As the Padres face a big uphill battle in San Francisco this weekend, we look at some news items….
- Yu Darvish's likely posting fee could be around $25MM and the right-hander might look for a five-year deal from an MLB club, suggest sources of Matt Cerrone of Metsblog.com. The Mets, Yankees, Rangers and Braves are listed as four of the eight teams who have shown an interest in Darvish, and we know the Rays have watched him pitch as well.
- Pedro Feliciano's struggles against right-handed hitters will prevent the reliever from earning a big contract this winter, writes David Brown of Yahoo Sports. The fact that Feliciano is a Type A free agent will also hurt his cause, since teams will shy away from losing a draft pick to sign a limited relief pitcher.
- Rafael Soriano, Cody Ross, David DeJesus and Francisco Rodriguez are among several free agents or trade candidates that Nick Piecoro of the Arizona Republic thinks the D'Backs might consider acquiring.
- Bob Gebhard, the Diamondbacks' vice-president and special assistant to the GM, will survive the expected front office changes in Arizona this winter, tweets Bob Nightengale of USA Today.
- Nightengale also tweets that Tim Wallach is "picking up plenty of steam" in regards to the Toronto manager's job. The Rockies have granted hitting coach Don Baylor permission to interview for that same position, reports Jordan Bastian of MLB.com.
- The Everett Daily Herald's Kirby Arnold lists several Mariners who might not be with the team next season, including Jose Lopez, David Aardsma and Casey Kotchman.
- Dodgers assistant GM Logan White told Baseball America's Jim Callis that he hasn't been fired by L.A., and is "working for the team until…told otherwise" (both Twitter links). Kevin Goldstein of Baseball Prospectus tweeted about "rumors starting to swirl" that White and the Dodgers were parting ways earlier in the day. White was one of several candidates interviewed for the Arizona general manager's job that eventually went to Kevin Towers.
- The Washington Post's Adam Kilgore lists five possible replacements for Adam Dunn if the Nationals don't re-sign the slugger.
- In a chat with fans on Thursday, Evan Grant of the Dallas Morning News predicted that the Rangers would announce contract extensions for manager Ron Washington and GM Jon Daniels within a week of Texas' final playoff game.
- Trevor Hoffman hasn't decided if he will play next year yet, but if he does, MLB.com's Adam McCalvy predicts Hoffman will look for "a situation in which he at least has a chance to be the closer."
