Peavy's choices: Padres or AL

Seems that the Padres are slowing down the process to keep Peavy in the loop.

"There's certainly a lot of interest from other clubs," Towers said. "But we've slowed it down the last three or four days because, after doing some fact-finding, and talking with other teams, I didn't want to go further until I got the go-ahead from Jake."

"...talking with other teams". What's that mean? It means, to me, that the five teams who Peavy has (supposedly) agreed to waive his NTC in a trade have either backed off entirely or not willing to part with the prospects required to get the deal done. Knowing rumors are merely just that, rumors, here's what we think we know, not to steal any thunder from Tim at MLBTradeRumors:

Braves: The Braves have the young/cheap talent to deal but apparently have decided against it, so far. Methinks we haven't heard the last from Atlanta.

General manager Frank Wren insists the Braves won't trade their most valued prospects, apparently not even to bring Jake Peavy to Atlanta.
......
"Many of the trade speculations that have been written over the past few weeks are inaccurate," Wren said. "For the most part they are simply an outsider speculating what we might do and not what we would do."

Houston: Doesn't seem likely that Peavy will land here. A lack of high end prospects seems to be the oft-cited reason.

St. Louis: Also passing on Peavy.

According to Bernie Miklasz of the St. Louis Post-Dispatch, the Cardinals are not a serious player for Jake Peavy. Miklasz's Cardinals sources downplayed the idea and noted that they've only had one conversation with the Padres.

Chicago: From Ken Rosenthal:

They always have liked Peavy, but probably would enter the discussions only if they lost right-hander Ryan Dempster as a free agent, which is unlikely. Even then, the Cubs might not match up with the Padres.

Dodgers: Also from Rosenthal:

When the Rockies were entertaining offers for Holliday last summer, they told the Dodgers that the price for them, as a division rival, would be higher than it was for any other club. The Padres almost certainly would take the same approach with Peavy.

So what's the next move? I think the Padres tell Peavy that unless he wants to consider an AL team (which seems more and more unlikely) the Padres are just going to go quiet on the talks until some comes to them with something palatable.

Also, what I heard from Peter Gammons this morning really surprised me. I was driving so I couldn't note it verbatim, but he discussed the lack of outs recorded by Peavy after the 7th inning this year. Also, how that 6 inning start in the NL West translates to the 5th inning in the AL East.

Here's some data on Peavy's late inning stats and some others that piqued my curiosity (yes, selective stats):

• Peavy faced only 69 batters in innings 7-9
• With only 27 games started, Peavy averaged facing 2.56 batters after the 6th inning
• Batters hit .290 against him later in games
• Peavy faced only 38 batters after throwing his 105th pitch; Averaged 106 pitches per game in 2008 (103 PC/game for a career).
• Peavy's away ERA in 2008 was 4.28; .258 Batting Average Against (BAA)
• Peavy's home ERA in 2008 was 1.75; .205 BAA
• Peavy's almost a neutral GB/FB pitcher, with a 1.11 GB:FB ratio in 2008, in line with career numbers. The bigger Petco keeps the flyballs within the fences for long outs.
• K-rate of 8.60 lowest since 2003, down from 9.67 in 2007. As a result, his K/BB rate of 2.81 was also a low since 2003 and down from 3.53 last year.

Lookie here, would I be psyched to see Peavy coming Eastward to the Bronx? Sure, within reason. Are there some very real concerns about his health, his ability to succeed in the rough-and-tumble AL East, his reluctance to come to NY specifically and/or the AL generally? Absolutely.

Anyone can cherry-pick stats that help their side of the story; just ask Scott Boras. But, stats are indeed facts. We have to consider all of them. Sometimes they tell the story; sometimes they are misleading. We need to keep digging.

For more on Peavy, please click here. Thanks!


{And I just loved the clarity on the picture to the right, Peavy's circle change. Kids, if you want to see how that grip looks, study that picture!}