As everyone from the world of baseball has now checked out from the Gaylord Opryland Hotel in Nashville, the 2012 Major League Baseball Winter Meetings have come to a conclusion.  Unlike most years, this edition was mostly quiet, with the largest financial commitment being a 4-year $40 million contract by San Francisco with outfielder Angel Pagan, the biggest trade involving Ben Revere and Vance Worley changing cities, and the hottest piece of news probably the Nationals signing 3-time All-Star Dan Haren Tuesday morning to replace Edwin Jackson in the starting rotation.  I wrote about the Haren signing yesterday, but four days of baseball activity has left me with a few Nationals topics worth discussing, namely the Zach Duke and Bill Bray signings on Monday and the Rule 5 Draft Thursday morning.

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The first day of the MLB winter meetings found general manager Mike Rizzo and the Nationals searching for some left-handed depth for their bullpen, signing Zach Duke to a 1-year major league deal and agreeing to terms with Bill Bray on a minor league contract.  Zach Duke, 29-years-old and a former 2009 All-Star representative as a member of the Pirates, spent the majority of 2012 in Triple-A Syracuse posting a 15-5 record with a 3.51 ERA in 26 starts and 164.1 innings pitched, then was promoted to Washington in September and impressively provided the Nationals with a 1.32 ERA in 13.2 innings of relief.  After experiencing a career free-fall in 2010 and 2011, a reunion with Nationals pitching coordinator Spin Williams helped Duke rediscover his ability to get hitters out.  Duke will enter spring training expecting to replace Tom Gorzelanny as the team’s left-handed long reliever and spot starter: while I prefer Gorzelanny, Duke should be a passable replacement at a fraction of the cost next season.

Bill Bray returns to the organization that originally drafted him #13th overall in the 2004 draft, after struggling through a difficult season in 2012, only pitching 8.2 innings in 14 games with a 5.19 ERA and 7 strikeouts against 14 walks.  Bray was part of the July 2006 blockbuster trade which sent himself along with Royce Clayton, Brendan Harris, Gary Majewski, and Daryl Thompson to Cincinnati in return for Austin Kearns, Felipe Lopez, and Ryan Wagner.  Although Bray struggled with injuries last season, he posted a 2.98 ERA in 79 appearances in 2011, and for his career, he holds left-handed batters to a meager .218/.312/.331 batting line.  If he can prove his back and groin injuries from 2012 are behind him next spring in Viera, Bray stands a good chance of finding his way onto the roster as a left-handed specialist, making this a intriguing and potentially shrewd minor league free agent signing.

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Ever since major league baseball altered the rules for eligibility of prospects available, the Rule 5 draft has been rendered significantly less effective than in its previous form, but like Stephen Strasburg’s inning shutdown, this event is thoroughly overanalyzed by those throughout the internet.  The Nationals entered the Rule 5 will a fairly full roster and amidst reports that Mike Rizzo and Davey Johnson left Nashville Wednesday evening, leaving everyone expecting the team not to make a selection during today’s draft.
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True to expectations, the Nationals decided to stand pat this morning while watching the Colorado Rockies select LHP Danny Rosenbaum, and infielder Jeff Kobernus chosen by the Boston Red Sox (who quickly traded him to the Detroit Tigers in a separate trade).  Rosenbaum, 25-years-old, spent 2012 in Double-A Harrisburg, posting a 8-10 record with a 3.94 ERA in 26 starts, striking out 99 batters and walking only 39 in 155.1 innings pitched.  A soft-throwing left-handed pitcher, Rosenbaum’s ceiling is not particularly high so his loss should not hurt the organization in the future, but as one of the few starters above Double-A, his loss further depletes an organizational weakness and increases the need for the Nationals to find additional starting pitching depth this winter.

Former 2009 2^nd round pick, Jeff Kobernus has steadily risen up the organizational ladder since being drafted, reaching Double-A in 2012 and batting .282/.325/.333 with 1 home run and 42 stolen bases.  Kobernus was projected to hit for more power when he was drafted, with the assumption that as he filled out he would find some pop, but now 24-years-old and with 9 total home runs in 1,172 at-bats in the minor leagues, it feels safe to project him as a backup at 2B and 3B with the ability to post a decent batting average with some speed and little else.  I was a big fan of Kobernus when I watched him in college at California-Berkeley, thinking he might eventually develop into an average starting second baseman: safe to say I was wrong on that projection, as it appears now Kobernus will work to carve out a career as a backup infielder and pinch runner with Detroit next spring.

In addition, in the Triple-A portion of the Rule 5 Draft the Nationals also lost LHP Jack McGeary to Boston and RHP Hector Nelo to the Los Angeles Dodgers.  Many Nats fans will recognize McGeary’s name, as he was the drafted in the 6^th round of the 2007 draft from a Massachusetts high school and signed for a $1.5+ million dollar bonus.  This contract allowed him to attend Stanford as a student but not play baseball for the Cardinal during the school year (as he was no longer an amateur), only playing for the Nationals during the summer.  McGeary underwent Tommy John surgery in 2010 and has pitched 25.1 innings in the past 2 seasons, making him a clever pick by his hometown Red Sox but highly unlikely to haunt the Nationals in the future.  Hector Nelo throws a powerful mid-90s fastball but his career 5.41 BB/9 ratio is the reason he was available and leaves baseball people skeptical he will develop enough control to pitch in the majors.  Anyone with that type of velocity is interesting to gamble on, but at 26-years-old, time is running out for him to learn to command the strike zone.

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After signing left-handed pitchers Zach Duke and Bill Bray on Day 1 of the MLB Winter Meetings, Tuesday morning the Washington Nationals continued their busy offseason by signing veteran right-handed starting pitcher Dan Haren to a 1-year contract reportedly worth $13 million dollars.  The Nationals starting rotation now seems established with Stephen Strasburg, Gio Gonzalez, Jordan Zimmermann, Ross Detwiler and the newly-signed Dan Haren rounding out potentially one of the most formidable groups in major league baseball.

Dan Haren, 32-years-old, went 12-13 last season with a 4.33 ERA, 1.291 WHIP (Walks + Hits divided by Innings Pitched), and 142 strikeouts against 38 walks over 176.2 innings in which he battled some issues with his back.  Earlier this winter the Anaheim Angels held a contract option on the 3-time All-Star for $15.5 million dollars, which the team declined choosing a $3.5 million dollar buyout instead, reportedly due to concerns about the health of his back and hip.  Then again, as recently as 2011 Haren was 16-10 with a 3.17 ERA in 34 starts and 238.1 innings pitched, and for his 10-year career, he sports a 119-97 record with a 3.66 ERA, 1.181 WHIP, a 7.6 K/9 ratio, and a 1.9 BB/9 over 1,876.2 innings pitched.  Haren throws an above-average sinker, an above-average “cutter”, and a below-average fastball to set up his swing-and-miss split-finger, which in addition to his excellent control and durability made him one of the best starting pitchers in baseball from 2005-2011.

But after such a mediocre performance last season, along with the fact that the pitching-needy Angels declined essentially to pay him 1-year and $12 million dollars causes me to pause and take a deeper look into his numbers.  His average fastball velocity decreased to 88.5mph in 2012, down from 90.0mph in 2011 and a career average of 90.8mph, and has steadily dropped about 0.5mph per year since 2007.  This year’s 1.5mph decrease may or may not have been the cause for the surge in his HR/9 ratio of 1.43 (1.05 career) and HR/FB ratio of 12.8% against a 10.5% career average.  A flyball pitcher seeing a surge in home runs is more than reason for concern, especially considering his home park last season suppresses homers.

In addition we saw his release point lower and move toward his arm-side (more 3/4s) in 2012, which could or could not be directly caused by his injuries last season, but is not a positive sign and further explains his results last season.  Finally, back and hip issues for a 32-year-old pitcher with almost 1,900 innings thrown in his major league career are difficult to overcome and act as another powerful consideration Haren’s best days are in his rearview mirror.  In spite of this, before Nationals fans lose all hope, in the second half of 2012 Haren posted a 3.58 ERA in 73 innings, allowing only 68 hits with a 4 to 1 K/BB ratio (56 to 14), and allowing for his shift from the American League to the National League, plus the potential for a flyball pitcher to play in front of a potentially elite defensive outfield of Jayson Werth/Denard Span/Bryce Harper gives him a good chance for a rebound season in 2013.

Once general manager Mike Rizzo and the Nationals front office declined to offer Edwin Jackson salary arbitration, this left the team with a clear need for another starting pitcher, preferably a durable, veteran, right-handed starter with a knack for pitching late into games.  This deal has a fair amount of risk to it, as Haren’s declining velocity and injuries could be warning signs that his days as an elite pitcher are finished.  If this is the case, Haren should still provide the Nationals with 190 league-average innings next year, and his contract will be seen as a slight overpayment but generally satisfactory overall (think Edwin Jackson 2012).  On the other hand, if his injury issues this past season were a 1-year problem and Haren can learn to overcome his lack of fastball velocity and further rely on his cutter and sinker to set up his split-finger in the future, Haren has the potential to function as one of the 10-15 best starting pitchers in the National League next year.
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Judging a signing like this is difficult because the major variable is his health, but the fact that the Nationals limited their risk to 1-year and another season of decline phase from Haren should still give the Nationals the veteran presence and innings-eater at the back end of the rotation they necessitated this winter.  However, if like Tom Selleck in the movie Mr. Baseball, the Nationals can bleed one last good season of baseball from Dan Haren in 2013, this transaction will be seen as the best move of the Winter Meetings and perhaps all of this offseason.  Therefore, because of the relatively limited risk of this signing, the reasonably high floor for Haren’s 2013 performance, and his ability to compete for a CY Young Award when healthy make this one of the better transactions thus far this winter.  Mike Rizzo and the Nationals should be commended for making such a potentially shrewd signing.

NatsGM Grade ->            B 

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