Opinion

In recent years, the Philadelphia Phillies have made most of their offseason noise in big trades and free agent signings, bringing names like Roy Halladay, Placido Polanco, Raul Ibanez and Brad Lidge to the City of Brotherly Love. However, in the past, the Phillies structured their roster in different ways, including a plethora of minor league deals, trading big names for young potential, spending heavily on the first year player draft and taking a gamble in the Rule 5 Draft. Which, in recent years, has landed All-Star outfielder Shane Victorino and long-relief man David Herndon.

Derek Jeter, Carl Crawford, Cliff Lee, and Jayson Werth have the Hot Stove burning up and the MLB landscape is bound to look different, with Jeter the only one likely to end up back with the same team.

Rumors are flying around like mosquitoes in the summer time. The non-stop talk about Jeter can also be related to mosquitoes because they both do one thing to people: annoy them.  

Enough about mosquitoes, it's time to get back to Hot Stove talk and address everything worth talking about right now in baseball.

White Sox GM Kenny Williams sent a strong message that his team will be ready to compete for a Central Division title in 2011 with a lot of activity Friday.

So far, Williams has played to form this winter.  He has not been afraid to make a splash and is retooling with veterans, as opposed to going young.

Let's take a closer look...

Addition Through Subtraction

For minor league pitcher Kyle Cofield, Williams traded away much maligned reliever Scott Linebrink.

For years, Ron Santo sat by his phone and waited. He waited for the Hall to call. But it never did.

The clock struck midnight, and the deadline for MLB teams to tender contracts passed. Of course, non-tendering doesn't mean you can't or won't return to that club, but often times it's a good sign that the team, player or both wanted to go in a different direction.

Let's take a look at some of the players who were non-tendered and where they might catch on.

LHP Ryan Rowland-Smith, Seattle Mariners

With the signing of Adam Dunn for four years and $56 million, Kenny Williams asserted his power over White Sox manager Ozzie Guillen.

Williams stood tall and in one fell swoop declared: This is the American League. This is the AL Central. This is U.S. Cellular Field. We will hit the ball. We will hit the ball far, and we will win. Take your National League, small ball crap and shove it.

Other than the back and forth bickering about Derek Jeter through media outlets, the New York Yankees had been fairly quiet this offseason. Sure, they have been talking with free agent right-hander Cliff Lee, but we all expected that.

Outside of those topics, the Yankees remained quiet, until now. The hot stove is official heating up in New York.

Derek Jeter, the captain of the New York Yankees, wants to stay in New York.

The ugly truth, though, is this is a business. It's a brutal business at times as we have seen with other players who have been committed to their teams. At some point, an organization must decide what is best for them.

The Detroit Tigers have already made a big splash in the 2010 offseason. Victor Martinez and Joaquin Benoit were key signings for Detroit. 

Detroit has said it would like to have a lower payroll than it had in 2010. After adding $29 million in new contracts (Brandon Inge, Jhonny Peralta, Martinez and Benoit), Detroit still has room to add another contract or two and still remain under the $60 million it dropped.

As the gloaming of the post Adam Dunn era begins to envelop the city that once embraced him, I am somewhat struck at the gloom and doom that is being predicted for both the team and the fans of the Washington Nationals.