Quote:
Originally Posted by duncan_idaho
Petro shows his ass when it comes to baseball quite often.
Yes, prospects can and should be leveraged to add starting pitching. But you have to find a partner that works to make a trade.
Quite simply, teams are holding onto controllable starters unless you pay through the nose for starting pitching.
He rode the Jair Jurrjens train HARD last year. HARD. Was screaming to trade for him. It's now clear the guy sucks (just like anyone who paid attention to advanced stats knew).
The Royals don't refuse to trade prospects. They refuse to make bad trades. Look at what Cleveland gave up for Ubaldo Jiminez. That's the equivalent of giving up Mike Montgomery, Jake Odorizzi and Jeremy Jeffress. For a guy who isn't getting it done.
It's a tough trading environment right now. Teams are sitting on young, controllable starters and prospects with equal determination. THat drives the price up to astronomical levels.
The only recent trade for a "stud" starter that really looks good right now is the Nationals trade for Gio Gonzalez. The trades for Mat Latos and Jiminez look god-awful.
What the Royals need to do is get aggressive in the best free agent pitching class in recent memory. Not trade legitimate prospects for marginal pitchers (as Soren has stumped for).
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What they should probably do is just suck it up and surrender a marginal prospect for a guy like Wandy Rodriguez.
Good pitchers are rarely available and they're
never cheap. Here the Royals could probably get Rodriguez for nothing more than salary relief. Wandy's not a great pitcher, but he's a legit starter; a #3 on most squads. And yeah, they should've gone after Edwin Jackson (still don't get that).
Had they been willing to field a competitive payroll, they could easily have 3 additional legitimate starting pitchers (w/ Oswalt as well). They have so many cost-controlled position players that its inexcusable for them to not pursue some SP on the free agent market.
But if that's the argument that Petro was trying to make, he came unhinged well before he was able to make it.