Normally I like to show pictures that emphasize Dunn's gut, but I say do the deal on the basis of this photo alone
If you believe anything that Kenny Williams says (I usually don't, but it's a personal choice) then the White Sox are perfectly content to stand pat with the spunky bunch of go-getters they have presently for the stretch run. That would certainly be interesting.
However, if you believe anything you read about Kenny Williams, then you have a good reason to think that he's still burning up the phone lines for all the players he's been rumored to be fancying for the past month. Remember, this guy dealt for Robbie Alomar AND Carl Everett twice at the deadline, and signed Omar Vizquel and Ken Griffey Jr. way past their dirty 30's; he's a guy who'll lock onto a player. Hell or high-water...or certified insanity.
So what possible reason is there to
not believe the report from
ESPNchicago's Bruce Levine that the Nationals are willing to trade Dunn
in exchange for Daniel Hudson and one of the promising but flawed trio
of prospects; 3B Brent Morel, C Tyler Flowers, and OF Jordan Danks.
Well, if the White Sox have to indulge their fetish for Jim Thome or
something like him, and subject me to two months of having the same
nightmare of Adam Dunn striking out on three straight high fastballs
with the bases loaded to lose the World Series every night, then I guess
this deal hurts less than it could. First off, it doesn't subtract as
much from '10 White Sox as dealing Beckham and riding out the rest of
the season with Lillibridge would. And second, the level of flexibility
the Nationals are giving on the prospects allows the team to assess
who's the least needed...or the most useless...depending on your life
perspective.
When my girlfriend asks why I just woke with a start in the middle of the night, I'll just tell her I was dreaming about a large and powerful man breaking my heart
Through just three starts, Hudson is producing at Carlos Torres levels,
except with more walks, more strikeouts, and more potential. To swap
out Hudson now would seem to say that it's not worth it to wait out his
progression, which seems bound to happen given that his biggest problem
(walks) is completely out of character. Maybe, under the 2010 World
Series-or-bust approach, waiting out Hudson
would take too long,
but then surely replacing him with Torres isn't viable either. Torres
walks a lot, and is walking more guys this year than usual. Riding out a
4-man rotation, especially with Freddy Garcia, still seems fairly
insane two months out, so one would
hope there would be a
contingency plan for the 5th spot; be it a washed-up veteran (Washburn,
Martinez???), post waivers trade (Jake Westbrook territory), or some
other sort of minor-league sabotaging deal far less palatable than this
one.
As for prospects, Flowers is at the biggest need position as Pierzynski
is a free agent next season, both Morel and Danks are going through some
growing pains in Triple-A, but Morel has the advantage of more power
and that he hasn't already struck out 112 times this season like Danks
has. I would ship Danks for that reason (he really hasn't done well
since rising to Double-A) and the fact that Jared Mitchell is a similar
player in the system once he returns from injury.
If this report is true, and the White Sox don't have to ship out a
significant contributor to the '10 team for Dunn, I can't imagine
Williams passing it up. If he's going to bring in Dunn to shore the DH
spot, it would sure be nice if he could turn all the players he just
rendered useless into a halfway decent starting pitcher.
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3 Comments
Joe Cronin said:
Testing whether it actually logged me in.
James Fegan said:
It worked!
James Fegan said:
A great promotional opportunity for the upcoming Notre Dame football blog, "On Down the Line"
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