Best Remaining Free Agent Fits

[Brendan25]

A lot of free agents are starting to come to a decision on where they are going to be playing next season. Guys like Pujols, Wilson, Buehrle, and others are gone.

Players like Aramis Ramirz, Edwin Jackson, and even Prince Fielder are still out there. Some posters want to rebuild, some posters want Prince. So in your opinion, which available free agents remaining would be the best fit for the Orioles moving forward?

[RZNJ]

A lot of free agents are starting to come to a decision on where they are going to be playing next season. Guys like Pujols, Wilson, Buehrle, and others are gone.

Players like Aramis Ramirz, Edwin Jackson, and even Prince Fielder are still out there. Some posters want to rebuild, some posters want Prince. So in your opinion, which available free agents remaining would be the best fit for the Orioles moving forward?

The best fit is Yu Darvish. Young, possible #1 starter to build the rotation around, and add the good kind of depth. The other best fits are the other international players, with the youngest being the best fit. No loss of players. No really huge contracts besides the one to Darvish. Ramirez is actually a good fit if you were going to sign someone like Darvish to go along with him.

[CA-ORIOLE]

Not free agents, but Cespedes or Darvish.

Actual FA's - Rick Ankiel. I have mixed feelings about adding a FA SP. If we deal Guthrie I suppose yes.

[oriole]

Sign Prince
Then sign Ramirez
Rotate the three (including Reynolds) through their respective positions and DH
Trade Jones for an awesome pitcher
Sign Cody Ross for CF

Roberts
Markakis
Ramirez
Fielder
Hardy
Wieters
Reynolds
Reimold
Ross

LOL, yeah...not gonna happen.

[joew]

Davish is the best because if we win the bid we're the only choice

[Oriolidae85]

Not a big Ramirez fan...I think he can have at least one good season in the AL, but the transition is more difficult for an aging veteran (see D. Lee, A. Dunn, etc...). It's going to take 3 years to get him to Baltimore and he has no defensive value. That said, he could have some value as a backup CI and DH....just wonder how much risk $24M+ is he really worth for several years.

[JTrea81]

Fielder and Beltran are the best fits going forward for the offense IMO.

Fielder is obvious, and Beltran is your LFer that can play CF and DH.

Put both of them in the lineup and you get an instant upgrade in offense.

RF Markakis
SS Hardy
LF Beltran
1B Fielder
CF Jones
C Wieters
3B Reynolds
DH Roberts
2B Antonelli

As for pitching, Roy Oswalt makes sense as you could get him for a 2-3 year deal.

[Oriolidae85]

The best fit is Yu Darvish. Young, possible #1 starter to build the rotation around, and add the good kind of depth. The other best fits are the other international players, with the youngest being the best fit. No loss of players. No really huge contracts besides the one to Darvish. Ramirez is actually a good fit if you were going to sign someone like Darvish to go along with him.

Agree that Darvish makes the most sense as well as the international market...

[JTrea81]

The best fit is Yu Darvish. Young, possible #1 starter to build the rotation around, and add the good kind of depth. The other best fits are the other international players, with the youngest being the best fit. No loss of players. No really huge contracts besides the one to Darvish. Ramirez is actually a good fit if you were going to sign someone like Darvish to go along with him.

And why would Darvish only sign a 3 year deal with the Orioles?

[Barnaby Graves]

Fielder and Beltran are the best fits going forward IMO.

Fielder is obvious, and Beltran is your LFer that can play CF and DH.

Put both of them in the lineup and you get an instant upgrade in offense.

RF Markakis
SS Hardy
LF Beltran
1B Fielder
CF Jones
C Wieters
3B Reynolds
DH Roberts
2B Antonelli

Ugh, Roberts at DH. I doubt he could put up the numbers at DH that would make him worth it there.

I doubt he could put up numbers at DH that would have made him worthwhile at 2B.

[SrMeowMeow]

I guess you give 2B to Roberts until either he proves he can't play or he injures himself again. If we're going the free agent route, then yes, ideally I'd plug in Fielder at 1B, Beltran at LF, Aramis at 3B. Use DH to rest Roberts (for Andino) and Wieters (for Teagarden) against righties and platoon Davis against lefties. Move Reynolds for something like what we got him for. Sign Darvish and a solid back-end starter (I would have loved Bedard in this role) like Garland or Jeff Francis. That'd give us a very strong team.

Rotation: Darvish, Guthrie, Francis, Arrieta, Britton. Start Matusz in AAA.
Bullpen: Just let Jim Johnson close already. Maybe try Tillman out of the bullpen. Simon can be in there too. Gregg is fine as a middle reliever.
Lineup: Solid from top to bottom. Wieters, Fielder, Roberts/Andino, Hardy, Aramis, Markakis, Jones, Beltran.
Payroll: What, 125M?

Too bad we're not the Yankees.

[RZNJ]

And why would Darvish only sign a 3 year deal with the Orioles?

He wouldn't, unless it was for 20M a year. If you are mentioning the 3 year deal because of what Duquette said, then yes, they'll never sign a top FA pitcher who's not near the end of his career. I'm just not sure if I believe Duquette. Either way, I don't believe they'll sign Darvish just like I'm sure they won't sign Fielder. So why are you asking me about this?

[Oriolidae85]

And why would Darvish only sign a 3 year deal with the Orioles?

Understand that the Orioles have the 3 year contract limit on pitching contracts, but Darvish is younger than most available SP's and I could see an exception being made. Would they add option years to Darvish, or guarantee more years in his contract, given his age? Wonder when we will find out who wins the Darvish Bid, as the Yankees Nakajima posting bid took about a week after the bidding deadline. So it could take until the 21st of Dec.

Wonder what the Rangers would bid for Darvish, if they did match/exceed Wilson's contract, how much are they willing to go for an unknown. Same with the other teams with big pockets

[RZNJ]

Word around the Red Sox is that they might not even bid. Word around the Yankees is that they aren't going to go big after Darvish. I wonder if any of this is posturing in hopes of keeping the bids low.

[Oriolidae85]

This has probably been linked before, but has some good tidbits of information:

The Yankees, who could use a front-end pitcher for their rotation, just won the posting bid for the 29-year-old Japanese shortstop Hiroyuki Nakajima, but for a modest $2.5 million. No one knows what it will take to win the posting auction for Darvish, but many in baseball say it will be at least $30 million, and perhaps significantly more.

Will that number scare off the Yankees and the Boston Red Sox, despite their financial resources? It might. The Yankees had a disastrous experience when they signed Kei Igawa from Japan to a five-year, $20 million contract, in addition to the $26 million posting fee. Igawa spent the great portion of that contract in the minor leagues.

And the Red Sox had only mixed results when they spent lavishly to sign Daisuke Matsuzaka. Boston won the posting in November 2006 with a bid of $51,111,111.11, then signed him to a five-year, $50 million contract, so the entire venture cost more than $100 million.

(The Red Sox obliterated the second-place bid of the Mets, who were shocked to have lost with their $39 million bid. This time around, the strapped Mets will not be involved with Darvish.)