Arizona’s Mitch Haniger and Milwaukee’s Damien Magnifico played their first major league games of 2016 on Tuesday, and Atlanta promoted touted prospect Dansby Swanson to make his debut Wednesday.
If this feels like a tap that never closes, you are onto something.
The total of those who played at least one game in 2016 though Tuesday was 1,239 – an average of more than 41 per team and almost as many as played in the entire 2006 campaign (1,242).
No surprise, because the number has been going up steadily from 1,284 in 2012 to a record 1,304 in 2013, to a record 1,320 in 2014 to a record 1,348 last year. With September call-ups still to come, 1,400 or more is in play this season.
Several factors have led to the increase. Teams are more cautious with players and thus use the DL more liberally, plus there are relatively new lists for concussions, paternity and bereavement. Teams are more willing to give younger players a chance and quicker than ever – Swanson and Houston’s Alex Bregman are the fastest 1-2 draft picks (in 2015) to appear in the majors since Alex Rodriguez and Darren Dreifort from the 1993 draft to the majors in 1994.
But, in recent years, clubs also have become shrewd in using the last spot or two on the 25-man roster as something akin to a taxi squad, shuffling players between the majors and minors. Teams often do this for fresh bullpen arms after blowouts or when extra innings tax a pitching staff. The Yankees, for example, have become adept at this carousel the past few years.
The more and more clubs employ this tactic, the stronger proponent I become of either having a taxi squad or freer movement to the major league roster. Heck, I believe a team should be able to set its roster daily and use any players in the system – they do pay them all. Can you imagine running a business and being told the guys who work in your factory in Des Moines cannot come and help you in New York?
This will be a subject in the ongoing negotiations for a new collective bargaining agreement, though I hear it has not yet been tackled seriously. Players, obviously, would love to expand rosters because it means more jobs. Teams are hesitant because more jobs not only means more players making – at least – what will be a higher minimum salary with a new CBA, but more money going for insurance and pensions, etc., and more service time being accrued for more players toward arbitration and free agency.
In addition, smaller-market owners fear their larger brethren will outspend them for extra/depth pieces, too. Those already concerned about the pace of play worry that more jobs means more pitchers and more pitching changes.
All of that is legitimate. But there can be ways to cap the number of pitchers eligible each day and give players with lesser roles and/or experience less service time or half the minimum wage – after all, that would still be preferable to players than no service time and a minor league salary.
I see having more flexible rosters helping with injury prevention by not forcing a hurt player to play because there are no other options and not having to over-play exhausted players. I also see the potential for a more interesting game. I think having a speed guy or two to strategically use at some point during a game would be valuable, as would bringing up a hitter who specializes in hitting lefties when an opponent starts a southpaw.
I would say you can have any 23 players from your system active any day and no more than eight can be pitchers (for example, a team would not have to activate the four starters who pitched the previous four games). That provides 15 position players with which to be creative.
No one wants the version we see in September, when, stupidly, teams can expand to 40 men after playing a whole season with 25. That expansion in a few weeks will assure that a record is set for players used in 2016.
And will scream that it is time to fix the roster manipulations.
Houston nearly ready to launch Gurriel
Yulieski Gurriel doubled and homered as part of a 3-for-4 outing in his Triple-A debut Tuesday, his best showing since the Astros signed arguably the greatest hitter in Cuban national team history to a five-year, $47.5 million deal on July 17.
Gurriel did not begin to play in the minors until July 30, and the Astros believed because it had been so long since he had played games that it would take a spring training-like period for him to acclimate, especially to upper-level velocity.
It is possible the Astros can summon him as early as a three-game series beginning Monday in Pittsburgh, but it is more likely it will be sometime during a six-game homestand that opens a week from Friday, particularly because Gurriel likely will serve as a DH at least early on. Rookie Alex Bregman has played well at third base after transitioning over from short, and after an atrocious first 10 games offensively, he hit .295 in his next 10 with an .811 OPS.
Gurriel will mix in some at third, and he could get time at first and/or left field, though the Astros might wait until next spring training before giving him a steady diet of multiple positions. In the short run – after not making a trade at the deadline – Houston is hoping Gurriel will serve as both a lineup and energy boost in the team’s quest for a playoff berth.
Mets haven’t had it this bad since Mackey Sasser
The Mets have a speed issue. They can’t stop a running game – particularly when Noah Syndergaard or Steven Matz starts – and they cannot generate runs from their legs.
Consider: They were 28th in the majors with 28 steals, which was fewer than five individual players had. They also had allowed a major-league-high 108 steals. The differential of minus-80 would be the worst since the 2013 Tigers (minus-93) and the worst by a Mets team since 1990.
Those 1990 Mets infamously had a primary catcher, Mackey Sasser, with the yips and a starter, Dwight Gooden, so poor at holding runners that he yielded a major-league-record 60 steals.