The MadBum rush

The Twins were most likely never seriously in the Gerrit Cole market, but now that the right-hander has signed the most lucrative pitcher contract in history, the top pitchers left in free agency are guys the Twins have been pursing. Which brings us to this:

#MNTwins are thought to be heavy on Bumgarner. They have a couple likely hurdles to clear, though; location and league.

— Jon Heyman (@JonHeyman) December 11, 2019

 


And there's nothing the Twins can do about either of those factors.

I'm not particularly optimistic about the Twins' chances to sign either Madison Bumgarner or Hyun-Jin Ryu. The Dodgers and Angels, having failed to land Cole, will probably be after those two, and at least for the Dodgers, neither league nor location is a drawback. Nor will I be upset if the two lefties sign elsewhere.

I suspect the Twins' most likely route to a name addition to their rotation is via trade. The Red Sox are eager to dump David Price's contract, and I'd just as soon have Price as either Bumgarner or Ryu. And Price's price in a trade might not be that high if the Twins are willing to take on most of the money. He is to make $32 million over the next three seasons; if MadBum's signing point is indeed  $100 million, three years of Price -- seriously -- is a bit cheaper.


All three of these lefties are on the wrong side of 30, and all three have medical histories. None of them are sure bets. But the Twins seem eager to take this sort of plunge. Whether any of them are eager to take the Twins' money is another matter.

Outrages I'm having trouble being overly outraged about

Jose Reyes is one-and-done in
Miami.

Outrage 1: The Miami Marlins turned themselves into fish sticks with a major salary-dump trade with Toronto (it's still not official, pending physicals and probably some salary review by the commissioner's office). Mark Buehrle, Jose Reyes, Josh Johnson, John Buck ... they signed last winter for big coin with the the Fish, and now they're gone.

In a pure baseball sense, it's probably a good trade for Miami. It's not like they broke up a good team. The Marlins finished last with those high-priced guys. They can finish last without them.

The real reason this deal draws universal derision when the Red Sox got a pass for doing the same thing in midsummer is that Jeffrey Loria and his co-conspirators in the Miami organization have poisoned the well. They don't get the benefit of the doubt, because they burned that long ago.

I believe that Loria and Co. are slimeballs and represent the worst of big-time pro sports ownership. I also believe that they are systematically wrecking Miami as a baseball market, just as they did Montreal.

I can despise Loria and everything he stands for without trashing this trade.

Miguel Cabrera wasn't the worst defensive
third baseman in the league -- hello, Trevor
Plouffe -- but he was close.

Outrage 2: Miguel Cabrera won the American League MVP award Thursday in a one-sided vote over Mike Trout.

Miggy had a big year, but he wasn't better than Trout, Triple Crown or no. Trout wasn't far behind Cabrera as a hitter, and was far superior in the field and on the bases. Yes, Cabrera's team made the playoffs, but Trout's team (a) won more games (b) playing a far more difficult schedule.

But this isn't the biggest outrage of recent MVP voting. This isn't Juan Gonzalez winning an MVP for piling up RBIs in an extreme hitter's park.

Outrage 3: David Price on Wednesday won the AL Cy Young Award in a close vote over Justin Verlander.

Again, Price had a fine season. Verlander was better. This is very much akin to 2005, when Bartolo Colon won the award over Johan Santana, an award the writers apparently began to regret almost as soon as it was announced. Colon had a good year, but everybody knew Santana was the superior pitcher.

The same is true this year, perhaps not to the degree that it was in 2005, but still ... I doubt anybody in baseball would rather have Price than Verlander (ignoring the salary difference).