The National League East refurbishes as the trade deadline (4 PM Tuesday) approaches.
The Braves are about to get Mark Teixeira from Texas for Jerrod Jarrod Saltalamacchia and prospects.
The Phillies have picked up Kyle Lohse from Cincinnati.
And your New York Mets will reportedly acquire 2B Luis Castillo from the Twins for non-prospects Drew Butera and Dustin Martin.
The Braves should be improved.
The Phillies might be helped.
The Mets? Castillo's in that realm of players I've always been convinced bats .490 against us, particularly as a visitor. His Shea average is .293, actually. Close enough. Three Gold Gloves are in his cabinet, from the relatively recent past.
Did I mention he's a proven second baseman? He's not dream-date Brandon Phillips, but he's not bad as available alternatives go.
Unless he morphs into Robbie Alomar, he couldn't hurt.
Now if only we could find the 2006 versions of Beltran, Reyes, Wright, Delgado and Lo Duca, we'd be pulling away from the rest of the division in no time at all.
You're the first person on the Internets to nail “Saltalamacchia” but flub “Jarrod.”
Silly mistakes are my existence's bane.
As a long-time reader, however, I will say it's refreshing to see one that's not math related.
Hope we get Laurie's insightful take on this deal, from both ends. Picking up Castillo sure doesn't hurt, but this team needs a solid late-inning set-up pitcher way before they need to shore up what was a decent, though not mind-blowing, array of second basemen.
Too many times, I've seen a Mets pitcher brought into the seventh or eighth inning of a tie or one-run game, and thought to myself, “Coin flip”. I didn't get that feeling when heading towards the 7 or 8 hole in our batting order. Yes, they filled a need, but Heilman and Feliciano in the late innings will not win this club a division title, IMHO.
Methinks another deal is going down in the next 18 and a half hours. At least, mehopes.
If it comes off, I like the price paid for Castillo. What I don't like so much is the thought of Omar turning around and dealing Gotay, which this seems to presage.
It's much too soon to give up on Ruben's still-unpolished defense and his offense is a revelation from a rookie middle infielder. I can't help it, I like the guy — and I liked the way the team was shaping up for the future as a roster of younger guys with enthusiasm, good OBP's and dangerous speed.
Now, if it's Easley they now ship off in exchange for some outfielder or other, or maybe an arm, well, that won't bother me so much, theough Easley is certainly a useful bench player. But I hope they don't deal Gotay.
No brainer. Professonal hitter and table setter for virtually nothing, nothing that would help us for a while that's for sure. You can bet the Mets pitchers are all smiling right now.
-sjg$
Hey, Dustin Martin was/is the man.
Giving up another Cyclones star is never a price I like to pay. But Castillo seems like a decent pick up. Gotay sure has been good though, offensively anyway…
Hey Greg, I saw you on SNY, sharing your expertise on the '96 Mets. Very nice.
Dennis, Twins fans aren't particularly happy to lose Castillo. Naturally my Twins half is upset and my Mets half is tickled pink. He should be a great addition to the team. It took a long time for my Mets half to even be able to root for him in a Twins uniform (because of his prior pestiness against the Mets), but now that I'm well over it, I'm thrilled that he's here.
In an unrelated note, anyone heard some of the pre-game music they've been playing at Shea lately? I got there a little early for El Duque's end of the double-header and heard “We Built this City” by Jefferson Starship, ostensibly in reference to the field assembling over the left field wall.
Pretty ironic, huh? Not only because the song is about San Francisco but also because of those lyrics:
“Someone always playing corporation games
Who cares – they're always changing corporation names”
Are the people at Citi really that tongue-in-cheek?