Mariners-Royals Make Strange Trade
July 10th 2009 20:29
The Mariners traded SS Yuniesky Betancourt to the Royals for two pitching prospects, Danny Cortes and Derrick Saito.
The Mariners claimed they could not resist adding two young arms to the team. Cortes was the Royals Minor League Pitcher of the Year in 2008 and projects to be a #3 or #4 starter in the majors. Saito is not experienced yet to really be on the major-league radar. While Cortes was a solid addition to the Seattle club's future, they are now left with Ronny Cedeno as the starter at SS moving forward. Cedeno is hitting .149 and the Mariners are in contention! Do they really think they can better compete with Cedeno at short instead of waiting for Betancourt to get healthy and take over?
As for the Royals, they claimed a need to fill their hole at SS. Willie Bloomquist was acting as the placeholder in the meantime. What is strange about this trade is that Bloomquist is probably the more productive hitter between Betancourt and Bloomquist, and Bloomquist fields SS quite adequately. This trade may have made sense for a team in contention, looking to get deeper on offense, but the Royals are certainly not in contention. They gave up one of the best prospects in their system for a SS worse than the one currently starting for them.
Bottom line: Both teams dealt from weaknesses (Mariners: SS/ Royals: SP) to acquire talent at a place they are strong (Mariners: Young pitching talent/ Royals: SS).
The Mariners claimed they could not resist adding two young arms to the team. Cortes was the Royals Minor League Pitcher of the Year in 2008 and projects to be a #3 or #4 starter in the majors. Saito is not experienced yet to really be on the major-league radar. While Cortes was a solid addition to the Seattle club's future, they are now left with Ronny Cedeno as the starter at SS moving forward. Cedeno is hitting .149 and the Mariners are in contention! Do they really think they can better compete with Cedeno at short instead of waiting for Betancourt to get healthy and take over?
As for the Royals, they claimed a need to fill their hole at SS. Willie Bloomquist was acting as the placeholder in the meantime. What is strange about this trade is that Bloomquist is probably the more productive hitter between Betancourt and Bloomquist, and Bloomquist fields SS quite adequately. This trade may have made sense for a team in contention, looking to get deeper on offense, but the Royals are certainly not in contention. They gave up one of the best prospects in their system for a SS worse than the one currently starting for them.
Bottom line: Both teams dealt from weaknesses (Mariners: SS/ Royals: SP) to acquire talent at a place they are strong (Mariners: Young pitching talent/ Royals: SS).
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