Comments on: Here’s that big trade you were looking for

By: Posts about TheIndians From Other Great Blogs issue #1 | Cleveland Indians Dugout Online | Cleveland Indians Blog

Sun, 16 Dec 2012 20:37:21 +0000

[...] I questioned whether or not Chris Antonetti slipped the other general manag more… Here’s that big trade you were looking for – itspronouncedlajaway.com 12/12/2012 After a few weeks of flirting with various teams and [...]

By: Mike

Mike — Wed, 12 Dec 2012 19:13:02 +0000

Great trade for the Tribe. I like having control of Bauer for 6 years. Not a big fan of Stubbs offense. The nice thing about this deal is it strengthens our OF defense. Stubbs is a plus defensive CF and now Bradley slides over to right or left and becomes a plus corner OF. Choo, by most defensive metrics, was terrible last year. His arm strength was his only asset. I wonder if management saw how teams like OAK and SF were winning (solid SP and defense/great bullpen/timely hitting)and decided to build in that mold. As far as Swisher is concerned, I would love to have him in the OF. However, I do not think the Indians win the bidding war on him with several other teams in the mix. If Victorino is worth 3/39 million then Swisher is at least a 3/42 or 4/50 million type of player. His agent will use that awful Victorino deal as leverage. Personally, I would not be surprised if they sign a less-heralded SP in the next few weeks. I would not expect them to break the bank for Kyle Lohse or Edwin Jackson but an arm like Carlos Villanueva(whom I like), Erik Bedard(please no), or Francisco Lariano(ugh!) is a possibility.

By: Drew

Drew — Wed, 12 Dec 2012 16:47:59 +0000

okay, they can spend $10M on Swisher then, or increase payroll a little bit since the $3.5M in cash to the Reds & Hafner buy-out are one-time events.

By: The Doctor

The Doctor — Wed, 12 Dec 2012 16:35:06 +0000

Getting essentially anything for Choo is fine by me, since he was clearly going to be gone at the end of the year if we hadn’t traded him, but this is even better than I expected – and I don’t even mean the players we received. Trading away Donald and Sipp is addition by subtraction, as Sipp’s maddening inconsistency and his baffling tendency to give up tons of steals despite being left-handed was eventually going to give me a tumor. As for Donald, the less “super utility”, aka guy who truthfully just isn’t very good at anything, guys we have on the roster, the happier I’ll be (this isn’t the Wedge regime anymore where we “need” to have 7 guys playing out of position or rotating between 2 positions they aren’t any good at). And as for Lars Anderson, who I still don’t understand why we acquired in the first place, good riddance.

By: Susan Petrone

Susan Petrone — Wed, 12 Dec 2012 15:50:47 +0000

ESPN reports that we sent the Reds $3.5 million in addition to Choo and Donald, so theoretically we’re getting more bang for the same payroll buck. By the light of day, I like this trade even more. It’s nice to see the front office using their resources wisely. I keep waiting for the other shoe to drop–I can’t believe that we got the better end of a trade deal.

By: Drew

Drew — Wed, 12 Dec 2012 15:17:56 +0000

I just did some quick internet searches and compiled the expected payroll of the Cleveland Indians 40-man roster in 2012. It is just shy of $50M when you include the MLBTR-expected arbitration amounts due for Marson, Aviles, Stubbs, Perez, Smith, and Masterson. They had a payroll of $66M last season. I know they had a few buy-outs like Roberto Hernandez and Travis Hafner and sent cash in the Choo trade, but was it more than $4M? That would leave about $12-$13M a year for Nick Swisher if they were to go after him and keep payroll around the same as last year. And if they were able to do all that they have done in the off-season and get Swisher only to keep payroll about the same, I’d call it a fantastic off-season.

By: Steve Alex

Steve Alex — Wed, 12 Dec 2012 12:14:32 +0000

I know what you mean Cad. I had to leave the room when Sipp came into the game. I could not stand the twitching and fidgeting, much less the high pitch counts and flirtation with disaster.

By: Leo O'Neill

Leo O'Neill — Wed, 12 Dec 2012 07:47:25 +0000

Great trade, sad to see Choo and Donald go mind. Always wanted to see how Donald would fair with a decent amount of at bats. Bauer has huge potential, to get him for essentially 1yr of Choo is much more than I thought possible. Roll on April.

By: Cadfael

Cadfael — Wed, 12 Dec 2012 06:31:17 +0000

I’m very happy with this. Choo was my favorite player on the team, but we weren’t keeping him. I like Stubbs, getting Bauer is awesome, and I won’t be sorry to see Sipp leaving. He drove me absolutely crazy.

By: Duke

Duke — Wed, 12 Dec 2012 04:52:21 +0000

Don’t expect much out of Albers. He has flashes of brilliance, but just as easily can look horrible. Should not be anything better than your 6th inning guy.