Would Brian Cashman Really Head to Miami in 2018?

Here we stand on August 31^st with the trade deadline now past and the rumor mill has already begun for the 2018 offseason. That’s typical in baseball but this story kind of hits close to home as some publications are already speculating that the Yankees GM Brian Cashman may be done in pinstripes after the season. Cashman, who is set to be a free agent at the end of the year, is speculated to be joining the Miami Marlins who were recently bought by a group headed by former Yankees legend Derek Jeter in case you’ve been living under a rock for the past six months or so but this begs the question, Cashman wouldn’t really leave New York for Miami…. Would he?

Honestly I can’t see Cashman bolting from the Yankees to go anywhere, let alone the Miami Marlins. Why? Giancarlo Stanton. That contract is moveable, sure, but that contract is going to hinder the Marlins ability to spend for a long, long time. Cashman, in his own defense, has been great lately with his handling of prospects and in trading for young, cheap and controllable players but at the end of the day Cashman has always and will always look to bail himself out with the big money grab of a veteran player or a key piece. That just simply, and I am obviously speculating here, won’t be the case down in Miami. The Miami Marlins will never have the payroll that the Los Angeles Dodgers or the New York Yankees have. The market would never support it, the attendance would never support it and I doubt the group headed by Jeter could support it.

Cashman finally has the power and the ability to basically make trades at will here in the Bronx. Sure, he has a spending limit but his spending limit here is much higher than it would be anywhere else in the league with the obvious exception of the Los Angeles Dodgers so why would he want to go anywhere else? Cashman has a young team brewing here with plenty of star power and has a Top 5 – Top 10 farm system to boot because of recent developmental changes and philosophies in the system which begin and end with the man handing out the checks and trading, or in this case not trading, the Yankees prospects. Cashman has fought for a long time for this kind of team, this kind of farm system and this kind of control over it and I simply can’t see Cashman moving on from it now.

The only way I can see Cashman leaving is if he gets a huge pay raise and promotion much like the Tampa Bay Rays executive Andrew Friedman a few years back. If Jeter were to offer President of Baseball Operations to Cashman and full control over the team… then maybe… but if it were just to be a GM I think Cashman will be back in the Bronx for the 2018 season, and I’m okay with that. 

Derek Jeter the Potential Owner!

Major League Baseball, are you ready for the return (potentially) of the great Derek Jeter to the game? No the Yankees shortstop is not returning to the field as a player but the future Hall of Fame player is trying to get back into the game in another way, as an owner. The Miami Marlins are reportedly up for bid and Derek and his wife Hannah are one of three potential bidders for the franchise.

Jeter, who is represented by Gregory Fleming in the potential transaction, is joined by former Florida Governor Jeb Bush and a group of businessmen from Goldman Sachs as potential buyers for the franchise.

Jeffrey Loria bought the team back in 2002 for a whopping $158 million and the potential price tag for Mr. Jeter or Mr. Bush could go anywhere from an estimated $800,000 to $1.6 billion. Loria is putting the team up for sale after reports came out that stated he may be nominated by President Trump to become ambassador for the United States to France.

You know what I am going to say to the potential return of Derek Jeter to the sport and game we all love. Yes please. I’m rooting for you Jeter! Good luck. 

Fantasy Baseball: Who are the Miami Marlins?

If you’re sitting in front of your computer on draft night and Jose Fernandez or Giancarlo Stanton are sitting there on the board you need to hurry up and take them. Obviously if you have the first few picks in the draft then maybe you want to stay away but other than that you need to take these new perennial fantasy baseball superstars. This much you probably already know though and I doubt you clicked on my post because you needed guidance whether to take one of these superstars or not. No, you clicked on this post because you want to read about the sleepers and who should be taken around Round 15 and beyond. You know, the sleeper picks that more times than not win or lose you your draft. Don’t fret, I’m here to help.

The Marlins are an intriguing team because even last season they had so much talent on the ball club and despite the talent lost far more games than they won. Not many people saw the miraculous season that Dee Gordon had at second base or the season that Adeiny Hechavarria quietly had at shortstop for the Marlins due to all the losing and the distrust of owner Jeffrey Loria. The Marlins have quietly assembled one of the better young teams in the league but the talent there needs to trust their talent before they can truly succeed. That’s where veterans and key players like Wei-Yin Chen, Carter Capps and Christian Yelich come in.

Chen specifically should benefit from the move from the AL East to the NL East and should especially benefit from pitching in the park, Marlins Park, which has allowed the second fewest home runs in the Major Leagues since its inception in 2012. Even if the team decides to move the fences in a bit like they are discussing this winter pitching in Marlins Park will never be like pitching inside Yankee Stadium or Fenway Park three or four times a season and it won’t be like facing that powerful Toronto Blue Jays lineup in his old league. Chen should see a spike in all his major stats except for obviously his strikeout numbers which have never been truly high in his career. Chen is a winner and can pitch like an ace despite pitching to contact and limiting his walks to get by.

Yelich got a big contract extension last season much like Giancarlo Stanton did and Yelich went out and did what Yelich does, he hit for a high batting average and he stole a lot of bases. Yelich is not a huge home run threat, even if they move in the fences down in Miami, as he hits the ball on the ground more times than not but he could jump up to a 10-20 home run guy as he matures and grows into his body. If you need average, stolen bases and runs scored than Yelich is your man. If you need power you’re probably not going to get it, although you may be pleasantly surprised by September.

Finally you have Carter Capps who is likely to start the season as a setup man for closer A.J. Ramos but will not likely stay there for much of the season. Ramos struggles with his command and has for much of his career making a huge stride in that department unlikely, although not impossible, in 2016. The difference between Capps and Ramos though is that Capps can be had around the 20^th round or so while Ramos is still a Top 20 closer in the league even with his command struggles. Capps would be the smart pick and easily put back on the waiver wire or traded if Ramos somehow finds the zone more consistently this season. You can always pull the “he may take over for Ramos if he continues to walk guys” card and get something valuable out of him. Plus his strikeout numbers are great anyway so you may just want to keep him.

There you have it, those are the Miami Marlins that could help you win your Fantasy Baseball league this spring. Also be on the lookout for any and all pitchers that make impacts in camp or are signed by Miami because Edwin Jackson’s value to the team is more as a reliever than a starter even though he is listed as the team’s 5^th starter currently. That can and likely will change before the end of the season so be on the lookout. 

Miami Is Shopping Marcell Ozuna?

I've been reluctant to write about this only because I haven't seen any concrete evidence that Miami is willing to sell. This is the offseason though, the time to dream, so for the sake of this blog post let's say that the Miami Marlins and Jeffrey Loria are willing to sell off a major young piece in Marcell Ozuna, should the Yankees be interested?

I like to keep this blog "PG" so excuse me for this, but HELL YES. Ozuna is a right-handed center fielder that projects to have 30 home run power in his Major League career. Ozuna is just 25-years old and has four years of team control including all of his arbitration years. Why would the Marlins, a team that handed outfielder Giancarlo Stanton a huge contract with a promise to compete for the life of it, want to trade Ozuna? Apparently there is some bad blood between owner Jeffrey Loria and their stud center fielder.

I'm not sure if you guys heard about it or not but the Marlins sent Ozuna down this season with the reasoning that they were hoping the demotion could turn around slumping season. Coincidentally the Marlins could delay his arbitration by a season if Ozuna spent at least five weeks in the minors in 2015 and Ozuna spent six weeks in Triple-A, just to be sure. That's all speculation until the recorded phone call between owner Loria and team president David Samson  hit the internet. SEE HERE for the actual audio but the important piece is below:

Female voice: “Scott Boras is on the line.”

Male voice: “Let me tell ya, tell Boras that his client is getting demoted, and that his client is a fat, [unintelligible] lazy, Dominican fuck.”

Wow if true, and wow if it's about Ozuna. No wonder Scott Boras and Ozuna are unhappy with the Marlins organization and no wonder why the Marlins want to trade him. Miami is doing this all wrong though, rather than waiting for all this to hit the internet thus lowering Ozuna's trade value they waited too long. Miami's screw up can be New York's gain.

Miami wants young starting pitching back for Ozuna and the Yankees have some, maybe not enough. I wouldn't give up Luis Severino for Ozuna but truth be told I would allow Nathan Eovaldi to head back to Miami and I would also lead a package with Michael Pineda. If the team is interested is Bryan Mitchell or Rookie Davis then let them go, Ozuna is a special talent. The problem is Seattle is said to be offering Taijuan Walker for Ozuna as we speak, New York may not be willing to bite that bullet and match.

Either way adding Ozuna to the Yankees continues to make the team younger, cheaper and absolutely leads to a Brett Gardner trade. The lineup is balanced, power is added and overall I think the team is exponentially better. It's a dream, every team is going to be interested in Ozuna, but Cashman hasn't worn his ninja costume in a while either... so maybe.

Dan Jennings Hire Reminds Many of the Final Billy Martin Hire

The Miami Marlins made news this week when the team fired their manager Mike Redmond less than 50 games into the season. Replacing Redmond is the team’s general manager Dan Jennings who will remain in both jobs at least until the end of the season according to Jeffrey Loria. Now I admit that I was barely alive and definitely not watching the Yankees when they hired Billy Martin to manage the team again in 1988 but I am a historian of the game and of my favorite team in New York and these two hiring’s are both, for the lack of a better word, interesting.

Before Martin was hired for the 1988 George Steinbrenner had already hired and fired Martin four times as the Yankees manager despite the two not exactly getting along. In fact Martin didn’t get along with many people during his Yankees tenure just ask Reggie Jackson in 1978 and that marshmallow salesman in 1979 who both cost Martin his jobs in separate instances. To make a long story short the Yankees manager lost his job once again after an altercation in the bathroom of a Texas topless bar, you can use your imagination or Google to find out the details if you would like, after being hired for the final time in the Bronx. Martin was reportedly being considered for a sixth go-around with the team when he died in a car accident in 1989 which begs the question that many Yankees fans had on the tip of their tongues each and every time he was hired, why?

I am pretty confident that the same can be said for the Jennings hire in Miami, minus the clubhouse altercations, the topless bars, the marshmallow man and the Bronx is Burning, why? Jennings has never coached, managed or played a professional game before in his life leaving many to wonder what made him more suitable then the plethora of candidates that are available for the job. Redmond was fired because of the lack of on-the-field success with a team that he, the GM, built and assembled this offseason.

The Jennings hiring was not the 1951 St. Louis Browns who hired the fans (literally) to manage, the 1961 Chicago Cubs who hired a College of Coaches to manage or the 1977 Atlanta Braves who hired Ted Turner to be their manager on paper but it may turn out in the end to be a lot like the disaster that Pete Rose hiring was to the Cincinnati Reds in 1984 (before the gambling and the banishment from the game and all that). 

Yankees President Levine a Fan of Marlins' New Deal With Stanton

Since it was made Monday, the deal that'll pay Marlins OF Giancarlo Stanton $325 million over the next 13 years has been criticized by many.

Some say it's just worth too much money, while others claim that Stanton hasn't proved himself worthy of such a salary at this point in his career. One reporter even asked Stanton if there was a part of his bringing in $69,000 a day that was almost embarrasing in a recent press conference, as that total surpasses the average American's yearly income. 

Just don't tell Yankees president Randy Levine that.

“Every team has to make a decision based on where they are at the time, where they are at the moment,” Levine told The New York Daily News' Mark Feinsand Thursday. “This is a great player."

That's undoubtedly true, with Stanton's impressive 2014 stats basically earning him the vote as the NL's top offensive player. His .288 batting average, 37 home runs and 105 RBIs left him second in the MVP race behind the Dodgers' Clayton Kershaw, a pitcher.

But should Miami have still committed to him?

"I think (owner) Jeffrey (Loria) stood up, the Marlins stood up, and both of them are pleased with it," Levine said. "Good for them.”

For now at least. Stanton's new contract passes that of Alex Rodriguez for the biggest in baseball, and we all know how badly his has worked out.

Stanton, 26, is yet to get in trouble off the field, and has played for the Marlins since he was a rookie in 2010.