I’d like to say that I’m going to fly through the remaining positions, but I’m going to be flying out-of-town for a few days. I’m unsure how much blog work (if any) I’ll get done during that time. Hopefully, I’ll get something back up here by the beginning of next week.

Impact Third Basemen to Be Traded

Brandon Inge has been the name mentioned most often in this spot as he wants out of Detroit, but his contract will be hard to move. Nineteen million over the next three years is hard to justify for a third baseman that hit .236/.312/.376 a year ago.

Ian Stewart will be competing for the second base job in Colorado this spring. If he fails to win the job, he’s blocked by Garrett Atkins at his natural position, and he’d be a very valuable chip if made available. The Rockies could use him to get a missing piece of the puzzle later this season.

This name might surprise people: Troy Glaus. Glaus was already traded once this season, but the Cardinals don’t look like they’ll be contenders this year. Next year doesn’t look much better. If you remember back to his actual trade this offseason, he had to waive a no-trade clause to go from Toronto to St. Louis. It’s very doubtful he’d do it again anytime soon, so he’s one name that can be safely crossed back off the list.

Contenders Needing a Third Baseman

Back on January 28th, the Philadelphia Phillies tried to place a patch over their third base hole by inking Pedro Feliz to a two-year deal worth $8.5M. The only problem is that Feliz isn’t much of an upgrade over the Greg Dobbs/Wes Helms/Eric Bruntlett platoon he’s replacing. Feliz has only topped the .300 mark in OBP once his entire career, and that was back in 2004. He’s moving from A####mp;T Park to Citizens Bank Park, which should help him get over .300 this year, but getting an improvement will help to close that Santana-sized gap that New York created. It would be great if they could get Ian Stewart to complete their infield picture for the next four years, but they don’t have much to offer that would help the Rockies. Until teams start to give up on ’08 at the trading deadline, there isn’t much out there to help the Phillies.

Put Me In, Coach

Andy LaRoche has been waiting for his shot to be the starting third baseman in Los Angeles, and it should be his to lose this spring. The Dodgers have used Nomar Garciaparra to block both James Loney and Andy LaRoche in the past. Last year, Loney took control of the first base job, and this year, LaRoche should follow suit. The question remains – will Joe Torre start the rookie over the veteran?

Next Year’s Free Agents

Casey Blake and Joe Crede make up this list, and I think it’s safe to say both will have to wait until next year to see their next contracts.

Pre-Free Agent Stars

Miguel Cabrera is the easy name to mention. Cabrera will make $11.3M this year, and he’s arbitration-eligible for one more season before his free agency. Even if he’s forced to move to first in a couple years, his bat is so outstanding that he’ll be worth whatever he and the Tigers can hammer out.

Ryan Zimmerman isn’t eligible for free agency until after the 2011 season, but I think he’s proven enough in massive RFK to be signed to a long-term extension. He’s their current and future franchise player, so it’s time to get the deal out of the way.

These guys haven’t reached this stage yet, but they’ve got the potential to be on this list a year from now: Evan Longoria, Alex Gordon, Andy LaRoche, and Edwin Encarnacion.

Recap

Brandon Inge, Ian Stewart, and Troy Glaus (if he’ll agree to it) are trading block guys for me. The Phillies need to upgrade their third base spot again to make up ground on the Mets. Andy LaRoche deserves to be starting over Nomar Garciaparra in LA. Casey Blake and Joe Crede will be next year’s free agent third basemen. Miguel Cabrera and Ryan Zimmerman should be signed long-term. Evan Longoria, Alex Gordon, Andy LaRoche, and Edwin Encarnacion could make their way onto the extension list with good 2008 seasons.

The Colorado Rockies were the biggest surprise of the 2007 season. Everyone’s heard about their winning 21 of 22 and their 8-day layoff before the World Series, but are they here to stay?

Strengths

Leading up to opening day, the talk was that Todd Helton would be playing for the Red Sox in 2007, but those trade talks fell apart. Once the season began, Helton proved that 2006 was a fluke that can be chalked up to illness. His .320/.434/.494 line wasn’t back to his previous seasons, but it is in line with his 2005 decline to .320/.445/.534. At 34 years old, Helton is on the decline, and he isn’t getting any less expensive, but for the present, he’s still an asset at first base. On the other side of the diamond, Garrett Atkins started out slowly. After bottoming out with a .188/.259/.267 May, Atkins hit .349/.409/.532 post-All Star break (very similar to his 2006 rates) to reach his season line of .301/.367/.486. Next to Atkins, rookie Troy Tulowitzki had a tremendous debut with both the glove and the bat. Tulowitzki should win the gold glove award, although it wouldn’t surprise if he wasn’t famous enough to win the vote (how else can Jeter win three straight?). Tulowitzki got plenty of buzz during the postseason that he won’t be under the radar for the gold glove next season.

Matt Holliday was another player that saw a surge in popularity this postseason. A certain MVP candidate, Holliday hit .340/.405/.607 while playing okay defensively in a spacious home outfield. The only bad news for the Rockies is that Holliday only has two more seasons before free agency. Across the outfield, Brad Hawpe slightly improved his numbers from last year (.293/.383/.515 in 2006 to .291/.387/.539 in 2007), but he still can’t hit lefties as his .220/.295/.398 line against them attests. If you mix Hawpe with Ryan Spilborghs, you’ve got an outstanding right field platoon. Spilborghs has hit lefties for a .338/.395/.510 clips in his major league career. Once you add in Hawpe’s .315/.418/.585 clip against righties this year, the Rockies would be a dominant force in right field.

If the Rockies get a lead, their bullpen has two strong options going forward: Manny Corpas and Brian Fuentes. Fuentes had been the closer since 2005, but he lost his job to Corpas around the All Star break. In a ten-day span, Fuentes gave up 10 earned runs in only 4.1 innings before being placed on the DL for just over a month. If you remove that horrid span, Fuentes managed a 1.74 ERA over 57 innings. However, Corpas has taken the job and run with it, posting a 2.08 ERA over 78 IP. This left-right combo in the bullpen will only get one year together unless Fuentes is signed to an extension as he becomes a free agent next offseason.

Getting that lead to the bullpen has always been a problem for past Colorado teams, but they have finally been able to get some productive arms in the starting rotation led by Jeff Francis. Other than Francis and Aaron Cook, the rest of the rotation will be filled out by their young guns, a couple of which who were seen this postseason: Ubaldo Jimenez and Franklin Morales. From watching Jimenez, it is evident that he has major league quality stuff, but he had trouble locating it in the strike zone. This year, he posted a 4.28 ERA over 82 major league innings, but that followed up a 5.85 ERA in 203 IP at AAA. Morales was much better as he used 112.2 AAA innings with an ERA of 3.51 to propel him into the major league rotation, where he posted a 3.43 ERA over 39.1 regular season innings. The remaining spot in the rotation will most likely be filled by Jason Hirsh, although Taylor Buchholz could be a fallback option. Despite the increased talent in the Colorado rotation, there’s still a tremendous amount of risk here.

Concerns

As I mentioned, Todd Helton isn’t getting any younger or less expensive. They tried trading him last offseason, and although I’d suggest them trying again, I doubt he’ll be as likely to waive his no-trade clause this time around. It’s a shame because then the Rockies could move Atkins to first base to make room for Ian Stewart. Instead, they have moved Stewart to second base this offseason to try to fill the void left by Kazuo Matsui’s impending free agency. If Stewart fails to make the transition, they’ll need to venture into the free agent market. They could go try to re-sign Matsui or go after one of Tadahito Iguchi and Luis Castillo. Yet another option is to let Jamey Carroll try to hit enough to make his defense an asset.

Another potential free agent departure is Yorvit Torrealba. With Chris Iannetta waiting in the wings, the Rockies should let Torrealba walk. Unfortunately, most World Series teams overvalue what got them there, and the Rockies could fall into that trap this year. Iannetta didn’t have a good season by any means, but over a full season, he can be expected to easily outproduce Torrealba at the plate. After all, Torrealba’s .255/.323/.376 line this year is a pretty low mark to pass. Just remember, Iannetta did hit .351/.447/.503 at AAA just one season ago.

With so many young arms expected to fill the rotation, the Rockies should try to find a quality starting pitcher in free agency. It could prove hard since some pitchers will probably still have reluctance to pitch at Coors Field, but relying on Jimenez, Morales, and Hirsh to hold down three spots in the rotation for the whole season is not a wise move.

The other concern that the Rockies must concern themselves with is signing Holliday to an extension. As a Scott Boras client, will Holliday break the trend and sign an extension instead of becoming a free agent? If I’m the Rockies, I have to try.

Overall

It took me a while to figure out what I think the Rockies should do. After all, they don’t have nearly as much young talent as the Dodgers, and you can’t forget about the Diamondbacks or the Padres. Then again, they don’t have Ned Colletti running the show. If they could move Helton, I’d do it, and the same goes for Holliday if they can’t get him signed to an extension. Since I don’t think Helton will agree to a trade now that they’ve been to the World Series, the Rockies should stay the course – replace Torrealba with Iannetta, hope that Ian Stewart can play second base, and acquire a good #2 pitcher to slot into the rotation.