FoxSports.com's Ken Rosenthal has a new Full Count video up, so let's see what he has for us…
- The Orioles will almost certainly be the first team to fire their manager this season, and both Bob Melvin and Bobby Valentine came up in past internal discussions. Bigger jobs are in store for Valentine, but Buck Showalter might also be a candidate. Rosenthal reminds us that the team doesn't have anyone in-house with prior big league managing experience.
- The Mariners expect Cliff Lee back on Friday and Erik Bedard back in four weeks, but the focus will remain on the offense and Ken Griffey Jr.'s .238/.289/.262 performance. Rosenthal says not to expect anything to happen with him anytime soon; Seattle has five Griffey-centric promotions scheduled for the first half.
- The Braves are a logical landing spot for Adrian Gonzalez, but they're also very high on first base prospect Freddie Freeman. The last time they traded for a first baseman with a year-plus left on his contract, they basically rebuilt the Texas Rangers.
- The Nationals made a run at Jermaine Dye and had more than one conversation with Gary Sheffield's agent, but GM Mike Rizzo said those talks were just to gauge interest. For now, they're happy with the a platoon of Willie Harris and Justin Maxwell because of their defensive abilities, and Rizzo says that will remain a point of emphasis as the team moves forward.
- Rosenthal expects the Nats to get better as the season progresses. They'll be adding Stephen Strasburg, Drew Storen, Chien-Ming Wang, Ross Detwiler, and Jordan Zimmermann to their pitching staff at various points this year.
“The last time they traded for a first baseman with a year-plus left on his contract, they basically rebuilt the Texas Rangers”
Priceless phrasing
These stories about Adrian Gonzalez to the Braves better stop because I’m sick of hearing lousy no-meaning rumors about dumb trades or signings that always seem to involve the Braves. Why us? Why won’t another team be constantly talked about on this website? We had Peavy, we had Bay, we had Damon, and we now have Gonzalez. Enough is enough just freakin’ lay off and go bother some other team with useless hot stove talk.
Maybe don’t go to a site called MLB Trade Rumors if you’re sick of trade rumors.
I’m not sick of trade rumors. I’m sick of people even bothering to say things that don’t make any sense. Why would someone even guess that Adrian Gonzalez might end up on the Braves? It would be another deal just like Teixeiras and most likely wouldn’t work out because it would empty the farm system and there is no way we would be able to extend him. It would be a dumb move that wouldn’t help us in the least. With Damon, there was also no point because of the plethora of outfielders we already have in a log jam. And back with Peavy, that subject was interesting up until they asked for Tommy Hanson and then it just went down hill because the thought of giving up Hanson was ridiculous. Did I mind the AJ Burnett rumors? No. The Furcal rumors? Nope. The Griffey rumors? No way. I was excited about all of them. I don’t mind trade rumors as long as they make a little bit of sense.
You’re really complaining that your favorite team is being discussed TOO much? I’ve got a solution for you: stop coming to this site and bit**ing about your team being talked about too much. If you don’t want to partake in the discussion then skip the link, it’s pretty simple.
Yeah, no denying that it was a horrible deal. I’ve tried to defend it, but its impossible. Without that trade, we probably wouldn’t have Derek Lowe and his outrageous contract, and somebody much younger and more effective would be in his spot, such as Harrison or Feliz. That’s my biggest regret. Trading Saltalamachia didn’t, and won’t, hurt us. Andrus might have been moved to second rather than having Prado over there, and while it’d be nice to him leading off, I don’t think losing him will be that big of a deal the way Prado is playing. Horrible deal, but one I’ve moved on from. The long term effect isn’t HORRIBLE, but its never a good thing to give away 4 of your top 5 prospects to finish 3rd in the division. Who knows who would’ve been a Brave had this deal not happened.
Oh not another Teixeira-like trade please :S i wouldn’t like to see Freeman/Vizcaino/Kimbrel go to another team..
If we could trade for him pending a contract extension it would be the only way for me, but the Braves don’t have the money to take on that kind of contract.. But this would be the only way i would accept to see Freeman, Vizcaino and maybe Teheran go to the Padres.. I prefer Gonzalez long term than the “chance” of Freeman to be a good player, it would take years and probably would never be as good as gonzalez is..
But coming back to reality, The Braves don’t have the money to offer a contract extension to Gonzalez and i don’t think they will give up their best prospects again as they did with the Teixeira trade.. I don’t think they are that desperate to win this year as Bobby Cox last season..
According to Baseball America Salty, Elvis, and Harrison were ranked 1, 2, and 3 respectively, which is going to hurt but to be fair Nefalti wasn’t even in the top 10 and he is probably going to wind up being the best player traded in that deal. So while hindsight might be 20/20 you have to look at the trade at the time it was made, Elvis and Salty were expendable, Harrison was still multiple years away and Feliz and Jones were throw-ins. If the Braves had been able to keep Teix the deal wouldn’t look so bad but hey you win some, you lose some.
I will still defend it. I mean, hindsight is amlways 20/20, but Teixeira did exactly what was expected of him after the trade. The fact that the Braves didn’t make the playoffs wasn’t because Tex didn’t hit (what did he average, like an RBI a game the second half of the season?). And you had your C and SS of the future so trading Salty and Andrus was essentially trading redundant parts, no?
And while I would love to have Feliz on the team, the viewpoint was we had tons of young pitching in the system. Now it’s true that Kyle Davies, Jo Jo Reyes, Charlie Morton, and Jeff Locke aren’t All-Stars, that was the perception at the time.
People love to bash trades… ask Braves fans if Adam Wainwright and Jason Marquis were worth J.D. Drew and watch how they ignore how Drew helped get them to the playoffs that year… ask Tiger fans if Doyle Alexander was worth John Smoltz and watch them ignore how Alexander went 9-0 in 11 starts (with a 1.53 ERA) for them down the stretch in 1987 and helped them win the division. Just because the guys you traded away ended up being good doesn’t make a trade “bad”.
Having said all that, with Freeman being relatively close to being major league ready, I wouldn’t trade for A-Gon unless he agreed to an extention and back-loaded contract like a couple of other people have suggested already. If he did agree to that I say Freeman/Vizcaino/Kimbrel and even a couple of lesser prospects would be well worth a proven stud like Gonzolez.