Green: This stove is getting hot, hot, hot
On a cold winter’s night, there’s nothing quite like a hot stove. No, I’m not talking about your great-grandma’s corncob-burning cast-iron affair or your brand-new eco-friendly pellet-incinerating apparatus. I’m talking about something even toastier — and more comforting on those days when the sun goes down practically before you’ve finished lunch.
I’m talking about baseball’s hot stove. To beat back the chill, there’s nothing like huddling around prosportsdaily.com or mlbtraderumors.com and clicking “refresh.” The teams of the AL East are still jockeying for position, with the Yankees pursuing pitching at all costs, the Red Sox looking to get a little younger, and Tampa Bay and Toronto looking to add some offense. (There was once another team, The Baltimore Orangebirds I think they were called, but I haven’t heard anything about them in quite a while.)
When I say the Yankees are pursuing starting pitching at all costs, I literally mean at all costs. Exhibit A: reliever Darrell Rasner was recently sold to Japan’s Tohoku Rakuten Eagles for a cool million. A million? That’s what the Steinbrenners find when they flip over their sofa cushions. Why even bother? Well, children, because CC Sabathia’s solid-gold toilet has to come from somewhere.
As for the Rays, they don’t have much money to throw around, but they have a farm system overflowing with more talent than they can use. Unfortunately for them, Evan Longoria looks like their last major-league ready hitter of note for a while. They’ll need to snag some lineup pieces — a DH, an outfielder or two — via free agency or trade, as well as do some tweaking with their bullpen. No big-ticket items required for the young AL champs, but a big bat would have a big impact.
The Blue Jays, meanwhile, just can’t catch a break. Despite having the best pitching in baseball all year, the Jays couldn’t climb out of fourth place. And now — to add teeth-grinding frustration to pointless suffering — No. 2 starter A.J. Burnett is a free agent. Their 26-year old rising star, Shaun Marcum, had to have Tommy John surgery and will miss all of 2009. Their other 26-year old rising star, Dustin McGowan, also had surgery — and has an uncertain return date after having his labrum repaired. Another GM might survey this sorry state of affairs and agree that it was time to build for 2010 — but not JP Ricciardi. Nope, JP always tries to “plug the holes” and “contend” — leading to another predictable also-ran season for Toronto. Sure, he could shake things up and trade Roy Halladay for a couple of good, young bats and a solid pitching prospect that would help his team break through the divisional juggernaut two years from now. But he won’t.
And that, for Red Sox fans facing a tough division and a long, bitter winter, should be a heartwarming thought indeed.
Sarah Green also writes for UmpBump.com and mlbtraderumors.com, and can be reached at sarah@umpbump.com.
