It's 16 days until Spring Training, and I'm in a quandary.
My owner's given me a few dollar bills to spend on a 5th starter, and I think I'm there, but the injuries were been so damned bad for pitchers last year with the pitch clock, that I'm not counting my chances.
We knew Yamamoto would go to the Dodgers, so we didn't even go for it. We could have done a bit better than what was asked for us for Corbin Burnes (Milwaukee's a mess, anyway), but we weren't going to give up the house for him. Verlander and Scherzer have both stayed in their spots, and if we're honest, and we weren't going to up Philly on Aaron Nola ((Hey, our team's rich, but it ain't 7 years, $172 million rich). The Yankees have offered Blake Snell a lot of house, but Scott Boras has told him that he wants more real estate. And he's not cutting prices, either.
But we've got this who's been calling us relentlessly about getting a tryout. But we're unsure if we're going to do it.
You know him? Yeah, it's Trevor Bauer.
I'm not the only GM of my 32 who's not bothered by the back story to Bauer. Sure, he had dalliances with that girl, but she turned out to be an absolute liar, and I'm surprised he didn't sue her for extortion. If you listened to her stupid radio interviews, you would be shocked that he didn't.
Listen, the league's hardly one that cares about human rights. Marcell Ozuna, who only got 20 games for beating his wife (joke) and nothing about the DUI arrest, is still given some love on MLB TV. Domingo German managed to play in New York. And throw a freakin' perfect game for those game before they booted his ass out for getting out of his head and throwing a sofa and stuff. Batterin' Aroldis Chapman's only got 30 games for choking his ex-girlfriend and shooting gunshots into a freakin' garage, and now he's got two World Series rings, for Chrissake. And there are others and others.
But Trevor? The guy's poison, and we all know it.
He's got that weird thing inside him that means he always has to run his mouth. He seems like the crazy dude sitting in his mother's basement believing the 4Chan posts that COVID was really porn for frogs.
The dude's got more presents online than Bill Gates. Instagram? Check. You saw him play out his life in Japan on that one. Twitter? Check. He told everyone on The Musker's place he was a better bet than Blake Snell, because he'd cost less than the guy, which would have irked him. His whole spiel about Snell 'deservedly making hundreds of millions' while there was another Cy Young winner waiting on the sidelines made him more desperate than the solo girl in a wedding movie.
Then there's the Youtube, where he bitched and whined about the rosin and Sticky Stuff debate, which mightily pissed off Manfred (The only thing Manfred probably enjoyed was his spatting with the Astros) . In fact, it pissed him off so much that he singled him out after his online attack about the sticky stuff. His fastball's spin rate lost 200 rpm when the boys started going all FBI on people's asses. Hey, I've had a couple of guys booted off my team for sticky stuff or rosin. MLB has never lost an appeal.
Thankfully, the Facebook page hasn't been updated since 2022, which is 1922 in Social Media years. He's still a Dodger on that page, which is kinda comical.
Dude, when Bauer's not throwing a baseball to a video phone (or a wall), he's publicly dueled with Gerrit Cole and Justin Verlander. He's thrown a ball over an outfield wall after a crappy outing. He made the Mets and their fans look stupid, and someone who works for Steve says that that's taken some doing!
Look, he can still pitch. Yeah, so the Japanese leagues are a step below our guys, but he managed an under 2.50 ERA, and shouldered over 130 innings. He was so bad early on that he got relegated to the minors, but he came back and was a NPB All-Star and fan sensation (Man, the sword shit went down well with them).
But the guys upstairs hate him. Which is amazing, if you think about how many of our guys hate those chumps upstairs.
I mean, look at the social media account of most of the players on my roster. These guys are making money and letting their balls do the talking (but not in a Bauer way). Maybe a few shots of a wedding or something that they are pitching, or telling people about where their next appearance is. More often than not they spend the season giving love to their teammates or saying: "See what you did" at Shohei or Acuna or someone who's hit a 540ft bomb in center...or caught one before it became one. I mean, I'm sure Brian Cashman's going to tell Stroman to either dial it down or turn it off while he's a Yankee, because he was great at rubbing people the wrong way when he was a Met and a Cub. Look, I'm sure there's a little fun. Especially during the Baseball World Cup. But I only had to Google the word: "Bauer" and "controversy" or "Bauer" and 'spats' and they've sent me back the Encyclopedia Britannica.
And we know he's desperate, because he did an interview with the charmers at Fox News where he sounded contrite. He said that he'd made some mistakes, tried to stay away from wanting to get laid on the internet, and said through reflection, he'd grown up a lot. And echoing a sort of President We All Know, he said a lot of teams had been in conversations with him. I'm sure we all believe him, but put 32 GMs like me into a room and jab them full of tequila or truth serum, and how many really told Rachel Luba they were interested in him? Where are the public workouts? Surely something must have leaked out by now? I mean, everybody's got a freakin' camera phone! But then, after his moments of reflection and prayer yada yada yada, he takes less than a month to take a quasi-shot at Snell, who's never been a crazy person (apart from the bit where he looked like Satan for talking about cash during the pandemic).
I mean, why in the hell do that when your back is well and truly against a wall? Does he not have a brain? Or does he think that his mechanical engineering degree makes him far more of a brainiac than anyone else?
The problem for my market is that there aren't a lot of others to choose from. Corey Kluber, who we looked at for a couple of minutes, has decided to retire. Jordan Montgomery's probably going to be too rich for our liking after his great half-season with the Rangers. Hey, there's always Madison Bumgarner, who's got a mouth on him - just ask Wilson Contreras about that - but his 10.26 ERA was atrocious last year, and he was pretty awful in 2022 too. Any bets on him getting better?
What are better options? Brandon Woodruff, who had a great year in 2023 and has had a very good career up to now. Are we actually prepared to sign him and wait around until 2025 and risk the shoulder? Or 9,000 year old Rich Hill, who'll fill in some innings. The only one we're not going anywhere near is Urias, who's also been banned for domestic violence. We don't need that on our resume.
If we need a clubhouse leader, we should get Liam Hendriks, who's been through more than most in recent years, but is coming from Tommy J.
Or, like the Dodgers and Cubs and numerous others, do we go and get a guy or two from Japan, who could help us more than a loudmouth in the locker room?
But as I've told my fellow 31 after we met for some late night debauchery at one of our owner's houses while he was away on his yacht, I'll think about Trevor Bauer, and might even get him for a workout.
If he turns off all of his social media and shuts the hell up, and doesn't mention who he's working out with.
