We hear a lot of talk about buyers and sellers this time of year, but as Ken Rosenthal of FOX Sports points out in his latest column, some teams will do neither this summer and other teams will do both. Here are Rosenthal’s latest notes with less than four weeks to go before July 31st:
- The Red Sox could be positioned to trade an outfielder this month if their rehabbing players return as expected. Boston figures to pursue starting depth in trades; the Red Sox aren’t considering trades involving Josh Beckett.
- The Yankees will probably not sign Josh Hamilton or Cole Hamels this offseason, since they aim to avoid the MLB luxury tax by 2014 and that means cutting back on extravagant free agent signings.
- Under GM Frank Wren the Braves won more games while spending less money than every team but the Rays from 2009-11, Rosenthal notes.
- If the Blue Jays trade players on the brink of free agency such as Edwin Encarnacion and Kelly Johnson, they’d look to acquire players who can help them win next year. And if the Blue Jays don’t like what other teams are offering, they’ll keep their potential free agents. Toronto’s not likely to overpay in a “go for it” trade, Rosenthal writes.
- The Blue Jays aren’t trading Colby Rasmus, who has become more driven, according to a team official.
- Rosenthal suggests the Athletics could look to acquire players midseason if they stay in the playoff mix. Bartolo Colon is the player the A’s are most likely to trade, Rosenthal writes.
- The Mets are actively seeking relief help, but it’s highly doubtful they’d trade for Huston Street, who publicly criticized Mets bench coach Bob Geren last year. The Mets, who insist they won’t trade top prospects, are likely to wait until the end of the month before making any trades.
- The Cardinals wouldn’t be willing to meet the Brewers’ asking price for Zack Greinke, Rosenthal notes. St. Louis is more likely to pursue a mid-rotation starter.
- The Diamondbacks believe they need a third baseman more than a starting pitcher.
I’d bet a decent amount that the Sox would consider a trade w/ Beckett — they need to shed salary & he’s one of their many bad contracts. Plus, he’s always hurt & a clubhouse cancer.
Beckett has been their best pitcher, has averaged just over 29 starts per year in Boston, and there’s absolutely nothing whatsoever to base calling him a clubhouse cancer on.
Stop listening to “Mazz.”
They are supposed to trade a solid pitcher, pay his salary and let the Aaron Cook’s and Matsuzaka’s of the world take his place according to some of the “enlightened ones” at the Globe and a few other media outlets in the new England area. That way they will have another item to gripe about when Beckett is given away.
Sometimes it will be a blessing when the NYT and it’s satellite group just comes crashing down altogether and it won’t be long. They are operating so much in the Red anyway and have been for years. loss of readership, can’t get digital subscribers willing to pay.. Print media a bust.. One way to say adios to poor sports writing in that area (NE).
If they never printed another article it would be fine by me.
a 4.09 ERA is average, but with this lineup they should be scoring more runs than 4
to support him
His 3.75 FIP is quite a bit better than average, as is his 3.00 strikeout to walk ratio.
do you have to use the word cancer
There’s really not a better word to encapsulate the notion he’s trying to express.
It’s okay, none of the other 29 teams are considering a trade involving Josh Beckett either
Trading Beckett now, while he has marketability, makes sense, if his entire salary goes away when he moves on.
Beckett doesn’t have the kind of value they would want him to have. He is having a very mediocre season. They would be selling low.
If a team is willing to take on Beckett’s entire salary, I think it would be worth it to trade him and deal with a hole in the rotation now for a chance to sign a real stud like Hamels or Greinke. Beckett is very good, but seems a little inconsistent for his high salary and I’d prefer my ace to make all his starts and not have annual DL trips.
trading for a rental would be a terrible idea for the a’s. there’s plenty of improvement with the young guys and a healthy Cespedes and mccarthy and anderson should be back after the ASB, but there’s also plenty of potential for backwards regression.
I’ll make an exception for any cheap reliever pickup, especially of the RHP variety because the A’s pen is bad.
Backwards regression? Sounds like a SABR term that doesn’t have a basis in reality. Agree, though, this team is playing about as well as it possibly can and that’s a testament to Bob Melvin. Practically every move he makes is the right one and the young starters are incredible.
Anderson isn’t going to be a factor this year. Hopefully he makes it back by September, which is usual for ACL injuries (14-months minimum.)
The A’s pen isn’t “bad.” Balfour is still one of the best set-up men in the business, Blevins has been solid and Cook is holding down the closer role fairly well. Another arm or two wouldn’t hurt.
Furthermore how many championships have the Braves won under Wren while he saving so much money? Yeah that’s right Zero. So spend smart and go get a difference maker- whether it be a hitter or pitcher.
I think you’re looking at it wrong to say Wren is “saving money.” That’s not what he’s doing at all. He’s been given a relatively strict budget by Liberty Media, who owns the team, and he can only do so much within the confines of that budget. For the last few years, that budget has been less than half what the Yankees, Phillies, and Red Sox have been spending.
There is no single acquisition that guarantees a championship. Frank Wren, in competing for the division every year despite spending half what the Phillies have spent, has spent VERY smart. By asking him to spend smart and win a championship…well, that’s a total crapshoot and I think you probably know so. It would be like me removing half of your brain, asking you to pick ten brain cells to take back each year, and then complaining that you weren’t winning a Nobel Prize in Physics.
this is all great except the analogy at the end.
You are correct in that Wren hasn’t been saving money- he just wasn’t spending as much. I misspoke in my earlier post. I also never said a difference maker would get us a championship- if it was implied my apologies. I am stating that I want a difference maker of some sort that may help this team find the consistency it’s so lacking. A guy off the bench who can hit with RISP or reliable bullpen guy to cut the game down until its Kimbrels turn. More than anything I just want to see this team play like they are capable. That doesn’t mean they’ll win it all, but right now not playing sloppy baseball every other day would be nice.
The only offer the Sox would ever get on Beckett would be the same kinf of buying-low, highway robbery nonsense like the Youkilis deal.
Beckett would probably demand 10 million dollars and a bucket of fried chicken to waive his 10 and 5 rights!
I honestly think the ‘rumors’ that Rasmus is available are rubbish. Why would the Jays turn around and trade a player that they acquired for nothing they needed, who has put in a lot a work to turn it around, and who has turned it around?
Rasmus is the kind of player you keep around for awhile. Plus, I laugh when he talks about his manager and refers to him as ‘Mr. John’. The boy still has his southern manners!
Not to go all psychoanalytic on you, but I’m not surprised that Rasmus is turning it around. Here’s my theory-he has a father that was hard on him that he could never please, then he had LaRussa who was hard on him that he could never please-father figures who were less then ideal father figures for him. Then he comes to Toronto, has John Farrell, a completely different type of man and suddenly he has a ‘father figure’ he can actually relate to.
That does not make Colby a bad player or a bad person-it just makes him someone that needs a different approach. He seems so much more relaxed-Cardinal fans do not take kindly to players that have any kind of struggle and I don’t sense that attitude with the Jays fans. They are patient while waiting on their players to turn things around.
I hope the Jays can get some pitching somewhere. I think the Yankees with their age and injuries could be vulnerable. They have one of the best offenses they’ve had in years. It would be a shame to waste it.
It’s pretty amazing to look at the AL East splits….the teams are virtually .500 against eachother so far. It’s going to be extremely important for the Blue Jays to win when they go out of the division…especially on the Seattle-Oakland trip. There’s still a lot of baseball to be played intradivision to decide who finishes in first and who likely gets maybe both of the wild card slots.
That’s what happens when teams know that you NEED to get rid of a guy to make room for the new young star.
I know but that would be very worrisome if I traded for him. He is very up and down sometimes his era above 5sometimes it’s below3.
i agree. however i could see a scenario in the off season where Rasmus is trade for a controllable quality pitcher.
but the whole now was invention to get traffic…
Maybe switching to the metric system was a perfect fit for Rasmus and the light came on for him.
You obviously know nothing about Cardinals fans. We never boo our own players, regardless of how they’re playing. Cardinal fans rarely boo anyone. Say what you want about LaRussa, but he is a winner. Colby’s problems resulted from an over controlling father. I wish him nothing but the best. He needs to stay in Canada as far away from his father as possible until he has the maturity to be his own man
if you cannot play in St. Louis with the “best fans in baseball” (SI & Sporting News) you must have some serious personal problems to go with your “tools”. Colby’s poppa was a thorn in TonyLaR’s side and the front office was not too pleased either. But let us just look at one statistic. Cardinals got rid of Colby; Cardinals win the World Series. Sometimes the smallest infection can cause a person to lose a limb. I hope he does well but do not think the Cardinals treated him poorly.
Just to be clear, I’m not really commenting on what I think of LaRussa as a manager. I do think he wasn’t the RIGHT type of manager to get the most out of Rasmus. There WAS a disconnect between the front office and LaRussa in regards to Rasmus. Mozeliak was trying to work out an extension, while LaRussa was making plans to sit him. That sort of thing surely makes a player confused about where and how he fits in. Rasmus is a human; that sort of stuff had to have an effect on him.
I don’t share your opinion. Publicly criticizing a member of someone’s family is verbal abuse and bad behaviour. That will somewhat tarnish Tony LaRussa’s legacy. That and steroid use by some of his players in Oakland and St. Louis.
or how about TLR’s multiple DUIs! what a role model…
They might not, but I’d have to imagine a team like Baltimore or Toronto who is close this season would take him and treat is as a free agent signing, since it will be tough for them to sign Hamels/Greinke/Sanchez.
I don’t see Boston doing this though as they’ve made up some ground and are right in the mix with them. The offseason may be the best time to make this deal or the waiver deadline if they fall out of contention.
I’d also think the Royals would like to add a strong arm to their rotation since they have a growing young lineup but really no pitching to speak of.
except they really didn’t need to get rid of him.
middlebrooks had serious flaws, even before he got hurt.
I see that also unfortunately. Expect his glove to stabilize, as he was solid at the Milb level and has made a few boo-boos at the MLB level more from hurrying up than anything, but his k zone is going to need improvement have a feeling.
It’s like waiting for the other shoe to drop. I understand some have pointed out his career bb/k splits, with regard to last year should not be used entirely as a point of reference.. But I am not exactly so sure.
This is the scenario I see happening. Gose seems to be expendable.
Ha ha. I wish we Americans knew the joy of counting and measuring everything on the metric system. It is so much easier to figure it out in your head.
Somehow, I think Rasmus was probably stumped by the metric system.
The Great White North may have started Colby’s meter … but hitting the face of the 500 deck is still going “yard”
no dought aboot it
I can’t think of the metric system without thinking of Dan Aykroyd’s skit on SNL about the new 10 letter “Metric Alphabet”……funny stuff.
I’m going to assume that’s not sarcasm but sometimes they want to read your comment before you post it because if it’s inappropriate they’ll just delete it instead of taking it down