January 7: The Hall of Fame voting is in, and nobody made it:
It's do-or-die next year for Joe Mauer, while some others made strong first-time showings (Altuve, Goldy, Freeman).
Meanwhile 38-year-old Trea Turner signed a 2/20 deal with Minnesota.
January 8: Lost OF Hendry Mendez to Texas on waivers.
Mendez was barely used despite being up all of last season and has no defensive value. Instead we'll go with a Japanese import from a couple of winters ago,
Norietsu Kurakawa, who's an average CF and an above-average corner guy who has some pop and is coming off a good (4.1 WAR) year with Durham.
January 12: Former Ray Forrest Whitley, who's fashioned a career as a middle reliever since leaving here after the 2027 season, joined the Yankees on a 2/10 deal.
January 14: Elly De La Cruz, coming off a .266-37-113 season, signed a 3/29 pact with the San Antonio Seagulls.
January 20: We signed our first amateur IFA of the winter, 17-year-old SP Humberto Herrera, who has 60/50/75 potential.
January 26: The Rockies offloaded perennial 30-homer guy Zac Veen to Texas for a pitching prospect.
January 28: After spending 3 years in Philly, OF Byron Buxton is on his way to the Dodgers on a 3/49 contract.
February 5: Tanner Dodson, in our bullpen the last few years but who missed the second half of last season due to injury, joined the Yankees for 1 year and $3.9M.
February 14: Veteran C Reese McGuire embodies the term "journeyman". Starting in 2027 he went from the Yankees to Boston to Detroit to Arizona, back to the Yankees, back to Detroit and now he's going back to Boston on a 1/9.4 deal. Guessing Arizona is next on his itinerary.
March 16: Joey Gallo comes full circle as the 38-year-old returns to where he started in Texas, joining the Rangers for 1 year and $12M. He's consistently hit 35-40 HR and consistently hit around .200 but he's still been good for around 3 WAR/season the last few years.
March 21: We've lost
Ozzie Albies for most of the season with a torn labrum as he'll be out until late August. I'm not sure that's a huge loss considering he only earned 1.2 WAR last year and is a lousy 2B.
Victor Mesa and
Marco Luciano can man the position adequately.
March 23: A newsy day as our free agent Taj Bradley joined the Cubs on a 2/32 deal and we signed a couple of vets to minor league deals: C
Patrick Bailey and OF
Ethan Wilson. Bailey should take
Cade Arrambide's job as backup C and will cut into
Angel Rivera's ABs more. We have a crowded OF but Wilson, who was a 2-WAR guy last year and has 25-HR power, will give us extra depth at Durham.