MLB Trade Deadline Thread

Manny not only will finish this season in Boston, the Red Sox will pick up next year's option at $20 million.
And when we're having this same discussion a year from today, Manny will finish the 2009 season in Boston and the Red Sox will pick up the second option year at the same $20 million.
And then at age 38, Manny will retire and wait five years until he is inducted into the Hall of Fame.


But this sure as hell is a fun exercise every year.

And can you imagine defensively challenged Jason Bay (also overrated as a hitter) trying to figure out how to play balls off the Monster?
The Red Sox wouldn't come close to making the playoffs if they make this deal.

 

I wasn't trying to derail this--I swear--and heaven knows there's one humorless small-market chap here who is just looking for an excuse to crap all over the thread. Psst: It's not you.

My point was that it's a pretty good indicator that baseball's working pretty well when the team with the lowest payroll in the game is thinking of making a trade like this.

All that said, I will once again believe this when I see it.

 

I think it makes perfect sense for the Marlins, who would (presumably) get a very motivated Manny to boost that lineup. They have a very real shot to win the NL East and he could be the missing piece. Yeah, Manny would be gone at the end of the season, but if it costs them only one good prospect and the guy Manny replaced (sort of like the Teixeira deal for the Angels), then why not?

Re: Red Sox, I'm with you. I guess they figure it's addition by subtraction, and if they get can get someone who can help a reeling bullpen in the process, so be it. Personally, I think they would do better to address the bullpen by trading Brandon Moss to the Royals for Mahay, because I'm not so sure Grabow would be all that great in the AL.

 

Griffey to White Sox, pending his approval. Yikes.

http://msn.foxsports.com/mlb/story/8398348/Reds,-ChiSox-agree-on-Griffey-trade,-await-approval?CMP=OTC-K9B140813162&ATT=49

(ps, these running threads suck.)

 

You don't want to do it, yet you keep dragging it up on every single thread in hopes of picking another fight. You are the one trying to crap all over this thread.

The Marlins' payroll is only that low because of the big salary dump they pulled before the season, but of course you conveniently forget the facts that don't fit your argument.

So, are we going to talk about trades or are you going to shit all over this thread?

 

How does this make sense for the White Sox? They have Dye and Quentin in the outfield corners and Thome at DH. Are they going to try to move Griffey back to CF?

 

It's no such indicator.

The Marlins have to toss a quality major-leaguer overboard for a guy they have NO chance of retaining once Boston stops paying most of his salary in two months.

System is beyond broke.

 

Yeah, I don't get this deal either. If it gets Paul Konerko, who has been useless since 2006, out of the lineup, it helps, but Griffey's numbers aren't much better. And, as you said, the corner outfield spots are taken so the only place to play him is in center with a platoon of Swisher and Konerko at first. I don't think he's good enough defensively for center anymore. I really want to know who they're giving up.

 

Pudge most definitely WAS a cancer in the clubhouse during the 2005 season, when he jumped the team for four days in midseason.

The team's response to then-manager Alan Trammell's request/insistence that Pudge be suspended was to suspend him, retroactively, for one of the four days he had already been gone.

A month or so later, the lardass drug addict/woman beater Dmitri Young, who had been in and out of the lineup most of the year with your typical fatass injuries (muscle pulls, ankle sprains) reached a contract incentive figure for plate appearances which kicked in a $6 million option for 2006. Young, amazingly enough, decided he didn't feel like playing no more in 2005. (Sitting on his ass eating nachos, drinkng vodka and dicking 20-year-old honeys sounded like more fun to him -- hell, it sounds like more fun to me.)

A couple of nights later, Trammell asked Young to pinch hit against the Seattle Mariners. Young told Trammell in no uncertain terms in front of the entire team in the dugout to go fuck himself (igniting what might have been a most enjoyable brawl with bench coach Kirk Gibson had they not been pulled apart).

Immediately following the end of the game (a disastrous loss) Trammell immediately stormed into Dombrowski's office and demanded something be done. Dombrowski replied, "We'll do something at the end of the season."

The Tigers, close to .500 at that point, went about 5-20 the rest of the way, and at the end of the season, they did something, all right: They fired Trammell, and made it abundantly clear, "off the record," that he had been fired for "losing control of the clubhouse."

A few days later, the crusty crafty Jim Leyland was hired as manager. The first player supplied by Tiger management to comment for the media was Dmitri Young, who said, "Leyland is a manager I can really respect." Shortly thereafter, Pudge Rodriguez chimed in.

Since then, Pudge has pretty much gotten along with Leyland, because Leyland has followed a quite sensible policy regarding Pudge: Pudge Does what Pudge Wants.

This policy hit the skids a couple months ago, though, when Leyland decided to alternate Pudge, then hitting .250, with the immortal Brandon Inge. Since that time, Pudge had raised his average to .295 (compared to his lifetime average of .302) while Inge continues to hit his customary .218. Nonetheless, the concept of alternating Rodriguez and Inge was hailed by the legion of Leyland sycophants among the Tiger beat writers as a strategic master stroke which had magically restored Rodriguez's effectiveness by alternating him with the "scrappy," "hustling" Brandon Inge.

Rodriguez's contract was up at the end of the year. More and more in recent weeks in notes columns by the local beat guys, which really might as well bear a standing head entitled "Deep Thoughts of Chairman Leyland," the thesis was repeatedly floated that "Tiger insiders" were not particularly worried about the prospect of Pudge walking at the end of the year, because they were more than happy with the play of the plucky, gutty Brandon Inge (still hitting .220) at catcher.

Undoubtedly Pudge, who by all accounts has a sizable ego, was not particularly thrilled by this line of thinking.

 

The Marlins (who don't HAVE to do anything, by the way) may decide to take what would amount to a minor risk in that pursuit of the NL East title. Whether they reach that postseason objective or not, they will make a lot of money this season.

 

If the Pirates cannot see that keeping Bay and signing two pitchers like Lohse and Lowe in the offseason can help the Pirates challenge for the division or a wild card, then the system, or the Pirates, are broken. Most likely it's the Pirates.

Before everyone laughs, the Pirates are third in the NL in runs scored and tied for sixth in all of baseball.

They have no everyday hitters over 30 and no everyday starters over 26. You add two consistant starters like Lowe and Lohse in the offseason and allow Karstens and Ohlendorf a chance to work into the rotation, and you have a winning team.

I think they could find five starters out of Snell, Lohse, Lowe, Maholm, Duke, Karstens, Ohlendorf, Gorzelanny or Dumatrait.

Ugh.