Results tagged ‘ Diamondbacks ’
Saunders wants to stay with D-backs
Spoke with D-backs lefty Joe Saunders this morning who said he’s still hopeful of returning to the team. Saunders is eligible for salary arbitration and could command a salary of between $8 million to $9 million. The team seems interested in signing him to a two-year deal more so than paying what it would cost to go through arbitration with him.
“I do want to stay here,” Saunders said. “It’s just a matter of if the D-backs want to bring me back.”
The D-backs have until Dec. 12 to tender Saunders. If they decide to non-tender him he would become a free agent.
– Steve Gilbert
Matt Williams suffers broken foot
SCOTTSDALE, Ariz. — D-backs third base coach Matt Williams said he has a broken right foot, the result of being hit by a ball during a soft toss drill.
Williams was spotted limping between practice fields Wednesday with a walking boot on his right leg.
The incident occurred he said a couple of days ago. How long it will prevent him from coaching third base is unknown.
This will be Williams first year coaching third base in the Majors.
Gibson talks about rules, roster
28 days until Opening Day
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Kirk Gibson had a lot of really interesting things to say during his media sessions with us Thursday in Peoria that I didn’t have a place for in my stories. Here’s some of what he had to say…
– On whether guys were starting to make a push for spots on the roster: “The book is just starting. I don’t think we’re close to a point where we could even make a good calculated decision.”
– There has been a lot of talk this spring and even over the winter about Gibson’s rules about cell phone use and the banning of pellet guns and the like in the clubhouse.
It seems to be a subject that Gibson is getting tired of revisiting.
“I don’t think I’ve been tough at all,” he said of his rules. “I think I’ve been fair. We just kind of said there are certain things we want to abide by and do. It’s not a big deal, it’s just like business as usual.”
Gibson also has emphasized that the rules were decided on after consultation with managing general partner Ken Kendrick, president/CEO Derrick Hall, GM Kevin Towers and his coaching staff.
“These are not just my rules,” Gibson said. “We sat down as an organization and talked about some important things. We had a lot of conversations, people had input and we sat there and said this is what we’re going to go with. Once the decision was made we moved on.”
It doesn’t sound like guys will be having their cell phones ringing in the clubhouse.
“You’re talking to somebody in the clubhouse, your phone rings and you go get it, I think it’s rude No. 1,” Gibson said. “Other people are having a conversation next to you and phones are going off, I don’t like it. It just gets to be too much for me. When we’re in here it’s pretty much a baseball environment let’s focus on that if you need to make a call just walk outside and make a call.”
– As much as Gibson has refrained from talking about the past, he did let a little slip near the end of his talk about rules and cell phones when he talked about preparing for games differently: “We definitely need to do a better job because the way we did do it sure in the heck didn’t work.”
– Sparky Anderson was obviously a big influence on Gibson and he quoted him when talking about privileges for his players.
“Sparky taught us a long time ago, you start with nothing and you earn everything,” he said.
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Looks like Zach Duke will pitch down in Tucson during Monday’s split squad game with Aaron Heilman working the game against the Royals in Surprise.
Happy Monday morning
After rain the last couple of days it looks like it is shaping up to be a beautiful day here at Salt River Fields.
Some leftover items from the soggy weekend:
– It was pretty funny to hear GM Kevin Towers greet newly-signed first baseman Russell Branyan not by his name, but as “Russell the Muscle.”
And while Branyan is big, he looks almost small compared to outfielder Wily Mo Pena.
Pena is listed at 270 pounds, but that might be a little light. A number of the guys were telling me I had to go shake his hand just for the experience of it and wow. Your hand completely disappears in his and his grip is like a vice.
“Unbelievable,” is how one player described him.
– Following Saturday’s first full-squad meeting, D-backs team president/CEO Derrick Hall said several of the new veterans pulled he and Ken Kendrick aside to share a couple of thoughts with them.
“These guys are telling Ken and I, ‘We’re going to make a difference, this is going to different, this is where we wanted to be and there’s a reason for that,’” Hall said.
One of the veterans brought over during the winter was infielder Geoff Blum.
“There’s a lot of us in here that are new so we don’t know what was going on the last two years and that might be a good thing,” Blum said. “From the outside looking in the last couple of years we’ve always noticed they had a ton of talent, but obviously from the comments that are being made, the clubhouse atmosphere had to be changed so we’ll what we can do.”
– The main word around camp this year is competition, but there’s another that’s close behind: Swagger.
“We talked about swagger quite a bit,” Hall said of that first meeting. “We want this [the team's logo] to mean something. The last couple years this hasn’t meant much and we want it to mean something so we have to reestablish that.”
And then there was manager Kirk Gibson during his press briefing Sunday.
“It was a good day, I like the vibe, I like the swagger,” he said.
Sounds like the goal is to swagger through some competition while changing the culture…
– I asked bullpen coach Glenn Sherlock for some time this morning and he said he couldn’t because he had an Air Force meeting.
Turns out it was actually a pop up drill he does with the team’s catchers. That’s the nickname he has given to it.
What about when he does tag play drills? Those are listed on the schedule as a Marine meeting.
Spring Training competition
42 days until Opening Day
7 days until first Spring Training game
The theme of the D-backs spring seems to be competition with the theory being that no longer will jobs just be handed out to players, they will have to be earned.
It’s a great idea that will foster a competitive atmosphere and force everyone to work harder than they have in the past and help them to reach another level, but it isn’t without some risk.
For example, let’s say for arguments sake that Kevin Mulvey or Zach Kroenke throw up zero after zero during the spring and by far and away post the best numbers of any of the starting pitchers this spring. And let’s also say that Zach Duke scuffles. Are the D-backs prepared to hand a starting role to one of those two and release Duke despite the fact that he’s owed $4.25 million this year?
And if they decided to keep Duke over someone who clearly outpitched him, what kind of message does it send to the clubhouse after you’ve spent weeks preaching that everyone has a chance to make the team? What does that do to the trust factor?
Again, it may not come down to that, but it is one of the risks you run when you say everyone can make the team.
It’s a little easier when it comes to position players and you’re talking about the competition at first base or left field. You play the best this spring, you get the playing time out of the gate. There are less big contracts involved at those positions.
I do understand the argument that you make bad player evaluations when you rely too much on their performance in March — when they might be facing players that will not start the season in the Majors — or September — when they might be facing pitchers that are only in the Majors because the rosters were expanded.
So yes, in theory, the D-backs should have a pretty good idea already what Brandon Allen, Juan Miranda and Russell Branyan can do at first, but given the struggles this team has had the last two years and the fact that the atmosphere in the clubhouse was one where some were clearly too comfortable, I don’t think the concept of earning a spot this spring is a bad idea.
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My colleague Corey Brock wrote an interesting story yesterday on Chad Qualls.
It seems despite all his comments last year to the contrary — and let me say that he was extremely adamant in those comments — his left knee did indeed bother him and that is what he feels led to him having a horrible season.
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Great quote from Gibson on why he wants his pitchers to be able to slash — i.e. fake a bunt, pull the bat back and swing away.
“You see guys just camp in there on your pitchers and I don’t like it,” Gibson said. “If they do that, my goal for us is we’ll have another option. I like to see guys hit the deck.”
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What it looked like this morning when I arrived at Salt River Fields..
Breakfast with Miggy
43 days until Opening Day
8 days until first Spring Training game
Greetings from Salt River Fields where the D-backs will be on field practicing from 9:30-11:50 a.m. this morning and signing autographs as they start to filter off the field around 11:20 a.m.
The work, though, gets started long before 9:30 here. Manager Kirk Gibson has been known to get here as early as 5 a.m. and his coaches are not that far behind him. I showed up around 7 today and there were players who had been here for a while already and gotten in their morning warm up workout.
Something I noticed a couple of days ago was Miguel Montero walking around with a little tray of food. It looked like one of those frozen dinners.
Finally had to ask him about it today and it turns out he is working at improving his eating so he has meals specially prepared and shipped to him. As he headed in to heat up his breakfast he allowed me to snap a quick picture (see the bottom of this post).
Doesn’t look like a lot of food for a guy Miggy’s size, but what I know about nutrition you could fit in a thimble.
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In case you missed this story yesterday, you might want to take a peek at Kelly Johnson’s quotes about last season. Sounds like the second baseman was pretty unhappy with the mood in the clubhouse and the team’s mental approach last year.
Seems to speak to the reason the organization felt the culture in the clubhouse had to be changed this year.
Good morning from Salt River Fields
44 days until Opening Day
9 days until first Spring Training game
OK, so when I said this blog was going to be updated daily, I didn’t anticipate having a computer virus that knocked me offline for a number of hours last night.
With that in mind, here is a bonus morning post from Salt River Fields at Talking Stick…
Forgot to post these photos from Monday. It appears that Barry Enright is getting quite a bit of support from his Chandler neighbors. Enright got into his car early Monday to head to the first pitcher/catcher workouts and was surprised to see these signs up in his ***-de-sac.
“It really meant a lot to me that they would do that,” Enright said of his neighbors. “It’s a great block, I have fun playing with the kids, just really good people and that they would do this for me really means a lot.”
Zavada expected to return to camp
The agent for Clay Zavada says he expects the D-backs left-hander to be back in camp Tuesday or Wednesday.
Zavada did not show up for the club’s physical exams Sunday night and was not in attendance at the club’s first pitcher and catcher workout Monday.
Zavada’s agent, Barry Meister, said that Zavada experienced some discomfort in his shoulder and that was the reason for his absence.
“He just needed a couple of days to figure out what was going on with his shoulder,” Meister said.
Meister said that Zavada was going to see either the team’s training staff or team physician Michael Lee about his shoulder Tuesday and that he had talked to manager Kirk Gibson about his situation.
Notes from first pitcher catcher workout
46 days until Opening Day in Denver
11 days until first Spring Training game
Another beautiful day for baseball at Salt River Fields with temperatures again around 80 degrees and bright blue skies.
We’ve been told that players will be signing autographs each day around 11:50 a.m. local time. The club has gone out of its way to make sure fans are able to get up close with the players on the pathways between the fields. I also noticed today that the main stadium was open for fans to walk around and take a look at.
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Today’s stories:
Notes: Hudson healthy; Heilman eyes starting
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Turns out GM Kevin Towers misspoke Sunday when he said Zach Duke would be late to camp because his wife was due to give birth to the couple’s first child any day now.
Duke’s wife Kristin gave birth last Wednesday so Duke was there and threw a bullpen Monday.
You have to feel for him leaving his 3-day-old child behind to get on a plane for Arizona, but that’s sometimes what ballplayers have to go through as part of the job. For now, he will have to make do with Skype, something he says he’s been doing three times a day to see his baby Madison.
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Clay Zavada’s absence from camp seemed to catch everyone by surprise. Still not exactly sure what’s going on there. Towers said he had heard something about Zavada maybe not wanting to go “through this again” whatever that means.
When I talked to Zavada a couple of weeks ago he sounded pretty excited about the season so I’m not sure what’s going on, but it’s something I’ll continue to follow and keep you updated.
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Seemed like there might be some progress on the Kelly Johnson front. The two sides have until Wednesday’s salary-arbitration hearing to reach a settlement.
Johnson’s agent is now in town and the dialogue has picked up between the two sides.
“Dialogue is better than no dialogue and over the last 48 hours we’ve had a lot more dialogue than we’ve had in the last two weeks so I look at that as a good sign,” Towers said.
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Catcher Miguel Montero made some interesting comments about the culture change in the clubhouse with the influx of veterans and Kirk Gibson taking over for A.J. Hinch as manager.
“The last two years we’ve been losing 90 games, and it seems like nothing happened,” said Montero. “I don’t think that is going to happen again. If we lose again, everybody is going to know that we lost a game. I think that’s what it means. And I like that idea, because I hate to lose. Period.”
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That’s all for today. I’ll be back at it bright and early Tuesday. Don’t forget you can follow me on Twitter @dbackswriter.
Steve Gilbert
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