Who Will Be Free?
Special Year-End Free Agent Edition
By: Charlie Miller | 10/5/10, 5:20 PM EDT
by Bruce Herman
A little scheduling twiddling has accelerated the free agent process somewhat this year. Within five days after the World Series (instead of 15), you’ll know who’s on the market — except for the non-tenders, which must be revealed by December 2 (instead of the 12th). If you’re in the wait-’til-next-year (or the year-after-that) crowd, it’s not too late to start window-shopping. Here’s a handy-dandy chart compartmentalizing the available merchandise.
| 2011 Difference-makers | 2011 Potential Front-Liners | Other 2011 Notables | Free in 2012 |
C | Victor Martinez | John Buck
| Rod Barajas
| Ryan Doumit* |
|
| Gerald Laird
| Ramon Hernandez
| Yadier Molina* |
|
| Miguel Olivo*
| Bengie Molina
| Jorge Posada |
|
| A.J. Pierzynski | Yorvit Torrealba* | Dioner Navarro |
1B | Adam Dunn | Lance Berkman* | Troy Glaus | Prince Fielder |
| Paul Konerko | Russ Branyan* | Ty Wigginton | Michael Cuddyer |
| Carlos Pena | Jorge Cantu | Xavier Nady | Adrian Gonzalez |
| Albert Pujols* | Adam LaRoche* |
|
|
| Aubrey Huff | Derrek Lee |
|
|
|
| Lyle Overbay |
|
|
2B |
| David Eckstein | Jerry Hairston Jr. | Robinson Cano* |
|
| Mark Ellis* | Felipe Lopez | Aaron Hill* |
|
| Cristian Guzman |
| Kelly Johnson |
|
| Bill Hall* |
| Brandon Phillips* |
|
| Orlando Hudson |
| Dan Uggla |
|
| Omar Infante* |
| Rickie Weeks |
SS | Derek Jeter | Juan Uribe | Omar Vizquel | Jason Bartlett |
| Jose Reyes* | Orlando Cabrera | Edgar Renteria* | Yuniesky Betancourt* |
|
| Alex Gonzalez* |
| Rafael Furcal* |
|
| Cesar Izturis |
| J.J. Hardy |
|
| Jhonny Peralta* |
| Jimmy Rollins |
|
| Nick Punto* |
| Marco Scutaro* |
|
| Miguel Tejada |
|
|
3B | Adrian Beltre* | Pedro Feliz | Eric Chavez* | Jose Lopez |
| Aramis Ramirez* |
| Melvin Mora | Casey Blake* |
|
|
|
| Edwin Encarnacion |
RF/LF | Carl Crawford | Pat Burrell | Willie Harris | Nick Swisher* |
| Jayson Werth | Johnny Damon | Marcus Thames | Jose Bautista |
|
| Jonny Gomes* |
| Carlos Guillen |
|
| Austin Kearns |
| Conor Jackson |
|
| Jason Kubel* |
| Raul Ibanez |
|
| Corey Patterson |
| Juan Pierre |
|
| Manny Ramirez |
| Juan Rivera |
|
| Jose Guillen |
| Josh Willingham |
|
| Brad Hawpe |
| David DeJesus |
|
| Andruw Jones |
| Bobby Abreu* |
|
| Magglio Ordonez |
| J.D. Drew |
|
| Scott Podsednik* |
| Jeff Francoeur |
|
|
|
| Ryan Ludwick |
CF |
| Rick Ankiel* |
| Carlos Beltran |
|
| Coco Crisp* |
| Grady Sizemore* |
DH | Vladimir Guerrero* | Jim Thome | Nick Johnson* | Jack Cust |
| David Ortiz* | Hideki Matsui |
| Milton Bradley |
SP | Cliff Lee | Bronson Arroyo* | Bruce Chen | Mark Buehrle |
|
| Erik Bedard* | Kevin Correia | Chris Carpenter* |
|
| Jeremy Bonderman | Doug Davis* | Aaron Cook* |
|
| Dave Bush | Freddy Garcia | Ryan Dempster* |
|
| Jorge de la Rosa | Rich Harden* | Edwin Jackson |
|
| Justin Duchscherer | Jeff Suppan | Scott Kazmir* |
|
| Jeff Francis* |
| Paul Maholm* |
|
| Jon Garland* |
| Roy Oswalt* |
|
| Aaron Harang* |
| Joel Pineiro |
|
| Hiroki Kuroda |
| CC Sabathia* |
|
| Ted Lilly |
| Adam Wainwright* |
|
| Kevin Millwood |
| C.J. Wilson |
|
| Vicente Padilla |
|
|
|
| Carl Pavano |
|
|
|
| Andy Pettitte |
|
|
|
| Javier Vazquez |
|
|
|
| Brandon Webb |
|
|
|
| Jake Westbrook |
|
|
|
| Chris Young* |
|
|
RP | Mariano Rivera | Hisanori Takahashi | Grant Balfour | Heath Bell |
| Rafael Soriano | Octavio Dotel* | Chad Qualls | Jonathan Broxton |
|
| Frank Francisco | Jon Rauch | Matt Capps |
|
| Brian Fuentes | Jesse Crain | Francisco Cordero* |
|
| Kevin Gregg* | Jason Frasor | Ryan Franklin |
|
| Trevor Hoffman* | Matt Guerrier | Bobby Jenks |
|
| Kerry Wood* | Aaron Heilman | Brad Lidge* |
|
| Joaquin Benoit | Chan Ho Park | Joe Nathan* |
|
| J.J. Putz | Kyle Farnsworth | Jonathan Papelbon |
|
| Koji Uehara | Dan Wheeler* | Francisco Rodriguez* |
|
| Scott Downs | Pedro Feliciano | Jose Valverde* |
|
| Arthur Rhodes |
| Fernando Rodney |
|
| Matt Thornton* |
|
|
* either player, current club or both hold an option for 2011
HIT AND RUN
Two of the three players who’ve played the most regular-season games without sniffing the playoffs will be off the list by tomorrow night: Michael Young and Aubrey Huff. Randy Winn, at 1,717, clings to the top spot.
This news is six weeks old, but I doubt you’ve heard it. Braves pitching prospect Brett Oberholtzer worked a game in the low-Class A South Atlantic League in which he threw 93 of his 109 pitches for strikes. I did the math; that’s 3.3 pitches per batter faced and 0.5 balls per batter faced. And the most amazing part was that none of those batters was Jeff Francoeur.
Before packing up for the winter, Brandon Inge set the Tigers franchise record for strikeouts, passing Lou Whitaker (1,099), who played in 1,102 (!) fewer games.
In a remarkable achievement that will go overlooked, the Mets’ Jonathan Niese made 30 starts and did not allow a stolen base. Only four runners even tried.
Pedro Feliciano broke the Mets record for pitching appearances for the third consecutive season, escalating from 86 to 88 to 92. In the process he set major league marks for outings over a three-season (266) and four-season (344) span.
Here’s how the White Sox negated their midseason surge and suddenly plummeted out of contention: In 18 games between September 5 and 24, their starting pitchers went 0-9 with an ERA of 6.45.
QUOTABLES
“As soon as I got out of the game, we started getting everybody out, so I must have been doing something wrong.” — Zack Greinke after a stinker in Cleveland.
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