Ryan Freel Traded For Joey Gathright

Please please please say that this could be the end of the Aaron Miles era!!

I know he's signed through next year, but he's a crap player that was always a crap player and he'll continue to be a crap player.

Not to mention that Chicago's current fifth outfielder, Joey Gathright, has given Chicago little reason to believe that he actually belongs in the majors.

Freel would give them a DeRosa-lite: a versatile guy that can man nearly every position on the field while consistently getting on base. The only difference is that Freel offers more speed and defense, while DeRosa offered more patience and power.

I'd really like the Freel addition for the Cubbies.

Then again, if this means dealing Micah Hoffpaiur to land him, then NO!!!! Hoffpaiur is our good bench bat, and with Bradley in the lineup and Lee sucking nuts, I'd like to keep Micah around.

I'm sorry, but the O's are not going to be trading him for Gathright. We have enough OF as it is with Pie, Montanez, Reimold in AAA knocking on the door, and Luke scott can also still play OF. If anything this may be a salary dump in my opinion.

Also, what if they gave freel for the PTBNL from rich hill?
I'd assume this doesnt happen though.

Per RotoTimes this morning

Joey Gathright, CF, Chicago Cubs Friday 5/8, 9:23 AM CT

Joey Gathright is expected to be sent down to Triple-A Iowa to make room for pitcher Randy Wells on the roster, according to the Chicago Sun-Times.

Our View: Gathright is only hitting 3-for-14 (all singles) over limited action in the Cubs' crowded outfield, and he is viewed as the most expendable. He has one stolen base, but was caught twice.

Wish we would have just kept DeRosa :(

But I guess I am in the minority because I don’t trust Freel. Speed guys don’t generally age well post 30, and he hasn’t really shown much the last three seasons. Granted, injuries don’t help, but he seems to have nearly completely lost what little power he once had, and his SB rate has gone down the tube (21 of 35, 60% from 2007-08). At his best he was a slightly below average hitter with speed and versatility – but we most likely wouldn’t be getting his best. We would be getting the lack of power, questionable speed guy with versatility that Baltimore is looking to deal.

Can we just trade back for DeRosa? :)

Freel has about asmuch value as mils right now so seems a little much for the cubs. Giving freel to the cubs in exchange for that player to be named or cash for hill seems great to me. We'd have to eat a ton of money but we are eating it now so getting some value would be nice.

It's done.

http://www.baltimoresun.com/sports/baseball/bal-ostrade508,0,687630.story

Well, it didn’t cost us anything at all, but still not sure it is going to make much difference. I like Gathright more as a pinch runner, and probably in the OF for that one or so inning that Milton likes to take off to close the game. I like neither at the plate, but Gathright wasn’t getting ABs so ideally Freel experiences the same.

“Please please please say that this could be the end of the Aaron Miles era!!”

And I cant imagine this means we eat the Mills contract. Such a move would do nothing more then prove the FO has no clue what they are doing. This is how I would see it

Trade DeRosa for nothing because of his salary (5.5) Sign Miles and Gathright for a higher combined salary (4.9 and .8 respectively, 5.7 combined) Release Miles eating that amount, and trade Gathright for Freel (4 Mil, or +3.2 over Gathright) who is less talented then the guy we originally shipped off to save money

My math shows (-) 5.5 + 4.9 + 3.2 = + 2.6. So if we release Miles, it will have cost us 2.6 Million in our attempt to ‘save money’ by replacing DeRosa and ending up with Freel.

I honestly think the Cubs traded DeRosa to make room for Fontenot, and to deal the 3 pitchers we got to the Padres for Peavy. That didn't happen, so Hendry looks like a fool.

Hindsight's always 20/20. Fontenot and DeRosa are both going to have solid years, our infield is a little better defensively, and I'd rather see Freel replace Ramirez on days off than Miles.

Ideally, it would have been nice to have Huff instead, but this was a good trade.

Considering how many disappointing players the Cubs have dealt to Baltimore the last few months, maybe the headline should just read:

"Cubs outright Joey Gathright to Baltimore."

I like it, Sour Bob. Having fun with Hill and Pie, guys?

Wow -- so the Cubs deal Gathright for Freel AND they only have to pay him the minimum. Great deal.

“Having fun with Hill”

Hill has a mere (for him) 6 walks in 10 IP. That’s only a 5.4 BB/9! Sure, might not seem like much to the average fan - but its infinitely better then the 8.3 he carried in 08.

Can 06-07 really be that big of a fluke? But looking at his 08-09 marks and comparing them to his 02-05 lines, you can see where 06-07 look like the real abnormality

“4:44pm: According to Bruce Miles of the Daily Herald the Orioles will pay the difference between the two players' salaries. Basically the teams are paying the same amount as they would have had they not made the deal.”

Well that is good to hear. And that being the case, releasing Miles would mean an eventual equal dollar cost going from DeRosa to Freel. Not good, but not nearly as bas as paying 2.6 for it. Because of it, add me to the
"Please please please say that this could be the end of the Aaron Miles era!!" group.

"or whatever Gathright was being paid"

yeah, 800K

Gathright was the odd many out in an over crowded outfield and the only reason Hendry ever picked him up was insurance in case Fukudome didn't come around and/or Bradley went down with injury. Getting Freel for the same money is a no brainer, Anything you get out of him is bonus and I'd much rather see him playing 3rd when ARAM needs a break. Maby Miles can be moved for a reliever? Regardless this was a good move by Hendry..... it still doesn't make up for trading DeRosa, but at least now the Cubs have a more versatile infield.

Kind of useless fothe orioles. Freel probably has more value then gathright now and paying all that contract sucks. I was hoping we could drop at least a mill on the cubs.

Hope Freel can play a good Third - he will probably be there a lot now.

Damn, I hope Aramis isnt hurt too bad.

"“Miles is signed for two years, not one. So no, Hendry didn't end up spending more money in an attempt to replace a player he traded in order to save money. He's smarter than that.”"

One year of DeRosa is still worth more than two years of Miles.

And two years of Miles is NOT worth 5MM. He's a replacement level player. There are plenty of AAA/AAAA guys who can do what Miles does for league minimum.

"Hope Freel can play a good Third - he will probably be there a lot now.

Damn, I hope Aramis isnt hurt too bad."

If Aramis is hurt long term, then I could see a trade for Beltre in the works. Although, assuming Beltre rebounds in offensive production level, that will cost a pretty penny.

Dislocated shoulder for Aramis. Those are tough, depending on the severity, it can require surgery so I guess we will just have to wait and see. The biggest problem is even when he comes back, the slightest thing can dislocate it again,

“Dislocated shoulder for Aramis. Those are tough, depending on the severity, it can require surgery so I guess we will just have to wait and see. The biggest problem is even when he comes back, the slightest thing can dislocate it again,”

Gah, worse then I wanted to hear. What are they saying, 2-3 months?

“If Aramis is hurt long term, then I could see a trade for Beltre in the works. Although, assuming Beltre rebounds in offensive production level, that will cost a pretty penny.”

That is a good chunk of change (remember, Seattle hasn’t seemed to be willing to include much, if any, salary when trading pieces off as of late) and we don’t have a ton of prospects to work with. If they want much, it wont happen. Plus, if it’s a deadline deal, Ramirez will be coming back sometime not too long after ideally, and Beltre would be wasted. If this injury happened closer to the break, I would agree they would probably work it out. Now though? Doubtful.

SuzysMan,

They haven't given a time frame. They have to see how severe it is. I'm not a DR, but I would guess best case scenario is he misses a month or so, worst case would be surgery and he's out for the year. My logical guess would be Aramis possibly somewhere in the middle, but I'm just guessing here. I would think he would be gone at least for a couple weeks to a month minimum. Like I said the worst part may be that it's one of those injuries that can definitely bother you the whole year and easily could get dislocated again, just from swinging.

So Ryan Freel is the first to go in what will hopefully become a contract year fire sale for the orioles.

next up? danys baez. after him? jamie walker. then, aubrey huff. maybe even luke scott even though hes not in a contract year.

"One last thing, W.T.H. was Milton arguing again! Get off the field you buffoon! We all know you want to argue each and every call that doesn’t go your way, that doesn’t mean you should! We already lost one big bat today, you looking to get your second suspension in about a 3 week span to ensure we loose another? Sit down and shut up!"

Just an observation from one Cub fan to another here. Don't let Milton put you in the hospital ;) I understand he can act like a child. I also understand we need his bat to heat up. Especially now that Aramis is down. Everyone is entitled to their opionion. I here 'ya! I'm a regular here. We can put up with his ups and downs I guess. We put up with Sammy's self entitlement for years. I am nervous a bit too. He can't handle April and May. What will he be like in August and September...yikes! Hang in there! ;)

The ARam loss is tough hopefully they can get him back before the allstar game. There is no replacemnent that would come close to his production. However there are options.
1. Ryan Freel- Good pickup for basically a garbage player.
2. Adrian Beltre- Probably wont have to give up much to acquire him as a rent a player.
3. Start working Vitters up thru the minors.
4. Bobby Scales Career minor leaguer, but was hitting in AAA.
My other thought is kind of a reach, history has shown some infielders can switch corners, use Haufpauir it is far fetched as he throws lefty.

Heading into the season, it was clear that when Koskie retired, no back up to 3B. I was all for getting Fonteno ABs. In doing so, that put DeRosa on the bench (too costly for that) or trade bait, since they wanted a lefty in RF.

It's already looking like they should have kept DeRosa, forget about Bradley and let Mark play RF. He would have moved over to third (his best position IMHO) and we would have our back up to Ram. I hope Hendry's plan does not bite the team the way it did when he had no true back up for Lee in '06 and took too long to get someone in there after the injury. Kind of missing Dee-Ro now. What's that saying...'hindsight is 20/20'.

The A-Ram injury sucks. I really love this guy as a player. He is another one of those guys, like Jason Bay, and Carlos Beltran, that despite playing in a big market on a very good team, tends to go unnoticed despite the fact that he produces like a superstar every year. He can just rake, and watching from afar, it seems like he really worked to be where he is. He always could hit, but has worked very hard on his defense to the point where at one point he was a liability, and now he is a very solid third baseman. He also improved his BB rate last year, really the only semi flaw he had left. This guy is one of the great players in this league, that nobody ever talks about. Hope he gets back sooner rather then later.

Bruce Levine just posted this on his blog at 5:32 pm today... I would post the link, but I'm new to this site and don't know if my post may be deleted so I'm paraphrasing, but this is pretty much the jist of it.

Ramirez will gone for a minimum of 6-8 weeks. He is getting a CT scan to see if there are any fractures where it dislocated, and he will probably go to James Andrews as well.. If there is a fracture detected, surgery will be required and he will be lost 6 months, so basically the year and playoffs, assuming the cubs make it

gcg, if you have a link to something important, then I don't think anybody would have any issue with you posting it. I mean, the whole idea of this blog is that Tim links different stories all around the country, even the world. I think people would only take issue with links if they are links to a persons blog or website, and they are just trying to spam MLBTR to get hits.

“The Cubs said 4-6 on their broadcast, and personally I think that's REALLY optimistic. If he is back before the All-star break, I would be shocked.”

Yeah, like I mentioned, I keep hearing 2 months and 3 to get the strength back to normal from people that have gone through it. 6-8 seems much more realistic then 4-6, and even it sounds like it might be a little low. The length if surgery is needed though is frightening :/

"I stand corrected. He did not make it to 3+ innings and his arm did fall off."

Thank you for bringing a smile to my face. I mean, not that I am laughing at his bad fortune, or enjoy the fact we lost him as well. But that was damn funny.

WISHING THE OS HAD GOT SEAN MARSHALL INSTEAD!