Curtis Granderson is already having quite a year for Detroit. With nine home runs and 19 RBI, he's seemingly developed a new power approach to his game and on pace to shatter his career highs.
But on Friday night, it was the gifted center fielder's glove work that wowed the crowd and had Cleveland's Grady Sizemore dropping his jaw in disbelief.
One of my favorite ballplayers to watch in the past few years has always been Wily Mo Pena. I'm not exactly sure how he does it, but he's hit some of the longest home runs I can ever remember seeing, both at Great American Ballpark and Fenway Park. Of course, he coupled that with some of the most spectacular swinging strikeouts I've ever seen as well. In fact, that about summarizes Wily Mo's entire career to this point; awesome home runs, awesome strikeouts and not much else.
Last year with Washington, the show came to an end as a shoulder injury sapped most of Pena's power. When the Nats cut him in spring training this year and no one picked him up, I was afraid the Wily Mo Show might be coming to a permanent end. Luckily, that's not the case! Monday the Mets signed him to a minor league deal and he will be headed to Triple-A.
The Daily Jolt is a dose of baseball reality every weekday morning.
The Nationals made it official Thursday, inking slugger Adam Dunn to a two-year, $20 million deal and introducing him in Washington. Dunn fills a glaring need for the Nats -- left-handed power -- but he also creates a roster crunch that general manager Jim Bowden will have to clear up before the team heads north for the start of the season.
Of course, Washington isn't the only club with a bit of a logjam heading into Spring Training. Here are a look at five rosters that will need to be un-cluttered in the coming six weeks, and how they might be.
Tim Hudson enjoys pitching against the Washington Nationals. Going into last night's game, he'd made 10 starts against the team and gone 6-1 while giving up 51 hits and nine earned runs. Monday's start was a little more ragged, 10 hits over six and two-thirds innings, but still resulted in his seventh career win. For a guy facing a team for the third time in less than a month, you can't ask for much more.
It was the first time the Nats got Hudson out of the game before the seventh in almost two years and the first time they scored off him since the first inning of opening night. Given that history and 15 losses in 17 games, it wasn't a performance for the Nationals to cry about. Manny Acta even seemed kinda happy about it, but one of his players wasn't feeling inspired by a decent, if losing, performance.
Just down the hall, hitting coach Lenny Harris was consoling Wily Mo Pena as the teary-eyed left fielder tried to make sense of an 0-for-4 night, including two of Hudson's three strikeouts.
Aw, it's hard to imagine that jolly face at right with tears rolling down it. As tough as facing Hudson must have been, I think Pena had some stuff of his own going on. He's now 3-for-30 to start the season with no extra-base hits and nine whiffs. Numbers worth crying about, to be sure. Heck, I almost shed a tear just looking at them.
Wily Mo Pena was a pleasant surprise for the Nationals after being acquired from the Red Sox last year. In 37 games, he hit .293 (.352 OBP, .504 SLG) with eight home runs and 22 RBI. For a team that ranked dead last in the NL in total runs scored and home runs, his bat was sorely needed.
Unfortunately, the team will be without his bat for at least the rest of spring training and likely the first few weeks of the season. From Barry Svrluga's Washington Post blog:
The results from Wily Mo Pena's MRI are back, and they reveal what many in the organization suspected yesterday. It is a Grade 2 strain of the left oblique. A club spokesman -- delivering the report from the medical staff -- said it was a "significant tear of the muscle," and it will "very possibly take four weeks" to recover. For now, he'll have a "very low level of activity" to allow healing to take place.
This is bad news for the team but good news for Elijah Dukes, who certainly has the potential to replace every bit of Pena's production if he gets into a groove and can hold off Alex Escober. Personally, I'll be rooting for Dukes, if for no other reason than the fact that it's fun to append "dawg" to the end of headlines.
Elijah Dukes is officially no longer Tampa Bay's problem: the oft-troubled outfielder was dealt today to the Washington Nationals for an unspecified minor leaguer. According to the Washington Post, the player the Rays are receiving isn't expected to have significant value, as the team was more interested in giving Dukes his much-needed change of scenery than anything else.
Are the Nats worried about Dukes' history of getting in trouble? Perhaps, but Jim Bowden has never shied away from giving players a second chance. In fact, he had one of his latest reclamation projects meet with Dukes soon after the trade was completed. From TampaBay.com:
After the teams agreed to the trade, Nationals officials met this morning with Dukes at a hotel neat the airport here in Nashville, site of the winter meetings. According to the Washington Post, Nats veteran Dmitri Young - the older brother of former Rays OF Delmon Young - was also at the meeting and he is expected to serve as a mentor to Dukes.
(How was Dukes able to make the meeting when he's supposed to be playing winter ball in the Dominican? He's apparently returned for good after missing his family.)
Here's to hoping that works out. While Dukes, 23, is going from one rebuilding club to another, he'll still have to earn his at-bats: the Nats have a suddenly crowded outfield that also features the likes of Austin Kearns (27 years old), Wily Mo Pena (25) and Lastings Milledge (22). That's an awfully intriguing mix of players -- they were all hailed as top prospects in their own time, but with the exception of Kearns, we've yet to discover what their true ceiling is. Considering how Bowden fleeced the Mets in getting Milledge and apparently picked up Dukes for nothing, the Nats fans have to be happy with the offseason so far.
For a season and a half, Red Sox Nation waited for the Wily Mo Pena power explosion. They saw spurts, in the form of tremendous towering home runs, but they were few and far between. And the "between" part was a mind-numbing collection of flailing swings at breaking pitches for strike three and misplayed balls in right field.
Since being traded to the Washington Nationals for the infamous "player to be named later" Wily Mo seems to have hit his stride. In just three games he is 5-for-11 with two homeruns and three RBI. To put that in perspective, Wily had just nine hits in 34 at-bats in the entire month of July with Boston. In that month he had one homerun and 4 RBI - all in the same game.
For the faithful fans in Boston, it has got to be a slap in the face. The Sox now rely on Bobby Kielty and his 52 big league homeruns and .255 career average as their big bat off the bench. While Wily Mo was painful to watch in a Sox uni - couldn't run, struck out a lot, played horrible outfield - he reeked of homerun potential. In a once-potent line-up that includes David Ortiz and Manny Ramirez, the presence of a bat on the bench isn't that important. But with both of the big guns' power numbers way down, and JD Drew not exactly tearing the cover off the ball, the big hit has been missing from the Boston line-up.
Boston has often lamented the loss of players - none more obvious than Jeff Bagwell - but the jury is out on Wily Mo. His failures are still too fresh in the mind, but if this guy continues on the pace he's on in his short time in Washington, the streets of Boston will be echoing with the familiar cry: "Why can't we get guys like that!"
As it turns out, Austin Kearns didn't have to fear the arrival of Wily Mo Pena after all -- he just has to learn a new position. On Sunday, in Pena's first game with the Nationals, skipper Manny Acta went with Pena in right field, Kearns in center and Ryan Church in left. Kearns has seen limited duty in center before, but it sounds like that will be his new permanent position. From MLB.com
"Instead of two out of three guys out of position, I'm just going to have one guy, but [Kearns] is probably the best suited guy to be there," Acta said. "Kearns has been tremendous. He is one of the best I've seen. When the ball meets the bat, Kearns is already moving. For his size and all that, he moves very well."
Kearns has been a disappointment as a corner outfielder this year, but his line (.263/.356/.447) doesn't look all that bad when you think of him as a center fielder. He's no Ichiro or Torii Hunter, sure, but he's better than Nook Logan and he's putting up roughly the same numbers as guys like Johnny Damon and Juan Pierre for much, much less money.
Apparently, Jim Bowden isn't going to stop until he gets every former Cincinnati Reds outfielder to come to Washington. There were rumors that Bowden was going after Adam Dunn earlier in the season. But in the end, he went after the much cheaper, and apparently much more expendable Wily Mo Pena, who the Red Sox traded to Bowden and the Nationals for a player to be named later.
Meanwhile the irony can't be lost on Austin Kearns, who's slugging percentage is near the bottom among starting outfielders ... and consider that the only guys below him are noted power hitters Juan Pierre, Alfredo Amezaga, Johnny Damon, Willy Taveras, and Reggie Willits. Kearns was all too happy to escape Cincinnati and the playing glut of Dunn, Pena, and Ken Griffey Jr. And now his boss, in the last two months, goes after Dunn, and trades for Pena. But Kearns should take heart, as his numbers (.250/.331/.381), bad as they are, are a touch better overall than Pena's (.218/.291/.385). So I'm sure Kearns isn't worried about losing playing time ... yet. But with those two, Ryan Church, Ryan Langerhans, and Nook Logan, that playing glut in the outfield is sure to return to Austin's life ... especially if Bowden decides to go completely crazy and go get Adam Dunn.
The White Sox and Red Sox were very close to completing a deal yesterday that would have sent Jermaine Dye to Boston for Wily Mo Pena, Manny Delcarmen, and a prospect. Word is that while the Red Sox had no qualms about parting with Pena, they weren't too keen on parting with Delcarmen or minor-leaguer Justin Masterson.
While there's a possibility the deal may still happen, only minus Delcarmen, there's also word that Dye and the White Sox could be on the verge of a contract extension.
The White Sox, according to an industry source, have made overtures about giving Dye an extension that wouldn't mortgage their long-term future. Dye can become a free agent after this season and seek a long-term extension elsewhere, even though he indicated last week that he wouldn't settle for a one-year contract.
A big issue will be the monetary value of the deal, although general manager Kenny Williams may wait until the 4 p.m. New York (3 p.m. Chicago) deadline to see if another team makes an offer that tops Boston's.
I'm hearing that the Sox are willing to go with a two-year extension, but that Dye would like it to be three-years. While I'll always love Jermaine Dye for what he's done for the White Sox, I don't think it would be wise to sign him to a three-year deal. I'm not even sure how happy I'd be with the two-year extension.
As for the Red Sox and their interest in Dye, I'm wondering what this means about David Ortiz's health. Dye has told the White Sox he doesn't want to be traded anywhere he'd be a reserve, and Boston's outfield is kind of set with Manny Ramirez, Coco Crisp, and J.D. Drew. So that means if Dye did get traded to Boston, if he were to get the playing time he wants it would have to be as a designated hitter. So maybe Big Papi is hurting a lot more than the Red Sox are willing to let on. Previously at FanHouse: Jermaine Dye Wants the Buehrle Treatment
Curtis Granderson is already having quite a year for Detroit. With nine home runs and 19 RBI, he's seemingly developed a new power approach to his game and on pace to shatter his career highs.
One of my favorite ballplayers to watch in the past few years has always been Wily Mo Pena. I'm not exactly sure how he does it, but he's hit some of the longest home runs I can ever remember seeing, both at Great American Ballpark and Fenway Park. Of course, he coupled that with some of the most spectacular swinging strikeouts I've ever seen as well. In fact, that about summarizes Wily Mo's entire career to this point; awesome home runs, awesome strikeouts and not much else. 
The Daily Jolt is a dose of baseball reality every weekday morning.
Tim Hudson enjoys pitching against the Washington Nationals. Going into last night's game, he'd made 10 starts against the team and gone 6-1 while giving up 51 hits and nine earned runs. Monday's start was a little more ragged, 10 hits over six and two-thirds innings, but still resulted in his seventh career win. For a guy facing a team for the third time in less than a month, you can't ask for much more. 
Wily Mo Pena was a pleasant surprise for the Nationals after being acquired from the Red Sox last year. In 37 games, he hit .293 (.352 OBP, .504 SLG) with eight home runs and 22 RBI. For a team that ranked dead last in the NL in total runs scored and home runs, his bat was sorely needed. 
Elijah Dukes is officially no longer Tampa Bay's problem: the oft-troubled outfielder was dealt today to the Washington Nationals for an unspecified minor leaguer. According to the Washington Post, the player the Rays are receiving isn't expected to have significant value, as the team was more interested in giving Dukes his much-needed change of scenery than anything else. 
For a season and a half, Red Sox Nation waited for the Wily Mo Pena power explosion. They saw spurts, in the form of tremendous towering home runs, but they were few and far between. And the "between" part was a mind-numbing collection of flailing swings at breaking pitches for strike three and misplayed balls in right field.
As it turns out, Austin Kearns didn't have to fear the arrival of Wily Mo Pena after all -- he just has to learn a new position. On Sunday, in Pena's first game with the Nationals, skipper Manny Acta went with Pena in right field, Kearns in center and Ryan Church in left. Kearns has seen limited duty in center before, but it sounds like that will be his new permanent position. From MLB.com
Apparently, Jim Bowden isn't going to stop until he gets every former Cincinnati Reds outfielder to come to Washington. There were rumors that Bowden was going after Adam Dunn earlier in the season. But in the end, he went after the much cheaper, and apparently much more expendable Wily Mo Pena, who the Red Sox traded to Bowden and the Nationals for a player to be named later.
The White Sox and Red Sox were very close to completing a deal yesterday that would have sent Jermaine Dye to Boston for Wily Mo Pena, Manny Delcarmen, and a prospect. Word is that while the Red Sox had no qualms about parting with Pena, they weren't too keen on parting with Delcarmen or minor-leaguer Justin Masterson.
