I’m out this week, but here’s a little something you might enjoy. Treat this as an open thread — I’ve just provided a potential starting point; feel free to “hijack” as appropriate.
- Six-Year Minor-League Free Agents and Khalil Greene (2002). Jake Gautreau used to be a pretty good prospect. Why was I so excited about Ryan Rupe? The Greene/Aurilia comparisons still make sense to me. I wonder if Greene will still be in San Diego when he finally puts it all together.
That’s all for now. Go Padres!
Tunes: Neil Finn, Elliott Smith, Rush.
You know, you should include the old comment threads on those old posts. Could be a good source of amusement.
The FA market continues to boil w/o KT dipping much more than his little toe in the water. I think there is some “shock and awe” going on in the exec offices at the prices. Probably everyone was looking to this offseason to finally be able to flex some spending muscles, and then the market changes and we’re suddenly not so sure of ourselves. Our $30MM in payroll flexibility can still buy some good FA’s, but I think KT, SA & Co are being forced to rebuild their whole attack plan given where salaries have gone. Will be interested to see if they pony up for what it’s taking to sign these guys…it doesn’t seem to be in the DNA to allow over-paying, regardless of how much $$ you’ve freed up.
You know its not the overpaying per year that I think kills them its the amount of years that they have to do it for. This will be sorianos last contract what modivation does he have to work hard in the offseason, he gets paid the same amount if he hits .400 with 75 bombs or if he hits .200 with 7 bombs.
MLB has a major problem with a few owners and they need to really get a hold of it and limit the length of contracts.
2 years 12.5 Million for Williams with an option… talk about overpaid.
And that’s for a 40 year old pitcher. Good for him — he’s close to home, probably making more than he ever has (I have not checked that, so I could be wrong).
I wonder what the Pads are going to end up doing. Probably trading for someone, at this point, I bet.
Anyone know if the Pads are interested in Adam Kennedy? I haven’t heard anything about that. He would seem to be a good fit.
Now that the Astros already overpaid for Carlos Lee, can the Padres get either Luke Scott or Jason Lane off their hands?
There doesn’t seem to be position for either of those two guys with Biggio being back and Chris Burke playing 2B/OF.
Probably not very high risk to try to trade for either of those two. Will cost less than Burrell, I think.
What do you think?
BTW, I’m glad Woody finally got to Houston after wanting to play there for years. And he got paid.
It’ll be weird to be playing the Giants next season. Old Padres vs. New Padres at the Petco Park?
I think a trade for one of those young Astros OF would be a fine idea. Lane has only about 2 years of ML service and Scott has less than one, and both are making less than 500K. Lane is getting a little long in the tooth at 29/30, but he was a good OBP guy in the minors and might be able to duplicate it with more playing time, I suppose. Scott is only a year younger, but looks similar with his OBP skills and maybe a bit more power. Maybe Lane and Sledge as a platoon in LF? I like Scott better after only a brief look, but he’s also a left handed batter so not necessarily a platoon partner for Sledge.
At first glance Lane appears to be the superior player.