Rays reliever Joel Peralta (photo courtesy of Anthony Gruppuso/USA Today Sports)
The Rays have exercised their $2.5MM team option on Joel Peralta for the 2015 season. In kind, in order to create space on the 40-man roster, the Rays have opted to have designate outfielder Jerry Sands and infielder Vince Belnome for assignment, according to a team press release. It should be noted, both Sands and Matt Moore were activated off the 60-day DL.
With the exception of last season, Peralta has been a reliable reliever bullpen since 2010, posting a 3.58 ERA, 9.8 K/9 and 3.49 K/BB rate and averaging 67 innings per season. A victim of the luck dragons last season, Peralta posted a 4.41 ERA in 2014, though he had strong peripherals (10.52 K/9, 2.13 BB/9) and an impressive set of ERA indicators (3.40 FIP, 3.11 xFIP, 2.54 SIERA).
Sands was claimed off waivers from the Pirates prior to the 2014 season. His stint with the Rays was brief — only appearing in 12 games — due to wrist surgery in July. Sands, 27, has a .689 OPS over 273 Major League PA with the Rays and Dodgers since 2011.
Belnome made 14 plate appearances over four games for Tampa Bay. The infielder has a strong .289 BA/.402 OBP/.459 SLG/.861 OPS slash line over 2613 career PA in the minors.
In other Rays related news, per Marc Topkin, in an interview with Matt Silverman on 620 WDAE, it was confirmed that Dave Martinez is one of “a number” of managerial candidates for the position vacated by Joe Maddon, though there are “no preconceived notions” of who will get the job.
Noteworthiness
Former manager, and current turncoat, Joe Maddon.
It turns out that some guy who used to manage the Rays officially joined the ranks of the curse-ridden Chicago Cubs yesterday. In a press conference at Wrigley Field Monday afternoon, Maddon publicly acknowledged that his previous visit to the Friendly Confines had a subconscious effect on the former skipper, following with awkward, passing reference to the Rays after 30 minutes on the microphone,
One more thing. Can I say, one more thing, please? I want to recognize my guys back in Tampa Bay. Very grateful for all the years that I spent there. Stu (Sternberg) and Matt (Silverman) and Andrew (Friedman) and the staff and the players, outstanding people, and thank you for everything.
Interestingly enough, as Ian Malinowski wrote in his latest piece for DRaysBay, Joe Maddon made an offer to the Rays that would have kept him in Tampa Bay for less money than the Cubs are paying him, according to Jon Heyman of CBS Sports. Said Heyman:
Maddon, following what one person described as talks that turned “contentious” after his decision to opt out of his under-market Rays deal, tried to keep things together by making the Rays his own firm proposal. Maddon, ultimately known as a “get-along guy,” was looking to extend an olive branch after nine fruitful years in Tampa Bay with his offer, which was turned down by the Rays, according to people familiar with the talks.
The Tampa Bay Rays will wait until Monday to make their option decision on reliever Joel Peralta, the Tampa Bay Times’ Marc Topkin tweeted. They’ll also be making other 40-man decisions, since Matt Moore and Jerry Sands need to be reinstated from the 60-day disabled list, and their roster is currently full. If the Rays choose to exercise Peralta’s $2.5M option, they’ll have options at the same price for 2016 and 2017 as well. Peralta is coming off a season in which he posted a 4.41 ERA, and the Rays could decide to let him go to save a bit of money and clear a roster spot for a younger player. What follows are a handful of links from this week past.*
Per Marc Topkin, in an interview with Matt Silverman on 620 WDAE, it was confirmed that Dave Martinez is one of “a number” of managerial candidates in the position left in Joe Maddon’s wake, though there are “no preconceived notions” of who will get the job.
Per Mark Polishuk of MLB Trade Rumors, Alan Nero, Joe Maddon’s agent, discussed how his client left the Rays for the Cubs in an interview with Jim Bowden and Jim Duquette (audio link) on MLB Network Radio on SiriusXM. Nero negotiated with the Rays for five or six days before Maddon opted out of his contract, a decision Maddon reached since Tampa didn’t want to make him one of baseball’s five highest-paid managers. Maddon was willing to take below-market value to stay but the Rays’ offer was “so far from realitythat it just didn’t make sense” for Maddon to accept, according to Nero. Theo Epstein wouldn’t speak to Maddon until he had written proof of the opt-out and permission from the Commissioner’s office, and Nero considers it “a bit insulting” that the Rays would suspect tampering took place.
The Rays officially announced that they have exercised their one-year, $7.5MM club option on All-Star utility-man Ben Zobrist.
Suffice it to say, this move was clearly one of the easiest for any team with an option over a player. Zobrist, again, turned in an excellent campaign and proved to be a tremendously valuable for Tampa Bay. In 654 plate appearances for the Rays, Zobrist slashed .272 BA/.354 OBP/.395 SLG/.749 OPS in the middle infield and outfield, with team leading 4.2 oWAR.
The upcoming season will mark the final year of control over Zobrist, who signed a four-year, $18MM contract extension that contained a pair of club options back in 2010. Zobrist earned $7MM in 2014 — the first of the two option years — and will earn $7.5MM this year, bringing his total earnings on the deal to $30MM over six years. He’s averaged a staggering 5.4 fWAR and 5.8 rWAR per season over the life of that deal.
Zobrist drew considerable interest at the 2014 trade deadline and would figure to do so again this offseason had Matt Silverman made Ben available. It should be noted, they — could at some point — approach him about an extension as well, or look to shop him next July should they again fall out of contention. The Rays could also simply retain Zobrist through season’s end next year and extend him a qualifying offer, guaranteeing themselves at east a compensatory draft pick at the end of the 2015 season.
“The Rays have until Monday night to decide on their $2.5-million option on RHP Joel Peralta, who has no buyout,” writes Marc Topkin of the Tampa Bay Times. Topkin went on, “Agent Mark Gilling said he had not yet heard from the Rays but was confident Peralta, 39 in March, could still pitch effectively, better than his 3-4, 4.41 record this past season showed.”
In other news, the path for former Rays manager Joe Maddon to complete his deal with the Cubs was cleared Friday with news that the north-siders fired Rick Renteria to officially create an opening.
In the statement announcing the move, the Cubs publicly acknowledged becoming aware last Thursday that Maddon left the Rays — the day before it was announced publicly. The statement (in its entirety below) stopped short of saying Maddon had been hired, saying the former Rays manager “may be as well suited as anyone in the industry to manage the challenges that lie ahead of us.”
For Maddon, the Cubs will hold a press conference on Monday to announce the hiring the former face of the Rays as their next manager, finalizing the move we have all expected.
The full statement from Epstein:
Today we made the difficult decision to replace Rick Renteria as manager of the Chicago Cubs. On behalf of Tom Ricketts and Jed Hoyer, I thank Rick for his dedication and commitment, and for making the Cubs a better organization.
Rick’s sterling reputation should only be enhanced by his season as Cubs manager. We challenged Rick to create an environment in which our young players could develop and thrive at the big league level, and he succeeded. Working with the youngest team in the league and an imperfect roster, Rick had the club playing hard and improving throughout the season. His passion, character, optimism and work ethic showed up every single day.
Rick deserved to come back for another season as Cubs manager, and we said as much when we announced that he would be returning in 2015. We met with Rick two weeks ago for a long end-of-season evaluation and discussed plans for next season. We praised Rick to the media and to our season ticket holders. These actions were made in good faith.
Last Thursday, we learned that Joe Maddon – who may be as well suited as anyone in the industry to manage the challenges that lie ahead of us – had become a free agent. We confirmed the news with Major League Baseball, and it became public knowledge the next day. We saw it as a unique opportunity and faced a clear dilemma: be loyal to Rick or be loyal to the organization. In this business of trying to win a world championship for the first time in 107 years, the organization has priority over any one individual. We decided to pursue Joe.
While there was no clear playbook for how to handle this type of situation, we knew we had to be transparent with Rick before engaging with Joe. Jed flew to San Diego last Friday and told Rick in person of our intention to talk to Joe about the managerial job. Subsequently, Jed and I provided updates to Rick via telephone and today informed him that we will indeed make a change.
We offered Rick a choice of other positions with the Cubs, but he is of course free to leave the organization and pursue opportunities elsewhere. Armed with the experience of a successful season and all the qualities that made him our choice a year ago, Rick will no doubt make an excellent major league manager when given his next chance.
Rick often said he was the beneficiary of the hard work of others who came before him. Now, in the young players he helped, we reap the benefits of his hard work as we move forward. He deserved better and we wish him nothing but the best.
We have clung to two important ideals during our three years in Chicago. The first is to always be loyal to our mission of building the Cubs into a championship organization that can sustain success. The second is to be transparent with our fans. As painful as the last week was at times, we believe we stayed true to these two ideals in handling a sensitive situation. To our fans: we hope you understand, and we appreciate your continued support of the Cubs.
Noteworthiness
“Was in an interview when I got this call. Sure glad I answered…I am ecstatic that the Rays have picked our option up for the coming year and I look forward to getting back to the winning ways in Tampa Bay in 2015!” — Ben Zobrist (Photo credit @jonathanthansen)
Daniel Russell of DRaysBay wrote of the imminent hiring of Maddon, saying, “Joe Maddon built this team and this organization, the face of the franchise for nearly a decade, and openly spoke about his commitment to the Rays — then made the business decision to dart out the door Andrew Friedman left open. Now it’s starting to let in a draft.”
Update: Joe Maddon has accepted the job, and will be officially introduced in a Monday press conference.
The Twitterverse exploded this afternoon with news that Joe Maddon and the Chicago Cubs are in the final stages of inking a contract to make him manager of the club.
CBS Sports’ Jon Heyman reported that both the Cubs and Joe Maddon’s agent Alan Nero denied a deal is done, however sources familiar with the dealings say a deal is imminent and to be completed in coming days — Maddon would indeed be the next Cubs manager.
Heyman went on,
The contract, once finalized, is expected to make Maddon one of the highest-paid managers in baseball and quite likely the best-paid in the National League. Mike Scioscia’s Angels deal pays him $5 million annually, so he sets the standard.
Cubs president Theo Epstein has long been an admirer of Maddon, according to people close to the team. The Cubs intend to make a big splash in free agency, and this represents a big start.
A couple of things stand in the way of the move; current manager Rick Renteria, and the potential for the Rays to file a tampering grievance against the Cubs.
As it relates to the former, per Heyman, Rick Renteria was told that the team was exploring the possibility of hiring Maddon, who became a free agent after recently opting out of his Rays deal. It should be noted, Renteria has two guaranteed years left on his three-year deal with the Cubs.
As for the latter, Major League Baseball’s tampering rules state,
There shall be no negotiations or dealings respecting employment, either present or prospective, between any player, coach or manager and any club other than the club with which (the player) is under contract or acceptance of terms.
In short, a team is not allowed to discuss employment with a player — or in this case, a manager — while he is under contract with another team. If there is evidence of tampering, it should be assumed the Rays front office will file an official grievance with Major League Baseball. While the consequences fail to be seen at the moment, there is the possibility that it could negate any associated move. Marc Topkin also noted there could be potential for compensation (A fine? A player?) determined by the commissioner’s office.
And just when you thought the offseason would be quiet…
Noteworthiness
We’re awaiting the official end of the season to put together our analysis of what to expect in 2015. Until then, DRaysBay knocked the proverbial ball out of the park with this piece titled, Rays payroll set to decrease in 2015.
As is common for this time of year, the Rays released a number of minor-league players with an eye toward shaping their rosters and the organizations depth chart. Per Baseball America, the following players have been let go:
Pitchers
Kevin Brandt
Ben Griset
Andrew Hanse
Brandon Henderson
Marcus Jensen
Tommy Lawrence
D.J. Slaton
Stone Speer
