MLB Bullets will meet you in St. Louis?

Good morning.

• The General Manager Meetings start today, and while the GM Meetings usually don’t produce a lot of news, they often are where deals that are finished at the Winter Meetings get started. Mike Axisa has four big questions heading into the GM Meetings.
• The big topic at this year’s GM Meetings is Marlins outfielder Giancarlo Stanton and Joe Frisaro gives an update over the current state of the Stanton trade market.
• The Marlins seem determined to deal Stanton, but Ted Berg believes it makes no sense because the Fish would never get enough back.
• Jon Heyman writes that the Red Sox are more interested in free agent outfielder J.D. Martinez than Stanton at this point.
• The biggest rumors have Stanton going to St. Louis, but Dayn Perry argues that there is reason to believe that Stanton, who has full no-trade protection, may not want to play for the Cardinals. Perry is a Cards fan too, so it’s not just someone arguing that Stanton hates toasted ravioli and Provel.
• The Twins are shockingly a contender in 2018 and they need relief help. They’ve reportedly reached out to the Reds about a deal for Raisel Iglesias.
• I know a lot of you would like to bring Rays pitcher Chris Archer back to the Cubs organization. (I know I would.) But while Rays GM Erik Neander says he’ll always listen, he considers Archer to be a building block for years to come.
• Buster Olney argues that the Pirates should be trying to move Andrew McCutchen and Gerrit Cole, as well as Ivan Nova.
• The Giants are interested in pursuing Red Sox outfielder Jackie Bradley Jr. as a team that plays half their games in AT&T Park’s giant outfield finally realizes that maybe outfield defense is important.
• Jon Heyman reports that the Royals will try hard to retain free agents Eric Hosmer and Mike Moustakas.
• Travis Sawchik argues that teams interested in signing Hosmer would do better to sign free agent Indians first baseman Carlos Santana instead.
• FanRag is running a series where they predict the three best teams for each major free agent. Here is their piece on Hosmer.
• And their piece on Jake Arrieta.
• They also speculate on Alex Cobb.
• Also the best three fits for Lorenzo Cain.
• And finally, three possible new teams for JD Martinez.
• If he hadn’t signed an extension, Angels outfielder Mike Trout would be a free agent this winter. Mike Axisa tries to guess what that circus would look like and guesses that Trout could have come close to a $600 million deal.
• Someone who won’t get close to $600 million is Shohei Otani. Jon Tayler looks at the unfair system that is going to cost Otani a hundred million dollars to benefit one major league team.
• Baseball Prospectus has a rundown of the top 20 free agents this winter (part one of the top 50) and guess which team they will sign with.
• Mike Petriello uses StatCast data to determine which free agents have the skills to be worth signing.
• Howard Bryant has a look back at the 2017 season and declares it pretty awesome.
• If you were watching the Arizona Fall League game live on the MLB Network on Saturday Night, you know there was a horrific crash between Twins outfielder LaMonte Wade and Cardinals outfielder Oscar Mercado that sent Wade to the hospital on a stretcher. You may not want to watch the collision if you’re squeamish, but the good news is that Wade is currently doing fine. He has a concussion, but there are no problems with movement in his arms and legs. (Yes, I was watching this live. It was scary.)
• The Yankees have interviewed former Indians and Mariners manager Eric Wedge about their manager job. OK. Joe Girardi wasn’t perfect, but you fire him so you can hire Eric Wedge?
• Buster Olney also reports that the Yankees have interviewed longtime Yankees coach Rob Thomson and intend to interview ESPN analyst Aaron Boone. So the other candidates are a guy who has been kicking around your farm system for almost 30 years and a guy who has never coached before at any level? Again, should not the Yankees have had this all figured out before they fired Girardi? Or is there something we don’t know about? This all seems so “Orioles-y.”
• Former MLB pitcher Josh Beckett was arrested for public intoxication after he tackled a country singer in a bar. Everyone’s a critic these days.
• The Astros World Series trophy got damaged when it fell off a table at a fundraiser. The trophy was then repaired and arrested for public intoxication. (They were lucky it was damaged at a museum fundraiser filled with restoration specialists.) But this goes for the Cubs last year too: The World Series trophy is not the Stanley Cup. It is a lot more fragile.
• The Brewers have a deal to remodel their Spring Training home in Maryvale and stay there for the next 25 years.
• Mike Stocker has a photo essay on the Beep Ball World Series, which is baseball for the visually impaired. Definitely worth the click.
• Mets pitcher Jacob deGrom cut his long locks, which he claims will add speed to his fastball. OK. Something for the boys at StatCast.
• Cliff Corcoran tries to come up with a statistical method for solving the issue of who is the best pitcher in baseball. Clayton Kershaw or Max Scherzer?
• And finally, there is the debate among baseball fans and Dodgers fans about who is the best pitcher in Dodgers history: Kershaw or Sandy Koufax? Brian Grubb may have just provided the final piece of evidence in Kershaw’s favor: Sandy Koufax once gave up an inside-the-park home run to Mr. Ed. If you’re too young to know who Mr. Ed was, he was a talking horse who had his own TV show in the sixties. (If you don’t know who Koufax was, what are you doing here?) Grubb provides a great outline of just how freaking crazy TV was in the sixties and how insane it was that some producer thought a plot about a horse hitting a home run off Koufax was a good idea for a show. Also be sure to look at the terrified look on John Roseboro’s face as the horse comes in for a play at the plate.

And tomorrow will be a better day than today, Buster.

A horse is a horse, of course, of course. And no one can talk to a horse, of course. That is, of course, unless that horse is the famous Mr. Ed!