Odds And Ends: Eaton, Balfour, McAnulty

P Mac needs to show the glove in left field, may be more interesting to see him in left field then R. Branyan or R. Klesko.

It's pretty bad when Eaton can't pitch well enough to be the #5 in PHILLY. Yikes.

I don't quite understand the Padres route they're taking to fill their outfield. They have a crappy aging right fielder, a crappy aging center fielder who can't stay healthy, and they're filling left field with guys that weren't quite good enough to make their previous teams. They're trotting out guys like Gerut and McAnulty when other teams are practically trying to get rid of guys like Murton. Then they go out and get another guy like the others in Justin Huber. It's like Towers is determined to fill the spot without giving up anything, so he's gonna try practically every option possible before giving something up. Thats not a good way to win arguably the tightest division in baseball, where the Dodgers, Rockies and D-Backs are all arguably better.

And last but least, why the hell did they teach Headley how to play left field, then send him down? He could be arguably the 3rd or 4th best hitter in that lineup right now, and yet he's getting sent down. If the Padres really want to win this year then Headley better be in the lineup by the end of May.

Nobody is sadder to see Eaton go than the fans of the Braves & Mets. Ahhh such a sad, sad, sorrowful day in my life.

I have no problem with Headley playing poor defense in left field, because I think his offense would be good enough to offset it. Plus he's young enough and talented enough that with a little time he could probably become league average.

I just don't feel like I can say the same about guys like Huber.

And I still can't get over Jody Gerut getting major time for a playoff contender. Thats screwed up. I would love to see the logic in that.

You can do worse than the Marquis deal. Marquis can give you 200 innings of 4.40 ERA ball. Thats not worth 3/24, not even close, but its not god awful. Adam Eaton is god awful. At this the Marquis deal isn't like the Darren Dreifort deal or something.

come on joelcards you're not being fair. You're gonna point out his one bad year, with St. Louis of course, but his two years before that with the Cards he posted ERA's of 3.71 and 4.13. I'm not saying he's gonna reproduce those numbers, but a 4.40 ERA isn't out of the question.

And who the hell cares that he had to fight for a rotation spot? He should've had to. Who cares how much he's getting paid, I'm glad that the Cubs don't choose who goes into their rotation based on salary.

Okay obviously I'll agree that the Cubs overpaid for him because its astonishing that any pitcher coming off a 6.06 ERA would even get a 3 year contract, let alone for $21M. Hendry is a moron in that sense because he probably could've gotten him for less.

My argument never had anything to do with him being overpaid, because he definately is, I'm just arguing that its not the worst contract ever, because Marquis isn't freaking terrible, he's just not 3/21 worthy, or really even that close.

Actually let me bring up Darren Dreifort one last time. Thats gotta be the worst conract ever. Hands down.

There is a method behind the madness that is the Padres outfield. One the reason the sent Headley down is so that he can play everyday, he would not get that at the major league level. Second why would you give up something when you could get the same thing for nothing?
Murton is not the answer for the Padres , they know it and they didn't want to give up Cesar Ramos and more to get him, which was the rumored demand of the Cubs for him. (that was a rumor, i have no way to verify, i got that during FriarFest) Now I don't believe that Ramos will be a superstar, but a good young hard throwing righthander for a league avg. outfielder when we have a ton of those already on the club?

Murton could very well be an upgrade, but not much of one.
Hairston played well enough last year with the club to earn a chance to see what he can do with a full year.
Giles is not going to hit for power anymore, we all know that. But he is still a good hitter with a higher OBPs.
Honestly i wasn't thrilled with the move to bring in Edmonds, i would have preferred someone like Wilits to handle center. So we shall see on that one. But Murton doesn't play center anyways.
Mcnaulty and Gerut, well I would have liked to see Headley stay but i agree with the idea of sending him to work on his defense.
And you never mentioned the main problem with the trade for Murton, giving up a good young arm for an avg. player, the Cubs already stole an arm like this from the Padres, his name is.... Jose Ceda...

It's been explained very simply and several times why Headley isn't starting the season with the ML club: making the jump from AA to MLB is hard enough, but asking someone to do it while making a position change is too much in the Padres' opinion.