Trades that could have been

We could have Mark Teixiera right now if only we'd part with Kotchman, Saunders, and Brandon Wood. Can you believe Stoneman is once again being so stingy with prospects that he fails to bring in the big bat?

Using Linear weights runs above average, plus UZR (you can get that from Tango and MGL's Book site, though if you are reading this you already know that):

Teixiera +22
Kotchman +16

That's quickly slapped together and I haven't even done a park adjustment. Not a big enough difference considering we need Saunders, cost, and Kotchman being 4 years from free agency, not 1 1/3.

How about Paul Konerko? Could we trade Kotchman for that big expensive bat?

Konerko: +12. Lets hope not.

As I type Kotchman is scoring the tying run against Detroit, after driving in a run with a long double. I love this kid.

We could have, either of the last 2 offseasons I suppose, traded Santana, Shields, Kendrick and Wood to the Red Sox for Manny Ramirez. Leaving aside that Shields and Kendrick are very valuable, Santana might find himself, and Wood is still a fine prospect, how would this affect the Angel's 2007 outfield? I suppose Manny in left would mean we wouldn't have to put up with the powerless Reggie Willits. Again, offense + UZR:

Ramirez +9
Willits +12

Wow. Reggie has actually outplayed the Hall of Fame slugger. Sure, we'd score more runs with Ramirez, but give up more too. And that's with Manny at -14 UZR, which is right in line with other bad outfielders (Griffey, Carlos Lee, Josh Willingham) and not some outrageaous -47 figure that pretty much nobody believes. I don't know if its random variation of MGL making some big adjustments to his park factors.

Actually, Manny would have helped the team if we take his +23 hitting and assume he's the DH, which means we never sign Hillenbrand, but its probably not enough of a gain to make up for losing Kendick and Shields. Certainly not worth paying 20 million for.

Mr. Stoneman, you rule, and I don't care if you make a trade before the deadline or not.