Footprints in the Snow is FanHouse's look at the paths to be forged by MLB teams this winter as they look ahead to 2010.
At $149,373,987, the New York Mets had the National League's highest payroll in 2009. Their fourth place finish in the NL East, 23 games back in the standings, might suggest that the cash Omar Minaya dished out wasn't money well spent. A closer look reveals a team harassed all season by injuries and a group of hitters that could never find a long-term answer to produce runs.
In the outfield, Carlos Beltran had a potential All-Star season broken up, playing in only 81 games due to a knee injury. In fact, only Jeff Francoeur amassed more than 500 at-bats among Mets outfielders, and he was a mid-season import from the Atlanta Braves.
The infield wasn't spared either as mainstays Carlos Delgado and Jose Reyes had their seasons cut extremely short due to injuries. Even staff ace Johan Santana ended his season early with elbow issues.
The good news is that most of these players are expected to be healthy and ready to go for spring training.
Footprints in the Snow is FanHouse's look at the paths to be forged by MLB teams this winter as they look ahead to 2010.
Take your hat off to the Angels for the way they weathered the dual gut punches of Nick Adenhart's death and a raft of early-season injuries to advance all the way to the ALCS this year. The biggest reason why was an offense that defied its reputation for playing small ball all the way to a franchise-record 883 runs. That, in turn, led to a much better than expected record and helped hide the fact that their pitching staff was fairly average.
That makes two straight years where the Angels wildly outperformed expectations, and general manager Tony Reagins will be hard-pressed to put together a team that does it a third time. Chone Figgins, Vladimir Guerrero and John Lackey are all free agents who figure to have a lot of callers in a weak year for free talent, which means that the team will likely be dealing with at least one significant change to their core group.
With the Rangers on the rise, the AL West could be ripe for a changing of the guard in 2010.
Footprints in the Snow is FanHouse's look at the paths to be forged by MLB teams this winter as they look ahead to 2010.
When you're the Yankees, the only acceptable end to a season is one that ends with a dogpile on the pitcher's mound and a champagne-soaked locker room. The 2009 season had quite an acceptable ending, then, although it isn't one they'll be able to celebrate for too long.
The nature of expecting a championship every year is that the work toward building the next champion begins before Broadway is cleared of confetti. This year's decisions will revolve around a trio of aging stars from the title squad as well as figuring out how they'll use their leverage as baseball's richest team to improve themselves for run at a 28th title.
As always, the latter means that you'll be seeing a lot of Mad Lib headlines with "The Yankees are interested in _______," and, as always, just about any one of them could wind up being true.
CHICAGO -- On a day this week when the stock market had one of the encouraging spikes investors have enjoyed more frequently over the past few months, Kenny Williams let out a sarcastic cheer for what it meant to baseball.
"Let's go, let's party," he said. "We've got cash again."
Then, the White Sox general manager quickly returned to reality, at least the version of reality that he and his colleagues have been describing this week at the GM Meetings.
"I don't think it works that way," he said. "We might need to see six months of recovery before we buy into that. We need an advertiser or a sponsor or two to come back to us."
Editor's Note: FanHouse's Jeff Fletcher contributed to this report
CHICAGO -- The Reds' need to slash payroll, according to a major league source, could lead them to explore trading second baseman Brandon Phillips as well as right-handers Bronson Arroyo and Aaron Harang.
Cincinnati's 2009 payroll was about $71 million. General manager Walt Jocketty said during a break Tuesday at the GM Meetings that he "might" have to move some high-salaried players to meet the 2010 goal.
"We're going to probably have less to spend this year than we have in the past," Jocketty told FanHouse. "It just depends on how [ticket] sales go this offseason."
NEW YORK -- The same nasty East Coast weather that seemed to throw the Angels off their game at the beginning of the American League Championship Series now may have worked in their favor.
The reason: John Lackey.
The Yankees already had their ace, CC Sabathia, lined up to pitch Game 7. But because Saturday's rain in New York pushed Game 6 to Sunday and Game 7 to Monday, Lackey could now pitch Game 7 on three days' rest.
"If we get Lackey going in Game 7," Scott Kazmir said, "we have a lot of confidence in that game, that's for sure."
In Advanced Scouting, MLB FanHouse's professional talent evaluator breaks down the playoffs from a scouting perspective.
Pointing a finger at a manager is an easy thing to do after a heart-wrenching loss. Sometimes the hard truth of a loss is little more than a lack of execution by the players. The Angels' Game 5 victory came down to a poorly executed pitch from the hand of Phil Hughes. That simple of an answer might be difficult to swallow, but that single offering has, at best, delayed the Yankees' return to the World Series.
Make no mistake, New York is at this point in the postseason because of the performance of its young relievers. But, youthful mistakes and jitters cost the Yankees dearly Thursday night. Until Game 6 begins on Saturday night, the pitch every Yankee should be replaying in their head is a fastball in a 1-2 down the heart of the plate to Vladimir Guerrero.
John Lackey was angry enough at his own manager to say some things that even an amateur lip-reader could tell were not family safe.
Torii Hunter was mad enough to chuck his glove into the Angels dugout and create a scene after a four-run lead had turned into a two-run deficit in one forgettable inning.
"I was pretty upset about them scoring those runs," Hunter said. "Everyone was."
In Advanced Scouting, MLB FanHouse's professional talent evaluator breaks down the playoffs from a scouting perspective.
Few pitchers in baseball proudly carry the title of ace, but CC Sabathia is one of them. If there was any doubt about that fact, it was all put to rest on Friday night against the Angels. Between his absolute mastery of the Los Angeles lineup and the pace of the game that New York set in the early innings, this was the formula every team wants to avoid in order to hang with the Yankees.
With the Angels unable to get runners on base to start the engines of their running game and the Yankees doing what they do best by taking pitches, this was a Yankee-paced game. If the Yankees are allowed to dictate tempo, they will come out on top more often than not.
Terry Francona announced the Red Sox rotation for the series on Sunday as well. Jon Lester will take the ball in Game 1 to face Lackey, while Josh Beckett will start Game 2 followed by the young Clay Bucholz in Game 3. The question is, who will Boston's fourth starter be?
Footprints in the Snow is FanHouse's look at the paths to be forged by MLB teams this winter as they look ahead to 2010.
Footprints in the Snow
Footprints in the Snow
Editor's Note: FanHouse's Jeff Fletcher contributed to this report
NEW YORK -- The same nasty East Coast weather that seemed to throw the Angels off their game at the beginning of the American League Championship Series now may have worked in their favor.
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