MLBits: A’s Move Not Settled, Announcer Drama, Machado and Other Big Contract Struggles, Burnes Human, the Javy Experience, More

May 23, 2023

A bunch of miscellaneous things to get to from around baseball today …

Since announcing that they were going to buy land in Las Vegas to construct a new ballpark and move the team, the A’s have … not finalized anything. There was the original plan at the Tropicana site, and then the new plan at the Bally’s site, but a final and approved plan is still not in place. They have to get the local politicians on board to make the move financial viable (read: a windfall for ownership), and that has not happened yet. There are reports of a tentative deal, but not all the necessary political bodies are on board, and it’s not close to the deal the A’s were said to be seeking. Could just be negotiation tactics, but Las Vegas/Clark County/Nevada are not jumping to throw a ton of cash into the deal:

HARDBALL ⚾️ ON STADIUM DEAL:
Nevada lawmakers at the table will not go higher than $175 million for financing, per an official, leaving a $220 million gap outside Clark County bonds for the $395 million ask. There are doubts whether the A’s will fill that gap. @FOX5Vegas— Jaclyn Schultz (@JaclynFOX5Vegas) May 22, 2023

NEW: Some Clark County officials have concerns over the @Athletics ability to pay their debt and generate tax revenue in a Las Vegas ballpark, which could affect property taxes for residents if revenue falls short. https://t.co/rY34qVcnJL— FOX5 Las Vegas (@FOX5Vegas) May 23, 2023

The thinking is that the A’s need to have a deal in place ASAP if they’re going to feasibly have a new ballpark in place soon enough to NOT have to play more than a couple seasons at their Triple-A minor league ballpark in Las Vegas. The expectation is that they’d play one more year in Oakland because their lease runs through 2024 (can attendance possibly get worse?), and then figure out a temporary solution in Vegas as the new stadium is built to debut in 2027.

More A’s headlines, which I’m sure they’re just loving. Long-time A’s announce Glen Kuiper has been fired after a review of the incident where he, seemingly inadvertently, said a racial slur when referencing the Negro Leagues Baseball Museum:

Glen Kuiper will not return as A’s announcer for NBC Sports California after a review into his saying a racial epithet on-air this month, a network spokesperson said today:https://t.co/AU2orisusI— Matt Kawahara (@matthewkawahara) May 22, 2023

Kuiper issued a statement in response, and he is obviously none too happy about what he sees as getting canned for one verbal slip up:

Glen Kuiper's statement:

"I wish the Oakland A's and NBC Sports would have taken into consideration my 20-year-career, my solid reputation, integrity, and character, but in this current environment traits like integrity and character are no longer considered."#Athletics pic.twitter.com/yOBoLWPaWk— Uprooted (@uprootedoakland) May 23, 2023

For what it’s worth, a source told The Athletic that “the decision was based on a variety of factors, including information uncovered in the internal review.” Obviously there’s an implication there that this one verbal slip up was not the only issue discovered, but my guess is the facts on that are going to have to wait for the inevitable litigation.

Manny Machado is only 30, so you wouldn’t necessarily expect a huge fall-off just yet, but when you see things like this – paired with the bad results – you probably get nervous if you’re the Padres, who just signed him to a new 11(!)-year, $350 million deal:

this is manny machado pic.twitter.com/rnspH1gIXo
— Codify (@CodifyBaseball) May 22, 2023

Machado, who otherwise could’ve opted out of his original deal with the Padres, inked the massive extension back in the spring so that the opt-out wouldn’t happen. Seems like a brilliant move on his part. To date, he’s hitting just .231/.282/.372/81 wRC+, and as you can see in the metrics up there, he’s earned it. He’s currently on the Injured List with a small fracture in his hand.

Machado’s situation got me curious about whether any other massive recent signing guys were disappointing so far this year, and there are definitely a few: Julio Rodriguez (12 years, $209.3 million; 95 wRC+), Andres Gimenez (7 years, $106.5 million; 75 wRC+), Carlos Correa (6 years, $200 million; 93 wRC+), and Trea Turner (11 years, $300 million; 85 wRC+) among them. There are a bunch of lower-dollar ones that stick out, too (Jose Abreu, Keibert Ruiz, Sandy Alcantara, Hunter Greene, Miles Mikolas, Jameson Taillon … ). It’s early enough that there’s plenty of time to rebound. But the ones that are for 7 or 10 or 12 years are ones where a big blip at the start probably gets you a little nervous.

Meanwhile, since I was perusing the early season stats, I didn’t realize just how human Corbin Burnes has been so far this year: 3.97 ERA, 4.82 FIP, 21.5% K, 8.9% BB. Kinda crazy numbers for a guy who was one of the best three or four starters in baseball since 2020. Remember the fight about arbitration before the season? I don’t think there’s any reason to believe it bled into Burnes’ performance, but it does become the backdrop when a guy then goes out and struggles for the first time in years.

Here’s how manager Craig Counsell talked about Burnes after he got blown up by the Astros last night (Brewers.com): “I would say he hasn’t put together a long string of good starts. I thought the two previous starts were pretty darn good. Probably just spraying the ball a little more than we’ve seen. The stuff is, by the way we look at it, really the same. Some misses, maybe a little bigger than usual. But nothing that’s like not really close to like putting himself right on track.”

The Brewers have also dealt with a lot of injury issues in their rotation (Woodruff, Miley, Ashby), so it’s no surprise they’re taking a flyer on recently-a-free-agent-again Julio Teheran:

Julio Teheran agrees to Brewers deal
— Jon Heyman (@JonHeyman) May 23, 2023

The Javy Báez Experience:

Javy has a 45.9 percent O-swing rate, and the lowest strikeout rate of his career, by 6.7 percent! at 17.3 percent. Playing great D. Production is meh. Just the strangest, most interesting and infuriating of players. Amazing really.— Bless You Boys (@blessyouboys) May 23, 2023

Javy’s numbers this year remain bizarre (and mostly bad) – he’s hitting just .238/.292/.335/76 wRC+, but he’s striking out just 17.3% of the time because of the referenced swing and contact tendencies. He’s hitting for no power, mostly because he’s making contact with almost everything he swings at – in years past, he swung nearly as much, but he didn’t make as much contact on the bad pitches. So he’s actually being HURT by his improved contact rate!

The Orioles City Connects are out, and they suck:

This is what it means to wear Baltimore on your chest. pic.twitter.com/42jXwRT9PV
— Baltimore Orioles (@Orioles) May 22, 2023

Thing is, they WOULD have been great if the inside trim had actually been on the outside instead of being hidden:

There's always more to the story.https://t.co/hK2tSdKcMB pic.twitter.com/Bg899awBSH
— Baltimore Orioles (@Orioles) May 22, 2023

The Dodgers managed to make all sides angry by inviting, then un-inviting, and now re-inviting a particular group to their Pride Night:

pic.twitter.com/626cPP4Ith
— Los Angeles Dodgers (@Dodgers) May 22, 2023

It feels like the Cubs have used a lot of pitchers already this year, but they’re actually on the low end of usage:

Number of different pitchers used this year:
28 OAK
27
26
25 COL TB
24 CIN MIA NYM
23 MIL SEA
22 ARI BOS LAA LAD MIN
21 CWS KC PHI
20 NYY
19 SD STL TEX
18 ATL CHC CLE DET WSH
17 BAL HOU PIT SF
16 TOR— Codify (@CodifyBaseball) May 23, 2023

I laughed:

Pretty sure that's Patrick. pic.twitter.com/O69RMfdHi6
— Rob Friedman (@PitchingNinja) May 23, 2023

Shohei likes Funyuns and now I KNOW the Cubs MUST sign him:

Patrick Sandoval just posted this photo of Shohei Ohtani eating Funyuns 😭 pic.twitter.com/jf7i12zX9e
— MLB Life (@MLBLife) May 23, 2023

I think baseball is more enjoyable when Joey Votto is playing, so I hope he can make his way back sometime soon:

“I’m healthier, stronger and moving towards to what I think is repeatable,” Joey Votto said Monday.

Does that mean Votto could soon return to the Reds?@ctrent details his progress as he continues rehabbing from an August surgery:https://t.co/btpy48Xj1I— The Athletic MLB (@TheAthleticMLB) May 23, 2023

written by

Brett Taylor

Brett Taylor is the Lead Cubs Writer at Bleacher Nation, and you can find him on Twitter at @BleacherNation and on LinkedIn here. Brett is also the founder of Bleacher Nation, which opened up shop in 2008 as an independent blog about the Chicago Cubs. Later growing to incorporate coverage of other Chicago sports, Bleacher Nation is now one of the largest regional sports blogs on the web.

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