Archives › Craig Calcaterra

It’s early to be doing this, but $8.5 million for Rollins is a really good deal, even if he’s not the player he was a couple of years ago. FanGraphs’ magic-player-value-contraption has him being worth north of $10 million in 2009, and that was probably his worst year since he became a regular, at least…

Chicago had been waiting to move Milton Bradley before bringing in someone else to take his place in the outfield. Now they’ve moved Bradley, and according to Dallas Morning News blogger Evan Grant, they’re close to signing Marlon Byrd. Grant says what a lot of others have said: the Cubs were interested in both Byrd…

Outside of the Big Bust Challenge Trade, there isn’t a lot happening in baseball today, so let’s look at little stuff. Stuff like Firestone becoming the Official Tire of Major League Baseball.  I just left the business world, so I don’t care about the synergies and cross-promotional opportunities involved here, but there were still a…

Due to the vagaries of geography and time zones and stuff, we easterners don’t get to hear a lot about what happens in Seattle. Oh, we get the big stories: Ichiro is good, Steve Largent has sure hands, the Denny Party has found a new place to settle — but the little stuff often escapes…

Anyone who has a strong enough constitution to be able to follow the Washington Nationals on a day-in-day-out basis knows that the only nice thing about it is getting to read Chico Harlan, who covers them for the Washington Post. He writes one of your better big-paper-affiliated baseball blogs, and always seems to have his…

Jim Bowden left his last baseball job under a cloud of incompetence and corruption, and the last time we heard from him he was wearing bright-seamed designer jeans and taking the Nationals to task for signings he himself made.  But hey, a rumor is a rumor, right! Take it away Jim: Despite denials…Yanks are in…

I usually wait for the blogs to start updating before I’ll write a “What they’re saying about . . .” post, but this Milton Bradley business has brought out everyone’s inner-Henny Youngman, and the one-liners are flying.  A sampling: Jesse Spector: “Cubs getting rid of a guy because he’s a pain in the ass. Mariners…

Larry Stone of the Seattle Times tweets that the Cubs are actually going to trade Milton Bradley to the Mariners for Carlos Silva.  An announcement could come later today. Holy Moses, it was more than just a rumor. Now all Seattle has to do is figure out where to play him. Left field seems the…

Monday through Wednesday, MLB.com was running a series about fixing the draft, dealing with international free agency, trading draft picks and hard slotting of draft pics, which I talked about here, here and here. It’s possible that I’ve gone temporarily insane, but I am certain that earlier in the week they had been scheduled to…

Cliff Lee thought he’d spend the rest of his baseball playing life in Philadelphia, saying “[a]t first I didn’t believe it. I thought we were working out an extension with the Phillies. I thought I would spend the rest of my career there.”  Ruben Amaro had other ideas, obviously, and it sounds like he was…

Yesterday we relayed word that the Dodgers and Reds were discussing a trade for Aaron Harang. Last night Yahoo!’s Tim Brown reported, based on word from a team source that such a deal was “not happening.” Probably for the best, at least from L.A.’s perspective. Because really, why would a team in the Dodgers’ financial…

That’s what Mark Feinsand of the Daily News reports, however it still wasn’t enough to get a deal done for Damon as the Yankees wouldn’t pay him $13 million per, even for two years. Assuming this is true, this is a case of Boras seriously misreading the market for his client, and ultimately doing him…

Not the San Francisco Giants. The City of San Francisco: City Attorney Dennis Herrera gave Major League Baseball a little chin music on Thursday, firing off a letter suggesting San Francisco would sue the league if it approves moving the Oakland Athletics to San Jose . . . “I need to make sure the interests…

Angelswin.com (found via MLB.com) reports that the Angels are interested in Braves’ starter Javier Vazquez.  That’s well and good, but the article only makes brief mention of Vazquez’s limited no trade clause that allows him to veto a deal to western division teams. A very personal clause for Vazquez, as the entire reason for it…

SI’s Jon Heyman writes that, despite the fact that that all of the other teams that need a left fielder are not really interested in Jason Bay, there is a “mystery team” in the running for him, making life harder for the Mets.  At the risk of falling into conspiracy theory land, I’m going to…

Yesterday I noted that Roy Halladay’s 9 year-old son is the one who allegedly pulled the trigger on the deal sending him to Philly and agreeing to the contract extension.  According to Baseball Prospectus’ Joe Sheehan, little Braden Halladay really made a bad deal: The story here is that one of the best players in…

If you happen to be in the greater Champaign, Illinois metroplex, I will be on WDWS 1400 with host Brian Moline talking about the St. Louis Cardinals and all things baseball in, oh, about ten minutes.  If you’re otherwise indisposed but just can’t get bear to miss me, they’ll have a link up to a…

Remember Gookie Dawkins?  Formerly his claim to fame was taking over for Pokey Reese as the most ridiculously-named infielder on the Cincinnati Reds. In a serious lowering of standards, the title was assumed by Ray Olmedo upon Dawkins’ departure prior to the 2003 season.* But Dawkins now has a new claim to fame: he’s been…

The New York Post’s Joel Sherman tweets so. The Seattle’s Times’ Larry Stone expands, though there really isn’t anything there to illuminate how serious the Mariners’ interest really is. The Mariners have been linked to everyone, it seems, so this could be anything from real interest to phony Boras-leverage-creation interest to some random mention of…

Mark Healey of Baseball Digest reports that the Mets and the Reds are in “serious talks” about a trade involving Bronson Arroyo. Nothing is likely to get done quickly, however, because according to Healey’s source there are multiple other players involved — including more Reds — and because the Mets “have a player under contract…

On Tuesday, Miami-Dade County approved proposals for $5.3 million in public art projects for the Marlins new ballpark.  They rejected my Jeff Conine fresco — apparently they didn’t believe me when I told them that the nudity would be tasteful — but they did approve some jumping fish contraption: It’s still conceptual and difficult to…

My neighbor has a 9 year-old they won’t let operate the damn remote, but little Braden Halladay was the decision maker that changed the course of three franchises. Go kids: “It’s such a family decision,” Roy Halladay’s wife was saying after yesterday’s press conference at Citizens Bank Park made it official. “We were sitting with…

This morning we passed along word that the Orioles are getting into the Matt Holliday bidding.  If they are, they’re doing it kind of like how I write in insanely low bids at silent auctions in the almost non-existent chance that I’ll get, say, an autographed team photo of the 1969 Seattle Pilots for ten…

I don’t know that there’s any trade rumor with as little actual merit creating as much buzz, sturm und drang as the Adrian Gonzalez to the Sox business.  Even the most wild rumor-passer-oners in the blogosphere all note that nothing has really happened except the passive acknowledgment of general overall compatibility between the Sox and…

Washington Post columnist Thomas Boswell is a big fan of the new committee tasked with looking at rules changes, pace of game issues and the like.  In fact, he’s so enthusiastic he offers a dozen or so of his own suggestions, most of which are aimed at speeding up the game.  On the whole I…