Winter Meetings Day 3 Recap

An article by Joe D    2 Comments

The Brewers have agreed to terms with Randy Wolf on a three-year, $29.75 million contract. The deal will be finalized pending a physical. The Mets had strong interest in the 33-year-old left-hander who made 34 starts and posted a 3.23 ERA and 1.10 WHIP for the Dodgers last season.

According to AOL’s Ed Price via Twitter, the Mets “feel they are in contention” for free agent left fielder Jason Bay. They will have to fend off heavy interest from other large market teams.The 31-year-old slugger hit .267 for the Red Sox last season with 36 home runs, 119 RBI and 13 stolen bases in 531 at-bats.

Former Met and current Marlin reliever Matt Lindstrom could be on the move according to Joe Capozzi of the Palm Beach Post. He writes that the Astros may be close to landing the 30-year old fire baller.

The Milwaukee Brewers have signed reliever La Troy Hawkins to a two-year, $7.5MM deal.

Ken Rosenthal of Fox Sports says that the Angels and Rangers have been the most aggressive on veteran reliever Darren Oliver. I wrote the following back in November on Oliver who I thought would be a nice fit. I like Oliver a lot and he has already had some success with the Met. Last season, he appeared in 63 games for the Angels and had a 2.71 ERA and a 1.14 WHIP in 73 innings. He struck out 65 batters while walking just 22. He shows no signs of slowing down.

According to Jayson Stark of ESPN, Joel Pineiro should be paid more than the three-year $29 million dollar deal signed by Wolf, according to Pineiro’s agent.

The Rockies are on the verge of completing a two-year deal with catcher Yorvit Torrealba, according to Buster Olney of ESPN. The Mets were looking at Torrealba as a fallback option if they couldn’t agree to a deal with Bengie Molina.

John Morosi writes that the Red Sox, Yankees and Mariners have interest in starting pitcher Rich Harden who is apparently willing to sign a one-year deal with incentives. This is the kind of low-risk high-reward type signing I thought the Mets might benefit from. Of the second tiered pitchers, a healthy Harden is probably the best of the lot.

There’s still no word on whether catcher Bengie Molina has accepted or rejected the reported 2-year $12 million dollar offer the Mets made this morning.

More later…