Laptop is back
The good news is, a new laptop arrived yesterday. The bad news is, there’s been nothing worth blogging about.
Today’s lineup:
Furcal, SS
Lofton, CF
Drew, RF
Kent, 2B
Saenz, 1B (Day off for Nomar, much deserved)
Ethier, LF
Izzy, 3B
Martin, C
Penny, P
Inside the Dodgers 
Well, at least Cruz isn’t in there. I’m not sure that Kent should be either, because he just doesn’t seem to be swinging like he normally does.
Wanted to give my take on our trading strategy for the rest of this season:
1) would not want to get any more “over the hill”, overvalued players on this ballclub – I think we already have Drew and probably Kent in this category. Unfortunately, I think we’ll regret Kent’s contract extension, since his numbers seem headed down. While Nomar has made a great contribution, by the end of the season his average will likely be closer to .300 than .350. While that is still impressive, there is no need to negotiate his contract while he’s peaking at .350 and overpay him as well.
2) I don’t want to rent a mature pitcher just for the rest of this season, like Maddux, at the expense of some of our future long term talent. I would rather get a promising AAA pitcher or two, particularly since we don’t have any pitching prospect who is really impressing at that level. Billingsley, while he may mature into something special yet, shows me very little as the best we have had available to bring up among starting pitchers.
3) Rather than trade our best prospects, I would be offering Drew, Kent, and even Furcal to some other team for a longer term player of value.
4) If we could package Odalis, Cruz and Hall, it would be worth almost any return in AAA prospects to our side.
I’m not sure that this strategy would give us a playoff berth this season, but I think we have bigger problems with our no-hit, no power middle of the lineup than one starting pitcher and one hitter in trade will remedy. I’d then rather hold onto the couple of prospects that will help us next year and will stay with us to ensure our success for hopefully a number of years to come.
3) Rather than trade our best prospects, I would be offering Drew, Kent, and even Furcal to some other team for a longer term player of value.
I like that one, not quite sure who’ed take ‘um though?
Cruz and OP needs to be released. Furcal is fine. This team is very competitve and will go to the playoffs. If only Bill Mueller(sp) was here, we could be much stronger with a starting pitcher upgrade at the trade deadline. Anyone else miss Mueller? Then we could trade izzy with couple of prospects fo a starting pitcher. Kent will not be traded. LOL Ned and Kent is too close and Kent wants to retire as a Dodger. Drew can be traded but what will we get? Furcal cannot be traded because his contract has too much money.
I agree with not reaching for a fat deal for Nomar. I think hes a great player, having an amazing year- hes been the one bright spot of this team and hes my favorite player in the line-up. BUT keep in mind- hes not all that unlike Drew- older player, with a nasty injury history putting up great #s. Drews 2004 year with Atl was amazing. But as we have painfully showed- you cannot extrapolate awesome years out to the future for older injury prone guys. Best case- We sign Nomar for a deal similar to this yea which is a little less than mkt value and had incentives for playing the hole year.
I have to agree with the consensus of this thread. We should not trade away our best prospects for rent a players or old injury prone tire patches. It would be great to trade Cruz, Perez, Hall but none have much value. Especially Perez. Unfortunately we are probably stuck with Drew. Hopefully he will stay healthy and get hot. Maybe get average production for above average money. Thanks DePo. Kent’s extension will probably turn out to be a mistake. I can see the Dodgers moving him to first next season and not signing Nomar. If Nomar has a great or semi-great year he will be too expensive for an aging injury prone player. Luckily, we are in the West and the very average team we have can possibly win it with what we have if we get some kind of consistant performance from Drew and Kent. We need Penny to come up big today and save at least one game of this series. Its a shame because two of the games could very well have gone the other way if we executed better with runners on 3rd with less than 2 outs. Go Blue!
nice comments, with some good intentions. However, there NEEDS to be a “market” for the guys we want to get rid of. Easy to say “trade Cruz”, however, Ned needs to find a team that can USE Cruz. The Yankees would probably love to have Drew to fill in for Matsui and Sheefield. I am just not sure there is anything in return. We need a consistent 30 HR guy, and waiting two years for Kemp won’t due. I think Izzy and Furcal will be on the left side for a while, the right side is old and fragile. If GOd smiles on the Blue, we might get a few good healthy years from Nomar. Eventually, the outfield will be Ethier LF, Kemp CF, and that elusive 30 homer guy in right.
Scrub 1-3 rookie Ks the side in the first, I aint watching this game, that’s for sure. This team flat out *****.
Why do people continue to pitch to Pujols? Dumb!
Alright! Martin got the runner in from 3rd. Nice execution. Those are the things that win ballgames.
I am afraid that this team is going to have an up and down ride in the 2nd half. Starting pitching can give some outstanding innings, and then some bad 4 innings and out starts. Repeating myself here, but we need a ******. In Atlanta Drew had Chipper, in SF Kent had big head Bonds, in Boston Nomar had Manny. We DO NOT have a Chipper, Barry, or Manny. Ethier will be a solid .320, 22 HR’s, 90 RBI guy who you can write in the lineup day in and day out. With time Kemp could be as solid, Martin is the catcher for a long while. After this we got trouble. We have overpaid for Drew and Furcal, and those contracts will be tough to unload when the time comes. Let’s enjoy the highs, and hang in for the lows, and pray for the GM.
****, those guys are good. Go Atlanta.
Nothing to do with the progress of today’s game, and I think Penny is as good a pitcher as any that we’ve got, but I don’t expect that he’ll repeat his success of the first half of the season. He’ll probably win 5, maybe 6 games the rest of the way. Our problem will continue to be subpar 3 and 4 hitters. If Kent needs to be on the DL, I wish we’d put him there. It’s hard to imagine that Aybar (or even Martinez) could be slower afield and less productive at bat than Kent over this past month. In addition to being vastly overpaid, are the Drew and Kent egos so fragile that Little cannot break them up in the lineup or sit them down when necessary.
Bear,
Ned can’t fix this quickly.
The Dodgers are hopeless right now. One move can change it all with staring pitching. But this series,our pitching is excellent with Chad and Hendrickson picking up the pace. There are rumors Aaron Boone might be traded to the Dodgers. We are going to need a veteran starter to make some noise in the season and playoffs.
At least Perez can take one for the team. Rest the bullpen for Arizona. Go Atlanta, go Philadelphia.
Maybe we can get our hitters back on track by letting Odalis pitch batting practice next.
if pereza is still on the team on august 1st (day after the trading deadline) then it is obvious the dodgers don’t care about winning but just don’t want to eat salary.
Right now I’m predicting the Dodgers will finish the season 10 games under .500 and take 3rd or maybe 4th place in the division. I don’t think it can be fixed by trades this year – Colletti can only mess things up worse by reacting under pressure and giving away our future. I hope that does not happen, and I’m willing to wait for us to add Kemp back toward the end of this season and maybe another two of our good rookie prospects next year. If we can trade for a couple of good pitching prospects and line up somebody like Zito under free agency, I would be satisfied and looking forward to next year.
I wish i could curse on here, because then I would use every expletive imaginable for what I feel for Odalis Perez. This guy is horrible on and off the field. He’s just not good anymore…look at him.
He complains all day long. Boo-hoo Odalis… throw the ball, and you’ll get what you want.
On the other hand, look at Tomko. He looks like he’s going to be joining the bullpen, and instead of crying about it like Odalis, he’s looking forward to the oppurtunity, and seems like he’s kinda siked about it! Thats what we want on our team…whatever it takes to win, however they can contribute. This guy Odalis, obviously no one in the league wants him or his salary. Designate him for assignment or release him and eat some of his contract. Theres no point in keeping him and paying him all this money for GARBAGE! you’re better off bringing up a rookie from the minors… he’ll put up the same numbers as Odalis, and you’ll pay him less.
do it. We beg you.
We came, We saw, & We wanna get the ****! out of St.Louis
Go Dodgers!