David Rubin will probably tell you that Philadelphia made a mistake. Me? Well, it doesn’t make me happy that a division team just got extremely better for what seems like a long time, but the only team I judge mistakes on is the Mets.
One thing for certain here; the owner of the Phillies and Bernie Madoff weren’t close friends. Did you catch the feature on Madoff last night on CNN/Anderson Cooper? Did you notice how serious the attempts are going to be to recoup the monies some of these investors made from this scheme?
What if the Wilpons made a ton of money on their good friend and eventually have to pay all that back?
The 2011 salary cap on the Mets seems to fall into the $130mil range, which left superstars like Lee completely out of the 2011 picture. Yes, there is a ton of bad money coming off at the end of the next season, but what if the ownership of the Mets are rocked by this investigation? Do you honestly think the ties will be taken off the purse strings?
Mr. Anderson will attempt to create a repeat of what happened in San Francisco last year. Develop your team from within around strong, over-slot college pitchers in the draft. Start them no lower than A+ and put them on a 3-year max plan to reach Queens. Yes, Jenrry Mejia will start the season in AAA, but if he aces that level like he did at the end of 2010? Don’t be surprised if Mejia joins the parent club around the same time Johan Santana returns.
And, what if the rumors out of Cincinnati are true? What if Alderson does sell Jose Reyes to them for Mike Leake, and a couple of other prospects? Now, you would have Santana and Mejia in June 2010, followed my Mike Harvey and Leake in 2011. You’ve got a killer young rotation, and a lower overall team payroll.
In my opinion, the Lee to Philly move will only speed up the current Alderson plan to fight these kind of wild fires with more digging around the perimeter, and less costly inner-fire approaches. Contain the wild fire until it burns itself out. Worked for San Francisco.
1 comment:
Actually, I applaud GM Amaro for having cahones the size of watermelons to get something like this done!! I am shocked, but the Phils seem to be able to pull such surprises out of their hat in recent vintage. Forget 3 years for them right now- they are built to compete in 2011 and 2012. They WILL have to pay for it down the line, when they can't afford any other players and they have over $100 mil on the books for players no longer useful. But since they are in a "win-now" mode, I think it was a move of sheer genius!!
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