First week of Spring Training notes and news...

First, some general baseball news:

Three minor league players are suing MLB for unfair compensation.  The claim is that minor league contracts haven't kept up with other salaries or the cost of living in general, and minor league players earn less than the current minimum wage.  Noted baseball author and former player Dirk Hayhurst writes in support of the lawsuit.

Fangraphs analyzes how much of their salary all of the teams devote to the starting lineup and the starting rotation.  Biggest non-surprises:  The Phillies devote the largest percentage of their payroll AND the largest payroll overall to their starting pitchers, $80 million.  However, the dollar amount is only a few million more than the Dodgers; The Yankees and Tigers both spend around $60 million and are near the top of the list in percentages.  The Giants are the second-highest percentage and the fifth highest amount at $57 million.  The Marlins are dead last by significant margins, at $3 million and 7%.

There are four teams effectively spending 64% of their payroll on the starting lineup, but of those four the Rangers have leapt far ahead with a figure of $84 million.  However, the Yankees are spending $120 million and the Dodgers $100 million, putting the Rangers in third place.  The Tigers are a few million behind at $78 million.  The Cubs have the lowest percentage with 21%, but the Astros spend a few million less than the northsiders with a starting lineup paid less than $15 million.

MLB Daily Dish discusses the aging baseball television demographic, and why it isn't a big deal.  I tend to agree, and the reasons are mostly contained in this paragraph:

In the end, of course, it doesn't matter that baseball has an older fan base as long as it can maintain that fan base. It may be that watching baseball on television simply appeals to people more as they get older. The success of MLB Advanced Media, which now generates more than $650 million yearly, shows that baseball is adapting well to a more global media environment and capable of connecting to younger sports fans outside of the living room. With each team offering 162 games to follow, MLBAM's success is more relevant than the online outlets for other sports. If the younger viewers missing from the broadcast ratings data aren't watching the games on television, but watching on MLB.tv or catching up with highlights on MLB.com, the older demographics are not especially important to projecting future audiences. Young people often leave their favorite team's market area to go to school or for work. They also go out more and are more likely to watch games in social contexts, so they are naturally going to follow the game in less conventional ways. When they are older, more settled and more affluent, they are likely to watch at home more than they do now.

That younger, portable audience is why marketing fandom is so important to teams now.  If you have a player who grabs public interest you need to market that player with clothing and collectibles.

Beyond the Box Score looks at LOB%.  The summary is:  Darvish is excellent and will continue to be (because of strikouts), Tillman was excellent last year but his LOB% is anomalous, so expect regression.  Edwin Jackson was terrible and is due to regress up; Lincecum was bad and probably won't improve.

25 Years of Upper Deck baseball cards, at Lookout Landing.  I never collected Upper Deck, but I did take part in the card boom of the 90's.  I got burned in every way you could get burned, including but not limited to:

1. "What, you thought these were worth *real* money?  Those numbers in the trading guide don't mean anything to me."
   
2. I now have a complete set of these cards.  Why do I feel so hollow inside?
3. I have now shrewdly completed a set of this hard-to-find series, which should be worth hundreds of dollars and only increase in value.  (Next trip to the card shop I notice that prices on this set have fallen drastically.  The printer *found* an entire warehouse of that card set.)

Nelson Cruz has signed an $8 million dollar deal for one year with the Baltimore Orioles.  Rangers fans were disappointed, although it has been reported that he had a similar offer from the Rangers but no guarantee to play every day or play the outfield.  The Orioles would give him that.  Playing the outfield regularly will help maintain his value better than just DHing, so I can't blame his choice.  Newburg discusses the signing and says that the big takeaway is how the Rangers front office perceived Cruz's value going forward.  This is something Mariners fans were worried about; they're feeling much better now.  Lone Star Ball contributor Christopher Fittz, aka ghostofErikThompson, writes a fantastic history of Cruz's major league career for Camden Chat.

The Fort Worth Star-Telegram catches up with former Rangers top prospect Cody Buckel.  Buckel was fast-tracking to the 40 man roster when he got bombed in spring training 2013, exposing a severe-case of fear-of-failure.  Buckel developed what is commonly called "the yips", which typically manifests itself in an inability to perform some minor task related to your position.  A catcher (such as Jarrod Saltalamacchia) might be unable to throw the ball back to the pitcher.  A shortstop may develop an inability to throw to first.  Buckel developed an inability to hit the strike zone.  Ever.  Looking back, he blames a mechanical adjustment that was recommended by an unnamed adviser last year.  He felt he had to make the change in order to progress with the Rangers, and his pitching career literally fell apart.  Buckel has spent the past year starting over with playing catch and regularly visiting sports psychiatrists, and is hoping to start progressing back up the minor league ranks.

Matt Harrison had a scary bout with back stiffness, but has been given a clean bill of health and has already resumed throwing.  A bad mattress was blamed.  Geovany Soto is sidelined until mid-March after having a bone removed in his ankle that was irritating a nerve.  Colby Lewis has looked good in spring training so far, and will start a game on Monday the 3rd.  The flexor tendon surgery isn't the big concern at the moment, but his hip resurfacing.  This is a procedure normally reserved for making your retirement comfortable.

Tommy Hanson pitched well in his first spring training outing.  Of course, he followed Yu Darvish's first effort which included 29 pitches, 1 hit, no walks and 4 strikouts, so Hanson had a lot to live up to.  The second game didn't go nearly as well, as every Rangers pitcher except Matt West, including two potential starters, sucked.

The Rangers have added the iTrac Vision Training System to their batting regimen.  It is heartily endorsed by new Ranger Shin-soo Choo, who used the system in Cleveland.

The machine, operated by Jason Stein, son of former Ranger Bill Stein, fires color-coded and numbered tennis balls at home plate from 80 mph up to a top speed of 140 mph. The challenge for the hitter is to see what color the number is on the ball and call it out.

"It’s hard to get timing down to hit a baseball,” said Choo, who used the machine in Cleveland, but did not have the technology available to him in Cincinnati last year. "This fires balls at you really fast and if you can figure out the numbers and the colors, it helps you recognize the pitch.”

The Rangers joined other MLB teams in showing support for the borderline-revolution in Venezuela:

The political unrest in Venezuela hits home for several within the Texas Rangers clubhouse. Elvis Andrus, Martin Perez and Robinson Chirinos are among the players from the country and they wanted to send a message of support back to their homeland.

Andrus, Perez and Chirinos gathered a group of players from varying nationalities to pose with a Venezuelan flag and signs stating their support. Adrian Beltre of the Dominican Republic, Yu Darvish of Japan and Jose Contreras of Cuba were among those who showed their support in a picture.

"One sign said: ‘In this organization, we have Venezuelans, Dominicans, Japanese, Cubans, Mexican and Koreans, but we support Venezuela,’” Perez said. "We just want to support our people.”

The Rangers' effort was spearheaded by Martin Perez, the young lefty who the Rangers locked up with a long-term contract this past winter.

Fangraphs looked at the numbers behind Ron Washington's recent tirade against people complaining about his bunting:

The bottom line is that Washington’s belief that his excessive use of the sacrifice bunt is allowing his team to create more runs to compensate for their lack of situational hitting is mostly [bleep].

In related news, the day after Washington made those comments he received a one-year contract extension.  Probably more is being made about Ron Washington's contract than should be; fans upset with his in-game management and dedication to the bunt have been expecting Washington to be sacked ala Dusty Baker.  Baker has become increasingly noteworthy for being one of the winningest managers in baseball, but one who also seems incapable of grabbing a championship.  Fans have noted that the contract is only for one year rather than multiple years (providing maximum flexibility), and also that Jon Daniels clearly stated that the *timing* of the contract extension was a coincidence; the extension had been agreed to earlier in the off-season.  One should also consider that since the Ryan departure, Daniels has been stacking the coaching staff with players more dedicated to both statistical analysis and technology.

Angels owner Arte Moreno has started talking about plans to move the team to Tustin, California.  It's mostly a negotiating strategy to get upgrades to The Big A, but it's still an intriguing proposal and a *very* interesting location for the new ballpark.

Ryan Dempster has announced that he will not pitch in 2014.  He gives the reasons as both personal and physical.  I'm sure we'll learn more about what's going on some time in the future.  In the mean-time, this will free up about $13 million in salary for the Sox; and honestly Dempster was back-of-the-rotation guy for the team most of the year.

If it's spring training (or the tenth game of the season, or Tuesday...) it must be Cliff Lee trade rumors time...

And finally, SBNation's Jon Bois creates his own basketball video game.  Sort of.

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