Marking Time

                                          This time of the year is the worst for me. Little or no baseball news. An occasional minor league free agent signing or two. The Royals and Reds trade was somewhat of a surprise. Teams usually wait until the winter meetings to make their first moves. Major free agents usually start signing during the meetings. The Dodgers have some roster flexibility after non-tendering Honeywell and Logue. I also have to believe they will make a trade or two at the winter meetings. 

                                          As usual this time of year, the rumors run rampant. One I keep seeing on different news streams is that the Dodgers have a real interest in Blake Snell.  Despite the fact that Snell is represented by Scott Boras, if he takes a shorter deal with a high AAV, the Dodgers might be interested. Snell will be 32 when the season starts. He is a high strikeout pitcher, but he also has stretches where he walks a ton. If he takes three years, the Dodgers might be interested. I feel they won’t offer long-term deals to pitchers in their late 20’s or early 30’s. The five-year extension for Glasnow was a big gamble. 

                                        They just won a championship, but the work for 25 is starting now. They have holes to fill, and the resources to fill them. They have in my opinion at this point, not much help coming from the minors. Rushing has played about 30 games in the outfield. Does his bat play strong enough to take over LF all the time? Doubtful, and no one knows at all how his defense will be. They might give Outman another shot in centerfield. His defense is fine. His bat last season was abysmal. But he has shown he can hit in the majors. He just needs to prove it again. Pages had stretches where he played very well. His BAbip was .304. His walk rate, 6.6% needs to be better and he struck out 24% of the time. He did have a 2-homer game against the Mets in the NLCS. I look for some improvement next season, but he is not a centerfielder. 

                                       One other rumor is that the Dodgers are really interested in Willie Adames.  But will they pony up the five or six years at 160 plus? Adames has a lot of power, 31 homers last season. He strikes out a little more than 25% of the time. He can steal some bases and his defense is solid. Or do the Dodgers use Edman there along with Rojas? One thing we all know AF loves is moving parts. Unless they trade for Crochet, I really do not see a block buster trade coming. And we all read that Gomes said they were going to concentrate of starting pitching. 

                                       Winter meetings start in exactly 14 days. We know the Dodgers might lose a player or two in the Rule-5 draft. One thing for sure, the free-agent players and their agents will be meeting with teams the entire time. One thing I would enjoy seeing for once from AF is a quick strike for a major piece of the puzzle. Say re-sigh Teo or make a big splash trade for a pitcher. Newsweek, not exactly a hotbed of good info, proposed this trade, Dodgers get Crochet, Sox get Rushing, Freeland and Morales. Uh, do not see that happening. AF might trade one top prospect in a trade, but 3? Nope. 

                                       I want to take this moment to wish all of our readers a very Happy Thanksgiving. I will be heading out to California for a few weeks on the second of December. I will have my laptop with me, but doing research on it is not exactly easy. Screen way too small. I will keep abreast of all the moves LA might make. As usual, I do not see any urgency to make a major move at this point. There are a lot of options out there, and there will be more. 

                                       If LA does not sign Teo, I could see them trying Santander. Switch hitter with a lot of pop. I see more additions to the bullpen, and some guys signed to be depth pieces at AAA.