ton of dingers left on the market. The fact this is so might be why there doesn’t seem to be a rush to sign any of them. If Bautista’s demands are too high, you move on to the next defensively challenged homer-happy hitter on the list. All four — and the other useful free agents — will sign soon enough, though. The holidays are behind us, spring training is ahead of us, and teams are going to start taking real stock of what they still need and can still afford. It’s safe to say a whole lot of the league can still afford to bring in dingers.
For real, Rockies, sign one of these guys to play first. Don’t let Ian Desmond be your answer there.
- Next year’s position player free agent class will look a lot like this one, and that’s because a bunch of the same players are going to be part of it.
- Let’s kick off 2017 by looking at Grant Brisbee’s picks for the best Grant Brisbee articles of 2016.
- MLB.com took a moment to remember the baseball people who were lost to us in 2016.
- David Price announced that there’s a baby on the way for the Price family in 2017.
- Here are five reasons to get excited about the 2017 A’s after a couple of disappointing campaigns.
- The White Sox could use a catcher, and the one they seek could be in the bargain bin.
- We won’t see the Hall of Fame voting announcement until later in the month, but early returns on the ballots we know of can tell us a lot.
- The Indians have a bunch of starters, so Paul Hoynes looked at whether Danny Salazar should be moved to the bullpen.
- Interleague play has existed for 20 years now, so here are a bunch of random interleague facts.
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