Buying A Prospect

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MrCrowesGarden
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Buying A Prospect

Post by MrCrowesGarden »

I'll just say now that I don't expect this to happen, but it should be explored. Read about in VEB: It might be worth the Cardinals time to consider an NBA style, contract dump trade. The incentive for taking on a player friendly contract would be netting a very good prospect for doing so.

Both the Yankees and Dodgers are mentioned as possibilities. Both teams want to lower that luxury tax number, but they both want to still add to their teams (most likely with Darvish.) Doing so would require shedding a hefty contract-- for the Dodgers, that's probably Matt Kemp and for the Yankees, that's probably Jacoby Ellsbury.

We know that the Cardinals payroll is down from the last two seasons, and that they at least seemed in earnest about acquiring Stanton and absorbing most of his contract, so we know the money is there. They could certainly take on either one of Kemp or Ellsbury's contract and probably still have room to add another player if needed. You then do what you want with the player, potentially including just releasing him and having dead money on the books.

You aren't just in the business of doing favors for the Dodgers or Yankees though, so you'd have to get a really good prospect out of it. We're probably talking top 50, maybe top 25 types. Jeff Sullivan threw out names like Yadier Alvarez or Justus Sheffield. Guys who could be future stars-- or guys you can use to soften the blow of the acquisition cost of Archer, Donaldson, Machado, etc.

I still think the Cardinals would be best served just signing Darvish at this point, but they should at least mull over buying a prospect. I don't think sitting on a pile of cash until the trade deadline with apparent holes on the roster before Opening Day is the best use of resources.

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pioneer98
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Re: Buying A Prospect

Post by pioneer98 »

It's a great idea but they will never do this. If they wanted to spend some money to get a top 25 prospect they could have just signed Robert.

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Jocephus
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Re: Buying A Prospect

Post by Jocephus »

ohhh, peaches!

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Re: Buying A Prospect

Post by Fat Strat »

I'm not seeing this either, especially since the two guys you mention are both OF'ers and that's the area where we have the least flexibility at the moment. If you can find the same kind of deal for a 1b'man/3b'man, then it would be worth talking about.

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MrCrowesGarden
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Re: Buying A Prospect

Post by MrCrowesGarden »

pioneer98 wrote:It's a great idea but they will never do this. If they wanted to spend some money to get a top 25 prospect they could have just signed Robert.
Also true. This is like getting a second chance though (that I don't expect them to take.)

dmarx114
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Re: Buying A Prospect

Post by dmarx114 »

Makes more sense for a tanking team to do this. If the money is there to be spent, I would rather spend it to improve this year's team.

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Re: Buying A Prospect

Post by Michael »

Jocephus wrote:ohhh, peaches!

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MrCrowesGarden
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Re: Buying A Prospect

Post by MrCrowesGarden »

dmarx114 wrote:Makes more sense for a tanking team to do this. If the money is there to be spent, I would rather spend it to improve this year's team.
As would I, but they’re reluctant to do that. This is simply another avenue to explore for getting better and is better IMO than sitting on a pile of cash that I don’t believe will be used.

salukifan2
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Re: Buying A Prospect

Post by salukifan2 »

Is there an example of this in baseball?

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lukethedrifter
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Re: Buying A Prospect

Post by lukethedrifter »

salukifan2 wrote:Is there an example of this in baseball?
Kemp?

Boston ridding themselves of Crawford, AGonz et al.

The salary dumping half of it anyway.

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