MLB Bullets and the Phoney Hot Stove

It’s seems almost obscene in retrospect, but the first eight months of World War II was called the “Phoney War” because not much happened. So far, not much has happened in the first two weeks of the Hot Stove. We’ll see how much that changes.

• Jerry Crasnick notes how the “Hot Stove” has been pretty cool to the touch so far this winter and has eight reasons why this might be so.
• Crasnick’s last reason might be the biggest: the 2018 free agent class. Jonathan Bernhardt looks at how next year’s class is impacting this year’s class.
• Eventually a deal is going to get done and Richard Justice has some possibilities of a deal that might break the logjam.
• Mariners general manager Jerry DiPoto asks “What slow Hot Stove?” as he made his third deal in the past week when Seattle got pitcher Nick Rumbelow from the Yankees. Yeah, Jerry. About that. You’ve made three deals this winter and no one outside of Washington state cares about any of them. And even there. . .
• One thing that’s holding everything up is teams are waiting to see what the Marlins do with outfielder Giancarlo Stanton. Reportedly, both the Giants and the Cardinals have made formal offers to the Marlins for the slugger.
• Jesse Yomtov gives four possible trade deals for Stanton that make sense.
• The big issue with Stanton is his contract, but when asked, Stanton replied that “all teams have plenty of money.” Yeah, but $300 million is more than just “plenty.”
• R.J. Anderson ranks all 30 teams on how likely they are to have Stanton playing for them next season. The dreams of Rays fans everywhere have been crushed.
• However, Rays fans can take hope in that there is “mutual interest” between the Rays and free agent DH Mike Napoli.
• Craig Edwards estimates how much money does each team have to spend this winter.
• Buster Olney notes that the Orioles face some tough choices about what to do with closer Zach Britton.
• Tom Verducci writes that the weak market that outfielder Jay Bruce is facing this winter is a sign that baseball is changing, and especially that it is becoming a “young man’s game.”
• Ryan Davis has five underrated free agents this winter.
• Mark Townsend has three “unheralded” free agent pitchers and three “unheralded” free agent hitters this offseason who could come up big for their teams in 2018.
• Jon Heyman reports that the Yankees are done with their first round of interviews for a new manager and ESPN broadcaster Aaron Boone and Giants bench coach Hensley Meulens were both impressive.
• Boone says that not having any managing experience should not be a problem in taking over the Yankees. Yeah. That’s what they all say.
• Sweeny Murti makes the case for Boone as the next Yankees manager.
• And Murti also makes the case for Meulens as the next Yankees manager. It’s simple. When you have a choice between someone whose nickname is “Bam-Bam” and someone who isn’t, you always pick “Bam-Bam.” (But seriously—Meulens could make a great manager.)
• Mark Townsend dismisses Boone’s lack of experience by saying that Aaron Boone’s entire life has been experience for managing in the big leagues.
• Former Yankees great Hideki Matsui is excited to see Shohei Otani come to MLB and thinks that Otani should both pitch and hit.
• David Schoenfield looks at the MVP voting and thinks both Stanton and Jose Altuve were worthy choices.
• Sabermetric godfather Bill James looks at the AL MVP voting and says that it’s obvious that Altuve was better than Judge and that the reason why so many people thought it was close is the WAR statistic, which he considers flawed. James is knocking down a straw man here in that Altuve got 27 of 30 first-place votes, so it wasn’t really close. But he does use it as a jumping off point to criticize the assumptions behind WAR and tout his old alternative, Win Shares.
• Joe Posnanski offers his take on the debate and thinks James has a point on WAR.
• Anthony Olivieri gives a day-by-day account of Jose Altuve’s wild week when the Astros won the World Series and the aftermath.
• David Schoenfield gives some candidates for baseball’s next dominating starting pitcher. What? No Adbert Alzolay?
• Mike Lupica makes the case for Mike Mussina to go in the Hall of Fame. Yes, Moose belongs. He’s this generation’s Bert Blyleven.
• MLB broadcasters, including Pat Hughes and Len Kasper, discuss the biggest calls of their careers. You can guess what Hughes’ biggest call was.
• Frank Jackson has an interesting history of the triple and some suggestions for increasing the number of triples in the game today.
• A man in Utah is collecting every baseball that lands in his backyard from the nearby high school diamond. Why? No one knows. But it is no doubt some sort of nefarious master plan to take over the world.
• And finally, Rangers shortstop Elvis Andrus got married this weekend, which is swell but not worth a mention here. What is worth a mention is a clip of Prince Fielder busting a move on the dance floor at the reception. We’ve missed you here at MLB Bullets, Prince. It’s good to know that you are still good copy.

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