MLB Bullets is getting ready for a holiday sale

Good morning, Wednesday.

• The Giants have hired former Dodgers general manager Farhan Zaidi as their new president of baseball operations. That’s the “Theo” role for the Giants front office. Presumably, he’ll look to hire a “Jed” as general manager. (With the Dodgers, he was the “Jed” under team president Andrew Friedman.) Also, Cubs VP Jason McLeod was a candidate for the Giants job.
• Looking ahead to the hot stove, Jon Heyman has a massive list of all 131 free agents. They’re all ranked from Bryce Harper to Chris Young and Heyman predicts how much money each player will get.
• This is no surprise, but the Phillies are interested in Manny Machado and they aren’t scared off by his “baggage.”
• The Nationals reportedly made an “aggressive” contract offer to Bryce Harper near the end of the season, but he rejected it. (Obviously.)
• Will Leitch argues that the Cardinals should sign Bryce Harper.
• Dan Szymborski has some warning signs for all of the top ten free agents. (ESPN+ sub. req.)
• The Yankees have agreed to a new one-year deal with pitcher C.C. Sabathia. Sabathia has been making noise about 2019 possibly being his last season, but he hasn’t made any official announcement about that.
• Yankees general manager Brian Cashman is saying that the Yankees want to stay under the luxury tax threshold. Wut? That’s not going to go over well at the next CBA talks.
• ESPN.com has a hot stove preview for the AL East.
• The big news may be coming out of the AL West, where the Mariners are reportedly considering a complete roster teardown.
• Jeff Sullivan thinks the Mariners could control the offseason trade market if they decide to sell.
• Mark Feinsand looks at which teams might be interested in dealing for Mariners James Paxton, Jean Segura and Mike Zunino.
• Jonah Keri looks at the Marlins offseason plans and about the market for catcher J.T. Realmuto, as well as some other players.
• The Diamondbacks will listen to offers for Paul Goldschmidt and Zack Greinke. As Craig Calcaterra points out in that link, it will be tough for them to trade either one. Goldschmidt because they’d need a ton back and there aren’t many teams looking to sell their farm for a first baseman. Greinke because as good as he is, the Snakes would have to eat a bunch of his contract to get anything good back for him.
• Whitney McIntosh has five pitchers who could benefit from a change of scenery.
• Mike Oz has a profile of Japanese pitcher Yusei Kikuchi, who will be posted by the Seibu Lions, his NPB team, this winter.
• Jon Paul Morosi reports that MLB is considering changing the trade deadline. The current idea is to move the deadline back to August 10th or 15th and then eliminate waiver deals. The Player’s Union would have to sign off on any such change.
• Astros pitcher Lance McCullers Jr. will miss all of 2019 after Tommy John surgery. I love how the press release say that the Astros say McCullers is “expected to make a full recovery.” When do they ever say otherwise? “We don’t think he’s going to pitch again, but we had him do the operation because the surgeon needed the practice.”
• Jeff Passan muses on how the game has changed since Babe Ruth’s day and wonders if baseball will ever be able to create a true “superstar” again.
• The White Sox signed manager Rick Renteria to a contract extension.
• The Dodgers are expected to complete an extension with manager Dave Roberts.
• Jon Tayler has a profile of new Angels manager Brad Ausmus.
• The SoftBank Hawks won the Japan Series this past weekend, beating the Hiroshima Carp in six games to win their second-straight title. The MVP was Takuya Kai, who only hit .143 with zero home runs in the series. Why did this catcher get named MVP with such poor numbers at the plate? Because he went 6 for 6 in throwing out runners trying to steal. You’d think they’d just give up after four. Once he started walking off the field before the tag was even made.
• And finally, with the baseball season over, many of you start going to the movies again. Luckily, we have two more short films by America’s Greatest Living Director, Andrew McCutchen. In them, he acts out what he doesn’t like about service in restaurants.

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