Fair Territory: Padres sign Nick Castellanos, Zac Gallen is back in Arizona, Harper vs Dombrowski?

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Speaker 1: Welcome everyone to the Monday edition of Fair Territory. I'm Ken Rosenthal. Interesting weekend for a couple of reasons. Well, one because we saw two teams in the NL West not acting like they're conceding to the Dodgers, acting like they're actually trying. And these are two teams I'm talking about, the San Diego Padres and Arizona Diamondbacks that generally do try, at least in recent times, the last four or five years or so, maybe Arizona going back even further. Their owner Ken Kendrick has repeatedly shown an interest in raising payroll when he deems it necessary, and the Padres, starting under their late owner Peter Sidler, have also been aggressive. But let's start with the Padres because they're in a little bit of a different situation now with the team for sale, with new ownership coming in and the current ownership not spending the way the previous owner Peter Sidler did, and the Padres under general manager Aj Preller, were in something of a financial bind the entire offseason. They signed Michael Kingting to a three years, seventy five million dollar free agent contract. This is after losing Dylan Cease after losing you Darvish to injury. They knew that their rotation was thin, and then in a twenty four hour or so period over the weekend starting Friday, kind of going into Saturday, they signed Nick Castillanos to a deal that will pay him only the minimum salary. At least from the Padres perspective, the Phillies will pick up the rest. And then they added Griffin Canning and they added Hermann Marquez, two accomplished pitchers at times in their careers. Marquez, of course, from twenty seventeen to twenty one, was really good for the Colorado Rockies. So where did the Padres stand. I'm not sure exactly. I don't know if they're going to be quite as good because even with the additions of Miguel Andrew Harr and now Castillanos, their offense that should be okay. I don't have a much of a problem with the offense and where it's going to be. I do still worry about the pitching. We've got Joe Musgrove coming off Tommy John surgery. This will be his first year back. We've got Griffin Canning coming off on a ruptured achilles tendon. He had surgery We don't know if he'll be ready for opening day. Herman, as I said, has not been good since twenty one. Last year was his first year back from Tommy John. His stuff was diminished. Tristan McKenzie, they picked him up on a minor league deal. He was dfa'd by the Guardians last year. And Marco Gonzalez did not pitch last season after undergoing flexers tendon surgery at the end of twenty twenty four. So let's take a look at their additions and their subtractions and we can kind of gauge where the padres are right now. It's an interesting series of moves, no question about it. As I said, they resigned Michael King. You can see their additions right there, and you can see who they lost. They lost some pretty big pieces. Dylan Cees, Robert Suarez. They'll still have a terrific bullpen without him, Luisa Rayes, Ryan O'Hearn, who was good after they acquired him at the deadline, Elios Diaz and Tyler. Now, the interesting part of the Castianas edition is, of course, what happened at the end of his tenure in Philadelphia. It was not pretty, and it was not pretty going back to that incident in Miami when he brought a beer into the dugout and of course had words with manager Rob Thompson. That lingered the entire season. It festered the entire season. His teammates turned on him, the coaches turned on him, and ultimately the front office turned on him. He gets a new start. And the one thing about the Padres, they are a team that welcomes any and all into their clubhouse. They are a team of players with different personalities, and they have always encouraged their players, for better and at times for worse, to display their personalities, to be themselves. So I would expect that Castianas would be a good addition for the Padres in terms of the clubhouse. I don't know that that's going to be a problem. What is a question is whether he is again going to hit. Below average offensive player last year, never a good defender. So that's the question I have with casting on us. I like Andrew har he is going to hit, but the Padres much different mix. They have a lot of options in the rotation. They don't need to hit on all of them. If one of two of those guys that I mentioned pitches, well, they should be in decent shape. Remember, they've got King Pavetta and Musgrove at the top of the rotation. Randy Vasquez proved a decent back of the rotation option last year. So here they go trying to do what they can in the NL West. And as I mentioned at the top of the show, the Arizona Diamondbacks are also trying to do what they can in the NL West. They were the fallback position for one of their own, Zach Gollan, who was a free agent, rejected a qualifying offer from the Diamondbacks and then signed back with the Diamondbacks when he couldn't get the multi year deal he wanted. Took the qualifying offer in terms of guaranteed money twenty two point zero two to five million, but because some of that has deferred, the present value is about eighteen point seven million, so he actually got less than he turned down. Not a great outcome for Gallon, but for the Diamondbacks it's a really good outcome because they have in their rotation right now. They have, of course Gallon, they have at the top of the rotation as well, Merrill Kelly. He'll be their opening day starter. Brendan fought Edward Rodriguez and Ryan Nelson, as well as Michael Soroka, who they re signed as a free agent I'm sorry, signed as a free agent back in December. I believe it was He can now supplement the bullpen if that is the route they choose to go with him, if they stay healthy through spring training. As I wrote in The Athletic on Sunday, he has incentives in both starting and relief appearances, so he can go either way and still earn more money than the seven point five million he was offered. The Diamondbacks also have the strong possibility of three important pitchers returning from Tommy John surgery sometime this season. I'm talking, of course, about Corbyn Burns and about the two relievers, Justin Martinez and AJ Puck. They're gonna be okay, I would think from a pitching perspective, especially now with the return of Gallon on top of the return of Kelly, the question probably will be more offensive. And they've signed Noan Arnatto actually they traded for him, signed for first base Carlos Santana. They have some questions still about what exactly is going to be, especially without Corby and Carroll to start their season with their offense. But the Diamondbacks two like the Padres, as I mentioned earlier, they're trying and that's what you want to see from your teams, even the teams that aren't as wealthy as the Dodgers. And you saw the interesting comments from Bryce Harper and Manny Machado on Sunday about the Dodgers. Both endorsed what the Dodgers are doing, said it was good for the games that more owners should do what they're doing. Well, of course, their players, we get it. They want the current system to remain intact. They want all teams to spend. But there is a segment of the fan base nationally internationally that feels kind of the same way. So that's a topic for another day. We'll discuss that at length as we go on. Finally, in this first segment, I want to get to the Orioles because the Orioles made a move late last week as well, signing Chris Bassett, free agent right hander, to a one year, eighteen point five million dollar deal. This sort of caps off their off season from a pitching perspective, a starting pitching perspective. They've added Shane bas They've added Zach Efflin brought him back, and they've added Bassett to a group that already included Trevor Rodgers, Kyle Bradish and Dean Kramer. They've got Kade Povich, They've got Tyler Wells. They should have sufficient depth. The question that is going to follow the Orioles all season, and it's the question that I still have about them. Did they do enough with that rotation. They certainly brought in some new people and people that should help. But we entered the off season saying what did they need? A bona fide number one. Bradish is in his first full season coming off the tim John Trevor Rodgers never thrown more than one hundred and thirty three innings in a season. These are guys who are top of the rotation potential pitchers and if times in their careers have shown that. But are they proven top of the rotation guys? Not quite now. The Oils were in the mix for Sis, for Valdez, for Rangers Suarez, but they ultimately did not come away with any of them. They did not trade for Freddie Peralta. So this is going to be the question with the Orioles. They should have a really good offense with the additions of Pete Alnzo and Taylor Ward, they could even trade, as I wrote on Sunday, either Kobe Mayo or Ryan Mountcastle. That's how deep they are in right handed corner infielders. But at the same time, they're gonna have to pitch, and that's going to be the key thing for them. They're gonna have to do it both from a rotation perspective and a bullpen perspective. They've got Kittridge back, They've signed Ryan Helsley. They are what looks like on paper to be a formidable team in the Al East. But as with every team, as with the Padres, as we discussed earlier, their pitching is kind of on a precipice. So I like where the Oriols are. I would love it if they had landed one of the top of the rotation guys. But remember as well, each of those pitchers Valdez, Sies and Suarez had questions about them. So nothing is a sure thing in this game. And at least the Orioles did not compromise their future too much by what they did in trading for Baz and signing the free agents that they did. All right, that is it for the first segment. We've got another one coming up, and then another one after that. Stay with us, all right. We got the Warby Parkers. I got the Raiders, but one thing I upgraded to Polarized. Sorry about it.

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Speaker 1: Time now for the inside Dish, the part of the show where I talk about maybe a story I've written, maybe a trend in the game, maybe something else entirely. And today I want to kind of combine two of those things, something I've written along with something that has been baited in the game for quite some time now, and the question is the value of chemistry. Last week I wrote a story about Alex Bregman and his impact so far on the Cubs, even though it is so early in spring training. It's the same kind of impact he made off the field with the Houston Astros and last season with the Boston Red Sox. And I noticed in the comments section of the article, and I hear this from fans too from time to time they ask, well, what is the value of this? What about all these things he's supposed to have done and supposedly does What is it really? How much does it matter? Fair questions? And in this age of analytics in baseball, it seems to me that fans have grown so accustomed to everything being quantified that when something can't be quantified, such as the impact of an Alex Bregman. It's difficult for them to grasp, and it's also difficult for the people running the teams to grasp, and at times, in my opinion, they underrat it. Now with Bregman, people might say, well, Ken, if you ask a bunch of the new players on the Cubs or the old players on the Cubs if he's having an impact, of course they're going to say yes, yes. But if you read the article, yes, read the article, you will see I talked to players about concrete things that Bregman is already doing and has done in the past. We saw stories like this when he was with Houston. He helped pitchers as well as hitters there. We saw it last season with Boston. The young players swore by Alex Bregman and what he meant to that clubhouse, and so did some of the veteran players as well. With him, he's bilingual. It's English speaking players, it's Spanish speaking players, it's hitters, it's pitchers. He's almost like another coach on the team. And of course none of this will matter as much as what Bregman will be bringing to the Cubs from a playing standpoint. His offensive value, his defensive value. But you can't tell me that there is no value to this. In fact, the Cubs wanted him in part for this very reason, and other teams did too, and we will see the impact that he has over the course of his five year contract. Five years, one hundred and seventy five million is what he received in free agency. So that is one element and one example of chemistry and what it might mean to a team. And I'm going to talk about two others, Los Angeles Dodgers, two time World Series champions. We talk all the time about how much money they spend, about what they've done in free agency. We talk a little bit about how good they are player development. We don't talk often enough, in my opinion, about that clubhouse and what they stand for and how they go about it. That is a group that holds each other accountable. It's a veteran group, to be sure. Max Munsey, Freddie Freeman, Mookie Betts, mcgil Rojas, all of these veterans that they have, and I'm sure I'm missing a few of course, Taskar Hernandez being another one in that group. When they have a problem with someone on the team, they confront that player, but they don't do it in a way that is necessarily negative. With them, the players seem to understand that it's all about winning, that everything that they talk about, everything that they do, is geared toward one thing, and that is winning a World Series championship. So comments and observations by players to their teammates that might cause problems in other clubhouses don't seem to cause problems with the Dodgers. That's good chemistry. On the other end of the spectrum, the twenty and twenty five New York Mets, now, some of their fans have objected to the chemistry conversation the entire offseason. Basically, their point is, and it's a valid point, that the Mets problem was that their starting rotation collapsed, and if their starting rotation had not collapsed, we would not have ever started talking about their chemistry. That is an entirely fair point. However, President of Baseball Operations David's Stearns, with the way he conducted this offseason, told you everything you needed to know about what he thought of the team's chemistry. Now, Stearns is an analytical guy, as analytical as anybody in the game, but he obviously saw that their clubhouse wasn't quite right. Now we've read all about the Lindor Soto riff. Both players kind of denied it over the weekends that everything was fine. It just seems to me that they're kind of different types. I don't know that it's a huge rift between them, but certainly by purging Nimo and allowing Alonzo to walk and then getting rid of Jeff McNeil, I'm gonna exclude Edwin Diaz from this conversation. He's a closer, He's not considered a problem in any stretch. But by doing what Stearns did again, that was a message that was I want a different vibe, I want different players, I want a different look here. Who do they bring in? Jorge Polanco been part of playoff teams, Boba Schett part of playoff teams, Luis Robert jor know. But in many of the examples that I will refer to there, in many of the cases where they looked for new players, Marcus Simeon is another one. They looked for players who had good reputations for chemistry and who also are guys that have been part of winning teams. The complaint, I don't know how fair it is, but the complaint some fans had with Alonso, Nimo and McNeil, and the complaint the front office seemed to have with Alonzo, McNeil and Nimo to some degree, was we haven't won with these guys, So we haven't won with these guys. Let's try something else. So again, to wrap this up, I can't tell you the value of chemistry. I can't tell you if Alex Regman will mean two or three more wins to the Cubs this year, simply because of who he is on the club, because of what he might impart to teammates such as Pete Crow Armstrong to a tip he might give a pitcher at some point. You don't know what that is. But people who know the game, people who are involved in the game, they know it's something. The people who are involved with the Dodgers, they know it's something. The people who are involved with the Mets, they know it's something. We're not making this up, folks. Chemistry is a real thing. We'll be back with Grill and Ken right after this bet.

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Speaker 1: Time now for Grill and Kenton, the part of the show where I answer your questions. Let's get right to them. First question comes, Well, it's coming from somewhere, but it is. Will Dave Dombrowski's comments about Bryce Harper galvanized or splinter the Phillies. I don't expect the comments by Dombrowski about Harper, whether he's elite or simply a good player. He's going to galvanized, excuse me, the Phillies. It's going to galvanized, and I believe has galvanized Bryce Harper, which is probably exactly what Dave Dombrowski, president of baseball operations for the Phillies, intended when he had those comments at the end of the season. You remember that I referred to them. He basically said, well, Bryce has been an elite guy, but last year he was only a good player, and it's up to him whether he becomes elite again. Harper addressed those comments Sunday to reporters. He said they were kind of wild, you didn't expect something like that to surface publicly. And I don't know that it's going to give Bryce Harper any more motivation. Bryce Harper is not a guy who needs motivation. We've seen him. He's one of the most fiery players in the game without his president of base Operations making any comments about him whatsoever. But if it does galvanize Harper to use the word in the question, well even better. And in my opinion, Dombrowski when he said that, that's exactly what he wanted to do. He wanted to get under Harper's skin. He wanted to maybe give him a little bit more incentive, motivation, whatever you want to call it. Now Again, Bryce Harper doesn't need that. But when you've got something to prove, a little extra to prove never hurts when you're a major league player, even for a superstar. So that was the point of Dave Dombrowski's comments. I don't know that I would have done it that way. I don't know that I need Bryce Harper any more motivated than he already is. But that was where Dombrowski seemed to be coming from. And to hear Harper on Sunday, you certainly know that those comments irked him a little bit. All right, next question, this one is are there signs of competitiveness emerging in Colorado? I actually wrote about this in my Notes column over the weekend, and I quoted Michael Lorenzen as saying that the pitching group they've put together, the group of coaches that they've put together, to him, is a big sign, a big reason why he signed there, and a big possibility for the Rockies going forward. It's a group of pitchers and coaches that came from other teams, and under now President Baseball Operations Paul de Podesta and general manager Josh Burns, they're going to take a little bit of a different approach, and I'm sure it's going to be a more advanced approach than Colorado has taken in the past. They were not known as being one of the most analytically driven teams, and beyond that, they're playing in the most difficult pitching environment in the Major League, So you need to try something different. And Lorenzo's point to me was, these guys are capable of doing it. They're creative in their thinking, and from that perspective alone, yes, there are signs of life in Colorado good signs, and I expect Deep Podesta and Burns to do well there now. Well, as a relative term, it means in their case, better than they were last year, and then better than next year after that. But they've got nowhere to go but up, and I expect with these two guys running the team, they will do exactly that. Next question, this one is how would you describe this quote from Red Sox president Sam Kennedy about Alex Bregman. The quote was, if Alex Bregman wanted to be here, ultimately, he'd be here.

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Speaker 2: Now.

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Speaker 1: How would I describe that quote? I would describe that quote as rather interested as in Sam Kennedy, what are you trying to say there? If you offered Alex Bregman the most money, he'd probably be in Boston. If you offered Alex Bregman the not trade clause that he clearly decided desired that the Cubs were ruling to give him, he'd probably be in Boston. When you get beat out for a free agent, you get beat out because you didn't offer enough in one form or another. So it's not necessarily up to Bregman to decide whether he wants to be in Boston. It's up to the Red Sox, as it was with Mookie Betts, to impress him enough, impress upon him enough that he is wanted to persuade him to stay in Boston. So this is not on our Alex Bregman. Unless he turned down thirty million more from the Red Sox, then it's a fair point to make if you're Sam Kennedy. But Sam Kennedy did not say that that is what happened. He only said if he wanted to be here, he'd be here. Well, yes, no kidding. But in free agency, anything goes. The Cubs made them the best offer. The Cubs got the player. The Red Sox need to be quiet about what they might have done for Alex Bregman unless they're willing to show their hand completely. And hmm, I just don't think they are all right. One more question before we go this one? Ooh, I like this one. What's next for Max Scherzer. Now? I spoke with Max Scherzer about I don't know a month ago, and he said that he is willing to sign with the right team right now. He's ready to go, he's healthy, he's good, but he's not going to sign with just any team who makes him an offer. He wants the right team. There are certain teams that he has in mind, and if he doesn't hear a good enough offer from one one of those teams, then he is willing to wait until after this season begins. So once the injuries start to mount, and they already are starting to mount, I would expect at that point Scherzer to make a move. And you see his former team, the Toronto Blue Jays, his last team, a team that he loved pitching for. They've got some issues with pitchers getting hurt already. Boden Francis out for the season. Shane Bieber, we knew when he accepted the qualifying I'm sorry when he opted in on his deal, it exercised his player option. You almost knew something was up. It's one year, sixteen million. If he was healthy, he could have gotten more in free agency, but no, he exercised the option. So they've got some physical concerns and I'm sure at some point, if it gets more acute for them, they'll be more interested in Max Scherzer. He's certainly have been willing to spend more money his Orus Sanchez. They bring him in this week six point eight million or so, and they're already over the highest threshold. They took him and took all of his money and had no problem doing it. So the Blue Jays could be one possibility for Scherzer, and I'm sure there are others as well, but he is in a position where he can wait because guys are going to go down, and then once the season starts, not only are injuries going to occur, in effectiveness is going to occur for certain pictures as well. And when you have all these combinations of things happening, then openings arise and teams get more desperate perhaps than they are now. All Right with that, we're gonna wrap up today's show. Thank you for watching for listening. Foul Territory coming up at one o'clock et Buck Show Walter joins aj Eric Kratz and Scott Braun. We'll be back Thursday, usual time slot twelve thirty Eastern with Alana Rizzo. Have a great week everyone, We'll talk to you soon.