As first reported by Richard at Friar Faithful, Brian Giles will remain in San Diego. According to the U-T, the Padres and Giles have agreed to a 3-year deal worth $27M, plus a club option for 2009 at $9M, with a $3M buyout. (Shout out to Peter for providing the U-T link.)
Discuss. Dance. Shout with glee. Go nuts.
WOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOO!
Damn, I’m jealous. For three years, I would have loved to see him in Cubbie Blue.
I am PSYCHED. In honor of Gilly staying in town, I’m going to run around the condo naked for a little bit. If anybody needs me, that’s where I’m at.
Dex, just don’t kiss any guys full on the mouth, they might take it the wrong way.
This is some unexpected great news. I wonder if that moron Dayn Perry still thinks the Dodgers are the team to beat?
http://msn.foxsports.com/mlb/story/5117958
I’m very pysched. This is a move I had given up on already. I was already well into preparing for life without Gilly, despite him being a perfect fit here. Now, does that end the runs at position players? I guess we’ll see.
As the teams currently stand, LA may be the team to beat still.
The Giles signing definitely improves our odds, though.
Nice RBW…
Hey Richard, how about some nice statical breakdown of our new OF?
Working on it at the moment.
SBNation and Photobucket both hate me at the moment. I’ll have something up tomorrow.
More stunning than the mental image of Geoff dancing like Leif Garrett! (And I mean that in a good way.)
Where does the payroll stand currently (Chan Ho $10MM?, Klesko $10MM, Giles $9MM, Cameron $7MM, Woody $5MM?…)? It’s very un-Padrelike to substantially increase the payroll. Hard to see room left for Hoffman/Ramon/decent starting pitcher without shedding salary somewhere first.
I really didn’t think Giles would be back. I can’t remember the last time I was so happy to be wrong about something!
Grant, Hoffy & Ramon ain’t coming back – and that’s a good thing.
Welcome home, Brian Giles. Again.
Yoohoo!!!!!!!
Maybe KT can still find a taker for Chan Ho Park.
Anyone listening to MTY1090 this morning (Thurs. @ 8:15)? That was me rippin’ Scott. I’m tired of him…
Can’t stand the 1090 morning guys either, but they haven’t had a good morning crew since Mason and Ireland, a loooong time ago.
Well, Giles is a Padre. Nice work KT. This doesn’t bod well for Hoffy though. We shall see.
And exactly why are the dogbones the team to beat?
Were you the one who said that you wouldn’t listen to Kaplan talk about baseball? And that you don’t think we should bring back Hoffman just because it’s the sentimental thing to do?
Bingo Mark…
Heard you too Peter. Valiant effort but there’s no use reasoning with those guys. They are better than the afternoon crew, but that doesn’t make them any less of a homer. Their interview with Hoffy yesterday was nothing but total ass-kissing.
My one concern with not resigning Hoffman is the PR/marketing hit, and it would be interesting to know how much of the Padres initial offer was valued on Hoffman’s marketing potential. Clearly his baseball value is continuing to decline, but he does have some worth to the franchise in terms of building the overall value of the Padres.
Now is that worth the 8+ million he’s seeking? I don’t think so, and now that they have done the proper thing and resigned Giles, there will be less of a PR hit than there might have been had they let all three of the big FAs walk away. It will be interesting to see the mood tonight at the season ticket holders get-together. No doubt it will be more upbeat than this time yesterday.
With Giles back it’s going to be interesting to see what they do with the left field spot. Use a Roberts/Johnson platoon out there which would give them White Sox like defense out there plus decent offense? Or make the reported move with the Red Sox for Wells and throw Johnson out there fulltime? Either way, unless Klesko is out there, their outfield defense should be among the league’s best. Would make it foolish to bring in the fences, although with Giles resigning I assume that they will now.
Johnson full-time; He has enough wheels to play CF (not at a sublime level, but passibly, he’s a superb RF’er).
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I was just told that MTY1090 reported a 3 team swap (in discussions) that had us sending out Aki & Loretta and bringing in Nomar & Wells.
But wait, isn’t Nomar a free agent? If so, he can’t be traded…
YATB? Yet Another Third Baseman?
I would have been very happy to start our hunt for a 3Bman with Nomar rather than Vinny … but that die is now cast … and cast … and cast …
Or is the implication of this deal that Nomar would go to 2B?
2006 Outfield and Salaries:
http://sdpf.blogspot.com/2005/12/padres-2006-outfield.html
Nomar’s a free agent. He can’t be traded.
I was wondering about the whole fence thing.
I hope it says the way it is.
BTW, here’s a good story courtesy of Hardball Times:
http://tinyurl.com/asgkb
Nomar is a free agent and he was playing 3B part time with the Cubs. I don’t see how he’d play 2B. He was never that great at SS and merely adequate at 3B.
Thank you, Richard, since I guess Geoff is asleep at the switch! But could I please ask you to convert your graph from percents to actual dollars? I’m curious what the grand total is presently (pre-Hoffman/Ramon/decent starting pitcher signing). Also, no Dave Roberts or Miguel Olivo in your list?
Nomar could sign before being traded, thus saving the team who receives him in a trade from having to send compensatory picks that they would if they signed him as an FA. Just a possibility.
I remain in favor of moving the fences in.
$56,040,000 with the 13 contracts I’m aware of.
On free agency and trading… I was under the impression you couldn’t trade a player you signed until some time in June. Does that sound familiar to anyone or am I just nuts?
Richard: Thanks for the salary info.
Brian: I wasn’t sleeping, I was just resting my eyes.
I’ve been tracking salaries in a spreadsheet since the end of the season. Not much trouble.
RBW, correct, you can’t trade a guy until after May if you sign him (see Cami in TX if you all remember that situation)…
Did Nomar play 3B? I think he’d be decently solid there. And on the phone w/ Richard (not RBW) I speculated about moving him to 1B (Klesko’s probably a sunk cost anyway…).
Bruce, as I said on Scott & BR, as long as we keep think about the marketing hit, we’ll continue to sign guys who end up having Klesko/Park/Nevin albatross contracts that hurt us later. “You can ALWAYS recover from the player you don’t sign, sometimes IT TAKES LONGER to recover from the ones you DO sign.”
Nomar played third base. 33.3 AdjG. Was well below average in Rate2. I didn’t see him play so that’s all I have to go on. Nomar was a league average hitter last year. Don’t you think Klesko can still out-hit Nomar? You have to go back to 2000 for the last time Nomar had a better season at the plate than Ryno.
The Klesko/Nevin contracts are a perfect example of why you don’t sign a player based on how recognizable their names are to the fans.
How many innings @ 3B?
Don’t get me wrong, I will be very unhappy if we cave in and pay Hoffman BJ Ryan/Wagner-type money for about 45 high-leverage innings per year. That’s a complete waste of resources, and I don’t think Hoffman is worth more than 7mil/year at this point. I was just curious if the Padres offer is representative of what the Padres believe his total value to be or just representative of his baseball value because I think Trevor’s worth at the moment goes beyond his on the field performance.
While I agree that the Klesko/Nevin contracts are great examples of why you don’t sign a player based on public perception of that player, I think Hoffman’s situation is completely different from theirs. Nevin and Klesko were given those contracts under the guise that the Padres were serious about locking up their core players in a half-assed way to compete during their “rebuilding” years. The Padres did that to keep the fans in the seats while we waited for Petco.
To some extent the same situation applies to Trevor, but despite the overrated aspects of the closer, Trevor brings much more to the table in terms of public perception than those two DHs, especially since he will be gunning for the all-time saves record. Keeping him in a Padres uniform as he does so will bring national attention to the organization and bring out larger crowds to the ballpark. There’s value in that, but is it worth dishing out overly generous amounts of money. No, but I think the Padres are missing out if they don’t offer him a bit more eventually. I think that 7/mil is reasonable, but by no means should the team bid against itself, and at the moment that appears to be the situation. And if Hoffman keeps acting like a baby in the media by demanding big money and respect, then the Padres absolutely should walk away.
Sorry for the length of that last post, it didn’t look that long when I wrote it!
Bruce, I’m going to quote you…
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While I agree that the Klesko/Nevin contracts are great examples of why you don’t sign a player based on public perception of that player, I think Hoffman’s situation is completely different from theirs. Nevin and Klesko were given those contracts under the guise that the Padres were serious about locking up their core players in a half-assed way to compete during their “rebuilding” years. The Padres did that to keep the fans in the seats while we waited for Petco.
Keeping him in a Padres uniform as he does so will bring national attention to the organization and bring out larger crowds to the ballpark.
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Back then (Klesko/Nevin) we needed public perception to get the Ballpark Initiative (“Yes on C”) passed.
Now we need to win. People win come when we win (remember the school-night sellouts in May during the hot streak?) and they’ll stay away (except on nights when Trevor’s gunning for a milestone).
People want to see a winner. They’ll bitch and moan and complain when Trevor leaves, but they’ll show up when we’re winning. Re-signing Trevor at more than 2 years per (6ish is my limit) would be a huge risk. ESPECIALLY when his skills ARE diminishing!
Ugh, I wish this had an edit feature…
***Correction***
Now we need to win. People will come when we win (remember the school-night sellouts in May during the hot streak?) and they’ll stay away when we’re not winning (except on nights when Trevor’s gunning for a milestone).
Nomar is not a free agent, Cubs have given him permission to explore opportunities elsewhere. He would play 2nd since Loretta would be leaving in said trade. This trade would include Aki, Loretta, Klesko and Stauffer/Eaton for Wells and Nomar/Soriano and RedSox prospect/Adrian Gonzalez.
296.7 Innings for Nomar at third.
.934 FPCT, 2.59 RF, .716 ZR if anyone cares about those numbers.
Prop. C passed well before Klesko or Nevin were on the team. But I do think they were re-signed as evidence of “commitment,” in addition to being very, very good hitters before their contracts were extended.
We just got unlucky that neither of them could stay healthy. They’re not even that old, and players seem to stay productive longer these days. Not bad deals.
Nomar isn’t on Chicago’s 40-Man Roster. He was playing under a one-year contract in ’05. How is he not a free agent?
Yes, Nomar is a FA. You don’t just get permission to look elsewhere.
Geoff – You are forgiven — musta been all that Leif dancing!
After some Googling, it turns out that Dave Roberts and Miguel Olivo are both arb-eligible. Speculation is that Roberts could earn over $2MM and I seem to recall the number $850K for Olivo. Add those two to your $56MM and you’re at $59MM with a decent chunk o’roster remaining to be completed.
Agree with Tom Waits — Yes on C passed in 1998. Nevin didn’t even join the team until ’99 and Klesko in ’00. Those big contracts both came much later still, following back-to-back strong seasons by both guys, particularly Nevin. They were both in their early 30s, hit with power, good averages and played 145 games/year. Considering all that, both were good contracts at the time. It was horrible luck that not one but both got hurt.
Don’t lump those contracts in with the Chan Hos and Darren Drieforts, where we could see the train wreck coming.
Why offer DR arbitration?
Is $2MM that much to offer a #4 OF (the role in which he’s excelled), especially as insurance if Johnson hits a sophomore jinx?
I might pay that much to insure we never have to watch Miguel Olivo out there ever again!
Back to Nomar at 2B — Is Barfield so un-ready-for-prime-time that they’d trade for Nomar or Soriano, presumably keeping Barfield in AAA for another full season?
Two unrelated thoughts:
$2M strikes me as high for a bench player.
Soriano is lousy. He can’t play second base.
Recap from tonight’s season ticket holder function. Leitner MC’ed; painful.
Alderson led off and did not have much to say which was revealing of the coming year other than we “are not retooling, not rebuilding, we’re reloading.” He also mentioned the importance of FA’s like Giles and Hoffman. He did NOT mention anyone else.
KT followed and was again very general about coming plans, but he did say we wouldn’t have a good feel for this club until late December or early January. He emphasized coming trades more than he mentioned FA signings. He played up Castilla’s 3B defense, not particularly his offense.
The third guy to speak was Grady Fuson, and to me he was by far the most interesting. He was very down to earth, ad libbed and joked with the crowd to begin with, but then had very cogent prepared remarks he delivered with ease and confidence. He remarked on the development of our new academy in the DR, which will be used for all Latin/South American and Carribean prospects. He briefly and clearly summarized the importance of developing a sound system which can support the big league club year after year by supplying it players to put on the field and to use in trades. Excellent!
Bochy spoke and said nothing very interesting although he also remarked on Castilla’s defense.
I skipped out early on during the Q&A session which followed, but did catch two interesting comments. Alderson stated they are going to move in the RF alley 10-12 feet next year and see how it plays. KT said, in a roundabout way so as not to tamper, they are pursuing Wells, and when asked about the rotation next year made no mention of Astacio but did mention Stauffer and Hensley as possibilities. Sounds like an interesting winter to come and an interesting season to follow.
Tom Gordon to the Phillies with a three-year, $18-million contract. Interesting to see if the Padres throw in for a third year but I bet they’d be willing to match that for Hoffman (Sorry, Peter.)
Isn’t $2MM about what was paid for Burroughs last year? I’m not suggesting we should always have a multi-millionaire bench guy but it has been done in the past.
Holy Cow! You beat me to it Brian. If that’s the market rate for 38 year old closers, how can you bring Hoffman back for less than that?