Thursday, February 3, 2011

Offseason's Biggest Winners & Losers

This is certainly a good topic of conversation with Spring Training coming up. Here's Mychael Urban's list:



Here's mine:

Winners:
  1. Boston Red Sox - Carl Crawford and Adrian Gonzalez will add a lot to their offense and defense. If they -- along with Dustin Pedroia, Kevin Youkilis,  and Jacoby Ellsbury -- can stay healthy, that offense will be extremely potent. 
  2. Milwaukee Brewers - The additions of Shaun Marcum and Zack Greinke improve that rotation significantly. Their farm system is just about cleaned out at this point, but they'll be fielding a quality major-league team in 2011. 
  3. Philadelphia Phillies - The addition of Cliff Lee makes that one of the best rotations in recent memory. That starting four is undeniably fantastic, and -- sorry to say this -- better than what the Giants have. With the Phillies' offense/pitching combo, they'll most assuredly be back to the playoffs for another year. 

Honorable Mention: I like the Oakland Athletics' additions of Josh Willingham and Hideki Matsui. They'll add some pop, and more importantly, make the A's one of the best teams in the majors in terms of OBP. However, they can't both DH, and they're both pretty awful in terms of defense. Moreover, the A's spent too much money on a bullpen that didn't really need much improvement. Also, the San Diego Padres did a nice job acquiring the formerly-highly-touted outfielder Cameron Maybin -- and even if he doesn't hit too well, he's fantastic on defense and provides speed. They also made several cheap acquisitions of good veterans: Brad Hawpe will definitely outperform what he's being paid (high OBP), Jason Bartlett and Orlando Hudson will give the Padres a nice vet middle-infield combo with a little speed, and Aaron Harang will be serviceable in the rotation -- and at $4MM, he's most definitely a good signing. The Padres also acquired a few good prospects in the Adrian Gonzalez trade.

Losers:
  1. Los Angeles Angels - They'll being paying an aging and declining outfielder $20MM/yr for the next four years, and they traded away two decent players in order to so. They'll have a hard time competing with the A's and the Rangers after failing to acquire Carl Crawford and Adrian Beltre
  2. New York Yankees - Their rotation is a bit of an issue. The fact that they've signed Freddy Garcia, Bartolo Colon, and Mark Prior is alarming. 
  3. Los Angeles Dodgers - They're paying Matt Guerrier $12MM over the next three years, and failed to find a suitable starting left-fielder. They will probably have a starting outfield of Marcus Thames, Matt Kemp, and Andre Ethier -- one of the worst defensive outfields I've ever seen. 
Honorable Mention: The Detroit Tigers. They gave a lot of money to Victor Martinez and Joaquin Benoit, and in the end, I don't think they'll be rewarded for this risk.

Comment-starter: Who are your top three biggest winners/losers of the offseason?