Outside The Confines: A perfectly ordinary day

There was a lot of little news stories over the past two days but there were no major stories that commanded the attention of the baseball media. Honestly, that’s a really good thing for baseball. We could all use a little boring right now.

• This is one thing that could upset that boring. A letter written by commissioner Rob Manfred to Yankees general manager Brian Cashman about the alleged sign-stealing by the Yankees in 2017 will be made public as part of a lawsuit. They say it will be released some time in the next two weeks.
• Reliever Andrew Miller retired after 16 seasons in the majors. Miller was one of the top union representatives in the recent labor talks.
• Derrick Goold writes about Miller’s career and how he changed the game by bringing back the multi-inning reliever. He also gave up two runs in 2⅓ innings in Game 7 of the 2016 World Series, so I’ll be forever grateful to him for that. He probably feels differently.
• Wander Franco, Rafael Devers and Jean Segura all spoke out against an international draft in an article by Gabe Lacques.
• New York City has modified their vaccination rules and professional athletes will now be able to play home games without having been vaccinated for COVID-19.
• But they still won’t be able to enter Canada and play the Blue Jays without a jab, and apparently that was a major stumbling block for the Red Sox and their negotiations with free agent Trevor Story. Jeff Passan has all the details on how Story ended up with the Red Sox. (ESPN+ sub. req.) It’s about more than just the jab, but in the end, Story got vaccinated before the contract was signed.
• Passan also tries to make sense out of the record-breaking free agent season. (ESPN+ sub. req.) MLB teams gave out contracts worth a combined $3.265 billion to free agents this weekend.
• Zach Kram ranks every team by how well they did this off-season.
• Hannah Keyser recaps how Correa ended up signing with the Twins. The entire deal came together very quickly.
• Aaron Gleeman writes that the Correa signing completely changes the image of the Twins and what is possible in Minnesota. (The Athletic sub. req.)
• Correa had his press conference and said he wants to “build a championship culture” in Minnesota.
• Kris Bryant talks to Patrick Mooney about leaving the Cubs and why he is excited to join the Rockies. (The Athletic sub. req.)
• The Rockies also signed Ryan McMahon to a six-year contract extension. Dan Szymborski looks at the McMahon deal and what the team can expect out of him over the next six years.
• There was a trade! The Blue Jays sent outfielder Randal Grichuk to the Rockies for outfielder Raimel Tapia. The Blue Jays also sent cash to Colorado.
• Jayson Stark explains why the Phillies signed outfielder Nick Castellanos for both his bat and his attitude. (The Athletic sub. req.)
• The Reds finally added a player for a change, signing outfielder Tommy Pham to a one-year deal.
• Former Cubs pitcher Zach Davies signed a one-year deal with the Diamondbacks.
• The Mariners signed right-handed reliever Sergio Romo for one-year and $2 million.
• Ben Clemens says that the M’s can expect Romo to increase their “fun differential” in 2022. And other good things.
• The Angels signed catcher Max Stassi to a three-year, $17.5 million extension.
• Thomas Harrigan has six “dark horse” playoff contenders.
• Stephen J. Nesbitt and Fabian Ardaya look at the new rule that limits the number of times a player can be optioned in a year and how it will stop the yo-yoing for some players from the majors to Triple-A. (The Athletic sub. req.) Some players do express concern, however, that players may miss out on a call-up because the team fears losing them.
• Peter Gammons notes that Tommy John surgery is getting better and better every year, but teams and pitchers still should try to avoid it. (The Athletic sub. req.) Basically, Gammons is warning teams not to overwork arms with this short Spring Training and off-season lockout.
• Manager Dave Roberts “guaranteed” that the Dodgers would win the 2022 World Series. Yeah, that’s not ending up on any bulletin boards. He did add one caveat of “if our starters stay healthy.”
• Some people have noticed that the swing of Royals prospect Bobby Witt Jr. is very similar to that of Mike Trout. He certainly looked like Mike Trout against the Iowa Cubs last season.
• Retired reliever Jeremy Affeldt talks to Daniel Brown about dealing with trauma and opening a baseball-and-buffaloes-themed brew pub. (The Athletic sub. req.)
• Derek Jeter opens old baseball cards, looking for his rookie card.
• And finally, Rustin Dodd has the story of a man who is playing catch every day with a different person for a year in memory of his son, (The Athletic sub. req.) who died at 16 in a car accident coming home from baseball practice.

And tomorrow is a better day than today, Buster.