Phillies - Acquired Blanton

Philadelphia Phillies - Acquired P Joe Blanton from the Oakland A’s for 2B Adrian Cardenas, P Josh Outman, and OF Matt Spencer

The A’s rebound quite a bit from the Harden/Gaudin trade with this one, with Blanton being the weakest, in my opinion, of the departed starters over the last year, with the except of Loaiza.  They might have gotten a better package for Blanton, though this is more than I expected, if they had traded him last winter, when you could glance at the stats and be excused for thinking he was some perfect #2 guy rather than a league-averagish starter with lots of ball in play, defense, and foul ground.

Given the ERA hovering near 5, I’m surprised the A’s got this much for Blanton.  Adrian Cardenas is the prize of this trade and far more likely to be the long-term future at 2B than Eric Patterson is, though he’s not as close to the majors.  Cardenas is the kind of prospect the A’s Latin-American scouting hasn’t come up with in recent years, though Beane has been insistent in recent months that the organization is working at correcting that.  Outman’s got a solid B+ fastball and I’m a little disappointed that the Phillies changed his delivery before I got to see the interesting, supposedly biomechanics-informed, version that his dad developed.  I don’t think there’s a lot of star potential there, but the A’s have gotten quite a bit out of less-talented pitchers and I wouldn’t be surprised if Outman’s better than Blanton in a year or so.  Spencer’s purely a throw-in, picked in the third-round last year by the Phillies, showing very little power for a solidly built guy.

Blanton gives the Phillies a mediocre innings-eater who should at the least prove less flaky than Brett Myers, though the organization shoulders a lot of blame with Myers.  The Phillies really needed a better starter than Blanton, though I don’t know if they really had enough to fetch one.  Blanton doesn’t replace Carlos Ruiz (Coste’s more a catcher in the Shawn W00t3n mode) and doesn’t cause Geoff Jenkins to retire, but he does help the team.  I think ZiPS is a little too high on Blanton, but it’s possible if he can keep the ball down more - the Phils have a very good infield defense and a lot fewer flies will die prematurely at CBP.

2008 ZiPS Projection - Joe Blanton
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               W   L   G  GS     IP    H   ER  HR  BB  SO   ERA 
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Year-to-Date   5  12  20  20  127.0  145   70  12  35  62  4.96 

Rest-of-Yr?    6   5  14  14   89.0   96   43   9  22  55  4.35  	
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Total         11  17  34  34  216.0  241  113  21  57 117  4.71 
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2009?         15  12  33  33  213.0  231  102  20  51 137  4.31     
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