Urge to Kill… Rising. « Mike Scioscia’s tragic illness

Urge to Kill… Rising.

July 26, 2008 at 10:28 am | In Carlos Santana, Casey Blake, Jon Meloan |

Hey folks! MSTI here. I’m online from an unbelievably slow connection somewhere in Wisconsin. Yeah, I’m still away. But I just heard about the deal that went down, and I’m about ready to head out to LA and start busting some heads. I don’t have much time or bandwidth to delve into this deeper - I’m sure Vin will do so later - but let’s just say…

NOOOOOOOOO!!!!!!

Just off the top of my head here, because I really can’t even access other pages at the moment:

1) Casey Blake is 35, and not a bad player, but one clearly on a downward spiral (check the yearly HR totals!)
2) Carlos Santana is the real deal!! He’s 22, and he’s got a .994 OPS and 96 RBI in 94 games in the minors. Plus, he’s a catcher. Are you kidding me? A young catcher who can hit? If you want to trade him for someone like Jason Bay, okay, maybe, but Casey Blake, really?
3) Jon Meloan has been terrible this year. Fine. His conversion to starting hasn’t gone all that well, as his 5-10, 4.97 ERA in AAA can attest to. But he’s still a damn fine prospect - just look at his stats relieving in the minors before this year.
4) What does this mean for third base? Is Blake going to be the new starter just because he’s old? Is this the death knell for any shot that Andy LaRoche had with the Dodgers?

Oh wait, I know. Blake will just play right field, so that Torre can find a way to bench both Kemp and Ethier at the same time.

Look, I don’t really mind getting Casey Blake. He’s a useful guy. I just think that what Colletti gave up to acquire him is mind-blowingly out of proportion. I would love to offer a more in-depth analysis of this, but I had to at least get this down.

Boo.

- Mike Scioscia’s tragic illness

8 Comments »

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I definitely agree with you here. I could understand Meloan although just a year ago he was one of our kids with a bright future. But Santana!?!? I know we have Russ at catcher and thats awesome. But I was excited about having Santana down in the minors for his trade potential. I imagined a trade deadline next year where we had Santana to dangle for someone of a greater impact. I just think Ned F’d this one up big time. Blake is a fine player, but not enough for Santana. I hope Ned gets the boot soon.

Comment by Alex — July 26, 2008 #
Peter Gammons explains why Carlos Santana was involved in the deal.

• The reason the Indians were able to get Carlos Santana, a very high-level prospect, in the Casey Blake deal is that the Indians took on all of Blake’s remaining $2 million salary. Several general managers around baseball wonder if L.A. doesn’t have cash flow problems.

Pathetic is about the only response to taht.

Comment by adrian — July 26, 2008 #
I’m 75% with you on this reaction, maybe even 95%. The 5%-25%? Recalling Jeff Mathis at Rancho. Great numbers, of a sudden a top catching prospect in baseball. Oops. Big flameout at Arkansas and two seasons in Salt Lake. Catchers have a habit of disappearing, though comparing the numbers, Santana’s spread between his average and OBP looks much more impressive than Santana’s at the same level. If he becomes a Victor Martinez or a Pudge, Ned should be hung for this deal.

Comment by Rob McMillin — July 26, 2008 #
… I mean, “Santana’s spread between his average and OBP looks much more impressive than Mathis’ at the same level”.

Comment by Rob McMillin — July 26, 2008 #
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[...] have been ready to jump to the bigs in 2009 anyway, but one of the only saving graces about the terrible Casey Blake deal is that it might have been okay to lose Carlos Santana since we were already going to have Martin [...]

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