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Saturday, December 17, 2011
There is a whole lot of talent changing hands here. The Reds and Padres announced a five-player deal Saturday, as Cincinnati sent right-hander Edinson Volquez and three of its top 10 prospects to the Padres for right-hander Mat Latos.
Along with Volquez, the Padres acquired right-hander Brad Boxberger, infielder Yonder Alonso and catcher Yasmani Grandal. All were recently named among Cincinnati’s top 10 prospects by MLB.com (Alonso second, Grandal fifth and Boxberger sixth).
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He likes trade for both sides.
I'd think they'd have a backup plan in case Rizzo struggles.
There is still Oswalt, Kuroda, and Jackson that might get decent contracts. And after that there are a lot of guys who might take a few million and an option that have potential for upside that the Cubs might take a chance on. They'd at least provide the name power to help fight the notion that the Cubs are tanking the season.
EDIT:SP free agents
And as far as free agent first basemen to back up Rizzo: it won't be anybody expensive. If Stewart is getting a shot with no moderately effective backup plan in place then why would Chicago worry about having a backup for a real prospect?
Unless you decide to take your Maserati for a spin on the 101.
Maybe they're looking to trade Soriano along with an enormous upfront payment. That would earn some goodwill with the fans who have mostly wanted to get rid of him for a few years already. Theo can say that he wants to evaluate the current talent this year and clean up the books before aggressively pursuing free agents and trades to improve the roster (e.g. "The goal is to make this team an annual World Series contender, and that's what we're aiming to achieve.") Then they can start LaHair, call up Brett Jackson, and hope that the team can stay in shouting distance of the playoffs for awhile with Pujols and Fielder gone from the division. Next year they would have almost no money committed with the likes of BJ Upton, Zack Greinke, Cole Hamels, Matt Cain, and John Danks slated for free agency.
However, bringing in Theo was, I think, a sufficiently big move that they didn't have to do one of those two. However, I'm not sure the fans will be content with a roster purge. And I'm not sure I would like Garza for Rizzo anyway.
If the Cubs did acquire Rizzo -- and even if they don't and they don't acquire Fielder -- I'm assuming they'll try to get Pena back on a reasonable deal. I'm not convinced anybody is lining up to sign Pena for 3 years.
Rizzo is going to be a good player, I think. But I wouldn't trade Matt Garza to get him if I ran Chicago.
It will keep them at bay, but will it keep them in the seats? That's what they have to worry about.
68 OPS+ is pretty good for a pitcher!
Aargh! That, of course, is a 68 ERA+. Volquez put up a sweet -27OPS+. Also, he was a terrible baserunner the few times he was on. He just killed the Reds last year. He was the anti-Votto.
Well, they have to worry bout whether they will buy the tickets ... actually showing up remains optional. :-)
Really, the Cubs have put some awful teams out there and still draw. If they can't weather a single season of 2.8 M sold then they're in bigger trouble than I thought. It also doesn't hurt that the Sox don't appear to be going all in this season either. So stock up on the sun screen, looks like a good summer to spend at the beach.
Anyway, it will be interesting to see how far Theo is going to push this and how low the attendance will drop.
That took over a month to be reported. In celebrity news, that's a century.
What he did say when he signed his contract extension was, essentially, "I don't know what I'll want to do in 3 years". No hate, not even a "I want to test the market at that time". He said that at that time, he didn't know where he'd want to play in 3 years. Seems like a level-headed decision to me.
And most Reds fans, or at least the ones who pay attention, saw this quote and found nothing wrong with it. The tin hat guys (the guys who think the Reds FO is completely incompetent, and the guys that think that no one in their right minds would want to play in Cinci, and the guys who think that Cinci is some backwater that would never pay what it takes to get a good player) of course assumed that this meant he was leaving as soon as he could buy a bus ticket.
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