The General Managers Meetings: What To Expect

MLB's general managers (and that certainly includes Theo Epstein as well as Jed Hoyer) will have their annual meetings in Florida, beginning today. According to Ken Davidoff of the New York Post, the quarterly owners meetings will also be held in Orlando, meaning dozens of baseball moguls in one place for four days.

Here's what Davidoff says might be going on for the next four days:

Expect much conversation about a diversity of topics, from the Japanese posting system to increased instant replay to eliminating home-plate collisions.

There will be a meeting of assistant GMs on Monday; a group dinner for GMs on Monday night; GMs meetings and owner-committee meetings on Tuesday; a joint GM-owners session with commissioner Bud Selig on Wednesday; and the ownership general session on Thursday.

But if that were all that transpired, then we wouldn’t care anywhere as much about these get-togethers. When they aren’t at meetings, GMs (and owners, in some instances) will convene with each other to exchange trade ideas, and spend time with player representatives, most of whom will be on site, to learn more about their free-agent clients.

Davidoff says there will likely be more "action", player-wise, at the Winter Meetings, which take place from December 9-12, also in Orlando. Nevertheless, he cites some key moves from recent years that took place at the November meetings:

The Phillies acquired Brad Lidge from the Astros at the 2007 meetings. The year prior, the Blue Jays signed free agent Frank Thomas. Yet it’s more likely that a high-level transaction will occur later this winter and the involved parties will refer to a meeting from this week as a critical step to getting a deal done.

So this week will be more laying of groundwork for trades and/or signings that might be completed during the December confab. Last year, during roughly the equivalent time, the Cubs made some minor signings: Brian Bogusevic, Scott Baker, Dioner Navarro and a few guys who wound up playing most of the year at Iowa, or were let go after spring training. The "big" signing of last winter -- Edwin Jackson -- didn't occur until January.

So what do you think will happen this week? Nothing? Something small? Something big? Your turn.