Baseball

Chicago deals Quentin

to Padres for prospects

Being traded from the Chicago White Sox to his hometown San Diego Padres couldn’t have been more convenient for All-Star outfielder Carlos Quentin.

“I get a call and they said I’ve been traded to San Diego. I’m already here,” the 29-year-old Quentin said on a conference call shortly after the trade was announced Saturday.

Four years after trading Quentin from Arizona to the White Sox, new Padres general manager Josh Byrnes is bringing him home.

San Diego gave up minor-league pitchers Simon Castro, a right-hander, and Pedro Hernandez, a left-hander.

Quentin hit 107 home runs and batted .257 in four seasons with the White Sox.

“Improving our offense is a priority this offseason, and the acquisition of Carlos gives us a proven middle-of-the-order bat,” Byrnes said. “We specifically targeted Carlos because of his production and his hard-nosed style of play.”

San Diego hit the fewest homers in the major leagues (91) and had the lowest batting average in the National League (.237) last season.

Ex-Mariner Laffey, Blue Jays agree on deal

The Toronto Blue Jays have agreed to a minor-league contract with left-hander Aaron Laffey and invited him to spring training.

Laffey, 26, appeared in 36 games for the Mariners last season and had a 4.01 earned-run average. He was selected off waivers by the New York Yankees from Seattle in August.

Tennis

Murray hires Lendl

Andy Murray of Scotland hired Ivan Lendl, an eight-time winner of Grand Slam tournaments, as his coach in a bid to earn a major title.

The fourth-ranked Murray, 24, will begin working with the Czech-born Lendl, 51, as he prepares for the Australian Open, which starts Jan. 16.

“It was important to me that any new person joining my team was able to add fresh insight,” Murray said in a statement. “Ivan’s impact on the game is unquestionable and he brings experience and knowledge that few others have, particularly in major tournaments. I look forward to working with him going forward.”

Djokovic defeats Ferrer

Novak Djokovic of Serbia routed David Ferrer of Spain 6-2, 6-1 to win the World Tennis Championship exhibition tournament in Abu Dhabi.

Soccer

Blackburn stuns Man U

Blackburn pulled off the biggest surprise of the English Premier League season, defeating host Manchester United 3-2 to spoil Man U manager Alex Ferguson’s 70th birthday.

Manchester United erased a 2-0 deficit on second-half goals by Dimitar Berbatov. But Grant Hanley scored the winner on a header off a corner kick in the 80th minute, capitalizing on a mistake by goalkeeper David de Gea for his first career goal for Blackburn.

The loss by the defending champions prevented Man U from ending 2011 in first place.

Manchester City can go three points in front by winning at Sunderland on Sunday.

Blackburn started the day at the bottom of the standings in the 20-team league.

Ferguson pledged to stay as Manchester United’s manager for at least another three years.

Elsewhere

• Teddy’s Promise beat Sugarinthemorning by 2 ¼ lengths to win the Grade I La Brea for 3-year-old fillies at Santa Anita in Arcadia, Calif.

Teddy’s Promise, trained by Ron Ellis and ridden by Victor Espinoza, ran 7 furlongs in 1 minute, 20.47 seconds. She paid $35 to win in the $300,000 race.

Seattle Times news services

BASEBALL

ARLINGTON, Texas — The Texas Rangers have acquired catcher Luis Martinez from the San Diego Padres for minor league pitcher Ryan Kelly.

Martinez batted .203 (12 for 59) in 22 games for San Diego with one homer and 10 RBIs. He homered for his first big league hit on July 27 against Arizona. A 12th round draft pick in 2007, Martinez hit .323 at Triple-A Tucson in 58 games. He had one home run and 28 RBIs.

The Rangers added Martinez to the 40-man roster on Wednesday.

Kelly was 3-6 with a 3.95 ERA and nine saves in 40 appearances for Class-A Myrtle Beach last season. The 26-year-old right-hander will be assigned to Double-A San Antonio.

OTHER DEVELOPMENTS

Briefly: The Indians have agreed to a minor league contract with versatile free-agent infielder Andy LaRoche and invited him to spring training. He’ll have a chance to win the club’s utility infield job. … The Milwaukee Brewers have signed infielder Cesar Izturis and left-hander Juan Perez to minor-league contracts with invitations to spring training. The Brewers also invited catcher Anderson De La Rosa, left-hander Jed Bradley and right-hander Taylor Jungmann to spring training. … The Kansas City Royals have signed reliever Jose Mijares to a 1-year contract, giving manager Ned Yost another left-handed option late in games. The team announced the deal Wednesday. Terms were not disclosed.

A person familiar with the situation says the Chicago Cubs and outfielder Reed Johnson are closing in on a one-year contract. The Associated Press reported Johnson will be signed pending a physical. … … Creditors of the Los Angeles Dodgers are joining the team in urging a federal district judge not to halt implementation of a bankruptcy court order authorizing the Dodgers to begin a process for selling television rights to future games. In a filing Wednesday, the committee said there’s no guarantee that a sale of the team without the TV rights will result in Dodgers creditors being paid in full.

Fourteen months after he was fired by the Mets, Omar Minaya is back in baseball. Minaya accepted a job with the San Diego Padres to assist General Manager Josh Byrnes with player acquisitions at all levels, according to a baseball executive with direct knowledge of the agreement.

Minaya, 53, had been courted by several teams to join their front-office staffs, including the Toronto Blue Jays, the Cleveland Indians and the Milwaukee Brewers, but the Padres’ job offered the greatest responsibility and potential. Minaya is expected to join the Padres’ front office at Major League Baseball’s winter meetings in Dallas next week.

The hiring will please the cash-strapped Mets, who can deduct his new salary from the roughly $1 million he was due to earn from the Mets in 2012. The Mets fired Minaya with two years remaining on his contract after the 2010 season and replaced him with Sandy Alderson.

Before Byrnes was hired by the Padres last year, he was a finalist along with Alderson to replace Minaya in New York. Byrnes went to San Diego instead and was promoted to general manager when Jed Hoyer left to join Theo Epstein with the Chicago Cubs.

Known for his old-school scouting abilities and affable personality, Minaya took over the Mets in the final days of the 2004 season. After two years of big spending on free agents he had built a team that was within three outs of the World Series. He reinvigorated the team and its fan base by signing Pedro Martinez and Carlos Beltran and later Carlos Delgado while the team promoted its Latin flavor with the moniker Los Mets.

But the Mets lost to the St. Louis Cardinals in Game 7 of the National League Championship Series. The next season the Mets suffered a terrible September collapse and missed the playoffs on the final day of the season. In 2008, they were eliminated on the final day, as well, then things grew even worse.

The 2009 season was marked by devastating injuries, as was 2010, as the Mets fell into near oblivion. But many of the players still on the Mets and in the organization were brought in under Minaya’s stewardship, including Ike Davis, Johan Santana, Daniel Murphy, Ruben Tejada, Matt Harvey and Jason Bay.

Minaya, who was born in the Dominican Republic and grew up in Queens, served as the general manager of the Montreal Expos from 2002 to 2004 before the Mets brought him back to head up their baseball department. He was a scout and an assistant general manager for the Texas Rangers and for the Mets under Steve Phillips.

Read More: Carlos Quentin (RF – CWS), Cameron Maybin (CF – SDP), Nick Hundley (C – SDP), Dayan Viciedo (RF – CWS), Mat Latos (P – SDP), Anthony Rizzo (1B – SDP), San Diego Padres, Chicago White Sox

According to Bill Center of the San Diego Union-Tribune, Chicago White Sox outfielder Carlos Quentin is on the San Diego Padres’ “list of possibilities” for an off-season trade. The 29-year old Quentin will have his salary determined under arbitration for the 2012 season, and has been a player mentioned in White Sox trade rumors for several years. The issue with Quentin, other than the poor defensive ratings he has posted over the course of his career and his history of injuries, has been that he is often very hard on himself and is prone to streaks and slumps at the plate. Here is what SB Nation’s White Sox blog, South Side Sox, had to say about Quentin in 2010-11: 

Carlos Quentin- .254/.340/.499, 24 HR, 77 RBI- When he was in the lineup, Quentin provided some power that was missing when he was gone.  He missed the last month of the year though with a strained shoulder.  It is impossible to count on this guy for an entire season.  He did improve in the outfield this year and he did enjoy a trip to his 2nd All Star game.  Final Grade: B-

If White Sox GM Kenny Williams was to deal Quentin, it would be to knock some payroll off the books while also creating room for younger (and cheaper) outfielder Dayan Viciedo. According to Bill Center, the only untouchables in the Padres’ organization at this point are Cameron Maybin, Nick Hundley, Mat Latos and Anthony Rizzo.

Stay tuned to SB Nation Chicago for more information, and for in-depth analysis on the Chicago White Sox be sure to visit South Side Sox. Visit Baseball Nation for more news and notes around the league, and check out MLB Daily Dish for off-season rumors and reports.

(Reuters) – List of National League Cy Young Award winners following the naming of Los Angeles Dodgers starter Clayton Kershaw as the 2011 winner.

2011 – Clayton Kershaw, Los Angeles Dodgers

2010 – Roy Halladay, Philadelphia Phillies

2009 – Tim Lincecum, San Francisco Giants

2008 – Tim Lincecum, San Francisco Giants

2007 – Jake Peavy, San Diego Padres

2006 – Brandon Webb, Arizona Diamondbacks

2005 – Chris Carpenter, St. Louis Cardinals

2004 – Roger Clemens, Houston Astros

2003 – Eric Gagne, Los Angeles Dodgers

2002 – Randy Johnson, Arizona Diamondbacks

2001 – Randy Johnson, Arizona Diamondbacks

2000 – Randy Johnson, Arizona Diamondbacks

1999 – Randy Johnson, Arizona Diamondbacks

1998 – Tom Glavine, Atlanta Braves

1997 – Pedro Martinez, Montreal Expos

1996 – John Smoltz, Atlanta Braves

1995 – Greg Maddux, Atlanta Braves

1994 – Greg Maddux, Atlanta Braves

1993 – Greg Maddux, Atlanta Braves

1992 – Greg Maddux, Chicago Cubs

1991 – Tom Glavine, Atlanta Braves

1990 – Doug Drabek, Pittsburgh Pirates

1989 – Mark Davis, San Diego Padres

1988 – Orel Hershiser, Los Angeles Dodgers

1987 – Steve Bedrosian, Philadelphia Phillies

1986 – Mike Scott, Houston Astros

1985 – Dwight Gooden, New York Mets

1984 – Rick Sutcliffe, Chicago Cubs

1983 – John Denny, Philadelphia Phillies

1982 – Steve Carlton, Philadelphia Phillies

1981 – Fernando Valenzuela, Los Angeles Dodgers

1980 – Steve Carlton, Philadelphia Phillies

1979 – Bruce Sutter, Chicago Cubs

1978 – Gaylord Perry, San Diego Padres

1977 – Steve Carlton, Philadelphia Phillies

1976 – Randy Jones, San Diego Padres

1975 – Tom Seaver, New York Mets

1974 – Mike Marshall, Los Angeles Dodgers

1973 – Tom Seaver, New York Mets

1972 – Steve Carlton, Philadelphia Phillies

1971 – Ferguson Jenkins, Chicago Cubs

1970 – Bob Gibson, St. Louis Cardinals

1969 – Tom Seaver, New York Mets

1968 – Bob Gibson, St. Louis Cardinals

1967 – Mike McCormick, San Francisco Giants

(Compiled by Frank Pingue in Toronto; Editing by Julian Linden)

SAN DIEGO (AP) — The San Diego Padres have agreed to a one-year, $1.25 million contract with outfielder Mark Kotsay.

Kotsay was with the Padres from 2001-03. The 35-year-old, a lifetime .278 hitter, has also played for the Florida Marlins, Oakland A’s, Atlanta Braves, Boston Red Sox, Chicago White Sox and Milwaukee Brewers.

Kotsay hit .270 with three home runs and 31 RBIs with the Brewers last season.

The Padres announced the deal on Wednesday.

Copyright 2011 Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten, or redistributed.

SAN DIEGO (AP)—The San Diego Padres have agreed to a $1.25 million,
one-year contract with outfielder Mark Kotsay(notes).

Kotsay was with the Padres from 2001-03. The 35-year-old, a lifetime .278
hitter, has also played for the Florida Marlins, Oakland A’s, Atlanta Braves,
Boston Red Sox, Chicago White Sox and Milwaukee Brewers.

Kotsay hit .270 with three home runs and 31 RBIs with the Brewers last
season.

The Padres announced the deal on Wednesday.