Rick Hahn has been more impressive in one evening than Kenny Williams was in his entire tour of duty as GM. Williams kept spending post World Series like a desperate Fantasy Baseball owner in a keeper league, and Hahn has managed to do what no baseball expert said he could do; shed $20 million and get back a top prospect.
Not only do the Sox now have money to spend next season, which no one seems to be able to comprehend, but also they received the Tigers #2 prospect, Avisail Garcia, thanks to MLB’s latest steroid scandal, Biogenesis. You could say everyone won in this deal, but the White Sox won big by taking a future Sox-killer from their main obstacle in the AL Central, the Tigers.
The Tigers did receive a long-term solution at Shortstop by receiving Jose Iglesias from the Red Sox that now makes Jhonny Peralta expendable. You have to give Dave Dombrowski credit again this season for making the necessary moves to get the Tigers back to the World Series, especially with the Peralta suspension looming.
It shows you how much the Red Sox wanted Peavy, they are paying all of his remaining salary and traded one of their MLB-ready prospects to a postseason competitor, but you have to win your division or wild card first, which is why the trade was done.
What did the Sox get in Garcia, they received a five-tool player that can hit for power, I sound like the scouts in Moneyball talking about Billy Beane, hope it works out better for Garcia. Garcia, 22, is batting .241 with two home runs and 10 RBIs in 30 games with the Tigers and was currently playing for Triple-A Toledo, where he was batting .382 with five home runs and 23 RBIs in 32 games. You can expect to see Garcia this weekend with the big club if the Sox can still pull off a trade for the gimpy Rios, after he followed two balls off his foot yesterday.
Hahn expanded his thoughts on the prospects the Sox received from the Red Sox in an interview with the Chicago Tribune:
Wendelken, 20, is 2-0 with a 2.77 ERA with 10 saves in 27 relief appearances at Class-A Greenville.
“He’s got a closer mentality and perhaps has that in his future,’’ Hahn said.
Montas, 20, is considered a project but has had his fastball clocked at 100 mph. He will polish his skills at Class-A Kannapolis under the supervision of minor league pitching coordinator Curt Hasler and field coordinator Kirk Champion.
“He has a little bit of delivery work to work on, but has the kind of stuff we feel that our development staff have had success with in the past, so we’re excited about being able to add them,” Hahn said.
Montas was ranked as the Red Sox’s 22nd top prospect by Baseball America, but he’s 2-9 with a 5.70 ERA with 96 strikeouts in 85 1/3 innings at Greenville.
Rondon, a 19-year-old switch-hitter, is batting .276 with one home run and 10 RBIs in 37 games at Class-A Lowell.
Rondon possesses “a real feel for the game and smooth with his actions, good range on defense and above average defender and the question as to his future role will likely come down to the development of his bat,” Hahn said.
There’s a lot of raw talent there, so hopefully the Sox can develop it. I think any pitcher that reaches triple digits deserves a shot.
Now the only question that remains is what will the Sox do today, if anything? Hahn isn’t anxious to give away players for nothing or spend a lot of money to pay his players to play for another team, and that’s something I like. I’ve never understood paying a player to play for another team. If you used the logic that you’re paying for better prospects it makes a little more sense, but their still prospects. You don’t know if they will succeed or not, but when you are sending the other a team an established veteran then why pay for a question marks. I’m not shocked the Cubs paid to send Soriano away, they did save $6 million, but I’m surprised they paid any of Garza’s remaining contract since the starting pitching market was so thin.
In regards to the trade deadline, I do not believe tweets from earlier today that Texas is lukewarm on Rios with Nelson Cruz likely gone for the remainder of the year when the Biogenesis suspension are handed out on Friday or that the Pirates are less interested either. Yesterday at 5pm Boston was not interested in Jake Peavy according tweets from the baseball insiders, whoops!
Major League A*Holes 