RealGM

Yes, the point of this thread is for you incredible baseball minds here on this forum to come up with either a reasonable trade or Free Agent signing that will result in us acquiring a leadoff hitter that will fill the void left by Marco Scutaro.

Now off limits are Lyle Overbay and Justin Jackson for Jose Reyes deals

I'll start off with one...

sign Orlando Cabrera, 1 yr/6 million dollars.

Short Term fix, great defence, decent bat, can bat leadoff.

or..

Sign Reed Johnson back to play LF. DH Lind, play Snider RF. Overbay at 1st. Ruiz bats DH/1B when lefties are on the mound or the odd righty.

Gathright.

Cabrera? Yeah, we are not about to be signing another shortstop. Two is enough.

In the odd chance he isn't traded, I would simply platoon Overbay and Bautista. Both get on base at a pretty good clip vs opposite handed pitchers, and hit some doubles. Baring Cito joining the sabermetric community and realizing that you should hit one of your two best players in lead off, I would be fine with that. Actually, Lyle vs RHP probably is one of your two best hitters, so I would be really good with that. Of course, Overbay likely won't be here, in which case that is all moot.

If you were going to sign a guy to move Snider to right, I wouldn't hate Scott Podsednik. He's still got some speed, which is at least entertaining, and got on base at a good clip last year. He can platoon with Bautista. But I really don't want Snider in right, and Podsednik doesn't have the arm for RF, and is as bad a CF as Vernon these days, so no.

After spending way too much time considering this, I'm going to say Randy Winn (in a RF/lead off platoon with Bautista) could be a good pickup. He's got ridiculous splits these days, but can still get on and hit singles at a decent clip vs RHP, and plays great RF. He would be fairly cheap, I would guess, and maybe tradeable at the deadline for a flyer.

I don't think with the budget we have or the assets we have we are going to solve our problem long term this offseason, so if we want a band aid why not Scott Podsednik?

If only to have Lisa Dergan at the games,

From the scrap heap, how about the Professional Hitter, Frank Catalanotto? He could platoon with JoBau and lead off. I always liked Cat.

For less **** options, how about trading for Hermida or DeJesus? Hermida is the 4th OF in Boston now with Cameron there and KC is looking to trade DeJesus for whatever reason. DeJesus is a really good fielder and solid hitter, while Hermida would be a high-reward play.

Throw Vernon Wells back into the leadoff spot. You can't rely on him to knock runs in, you might as well get his at bat over with.

Was it two season ago, when he was struggling and was put in the leadoff spot and hit 330 for like 20 games?

Wells had a few stints leading off in the historically injurific 2007 season with mixed results (http://www.baseball-reference.com/playe ... &year=2007). The first two stints were good but then he ended the season with an awful stint. Sample sizes are too small to make any judgment, though. I guess it's worth a shot but he'd be hitting behind guys like Gonzalez and Buck.

Duffman100 wrote:Throw Vernon Wells back into the leadoff spot. You can't rely on him to knock runs in, you might as well get his at bat over with.

Was it two season ago, when he was struggling and was put in the leadoff spot and hit 330 for like 20 games?

I wouldn't screw around with WV's hammies at this point (b/c leadoff hitters are supposed to run a lot, which is a definite no-no for Well's delicate hammies. BTW, I don't regard Wells as much of a player). I think the next trade, the Overbay deal, would probably land a leadoff hitter. Looking around, I think a good one would be Willy Taveras from the Reds. With Votto not exactly a guarantee to play a complete season after last year's injury prone year (there's also questions if he actually is a 1st baseman). Willy's deal isn't too bad (next year- $4 mill) so a deal could be worked out. He wasn't great last year but Taveras+prospect for Overbay should work between the 2 sides and addresses the needs of both sides,

Taveras (RF)
Hill (2B)
Encarnacion (3B)
Lind (DH)
Wallace (1B)
Wells (CF) (Sorry, I don't trust him any higher than here)
Snyder (LF)
Buck (C)
Gonzalez (SS)

I'm actually OK with a Gathright/Bautista tandem at leadoff if a trade isn't made. It's not like the Jays are going to be competitive anyways so they might as well check out what they have in Gathright, who I remember being OK with the Royals.

Now I think the Overbay deal may be for another 2 prospects, but that's just me. I see the Jays eliminating a lot of excess unneeded salary like Downs, Overbay, possibly Encarnacion if we can find a suitor and possibly someone like Accardo or Frasor, depending on what we get back.

They way it looks though, is we may start with Bautista in RF and hit leadoff, which I'm not too thrilled about.

Is David Dellucci still on the roster? If so, he's got as good a shot as anyone to lead off with ol' Cito still calling the shots.

chocolateSensi wrote:Is David Dellucci still on the roster? If so, he's got as good a shot as anyone to lead off with ol' Cito still calling the shots.

i can't tell if you are joking or actually making a lot of sense.
how bloody scary is that??

or maybe they will try Shannon Stewart for a 3rd-times-a-charm contract?

Man, the Jays are obviously in rebuilding mode, signing a vet to a one year deal isn't in the plan.

orlando hudson ftw

Sign Damon and Delgado to one year incentive laden contracts.
Trade Adam Lind for an A+ top of the rotation prospect. For instance how about Madison Bumgarner from the Giants.

Damon - RF
HIll - 2B
Wells- CF
Delgado - DH
Overbay - 1B
EE - 3B
Snider - LF
Buck - C
Gonzalez - SS

Marcum
Romero
Rzep
Morrow
Cecil

Setup Downs
Closer Frasor

Zuul wrote:Sign Damon and Delgado to one year incentive laden contracts.
Trade Adam Lind for an A+ top of the rotation prospect. For instance how about Madison Bumgarner from the Giants.

Damon - RF
HIll - 2B
Wells- CF
Delgado - DH
Overbay - 1B
EE - 3B
Snider - LF
Buck - C
Gonzalez - SS

Marcum
Romero
Rzep
Morrow
Cecil

Setup Downs
Closer Frasor

That's a horrible plan, JP can even do better.

Zuul wrote:Trade Adam Lind for an A+ top of the rotation prospect.

you can't be serious?! get outta here!

MGD24 wrote:

Zuul wrote:Trade Adam Lind for an A+ top of the rotation prospect.

you can't be serious?! get outta here!

Only partly serious. I firmly believe you sell high if you think your stock may be over priced. I don't know if Lind is a .950 ops player in the long run. I value Snider more than Lind even if the numbers don't support my position currently. I did say an A+ prospect, meaning a top 10 mlb prospect. Maybe we end up trading him for the next up and coming Tim Linecum.

Relentless88 wrote:

Zuul wrote:Sign Damon and Delgado to one year incentive laden contracts.
Trade Adam Lind for an A+ top of the rotation prospect. For instance how about Madison Bumgarner from the Giants.

Damon - RF
HIll - 2B
Wells- CF
Delgado - DH
Overbay - 1B
EE - 3B
Snider - LF
Buck - C
Gonzalez - SS

Marcum
Romero
Rzep
Morrow
Cecil

Setup Downs
Closer Frasor

That's a horrible plan, JP can even do better.

Actually JP would give out 5 year deals. I am saying one year veteran rentals. What prospects are we holding back at DH and the Outfield? Ruiz, Dopriak or the all round amazing Bautista?

Otis Freak'n Nixon.

Relentless88 wrote:

Zuul wrote:Sign Damon and Delgado to one year incentive laden contracts.
Trade Adam Lind for an A+ top of the rotation prospect. For instance how about Madison Bumgarner from the Giants.

Damon - RF
HIll - 2B
Wells- CF
Delgado - DH
Overbay - 1B
EE - 3B
Snider - LF
Buck - C
Gonzalez - SS

Marcum
Romero
Rzep
Morrow
Cecil

Setup Downs
Closer Frasor

That's a horrible plan, JP can even do better.

Signing a vet to a 1 year deal is a solid move even for a rebuilding team, as long as the plan is to trade the player in question for prospects come the deadline. If the money is alreadly in the budget for this season (I'm not sure if it is or isn't), it's not a bad move at all.

The problem with JP is that he'd sign these type of guys to 3-5 year contracts.