Morning Rundown: Initial power rankings, top free agents available, Bryan Reynolds 2023
A look at news around the league.
MLB.com has released its initial power rankings for the 2024 season, and the defending champion Texas Rangers are third, with the Atlanta Braves at one and the Los Angeles Dodgers at two.
It certainly shows their respect for the Braves, as the Rangers won the World Series, and the Dodgers spent a Billion dollars on free agents (and contract extensions).
The Pirates open things up at 26th, with only the White Sox, Nationals, Rockies, and Athletics behind them. Of the bottom 10 teams, only the Giants (22) and the Marlins (21) finished with more wins than the Pirates, with the Guardians ending with the same amount.
Kansas City and Los Angeles (Angels) finished ahead of them in the initial rankings despite finishing with fewer wins than the previous year. The Royals only had 56 wins but have aggressively added free-agent pitching this offseason.
We are about six weeks away from pitchers and catchers reporting to spring training, and there are still quite a few big-name free agents available.
On the pitching side of things, defending NL Cy Young winner Blake Snell, as is playoff standout Jordan Montgomery, is still available.
Some other notable pitchers;
Michael Lorenzen
Sean Manaea
Alex Wood
Josh Hader
On the hitting side of things;
Cody Bellinger
Matt Chapman
Rhys Hoskins
Michael A. Taylor
There might not be a single statistic that can accurately indicate how well a player is performing. At the top of the list, though, is OPS. Bryan Reynolds has only had two seasons where he posted an OPS of .800 or lower - his forgettable 2020 year and this past season.
Despite that, did he actually get better? Alex Stumpf had a great look at Reynolds’ 2023 campaign and how some of his metrics improved despite a dip in his OPS.
Every Monday during the offseason, we will be doing a mailbag article. Please send in your questions to have them answered! Either comment below with ‘mailbag’ entered in the message or email us at bucsondeckqa@gmail.com.
I look forward to answering what you guys have!
I'd bet a dollar the Pirates do something of significance (for them) this week.
I'm guessing a trade and the Perez signing and something like Bader or Manaea.
PirateFest is this weekend, they're going to do something.
If Nutting was a real businessman, which is something people claim he is but if so it certainly doesn't show in his ownership of the Pirates, he would invest in the team and increase it's standing and value.
If, and that word is enormous in this instance, the Pirates were to sign Bellinger to a $70-75 million dollar three year contract (and don't believe the very old and weary claim that they can't afford it because they certainly can) and Lorenzen for three years at $9-10 million a year that would amount to somewhere around $30-35 million a year, which not much more than they spent last year for the five mediocre players they signed then.
Those two players or ones like them would excite the entire fan base and get a lot of on-the-fence fans interested. Season ticket sales would go up immediately and the national media types would take notice leading to more people watching on TV and buying "Pirate stuff." The Pirates would make most of that money back, maybe more, by honestly fielding a better team instead of waiting for MLB to pay them their share of revenue sharing. A decent businessman might consider doing something like that, but the Pirates ownership doesn't fit that category. It's a shame, and I mean that term in both senses of the word (it's too bad and shame on them).