- It’s now unlikely that Marlins third baseman Martin Prado will make it back for any significant playing time before the end of the 2017 season, Tim Healey of the Sun-Sentinel reports. The veteran has been trying to return from knee surgery, but his rehab efforts were interrupted by Hurricane Irma. Whether or not he can suit up, it seems promising at least that the 33-year-old seems to have bounced back fairly well from the procedure. After all, he’s still promised another $28.5MM over the next two seasons.
Marlins Notes: Ichiro, Jeter, Close
- It wouldn’t be surprising to see Ichiro Suzuki back with the Marlins next season given the respect Derek Jeter has for his former teammate, Barry Jackson of the Miami Herald writes. Suzuki, who turns 44 in October, has indicated that he intends to play in 2018. The veteran has a .260/.325/.345 slash line over 195 PA for the Fish this season while providing backup at all three outfield spots.
- It wouldn’t be surprising to see Ichiro Suzuki back with the Marlins next season given the respect Derek Jeter has for his former teammate, Barry Jackson of the Miami Herald writes. Suzuki, who turns 44 in October, has indicated that he intends to play in 2018. The veteran has a .260/.325/.345 slash line over 195 PA for the Fish this season while providing backup at all three outfield spots.
- Also from Jackson’s piece, he hears from an investor connected to the Jeter/Bruce Sherman ownership group that there was discussion earlier this summer about the possibility of Casey Close, Jeter’s longtime agent, joining the Marlins front office. It isn’t known if this idea is still being considered, or if Close even has interest in a career change. Jackson speculates that Close could oversee the Marlins’ business operations, while Jeter handles the baseball ops department. Close currently heads Excel Sports Management’s baseball division, and it would send some major ripples through the agent world if he did depart for a new job given the number of players (including some of the game’s biggest names) represented by Excel.
Giancarlo Stanton Says He's Not Worried About Future Trade Talks
In the course of discussing his mammoth home run output this year — and the importance of reaching 61 — Marlins star Giancarlo Stanton also addressed his future with Tyler Kepner of the New York Times. Even if the organization wants to and can work out a deal involving Stanton, he’ll have veto power over any deals. But he says that’s not on his mind at the moment. “I’m literally just worried about tomorrow, the next hour,” says Stanton. “I know how everything works around here, so I’m not surprised, and not worried about two months from now or the offseason.”
MLBTR Poll: Giancarlo Stanton’s 2017 HR Total
Marlins right fielder Giancarlo Stanton continued marching toward the 60-home run mark on Saturday when he slugged his 54th long ball of the year, a 456-foot shot off Braves left-hander Max Fried. While the 68-74 Marlins lost the game and have dropped 11 of their past 13 to plummet from playoff contention, Stanton still seems likely to garner serious NL MVP consideration even if he doesn’t reach 60. The 27-year-old currently leads every other NL player by at least 17 homers, after all, and has slashed an incredible .282/.377/.646 in 604 plate appearances.
The excellence Stanton has exhibited could be difficult for MVP voters to ignore, particularly if he does reach the celebrated 60 figure by season’s end. In doing so, the 27-year-old would follow Barry Bonds, Mark McGwire, Sammy Sosa, Roger Maris and Babe Ruth as the sixth player to accomplish the feat (McGwire and Sosa each did it multiple times) and the first since 2001. That was the year Bonds smashed a record 73. Remarkably, Stanton may have outdone his former hitting coach had he been as otherworldly in the season’s first half as he has been since the All-Star break.
While Stanton racked up a “mere” 26 long balls in 369 PAs between Opening Day and mid-July, he’s already at 28 through 235 attempts over the nearly two months since the Yankees’ Aaron Judge upstaged him at the Home Run Derby on Stanton’s turf in Miami. Stanton has gone yard every 8.39 trips to the plate in the second half, which would translate to 83 over a 700-PA season (Stanton’s on track for 698). Should Stanton continue to stay healthy and hammer HRs at his second-half pace, he’d finish the year with around 65 – a number only Bonds, McGwire (twice) and Sosa (twice) have matched or exceeded.
As superb as Stanton has been, it goes without saying that it will be immensely difficult for him to keep raking at his current clip over the Marlins’ final 20 games of the season. But both the slate of mostly unspectacular starting pitchers scheduled to face Stanton over the next couple weeks and the Marlins’ three-game set at Colorado’s Coors Field thereafter should aid him in his quest to go deep at least six more times this year. Clearly, Stanton’s on the verge of posting one of the most awe-inspiring offensive seasons in the history of the sport. The question is: Will he pull it off?
Photo courtesy of USA Today Sports Images.
Latest On Marlins’ Ownership Transition
Even as would-be Marlins owners Bruce Sherman and Derek Jeter begin digging into operational details, the prospective ownership team is still working to finalize the deal reached with current owner Jeffrey Loria in early August. Things still seem to be on course, though the process is far from over.
Indeed, the league intends to take a close look at the arrangement, Charlie Gasparino and Brian Schwartz of FOX Business write, peeking into the pocketbooks of the proposed investor group members and assessing the deal’s structure (in particular, it’s mix of debt and equity). MLB is hoping to ensure that the new ownership group is equipped to engineer a turnaround for a cash-strapped organization.
That effort could take “months” to resolve, per the report. MLB does hope to wrap things up by the time the World Series ends, though. That’s an important time marker, since the offseason kicks into gear immediately thereafter.
That process is already underway. Sherman has already met with MLB owners. Jeter will have his turn to do so within the week, per Jon Heyman of Fan Rag, as he will present his ideas for running the club to the ownership committee that will assess the deal.
There are no shortage of questions facing the Marlins this winter; the club has had its moments, but still sits five games under .500 and lacks a clear path to contention in 2018. Superstar Giancarlo Stanton and other core players could — some would say should — be dangled in trade over the coming offseason.
Needless to say, Sherman and Jeter will have quite a lot to tackle in assessing the ballclub and implementing a plan. Even if the approval process goes smoothly, there likely won’t be much of a grace period before the new ownership group begins making tough decisions — including, but not limited to, player transactions.
In order to hit the ground running, the owners-to-be have begun assessing the club’s operations. As Clark Spencer of the Miami Herald writes, Sherman and Jeter met earlier this week with “various department heads” within the organization, including but not limited to baseball operations. Those sit-downs will presumably help the incoming duo sort out a strategy for revamping the organization once the deal is finalized.
Marlins Activate Wei-Yin Chen
After an absence of a bit more than four months, Marlins left-hander Wei-Yin Chen has been activated from the 60-day disabled list, Clark Spencer of the Miami Herald reports (Twitter links). He’ll head to the bullpen for the time being.
Chen’s return is not insignificant for a Marlins club that has ridden a historic Giancarlo Stanton hot streak back to the fringes of the National League Wild Card race. While they’re still five games out of the second Wild Card spot (with three teams to vault), the Marlins have at least managed to make things interesting down the stretch.
Of course, what the Fish could really use right now is a quality starting pitcher. That’s just what the team thought it was getting when it signed Chen to a five-year, $80MM deal before the 2016 season.
Instead, Chen has worked to a 4.85 ERA over just 150 1/3 innings since arriving in Miami. He has made only five starts this year, spending most of the season rehabbing through a partial UCL tear.
There’s no chance at this point that Chen will opt out of the remaining $60MM over three years left on his contract. Hopefully for both he and the team, however, he’ll at least be able to get back on track late in 2017 and come into camp healthy for the 2018 season.
Jorge Mas Would Not Have Slashed Payroll Had He Bought Marlins
- It doesn’t appear that the Marlins’ low-spending ways will change when their new ownership group takes over, but their fate would have been different had local businessman Jorge Mas purchased the team, Barry Jackson of the Miami Herald tweets. Unlike owners-to-be Bruce Sherman and Derek Jeter, Mas would not have planned to slash payroll had he put forth the winning bid for the franchise. Mas finished as the runner-up to Sherman and Jeter, who are at the helm of a faction that agreed last month to buy the Marlins from Jeffrey Loria for $1.2 billion.
Latest On Plans Of Next Marlins Ownership Group
While the Marlins’ Jeffrey Loria era will soon end, the franchise’s low-payroll ways won’t, Barry Jackson of the Miami Herald reports. Bruce Sherman and Derek Jeter agreed to purchase the team from Loria for $1.2 billion ($400MM of which will come from Sherman), but they don’t have the type of money necessary to spend big on a roster, according to a potential investor who spoke with Jackson. Sherman and Jeter informed Jackson’s source that they plan to pare down payroll from $115MM to either $80MM to $85MM or $55MM in 2018, depending on whether they trade high-priced MVP candidate Giancarlo Stanton. Slashing spending won’t sit well with Marlins fans who have witnessed the team go on a late-season run and Stanton turn in an awe-inspiring 2017 performance, Jackson notes. And Jackson adds other details that likely won’t please fans, either, as the investor told him Jeter’s set to pay himself $5MM per year until he recoups his $25MM investment and get a company credit card so he can cover expenses from his home in Tampa Bay to Miami. Further, Jackson suggests that FOX won’t be renegotiating the Marlins’ television contract, the least valuable in baseball, before its expiration at the conclusion of the 2020 campaign.
Wei-Yin Chen To Return In Coming Days
The Padres fired hitting coach Alan Zinter on Friday, Dennis Lin of the San Diego Union-Tribune tweets. Zinter lasted less than two seasons in the position, having taken the job in November 2015. The Padres’ offense ranked toward the bottom of the majors during Zinter’s run, but he didn’t exactly have a world of proven talent at his disposal. Manager Andy Green explained to Lin that he’s seeking a “different voice” for the role. Meanwhile, GM A.J. Preller told AJ Cassavell of MLB.com that the Padres will begin searching for a successor immediately, but he indicated there’s no rush to hire a replacement (Twitter link).
Here’s more from the National League:
- The Brewers’ rotation was rife with question marks entering the season, but it now appears the surprise contenders have at least three legitimate building blocks in Jimmy Nelson, Chase Anderson and Zach Davies, Tom Haudricourt of the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel observes. The emergence of that cost-controlled trio has been especially important to a team that’s not able to spend big on free agents, and Haudricourt points out that the Brewers may even have a couple more promising young starters on hand (Brandon Woodruff and Josh Hader). It’s possible they’ll go into 2018 with those five comprising their rotation, Haudricourt notes.
- Rockies outfielder David Dahl is resigned to the fact that he won’t be able to contribute this year, Patrick Saunders of the Denver Post writes. Dahl hasn’t appeared in a major league game this season, and he hasn’t played in a minor league contest since July 31, thanks to the rib injury he suffered during spring training. Now, Dahl doesn’t expect to swing a bat again until December, according to Saunders. “The thing I really need is rest, to let it heal completely, because every time I would start swinging, I would start feeling it again,” said the 23-year-old Dahl, who excited the Rockies last season with a .315/.359/.500 batting line in a 237-plate appearance rookie campaign.
- A partial UCL tear in Wei-Yin Chen’s left elbow has kept him from taking the mound since May 1, but he’ll return to the Marlins in the coming days, Tim Healey of the South Florida Sun Sentinel reports. While Chen will finish 2017 as a reliever, the Marlins expect to slot him back into their rotation next season. After this fall’s World Series, Chen will be able to opt out of the remaining three years and $52MM left on the five-year, $80MM contract he signed with the Fish in January 2016. That’s obviously not going to happen, though, as the ex-Oriole has struggled with injuries and turned in mediocre results during his two years in Miami.
Cafardo: Red Sox Must Pursue Giancarlo Stanton
The first-place Red Sox’s success this year has come despite a lack of power (they entered Saturday 26th in the majors in home runs and 27th in ISO), leading Nick Cafardo of the Boston Globe to argue that they have to pursue Giancarlo Stanton in the offseason. It’s unclear whether the new Marlins ownership group will shop the right fielder and potential 60-home run man, but Cafardo contends that a Red Sox offer consisting of left fielder Andrew Benintendi, left-hander Eduardo Rodriguez and a pitching prospect would grab the attention of Derek Jeter & Co. As great as Stanton has been this year, it’s tough to imagine Boston parting with Benintendi, a top-flight rookie who won’t even be eligible for arbitration until after the 2019 campaign. Stanton, meanwhile, is still due another $295MM from 2018-28, and his contract includes full no-trade rights and an opt-out clause after the 2020 campaign.
