Kazmir Back To The Mets? Pena On The Block?
Carl Crawford, Carlos Pena, Cliff Lee, Scott Kazmir July 28th. 2009, 1:13pmJoel Sherman of the New York Post is reporting (via MLB Trade Rumors) that the Rays have discussed trading Scott Kazmir with both the Rangers and the Mets. Neither move appears to be heading anywhere.
The Rangers turned down an offer to bring Scott Kazmir home to Texas. The Rays have shopped Kazmir around a bit, even calling the MetsNew York Mets , who expressed initial interest but nothing more.
And while it is no surprise that the Rays are trying to move Kazmir to free up salary to acquire Cliff Lee and/or Victor Martinez, the big surprise is that the Rays would also be willing to move Carlos Pena.
Tampa is trying to see if they could trade Kazmir, Carlos Pena and in the right blockbuster even Carl Crawford to free up dollars to make a bigger trade. The Rays are most focused on seeing if they can add Cliff Lee and Victor Martinez in one trade, though they continue to call on Halladay, as well.
Pena is making $8 million this season and is due $10.125 million next year in the last year of his current deal.
MIDDAY TRADE CONFIDENTIAL, JULY 28 [New York Post]
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Moving Pena only makes sense if you are definitely landing V-Mart or think Willy Aybar is capable of playing first base full time and putting up comparable numbers. I suppose they could essentially platoon Aybar and Navi/Diesel and play V-Mart at both first and catcher, which would soften the blow of Pena being gone somewhat. And Pena might bring back a nice haul in trade, maybe from a team like the Giants who are desperate for a power bat. Pena + stuff for Bumgardner?
Hmmm. Giving up Pena when trying to reach the playoffs is a bad idea, in my opinion. If we are selling, which I think we should depending on tonights game… then they shouldn’t be looking to shed salary for lee and vmart.
Seems like one part fire sale, one part upgrade. I don’t get it.
I say it’s time to move Pena and Kaz and the older members of the pen and just build towards next season. I HATE the thought of giving up on a year, but it just looks like this team can’t win the big games they’d need to make the playoffs. And I don’t really know why they are underachieving sooooo much, but it looks like the time has come. I guess wait till the end of this series, but they have to win 2 out of 3. And the guy I’d really wanna trade is Burrell for almost anything, but that seems impossible. They need more cap space, go reallly young get some super prospects and win next year or the year after if need be, it ain’t gonna happen this year.
Something seems a little fishy to me, though. Listening to the New York papers around trade deadline day is like listening to the Montreal papers around the NHL trade deadline day. A lot of their columnists go with what they would LIKE to happen instead of what is actually happening.
That’s not to say I’m against anything that was linked and posted by Cork, it’s just I’ll take it with a grain of salt.
Agree 100%. Anyone thing the ESPN crew is all up on the Phillies’ nads? Sheesh, everyday, it is a new feature about why the Phils desperately need Halladay.
Oh, you want to hear something REALLY rich? The other night when Papelbon was a bit dicey for the Red Sox, whoever was in the host chair for Baseball Tonight said that they needed to trade for a closer because “WE CAN’T HAVE THIS.” O M G. He actully said “WE” can’t have this.
This is why I don’t watch ESPN anymore, as much as I can avoid it.
The New York writers are the laziest writers in baseball. Usually whenever a New York team is in town they either write about how they hate the trop, that baseball will never make it in the State of Florida or that that the Rays need to have a fire-sale and trade all their players to the Yankee or mets.They have been harping a trade for Kaz since they traded him years ago. Usually they give up a dozen baseballs and some minor league A ball player/ has been for Kaz, Upton and Crawford. Most of the time they have no idea who is still in their farm system but the Rays management want to shed payroll and will be glad to trade away their stars.