The frozen pitching market

The new year is several days old, and to a large degree the Hot Stove League has frozen up.

Part of it, of course, is that many teams have made their moves. Part of it has been the holidays — it's always a bit slow between Christmas and New Years. And, this year, part of it is the belated posting of Japanese star pitcher Mazahiro Tanaka.

Three prominent established free-agent starters remain on the market — Matt Garza, Ervin Santana and Ubaldo Jimenez — but not much is happening with them, partly because their flaws are well known and Tanaka's are not. Among those flaws: Garza missed extensive time in 2013 with arm issues; Santana's and Jimenez' strong 2013 seasons were not in line with their previous seasons; and signing Santana and Jimenez will cost not only money but a draft pick.

My expectation is that once Tanaka signs, things will unlock, at least for Garza. He will "only" cost money, not a draft pick.

(There was a report this week that the Twins had checked in with Garza, who, of course, started his career with Minnesota. The issue for the Twins, according to the report, isn't salary, it's years; they want a shorter-term deal than the pitcher wants. This may well be linked to his arm issues of the past season.)

Santana and Jimenez? With the draft pick attached, they each have the possibility of being this year's Kyle Lohse, who was unsigned until well into spring training last year.

Lohse wound up with Milwaukee, and had a pretty good season for a weak Brewers team: 11-10, 3.35 in just under 200 innings. But I don't think St. Louis regretted letting him walk — they won the pennant without him and pocketed a draft pick in the process.

The current free agent compensation system is in its second year, and none of the 22 free agents who got a qualifying offer has accepted it. I suspect that until somebody does, teams will be increasingly willing to extend the offer (expecting it to be rejected), and free agents will be increasingly frustrated by the way the draft pick penalty degrades their market.

Dissecting the Bill Smith era: The Young-Garza trade

Almost all of Delmon
Young's value with the
Twins came in 2010.

When: Nov. 28, 2007
What: The Twins sent RHP Matt Garza, SS Jason Bartlett and RHP Eduardo Morlan to Tampa Bay for RF Delmon Young, INF Brendan Harris and OF Jason Pridie.
Values: Garza has earned 44 win shares and 11.9 WAR (wins above replacement) since the trade; Bartlett 64 WS and 13.9 WAR; Morlan has yet to play in the majors. Young has earned 52 WS, 1.3 WAR; Harris 19 WS, -0.2 WAR; Pridie 4 WS, 0.3 WAR. The three players Tampa Bay received have earned 108 win shares and 25.8 wins above replacement since the trade; the three players the Twins got earned 75 WS, 1.4 WAR. None of the six remain with the same team.
Twins motivation: Plugging outfield holes.

When Bill Smith inherited the general manager's job in September 2007, he faced two large and obvious issues: The pending free agency of Torii Hunter and Johan Santana's walk year.

Connected to the Hunter issue was that the 2007 Twins had a gaping hole in left field. Since it was quite obvious that the Twins were not about to meet Hunter's price, Smith was looking at two vacancies in the 2008 outfield.

Young was an intriguing trade target -- young, strong, he had hit .288 and driven in 90-plus runs as a 21-year-old in 2007. He appeared fully capable of living up to his status as the No. 1 overall pick in 2003.

Garza was also a first-round draft pick with intriguing talent. The Twins had a surplus of young starting pitchers and a shortage of usable outfielders; Garza and Young were the obvious cornerstones of the trade.

Brendan Harris washed out as
a second baseman early in 2008
and spent his Twins tenure
shuffling between third base,
shortstop and the bench.

But Young was not only a former first pick but somewhat more accomplished in the majors already. The Rays needed something more -- and that something more turned the trade in their favor.

I have always believed, reading between the lines, that Ron Gardenhire was never sold on Bartlett as his shortstop. He was reluctant to play Bartlett and only installed him in the lineup in 2006 when then-GM Terry Ryan gave him no choice by dealing away veteran Juan Castro. In 2007, Bartlett committed a string of costly early-inning errors down the stretch that helped bury the Twins' final chances of getting back into the race.

It was the exchange of shortstops -- Bartlett for Harris -- that made this a plus trade for Tampa Bay. Garza for Young is even enough to justify given the needs of the Twins at the time; Pridie and Morlan are essentially irrelevant. But Harris' defensive deficiencies -- which were evident in the defensive metrics at the time -- kept him from becoming a regular with the Twins. And the Twins haven't had a 100-game shortstop season since dumping Bartlett.

Neither Young nor Garza have so far truly lived up to expectations. Both were traded within the past year, and there are reports that the Cubs are shopping Garza around.

Tale of two pitchers

Identify these 2010 stat lines:

Pitcher A: 128.2 IP, 4.06 ERA, 1.236 WHIP, 41 BB, 97 K

Pitcher B: 137 IP, 4.01 ERA, 1.182 WHIP, 28 BB, 120K

It's fairly close, but Pitcher B appears to be having the better season, right?

Pitcher A is Matt Garza (photo above), who threw a no-hitter Monday night. Not just a no-hitter — a 27-batter no-hitter. One man reached, on a walk, and he was erased on a double play. Yeah, the Tigers are missing some key players, but it was a marvelous game from a talented young arm.

Pitcher B is Zach Greinke, last year's Cy Young winner, who got embarrassed Monday night by the Twins (eight runs in four innings); Greinke's ERA rose 42 points in that outing, from 3.59 to 4.01.

Greinke has made three starts against the Twins this season. He's 0-3 with a 10.29 ERA in 14 innings against Minnesota. Against everybody else, he's 6-7, 3.29 — not Cy Young stats, but quality work for a bad team.