Free Agency is now 19 hours old and there is absolutely nothing to report for the Phillies. The Phillies are not expected to be involved in any of the 1st Tier free agents anyway and there has been a Kremlin-like silence from newly appointed GM Ruben Amaro Jr. so far. The Phillies have supposedly alreadly made one attempt to resign LF Pat Burrell just after the season ended. They are also supposedly in serious talks with free agent SP Jamie Moyer. Moyer, coming off of an impressive season in which he had a sub 4.00 ERA and led the team in wins at age 45, is looking for at least a 2 year deal. Shooting from the hip, I'll predict that Moyer signs a 2 year, $14-16 million with a good number of incentives based off innings pitched. Worst case is Moyer completely hits the wall in 09 and we simply have a very expensive 2nd pitching coach. Odds, and any rational statistical analysis, point to Jamie having a decent season in 09 and a further drop-off at age 47 in 2010. Still, considering we got him for free, he'll be worth whatever they end up paying him. Jamie might not have an ERA in the 3.00s again but he's still a very capable starter. Burrell is more of a long-shot to resign but I still see it happening. There hasn't been any buzz whatsoever on Burrell so far. He's a liability defensively and he doesn't like to DH so that limits his options considerably. He's likely a 2nd tier free agent and that will also hurt his marketability during an off-season where the national economic downturn will affect such signings. His best fit is in Philly and both he and the Front Office will likely eventually figure that out. My guess is somewhere around 3 years, $40 million. It could very well end up lower than that in the end if the market for aging LFs really drys up. The Phillies are also rumored to be looking for some cheap bullpen help, so we should expect them to sign some low key veteran relievers to take over the long reliever roles. The key parts of the 'pen are already in place so there won't be any big waves made. The bench is more likely to receive reinforcement internally from prospects like C Lou Marson and SS Jason Donald so I wouldn't expect any major signings in that department either. The Phillies could still stun us with another major Winter trade to fill their LF hole but its a longshot at this point.
Yeah, its a boring off-season so far but we did just win the World Series so I can't complain too much.
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
No comments:
Post a Comment