When the Giants Come to Town, It's Bye-Bye Baby

12.17.2007
Weekend Deals

Lots of NL West news while I was at Babies R Us this weekend:

* Billy Beane traded Dan Haren to Arizona for six prospects. Arizona loses blue-chip outfielder Carlos Gonzalez and others but gains a co-ace for Brandon Webb. If Randy Johnson can squeeze one more good year from his bad back (no sure thing), the D-Backs will have the nastiest one-two-three punch in all of baseball, perhaps. As for Oakland, BP’s Kevin Goldstein says Beane’s rebuild has gotten off to a good start.

* Dodgers sign Japanese RHP Kuroda to three years, $35 M. This doesn’t make much sense from a risk/reward perspective, no matter what this guy writes. He’ll be 33 when the season starts, and he’s more likely to be Kei Igawa than Dice-K. His signing and the Haren trade should open up the pitching trade market; let’s see how long it takes before the Noah Lowry/Jonathan Sanchez rumors start to flow again.

* Jim Edmonds goes to San Diego. He’s been wracked by injuries the past two years. If Edmonds plays more than 120 games, the Padres will be lucky. This is not the same guy who hit 42 homers in 2004, but it’s still a fairly low-risk move by San Diego. He has one more year on his contract, and St. Louis is paying a slice of his $8 M salary.

* Oh, and: Arizona also traded its closer Jose Valverde to Houston for reliever Chad Qualls, infielder Chris Burke and young pitcher Juan Gutierrez. Valverde was excellent in ‘07, but he’s the perfect example of the fungible closer. It seems just as wise to give another young arm a shot at the role, and Arizona has plenty of hard-throwing young arms. 

Scorecard: Big wins for Arizona. They could be the run-away-and-hide team in the division this year.

***

SMALL PRINT UPDATE: Now reading George Orwell’s Why I Write, an odd essay reprinted as part of a Penguin’s series of “Great Idea” thought pieces. Most of it consists of Orwell’s wandering World War II musings on European politics and the necessity of democratic socialism. Many of his observations are a fascinating window on the times, as Nazi bombs fell on London. They often feel relevant in today’s world, too, as he skewers both the intellectual left and plutocratic right.

Other observations show how the best-intentioned ideas warp through time. For example, he touts the modern miracle of housing projects, bringing to the poor amenities (hot water, constant electricity, a solid roof) that were once reserved for the wealthy. Now such projects are seen as reinforcements of the cycle of poverty. In the final slim chapter Orwell finally gets around to why he writes, and it’s like Strunk & White filtered through English curmudgeonry.

Now listening to A.C. Newman’s The Slow Wonder. He’s the lead New Pornographer, and his album is a good approximation of what you’d get if you combined Challengers and Twin Cinema but stripped out the Dan Bejar and Neko Case-led numbers. Not quite as punchy as Cinema, not quite as dreamy as Challengers, but the lyrics are as opaque as ever. None of the songs on Slow Wonder would be out of place on either album.



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[December 17, 2007 9:25 PM]  |  link  |  reply
Chris said

Lefty,

I don't think the Kuroda signing is too terrible, it's slightly overpaying but I don't see how its any worse than giving a guy like Carlos Silva or Kyle Lohse $10M per year.

Here's what BP said about him:

He's not Daisuke Matsuzaka, but Kuroda a very strong power pitcher with a low to mid-90s fastball and a wicked forkball. In addition, he features a plus shuuto, something like a screwball, as well as an effective change. Even if he only pans out as a third or fourth starter in the majors, he will give you innings, work deep into games, and he should be fairly consistent start to start.

I'd probably be more inclined to give him a spin than Silva or any other FA pitcher.

[December 17, 2007 9:37 PM]  |  link  |  reply
ELM said

>I don't see how its any worse than giving a guy like Carlos Silva or Kyle Lohse $10M per year.

Those contracts will be bad, too.