Friday, January 8, 2016

Chris Davis the Gate Keeper


The 2016 offseason began with a bang as teams began to cash in and get some “bang” for their buck. Craig Kimbrel came off the trade market pretty early while David Price and Zack Greinke’s families presumably had some great Christmas holidays after the free agent contracts they signed. Since then though the market has slowed down and has been slow to develop in many areas, especially the outfield department. Why? Jason Heyward, the top overall free agent and the top outfield prospect, has already signed and the dominos were expected to fall by now… but they haven’t. I know why, its former Orioles slugger Chris Davis’s fault.

Chris Davis is the gate keeper to the entire offseason, let me explain why. The Baltimore Orioles are interested in at least one outfielder this offseason but in their market they have to make a choice. Do they want Davis to come back or do they want one of Yoenis Cespedes or Justin Upton. Baltimore has put out a deal worth $150 million to Davis and have since retracted the deal supposedly but I’m not buying it. If they had they would have jumped on an outfielder, Upton specifically since his family ties run to the Virginia area, but they haven’t. Why? Because they are waiting on Chris Davis to make up his mind.

Upton is a better outfielder than Cespedes and unless a sweetheart deal comes around, like the three year deal the San Francisco Giants or Chicago White Sox would like to sign Cespedes to, he will likely wait until Upton comes off the board. Why? Because this is going to be the biggest and presumably best contract that the Cuban-born outfielder gets. He is going to milk it dry for every penny possible and teams won’t get desperate until Upton signs.

So this is a Yankees blog, how does Chris Davis, Justin Upton and Yoenis Cespedes affect the Yankees? Brett Gardner. The Yankees aren’t going to have many takers for an outfielder, especially a 32-year old outfielder like Gardner, when there is such talent out there on the free agent market. Some teams may shy away from Upton since he declined a qualifying offer this winter and will be attached to draft pick compensation but that is not the case with Cespedes. Cespedes was traded to the New York Mets this season and is ineligible for the qualifying offer. No one is going to give up good prospects for Gardner with Cespedes out there on the market.


So Upton isn’t signing until Davis does and Cespedes isn’t signing until Upton does and the Yankees couldn’t dream of trading Gardner until Cespedes signs. Get it? Confused? Me too. That’s the baseball offseason though. Enjoy it. 

4 comments:

  1. It all makes sense to me. That's why we can't get in on the power guys, no money to spend and will not give up a draft pick...#16 unless more teams ahead of us sign a few FAs. There is a very small chance Yoenis Cespedes could end up without a contract and sign a one year deal with us.
    As for trading Brett without having another player to replace him, NO PROBLEM, we have Hicks and others on the farm.
    For the BP I don't think we are bad off at all, we have; Mitchell, Rumbelow, Shreve, Pinder, Pazos, Coshow and Lindgren later in the year. Coshow has a great fastball and very good slider, better in the BP than as a starter and after (or during) this year he could become a Warren Clone.

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    1. Coshow and Rookie were both in that deal, not good, I forgot both of them will come back to beat us...bank on it...or not!

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    2. Cale Coshow was not in that deal, Caleb Cotham was. Coshow is a big guy with a big arm but not likely a big league option until June or July at the very earliest.

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    3. Thank you Daniel, another Name thing for me.
      Coshow is the guy I was talking about (just my name mix-up again).

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Sorry for the Capatcha... Blame the Russians :)