26Oct/083:53 PM

Off-season action for the Diamondbacks

By Jim McLennan

This winter looks likely to be a good bit more active for the Arizona Diamondbacks than the 2007-08 off-season. After the team was eliminated from the playoffs, they didn’t really have all that much to do in order to prepare for the coming season: the acquisition of Dan Haren and the departure of closer Jose Valverde were about the only moves that seemed of importance at the time [with hindsight of course, the trade of Carlos Quentin to the White Sox was, perhaps, even bigger]. A year later, and there are several decisions which need to be addressed between now and Opening Day. Here’s a quick sweep over the main ones.

1. Who’s on Second?
Orlando Hudson is a free-agent, and despite the injury which ended his season early, looks set to receive a big pay-day from somewhere else. I don’t really mind that too much. He’ll be 31 before Christmas and, while still likely to be productive for a couple of seasons, it’s likely whoever signs him will get at least one or two years of offensive decline, depending on the length of the deal. This is already apparent in O-Dawg’s defense, where the objective evidence, as measured by stats like Range Factor, is already trending towards average, if not below. Whatever deal he gets will be over-valued, so I’m at ease with him going elsewhere, and Arizona getting draft picks as a result.

The question then becomes, who plays second for Arizona? With all due respect, and much as I love the guy, Augie Ojeda is not the answer. A .642 OPS last season - and that’s actually better than his career average - won’t cut it for production at the plate, though he will still likely have a role as a bench player. The list of free-agents isn’t exactly overwhelming either: the only one younger than Hudson is Felipe Lopez, who hit .234 for Washington before being cut [St. Louis picked him up and, admittedly, he did well for them]. There’s not much in the farm system either: after the trade of Emilio Bonifacio, getting the starts at second for Tucson was career minor-leaguer Don Kelly, who’ll be 29 by Opening Day and has never played a single game in the majors.

The two possibilities are a trade - something almost impossible to predict - or shifting Mark Reynolds from third to second-base. The latter in intriguing; while his major-league leading number of errors might have you wincing, most of those were on throws to first, something that should be alleviated by a move to half the distance or less. There’s no doubting Reynolds’ athleticism, and he did play the position sporadically throughout his minor-league career. Whether that will convert to the big leagues is the key question: his bat was a potent one, and if he proves capable of turning the double-play with Stephen Drew, this would seem the most likely solution.

2. Will Randy return?
Johnson’s performance in 2008 proved a small wonder, passing all expectation in terms of his durability, even though he didn’t reach the goal of 300 career victories. He finished five short, despite his first nine-inning outing in over three years, on the final day of the season against Colorado, but the back issues which curtailed 2007 were all but absent. The Big Unit had an ERA of 2.41 after the All-Star break, sixth best in the National League [min. 60 innings]. Like Hudson, he’s going to be a free-agent - the question is both, can the Diamondbacks afford to bring him back and, can the Diamondbacks afford not to bring him back?

The team is due to get some payroll relief with the expiration of Johnson’s current deal, which paid him $10m this year, Hudson ($6.25m), and also the merciful end of Russ Ortiz, who got paid $8.5m by the team to sit on his useless ass and recover from surgery, having been waived in June 2006, less than half-way through a four-year deal. It’s generally though payroll will receive a small bump too. However, against that, many of the current players under contract are due to receive increases - Dan Haren’s new agreement, gives him $7.5m for next year, compared to $4m in 2008. Those all total around $13m, eating significantly into available funds.

The question is really how much of a home-town discount Johnson is prepared to give the team with which he won a World Series, threw a perfect game, etc. If they can agree on a figure, perhaps around $8m, then I think everyone would be happy, though the D-backs might have to forage down the back of Ken Moorad’s sofa to get together that much money. But if Johnson demands eight figures - and even at his age, based on his 2008 performance, it’s not unreasonable to think he’d get it elsewhere - then we could have an impasse. Again, even with the likely arrival of Max Scherzer, there isn’t much to look forward to coming up in the farm system. But that might change…

3. Is it just me, or is there a draft in here?
Almost as important as who the Diamondbacks sign, is who they don’t sign. Because, to help maintain competitive balance, if you offer a free-agent player arbitration, and he declines, you receive one or two draft picks in compensation. What you get depends on a) the player signed, and b) the team they sign with, so it’s important to keep an eye on this over the winter, as Arizona could end up with as many as nine picks in the first, second and supplementary [between the first and second] rounds of the June draft, though initial reports suggest it’s going to be a pretty weak selection of players].

Free agents are divided, based on their performance over the previous two years, as Type A, Type B or unclassified. You get nothing for losing the last category. Type A players will get us a supplemental pick and a compensatory pick from the signing team. Type B free agents get us just a supplemental round pick. The compensatory picks are the highest available the signing team has, but the first 15 picks in the first round can’t be lost: a team would give us their second round pick instead. And If a team owes multiple draft picks to different teams, the team whose player had a higher score gets the higher ranked pick.

Of our free agents, Hudson, Dunn and Cruz look likely to be Type A, with Lyon a Type B. If we don’t sign any of them, that would therefore be seven additional picks to Arizona, in addition to our own two: nine of the top 80 or thereabouts. Quite a haul, as we look to rebuild the farm system. So not signing free agents is not necessarily a bad thing. Oh, and in case you’re wondering Randy Johnson, while a free agent, is unclassified, largely because his 2007 season was so poor, and the system uses two years of results. If we sign him this season, then at the end of next year, his status will be based on 2008 and 2009, and might be much better.

4. The crowded outfield.
This is one of those issues that could end up solving itself to a certain extent. But, in an ideal world, we would have Adam Dunn at first next year, with an outfield consisting of Eric Byrnes, Conor Jackson, Justin Upton and Chris Young. Unfortunately, you’ve probably noticed four outfield players named and, I need hardly point out, only three spots. Even with the odds being against Dunn getting re-signed, we may well see Chad Tracy the full-time incumbent at first, though that depends on whether Reynolds gets moved to second-base or not.

We are, as you can see, dealing with a domino-like situation of positions and players here, which makes it extremely difficult to come up with any accurate predictions at this point. One thing seems sure: Eric Byrnes has made it abundantly clear [link goes to MP3 of interview] that he isn’t going anywhere, saying, “No Trade Clause to any team. If you try to trade me, I have my middle finger up in the air so don’t even worry about it. Save the phone call.” Since it seems safe to assume Young, Upton and Jackson aren’t going anywhere, this one will be interesting.

It would also seem to all but rule out any chance of Luis Gonzalez returning to the team. He expressed interest in returning, but there seems to be little chance of this. Not only is there no credible spot for him on the roster, it appears that a number of the young players [Drew and Young in particular] were rubbed the wrong way by the veteran during his previous tenure. Now that these some young players are the core of the team, it would be extremely risky for clubhouse chemistry, if management were to bring back Gonzalez for a last hurrah, simply to satisfy the nattering nabobs of negativity on the AZ Central message boards.

5. A bullpen that’s full of it.
“It” in this case being reliability. Whatever the cause, there’s no doubt that the 2008 version was a good deal less effective than the one in 2007: last year, the relief corps had a record was 17-28, compared to 30-19 when we won the pennant. Oddly, the ERA was only marginally higher, at 4.09 compared to 3.95, so it seems as if the raw talent wasn’t much changed: perhaps they just gave up runs at the most inopportune moments. We’ll likely be losing Juan Cruz, who posted the lowest ERA at 2.61 and struck out 71 in only 51.2 innings, a rate better than almost everyone else in the majors. And Brandon Lyon is also eligible as a free-agent, though whether anyone wants him or not, remains to be seen.

Chad Qualls is currently the incumbent in the closer’s spot, and he performed admirably in the role, converting seven straight chances. He didn’t allow a run in the final month of the season, throwing 14.2 scoreless innings and allowing only six hits and one walk, while fanning 13. Behind him, Tony Peña looks likely to start 2008 as he did this season, in the set-up role. The key question is how Jon Rauch bounces back from his dreadful performance since being traded from Washington. He had a 6.56 ERA and was tagged with an 0-6 record in only 23.1 innings, the long-ball in particularly proving problematic. He’s under AZ control through 2010, so a rebound from him would be nice.

The other four bullpen spots are more or less open. Leo Rosales and Jailen Peguero both did okay in their time with us, while Doug Slaten remains the LOOGY of choice, in part due to a lack of credible other options. The long-relief and/or mop-up role looks to be between Yusmeiro Petit and Edgar Gonzalez, assuming the latter makes a good return from a strained elbow. It’d be nice if two or three of those turned out to be solid options for Melvin to turn to, late in games.