=== AAAA Starters, Dept. ===

Just real quick, to get to the punch line on the Rainiers' best starter.

New D-O-V readers tend to start off with the impression that Dr. D is high on a lot of M's players.  Not historically.  (Although the M's bats are now a Stars & Scrubs tsunami that forces our positive-POTD fleet out into open waters). 

What you are seeing is:

1) We tend to headline POTD the players we are actually interested in (thumbs-downs on players get buried in the comments), and

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Caffeinated Confines has a razor-sharp post up in which they point out that Ibanez' LH/RH splits are going east and west in 2006.

2003-05 vs LHP:  740

2003-05 vs RHP:  833 

2006 vs LHP:  621 (…and 9 BB / 28 K's in 120 AB)

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First up, D-O-V's first law of July 31 birdwatching:  70% of July trades will shock you.  There wasn't a whisper of Carlos Lee to Texas before the deal went down.  There wasn't a whisper of Wilson Betemit to the Dodgers.  It was just us pundits sending Lee and Betemit to the usual suspects.

There might not be a whisper of Greg Maddux to the M's before it went down.  We just dunno, is all we're saying.

We're not recommending all the below moves, LOL, so easy with the "I wouldn't do this one."  Most readers wouldn't do anything major, and that's fine.  This is just an index of the main actors this weekend, guys who might impact the AL West.  Feel free to add more.

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TSN has a neat little article up with some interesting thoughts on this weekend's target-rich environment.

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Recent debate in the Trade Market thread has compelled me to post a more formal explanation of my position regarding a trade for that "big marquis player!" everyone around the blog-o-sphere seems to be clamoring for.

I am quite well informed on the principles of stars and scrubs roster building and well aware of the position the good (?) Doctor and leader of this blog takes when it comes to acquiring a Miguel Cabrera or similar talent.  I would normally share his enthusiasm for converting 3 good players into a great one to save roster space for others to contribute (it's better to have one player producing 60 VORP than two players producing 30 because you're probably going to find a second player who can produce something more than zero to fill the vacant roster spot), but this is not one of those times when a stars and scrubs mega-trade makes sense, and here's why.

Check that Depth Chart, Boys and Girls!

Here's is the current disposition of the Mariner depth chart following the Broussard deal (green players are major leaguers, blue players are impact prospects not on the roster, red players are org guys who will not factor into this team's decision-making in the next two-three years and purple players are somewhere in between (I'm only going to carry this out to Inland Empire, becasue beyond that, it starts getting really really hard to predict who's going to do what, and I don't think Bavasi bases his roster decisions on which prospects he has in the California league or in rookie ball).

Catchers:

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=== JULY 29 UPDATE:  Wilson Betemit for Danys Baez and Willy Aybar ===

We view this one as we do the Carlos Lee trade, with the Braves playing the Milwaukee "have-not" market role, and the Dodgers playing the Rangers' "have" market role.

The have-nots (or more accurately here, the ones under pressure to trade) give up the best player in the deal.  They get back a very comparable player who is not quite as good, and receive important bullpen help as compensation for the difference.  Eminently logical, Mr. Spock.

Kevin Mench was 80-90% of Carlos Lee, and Willy Aybar is 80% or so of Wilson Betemit.  Aybar is an underrated player, a switch-hitter (like Betemit) who plays various infield positions (like Betemit) and is pretty good for how young he is (like Betemit).

BP's projections show a 10% chance for Aybar to become a 60-VORP player and I don't think that's out of line.  They give a 25% chance overall for Aybar to become a .285 EqA type player — that's a real nice regular infielder - and figure that Aybar probably will become a solid ML regular.

Betemit isn't really a lot more talented than that; he's just two years farther down his career path, and at 25 (? IIRC) is having (apparently) his breakout season.  Aybar is just as liable to do the same in two years.

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Keith Law, whom I respect, was one of the most visible early Baseball Prospectus authors.  He is a quintessential seamhead — we mean the description affectionately — with an MBA from Harvard and no athletic background (that I know of).

He had a fine run at BP, and then for 4+ years, lived the BP dream job as an apprentice to J.P. Ricciardi.  It's what every BP amigo aspires to:  a paid job reporting directly to the powerful, saber-literate GM of a "have" team. 

A couple of months ago, Law moved from the Blue Jays to ESPN.

This isn't about Law; it's about the M's farm system.  But Law's opinion of the Choo-Broussard trade floored me:

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Q:  Most-comparable players?

A:   Hard-working, moderately-talented lefties who bloomed a little later, and shared Broussard's skill set (PX, SX, eye, ISO, 110 OPS+, etc) used to include Raul Ibanez, Paul Sorrento, and Tino Martinez.

Now that Broussard has become a different hitter in 2006, Geoff Jenkins is a very comparable player. 

In Safeco, Broussard has chances to play as a sort of lefty Richie Sexson.  See the comment below about the home park.

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Trenchtown axs,

hey doc, did you try and spam over Prosportsdaily?

Of course not.

A couple of days ago we got a trackback from this PSD board (which I hadn't heard of before) which showed our POTD links in their chat forums and some discussion on the subjects.

To be friendly towards the Sox fans, we posted once on the Red Sox board (which had a Shealy POTD), said "howdy," gave them a Lester/Papelbon link (just like the Shealy link to DOV that was already there) and said if you want to talk Sox/M's deals (on their board), kewl.

Like we do occasionally on the ESPN board, and like people do here, of course.

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We checked back the next day or so and were … banned?!  For what?  LOL.

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