December 17, 2007
Episode 83: Tejada in, Edmonds out
By
Amanda
Posted at 9:18 pm
This week on the podcast:
- Cubs signing Kosuke Fukudome and Cubs non-tendering Mark Prior. Both sort of hard to quibble with.
- Houston trading for closer Jose Valverde from the Diamondbacks for 2B Chris Burke and pitchers Juan
- Gutierrez and Chad Qualls.
- Houston trading for Miguel Tejada and Tejada appearing in the Mitchell Report.
- Even more talk about the Mitchell Report.
- Cardinals trading away Edmonds, and the tears that flowed thereafter. But don’t worry; he’ll be OK.
- Brewers tendering one-year contracts to: SS J.J. Hardy, RHPs Dave Bush, Claudio Vargas, and Seth McClung, and LHPs Brian Shouse and Chris Capuano.
- Reds tendering one-year contracts to 2B Brandon Phillips and RHP Matt Belisle, coincidentally two guys likely to show up in the Hottest NLC Player bracket later this week (if I get all my Christmas presents wrapped in time).
- Pirates continuing to do not much of anything. Imagine.
Podcast: Play in new window | Download
RHM – The guy who put his foot in his mouth (up to the knee) over women in the dugout was Keith Hernandez.
The podcast mentioned my comment about the Cardinals firing Jocketty (expressed in the thread dealing with the Edmonds trade). I just want to clarify what I meant by that comment, which basically was this: What has Mozeliak done that Jocketty couldn’t have done?
Eckstein out, Izturis in. Edmonds out, some 25-year old from Class-A ball in. Gary Bennett (.252) out, Jason LaRue (.148) in. Aaron Miles and So Taguchi out, nobody in. Countless minor leaguers and spare parts both in and out.
That’s all a lot of in and out, enough for an entire honeymoon in fact, and yet…are the Cardinals a better team now than they were at the end of 2007? Their problem was pitching. Mozeliak has done nothing to address that, and he’s opened up several more holes besides.
Here’s how smart this guy has been: The Pirates got Izturis from the Cubs last July for a PTBNL. The Cardinals just spent $2.85 million to sign him as a free agent (pretty sad when the Pirates make you look bad!), and then the Blue Jays signed Eckstein for $4.5 million.
Som the Cardinals saved $1.65 million by letting the spark plug of their offense walk as a free agent and signing a guy the Cubs and Pirates both rejected to replace him.
That’s less than the $2 million the Cardinals reportedly gave to the Padres along with Edmonds (to get a “prospect” who was still in the low minors last year at age 25). It’s also chump change for a team with a projected $110 million payroll for 2008.
So, to answer my own question, what Mozeliak has done that Jocketty couldn’t have done is to make that many moves without improving the team one bit. Thus I ask once more, why did they fire Jocketty again?
JK