Ray Durham Trade Reactions

I think that Aurilla to the Rays makes a ton of sense. He would be the perfect platoon partner for Eric Hinskie. Those two could play DH. It would also get Johnny Gomes off the roster.

Not very impressive for the Giants, though I suppose a million bucks is a million bucks.

They've said that Winn and Molina -- ie, their only players with any real value -- aren't available. That's admirable in a way in that it shows respect for this year's fans (I'm talking to you Billy Beane) but it's no way to rebuild.

Trading Durham had almost everything to do with opening up his spot on the roster for the younger guys and virtually nothing to do with what they could get in return (guys over 33 these days seem to be undervalued, anyway, so they can't expect to get much back). At the very least, I think it's a class act that they traded him to a contender.

Of course, it would have been nice if they could have gotten just one b-level prospect instead of two c or d-level prospects in return.

Schierholtz has clearly shown in AAA that he's not ready for the majors. He's still inconsistent, and would not have beaten out Winn nor Lewis, so it was not idiotic that he didn't start out in the majors.

Idiotic would be not trading Blanton over the off-season when he pitched above his talent in 2007, he might have gotten more in trade. Luckily for Billy, the Phillies were desperate, giving up their #2 and #4 BA rated prospects, though it is all relative, because their farm system is pretty depleted from previous trades and promotions, and somebody has to be their #2 and #4 prospects. Outman is not considered much more than a middle to back of rotation prospect, and Cardenas is a failed SS prospect, trying to make it at 2B now, with not much speed nor power, so his main thing is batting average.

The Giants would have had $7M off the payroll anyhow, Durham was a free agent after the season.

The Giants rarely talk about who they make available or not, but made clear with the Durham trade that young pitchers are off the table, they aren't interested in renting any vets, and if there are any vets on their roster where "Our older players, if they were good enough in the market to be able to be acquired by somebody else, we were willing to do that. Thus, Ray is the first transaction." So nobody is off the table, despite speculation previously in the media.

You know, I could have said the same thing about the Giants the past 3 seasons too, that they were built to be a playoff team except that injuries derailed their efforts.

Funny how Billy isn't lambasted for adding players, whether young or old, who get injured so frequently, whereas Sabean is. And Thomas, Piazza, Sweeney are typical Sabean additions of the past, funny how Beane is copying that, why not let Buck or any of the plentiful mix of young outfielders play there instead?

Lastly, the A's rotation is built of all these low K, low K/BB starters, they are not good to build around, you want high K, high K/BB starters, see what BP recommends for playoff success, see what Baseball Forecaster and BP says for good peripherals. They have some nice guys coming up in Gio and others, but that means they are rebuilding for the next 2-3 years before competing seriously again.

AA, theyre still a very lucky team, as anyone who watched the Boston series can attest to. But sadly oaklands offense died when Thomas, Chavez and Sweeney went down and the gap got huge.