And the San DIego Padres jump in! Could Mejia be coming back?

This is exactly the way it's supposed to be.   Get a bunch of people interested in a 'property' and drive up the price to get the best return on your investment.

But this isn't real estate and Corey Kluber isn't a piece of land with a building on it.

That being said, if the Indians are truly pitting division rivals against each other I would suggest they open a dialogue with St. Louis.   Having San Diego and the Dodgers pitted against each other is great but adding the Cardinals to the Reds would make this even more interesting.   Engaging the Braves might be another way to drive up the price.

But back to the Padres.

It is rumored the Indians would have to be blown away to get a deal done.   It has also been stated that the Padres would not include either of their top two prospects (Fernando Tatis Jr. or McKenzie Gore) in the trade.   With those parameters here is my deal:

Kluber and Haase for OF Hunter Renfro, C/OF Francisco Mejia and RHRP Andres Munoz

Yes, I still think that Mejia can catch and I like keeping his bat in the lineup when he isn't catching.   Having him as the DH with Santana playing 1B and Bauers in LF will do that.   At the same time if we do this it kinda makes the Luplow trade look worthless (assuming you didn't think it was a worthless trade already!) as Renfro goes to RF in that situation.  But whatever.

So there it is.  

This deal meets all the criteria above and, in its own way, it is kinda cool.

However, the problem is that there are MANY PR reasons this doesn't work for the Padres.

1. They traded Kluber away in the first place.   It is hard to justify paying a high price for a guy you traded away for a low return (Ludwick, based on his production in San Diego).

2. Getting Hand and Cimber for Mejia looked good for both teams at the time but I imagine that the Padres fans may feel cheated on that deal now that they have had time to think and read about the reasons why the Indians were willing to deal Mejia. I think those fans need Mejia to contribute heavily FOR the Padres at this point to feel good about that trade...not use him as trade bait for a bigger trade.

3. When the Padres fans think about it they would have, in a 6-month period, traded Hand, Cimber, Renfro and Munoz for Kluber and Haase.  I don't know if that would fly with those fans as being even exchange even though I think that it is CLEARLY even exchange with the Padres getting the better of the deal if Kluber stays healthy and Munoz isn't a good contributor in the next year or so, given what we can expect from Cimber, Hand and Renfro.

Do St. Louis Cardinals make sense for Kluber trade

It appears that Jose Martinez who has played 1B, LF and RF for the Cardinals may be available with their acquisition of Paul Goldschmidt.

Living in St. Louis gives me a little perspective and I am not a huge Jose Martinez fan, truth be told, as I don't like his basic numbers that much and he is an older guy (31) even though his ML experience is limited (1+ years).  However, he is an upgrade to what we have and is controllable and there is no full-time position for him right now in St. Louis.

I doubt if the Cardinals would go for this but I could see us making the following trade:

Kluber, Kipnis and $5 million for Martinez, Dakota Hudson, Ryan Helsley and Kolten Wong

Helsley may be a little too much to ask for in this trade but that is where I would start and if I had to throw in another minor leaguer I could see us giving up Dalbert Siri.

Just a thought.

Trading Kluber

OK, two teams interested in Kluber participated in a trade.   The interesting thing about that is that two of the Dodgers linked to Kluber, Matt Kemp and Yasiel Puig, were in that trade!   This sets up all sorts of scenarios.  

I think the above trade increases the chances that the Indians both deal with the Reds AND include Kipnis in the deal.   Let's talk why:

• The Dodgers have traded enough outfielders now that they can no longer trade an outfielder to Cleveland.   Even if they do sign Bryce Harper it would only give them 5 outfielders on their roster and I don't see how they could give the 4th outfield spot to Andrew Toles and trade Alex Verdugo to the Indians.  I guess they could move one of their infielders to the outfield but I think this dooms the Kluber trade.  The Kluber trade with the Dodgers looked good if we would have taken on one of their contracts and given them Kipnis.   Say, Verdugo, Kemp, Dennis Santana and Will Smith for Kipnis and Kluber.   Without Verdugo that deal HAS to die on the vine and now with Kemp gone, there is no way to make the salaries work AND still get the Indians quality prospects for Kluber
• The Reds, on the other hand, appear now to have the pieces the Indians want and, according to their FO, they have "resources" left to use to improve their team.  So let's postulate a trade.   The first part is a salary exchange, then we talk Kluber for whoever we can get.   

Kipnis for Puig and Kluber, $3 million (difference between Kipnis and Puig salary) for Senzel, Herget, Santillan and Jose Lopez

This would increase the Reds payroll with Kluber's salary.   We would get a right fielder, a replacement for Kipnis on the infield and three guys who can help our bullpen in 2019 and beyond with Santillan being a possible future starter, as well..  

In summary I think this minimizes the chances of Kluber being traded to the Dodgers, that is if we want a good, long-term return and it increases the chances of him being dealt to the Reds as they are now set up to have the pieces the Indians want AND take on Kluber's salary.

Qualifying Offers

OK, it's time to revisit the lack of qualifying offers made by the Indians.

We now know some things we didn't know at the time qualifying offers had to be made:

• Yasmani Grandal was offered the $17.6 million qualifying offer and rejected it.   He hasn't signed yet.  In my opinion I can't see him being as valuable as our best free agents.
• The Indians were looking for ways to cut salary this off-season and that plan would have been severely impacted if anyone had accepted a qualifying offer
• The Indians really don't seem, at the present, to care much about this level of draft choices given that they gave one away to Seattle in a recent trade.
• The Indians seem to be spending more time scouting and signing higher level talents in Latin America than they have in the past.

We also know that Michael Brantley has signed a two year deal worth $32 million and that Andrew Miller has signed a two-year deal for $22.5 million.   Cody Allen, the other reliever who might have been worth making a qualifying offer to has not yet signed.  We were not allowed to make a qualifying offer to Josh Donaldson as he was not with the club long enough.   He recently signed a 1-year deal for $23 million.

I think the last 3 bullets above really point out that the Indians really were never going to make qualifying offers to their free agents under any situation.  

Look, I am a prospect guy so I like draft choices.   I also know that if you play your cards right you can get 5-10 3rd round or better talents in a draft IF you have a lot of high draft choices to begin with as, among other things, it increases your bonus pool.  The Indians don't appear to be thinking that way and their budget constraints just made it easy for them to turn down the opportunity to get something they don't presently seem to value: extra draft choices, although I think it is fair to say that at least Michael Brantley would have rejected the offer, maybe Andrew Miller, too.

The Indians have chosen to go a different direction but let's all be aware that this was a conscious decision.   So, if we don't have enough prospects 5 years from now, one of the things we can trace it back to is the lack of value they seem to put on excess draft choices and acquiring and keeping them.

Still trading Kluber, huh?

I am OK with trading Corey Kluber.   Let's set the record straight right here.   However, it would have to be for a great return.

Let's define a great return:

1. Young highly regarded prospect (top 20 in all of baseball) who can step in and play a position of need this year (outfield, third or second base).

2. A reliable reliever who is under a club-favorable contract and still had 2 or more years of control

3. A young, highly rated prospect who is still 2 years away from having to be rostered and at least 3 years away from the majors.

4. If necessary, taking on a short term veteran contract of lesser value than Kluber's if they fill a position of need with us.

Now, in saying this I wanted to throw out some names:

Francisco Mejia

Oliver Perez

Willi Castro

Edwin Encarnacion

Basically I am asking to get back what we already traded away in the past 6 months.

Now, when you think about that, isn't it silly to trade Kluber away just to get back guys like this?

I think it is.

How about you?

Let's take a few minutes away from baseball to catch our breath!

So let's talk some football.   Here are my opinions, for what they are worth.

• I can't believe anyone thinks Ohio State deserved to be in the playoffs.   Just too many close or unconvincing victories against weak opponents and then there is Purdue.  That being said, they keep cranking out NFL players and keep winning.
• The Browns at 6-7-1 are a pleasant surprise.   Still, I watched all of their game on Saturday, the first time I have seen them in a complete game.   They didn't look very good.   They won, but not in a manner that would convince me that under Mayfield they are on the upswing.  The kinda won ugly.  This is the type of vast improvement that is part mirage and portends a falloff to say 4 wins next year.  They need to find a way to keep this momentum going into the off-season and next year and buck that fall off trend.
• Let's talk Ohio State football recruiting next.   I think this whole recruiting 'dance' is just comical.  Guys committing two years in advance only to decommit and then commit to someone else, sometimes multiple times before the early signing period.  If you are a hard core, all in OSU football fan this must drive you nuts.   I am only at the periphery of it and I think the whole process is crazy.
• Speaking of crazy, I just read that Georgia's freshman quarterback is thinking of transferring to OSU!  That brings me to the major point of this post.    OSU, not counting Haskins, has 4 quarterbacks on their depth chart including two, Martell and Baldwin, who are top recruits.   Why on Earth would another quarterback want to come here.   Weird.   Now I can see where maybe you need 12 offensive linemen on scholarship and so a freshman coming in and seeing 10 guys on the depth chart in front of him wouldn't be dismayed.   But a quarterback coming into a program that already has 4 quarterbacks plus Haskins?   That's like having 5 scholarship punters.
• OK, that's it for now.   Now back to baseball.   Sometime I will have to digress and tell all of you about my connection to professional wrestling!

Minor league infielder Andruw Monasterio, huh!

So the PTBNL in the Yan Gomes trade is Andruw Monasterio!

Underwhelming, to be sure..

Hey, its not like I have anything against Monasterio.   Apparently Washsington thought enough about him to have him on the 40-man roster and if what I read is accurate for the last two years, meaning he only has one option left.  

But, as I said, I don't have anything against the guy.   Of course, I don't have anything against Eric Stamets, Luke Watkamatsu, Dillon Persinger, Jorma Rodriguez, Dorsys Paulino or even higher ranked prospects like Tyler Krieger, Mark Mathias and Ernie Clement.

But that's the point, isn't it.   Utility infielders, even ones on the 40 man roster (like Stamets), are not that valuable.

So, getting Monasterio as the PTBNL in the Yan Gomes salary dump trade makes perfect sense.   It was a salary dump.   Therefore, you wouldn't expect the PTBNL to be worth much.   And he wasn't.

In fact, you COULD make the case that taking Monasterio actually did Washington a favor as it cleared a 40-man roster spot for them without them having to DFA Monasterio or provide us with a younger prospect who had more value and/or didn't have to be rostered yet..

So I have to ask myself: Which team did this PTBNL transaction help more: The Indians or the Nationals?

I would say it was a wash...which means it actually didn't help the Indians now or in the future...much like the whole Gomes trade and, until proven otherwise, every trade the Indians made this off-season.