Adrian Gonzalez: Traded to the Red Sox
Gonzalez was traded for RHP Casey Kelly, 1B Anthony Rizzo, OF Reymond Fuentes, and a player to be named later.
I don’t think there’s anything else that needs to be said.
Aaron Harang: Signs with the Padres
San Diego-native Harang has agreed to a deal with the Padres.
Harang, who spent the past eight seasons in Cincinnati, has a career FIP of 4.14, which is impressive given that the Reds play their home games in the hitter friendly Great American Ballpark. A power pitcher with two 200-strike out years under his belt, Harang also has a career K/9 of 7.47% with a K/BB of 2.96.
The right-hander is coming off his worst season in seven years, in which he posted a WAR of only 0.9. This was due in large part to Harang making only 20 starts and missing considerable time with lower back trouble. Bill James projects a 4.17 FIP for Harang in 2011.
Chris Denorfia: Tendered a contract
With the deadline looming, the Padres agreed to a one-year contract worth $800 thousand with Denorfia. This season, Norf was the team’s second best hitter after Adrian Gonzalez, providing +6.4 wins. Next season, he will serve as the team’s fourth outfielder, behind Ryan Ludwick, Cameron Maybin, and Will Venable.
While the team will be bringing Denorfia back for 2011, the same cannot be said for Scott Hairston and Tony Gwynn, Jr. Both players have been non-tendered, ending their Padre careers (at least, for now).
Jon Garland: Signs with the Dodgers
According to Dylan Hernandez, Los Angeles has signed Garland and according to Jon Heyman, it was for $5 million plus bonuses and a vesting option.
Earlier this month, Garland turned down his end of a mutual option with the Padres that would’ve been worth $6.75 million. Earlier this week, the Padres offered Garland arbitration, which means that they’ll get a supplemental first round pick in next summer’s draft.
Nick Schmidt: Unprotected for the Rule 5 draft
With the Rule 5 coming up in December, MLBlogger Dave Gershman has gone through and compiled a list of all players left unprotected for the draft.
To give you a quick catchup, any player with three or four years professional experience who’s not on his teams 40-man roster is eligible for the draft. Two years ago, the Padres drafted Everth Cabrera out of the Colorado Rockies.
The big one for the Padres this year is former first-round pick Schmidt. The Padres took the left-hander in 2007 and he hasn’t really done anything since. He missed the entire 2008 season due to injuries and has yet to advance past Lake Elsinore, where he has an ERA of 5.51 in 35 starts. It’s doubtful that anyone will take Schmidt and keep him on their major league roster for the entire season, but it’s not what anyone had in mind when he was taken out of Arkansas.
Simon Castro: Fangraphs’ no. 1 prospect
Fangraphs posted their top 10 prospects list for the Padres system today and they named Simon Castro numero uno.
Sez them:
Castro reached triple-A in 2010 at the age of 22. The hard-throwing right-hander pitched the majority of the season in double-A and posted a 3.32 FIP in 129.2 innings of work. He showed respectable control with a walk rate of 2.50 BB/9, but his strikeout rate dropped from 10.07 K/9 at high-A in ‘09 to 7.43 K/9. As he continues to face more advance hitters, Castro will need to improve his slider and changeup to go along with his 90-95 mph fastball. The young pitcher has nice balance on the mound and stays tall through his delivery. He does land on a stiff leg at times and there is a little effort in his delivery, which puts some strain on his shoulder. He throws with a low-three-quarter arm angle and does not have a ton of deception. Despite the mildly alarming drop in strikeouts, Castro is by far the best prospect in the season but he likely still needs another half year of seasoning in the minors.
This is a cool list because they also project each players’ estimated peak WAR. They have Castro topping out at 4.5, while they see another player making it to 5. Since I’m not an asshole, you’ll have to click to find out who that is.
Kevin Correia: Offered arbitration
Along with Jon Garland and Yorvit Torrealba.
Garland and Torrealba have already turned down options they had to return to the Padres next season, though that doesn’t mean that a new deal can’t be worked out. All three players are Type-B free agents, meaning that the Padres will receive supplemental draft picks (in-between the first and second rounds) if they sign elsewhere. That would give the team two first round picks (the 10th, compensation for not signing this year’s pick Karsten Whitson, and the 25th) and three supplemental picks.
The Padres declined to offer arbitration to David Eckstein and Miguel Tejada. While Eckstein was also a Type-B free agent, Tejada is a Type-A, meaning that the Padres would’ve received a first-round pick had he signed with another team (more or less).
Bud Black: Named NL Manager of the Year
Leading a $40 million payroll to 90 wins will do that, though Buddy beat Dusty Baker of the Reds by the slimmest of margins (that’d be one point).
Some quotes, as collected by Corey Brock:
Jed Hoyer: “When I first got here, I saw that he can think along the same lines as the front office. Over the winter, we were talking about what we were going to do and he could walk through the roster, not just thinking about this year but three years down the road. He’s able to think about the game in multiple dimensions. And that’s very impressive.”
David Eckstein: “With Buddy… he just doesn’t overreact. He’s always encouraging guys. Players aren’t fearful of making mistakes… That’s huge, especially in the situation we’ve been in here with so many young guys. He believes in those guys. There are some managers who don’t tolerate rookie mistakes.”
Chase Headley: “He’s a tremendous players’ manager. You feel like he always has your back. You always feel like he’s being open and honest with you and will explain to you why he’s making a move or why you’re not playing. He welcomes that. Players respect that a lot.”
Congrats, Harry.
Ryan Webb: Traded to Florida
I suppose I could’ve just edited the previous post but oh well.
To completel the Cameron Maybin trade, the Padres are sending Ryan Webb and Edward Mujica to the Marlins. Both pitchers had solid 2010 campaigns though Webb is the real prize for Florida. He posted a FIP of 2.82 with an xFIP of 3.32 and he’ll only be 25 next season but with Frieri and Gregerson in front of him and Scribner and Italiano behind him, he was expendable.
Cameron Maybin: Traded to the Padres
Tom Krasovic confirms that the Padres have acquired Maybin from the Marlins, pending a physical.
Maybin’s somewhere between stud prospect and Quadruple-A player. For three years, from 2007-09, he was ranked by Baseball America as one of the Top 10 prospects in the game but he’s had trouble transferring that over to big league success. In over 400 minor league innings, Maybin amassed an OPS of .871 but he has only managed a .692 mark in the majors (or an 89 wRC+) in 168 games.
Still only 23, there’s time for Maybin to figure things out offensively, while it seems that he might already have it on defense. In 1138 innings in the bigs, Maybin has posted a UZR of 5.1 with an RngR of 7.3. It’s hard to say anything definitive about Maybin the defender, but he’s off to a good start.
There’s no word yet on what the Padres will be sending Florida in return, so the book’s still out, but it looks like the Padres bought low on one of the premiere talents in baseball.
