Miami Marlins notes: slugger unavailable, rival notes

It's been a sort of "end of an era" week for the Miami Marlins. This week however also included the somewhat unfair Gold Glove awards. Those awards have long been popularity contests, but it still stings to not see deserving Marlins players receive award nominations. In the meantime, we have more news. A certain slugger will not be an option in trade and a rival team is after an interesting starting pitcher.

Miami Marlins notes as the week is coming to an end.

Miami Marlins rivals the Atlanta Braves are not having the greatest off-season. Yes it just began, but they're largely expected to lose top of the rotation starter Max Fried. They simply don't pay at that level, and it's fully expected that he will go on to sign with another big market team. The fact that Atlanta lets their top players leave via free agency, when they're not signed to aggressive extensions makes it all the more obvious.

It turns out that Atlanta has a replacement in mind already. That replacement is none other than Nathan Eovaldi of the Texas Rangers. The injury-prone journeyman had his highs and lows and even pitched for the Marlins from 2012-2014. He's coming off of a solid season in Texas, where he pitched to a 3.80 ERA/3.83 FIP, with 8.8 K/9 and 2.2 BB/9 in 29 games and 170.2 innings pitched. He isn't a top of the rotation arm, but he should fall within Atlanta's price range.

In other news, the Sacramento (?) Athletics are not going to trade breakout DH Brent Rooker after all. He was largely expected to be a major trade candidate this off-season for pretty obvious reasons. The Athletics trade everyone and are rebuilding, while he is coming of a .293/.365/.562 batting line, along with 39 home runs and 112 RBI in 145 games and 546 AB. He was worth 5.6 WAR.

The Athletics are perhaps surprisingly planning to play better before their move to Las Vegas, and holding on to still arb-eligible Brent Rooker is apparently part of this plan. The Miami Marlins won't be able to trade pitching for him.