twinsfan
Posts: 64321
Joined: 12/21/2009
Status: offline
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Down with Goldy on the Padres: Last baseball thing I want to mention is how great it is to see San Diego just say "F&%$ it" and go for it big time. They've constructed a completely new outfield of Matt Kemp, Justin Upton, and Wil Myers, acquired a new catcher in Derek Norris, and landed a young 3B in Will Middlebrooks. Considering the Padres were a historically horrible offense last year (their team total over/under in Vegas was frequently 2.5) replacing over half the lineup is not a bad idea, and they were able to do it without trading away any of their top 3 blue chip prospects (though they traded pretty much everyone else in the minors away). They also only had to ship out one of their starters, a team strength, and will go into next season with a mostly intact rotation. Two other signees, Josh Johnson and Brandon Morrow, have flashed a ton of talent but neither has had much success staying healthy - perfect signings to fill that #5 slot, really. Of course, any time you take this kind of risk you are inviting disaster in countless ways. Kemp will be tasked with playing center field and by any metric or the eye test his body really isn't up to that any more. Myers had a really bad sophomore season and the Rays essentially totally gave up on him with questions about his work ethic. Norris is a big bat but is pretty horrendous defensively, and Middlebrooks has been underwhelming at best in his short career. I couldn't find anything bad to say about Upton. This is all pessimism of course, since I'm a Minnesota fan, and I think these are fantastic risks for a team in need of a shot in the arm and I'd love the Twins to pursue a similar course once they think they're close to being a contender. They also now have an expendable Carlos Quentin, who can still hit the crap out of the ball when healthy - though he hasn't played more than 100 games since 2011 so who knows if he even can be healthy anymore. If he can get through the first half of the season or so healthy and hitting, expect the Padres to aggressively move him to an American League team since he's basically a born DH. It's a fun time to be a Padre fan. I hate them.
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“We are an unserious nation that's in serious $hit.” -Me
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