The Milledge Trade Looks Worse Today

from MetsLifer.com
If you haven't heard there's news from the winter meeting that the Tigers and Mets are talking about a possible trade that would send Dontrelle Willis to the Mets.

What's the catch? Well, the catch is the Tigers have found themselves with a payroll overload and need to cut back so any deal involving Dontrelle would also include taking Pudge Rodriguez and his +$13MM salary. Now Pudge has a no trade clause, but would waive it if he was offered a contract extension from a playoff team (i.e. New York Mets).

So how does this make the Milledge trade any worse? Well we now have an overload at catcher so for this deal to happen we'd either a) have to cut one of our existing catchers under contract b) find a way to package one of them in a deal for Willis/Rodriguez. The problem with option B is we just signed Castro to a contract and just traded for Schneider and are stuck with his contract. This is not about Ryan Church. Church will bat .270 for us and knock in 60 RBIs. This is about getting a middle of the road catcher early in the offseason before knowing what's really out there.

Of course hindsight is 20/20, but it just compounds the bad feeling I'm getting from the Mets this offseason. I have a horrible feeling that come April 1 we will not have acquired a top notch starting pitcher. Livan Hernandez will be in the rotation. And our bullpen will be very similar to last year.

I'd love for the Mets to make this deal with the Tigers. The Marlins were packaging Willis and Cabrera because they wanted to dump payroll. The Tigers don't really need Willis and now find themselves wanting to dump payroll as well. This is a perfect scenario for the Mets. The Mets could try and send Castro, Heilman, and Mulvey to the Tigers for Willis & Pudge. The Tigers don't need any more bats or big time contracts.

Will this happen? Who knows. But if it doesn't happen in the coming week, it will be less likely that it ever will.

Would You Give Up Your Youth For. . .

from MetsLifer.com
In a totally hypothetical situation, yet possibly plausible, the Mets starting rotation next year could be Pedro Martinez, Dan Haren, Joe Blanton, Dontrelle Willis and Oliver Perez.

I know what you're thinking. The answer is no I'm not high. But this is a scenario worth considering. That hypothetical starting rotation consists of 4 pitchers with young arms and one solid veteran. It's a rotation that's pretty much set for the next 3 years with Pedro's longevity being the only question mark.

What will it take to get them? Ha, here's the kicker. The Mets would more than likely have to give up Fernando Martinez, John Maine, Lastings Milledge, Carlos Gomez, Ruben Gotay, Kevin Mulvey and Deolis Guerra. The A's would want Maine, Gotay, Mulvey & Gomez for Haren & Blanton. The Marlins would get Guerra, Milledge & Martinez for Dontrelle Willis.

So the Mets would give up basically their top 3 position prospects, their top 2 pitching prospects, and one solid starter for three young stud pitchers. Would you do it?

At first my knee jerk reaction is it's a crazy idea, don't do it. But after thinking about it the Mets would have 3 solid pitchers, 2 potential aces, on their staff that would be locked up for the next 3 seasons. What are they really giving up? They're giving up the potential for one of those young players to become an All Star, but there's not guarantee that they will.

John Maine is the guy that really makes this deal tough for me. I think Maine has the potential to be a #2 guy on a staff but I don't see him being a #1 starter in the future. I love John Maine and his performance on the second to last game of the season this year was legendary. If somehow this could be done without Maine it would make it so much easier to do.

As we have learned over the past two seasons, starting pitching is the key to a championship. If these deals could be made we'd still have the core of our lineup in tact, but we're potentially mortgaging the future for the present.

Still I think I'd do it because there's no guarantee to what the future holds.