The worst case scenario became reality when the Cardinals traded Chris Perez and a player to be named later to obtain former Cub Mark DeRosa. As you’ll recall from my previous posts, I was afraid that DeRosa might ended up with the Cardinals and that is exactly what happened.
The extremely versitile DeRosa is hitting .270/.342/.457 this year with 13 HR and 50 RBI for the Indians. For what it’s worth, those stats would rank him second on the Cubs for HRs and first for RBI.
Chris Perez is a well respected prospect who at one time was considered the Cards closer of the future. However, he has struggled a bit this year. In 29 appearances Perez has a 1-1 record with a 4.18 ERA. He has 30 strikeouts and 15 walks in 23.2 innings of work. That’s not horrible, but it’s not what was expected of him this year. In fact, Jason Motte passed up Perez on the Cardinals’ prospect list.
The PTBNL could turn out to be a big deal. Cleveland will be scouting the Cardinals prospects and who they get could determine just how good this deal is for both the Cardinasls and the Indians. Regardless of who the PTBNL is though, this deal shows that the Cardinals are serious about winning now, not just protecting prospects who may or may not turn out to be good someday.
This trade also shows the difference between the philosophies of the Cubs’ and Cardinals’ front offices. The Cubs are waiting until Aramis Ramirez comes back in a couple of weeks to determine what, if anything, they are going to do prior to the trade deadline. As I mentioned in a previous post, this doesn’t make sense to me because the Cubs have definite needs even if Ramirez comes back a full strength.
The Cardinals, on the other hand, didn’t want to wait. According to a quote from Cardinals GM John Mozeliak in an article by Matthew Leach on MLB.com:
“There was motivation on both sides,” Mozeliak said. “When it was all said and done, it was something that we didn’t want to see go away if we waited any longer. A lot has been made about how we’ve dealt with trades over the past year and half or so. This was something we were very reactive to. Rather than try to drag this out and see if our offense got better or see if we could get closer to the July 31 date, we though it would be best to be proactive.”
The Cardinals have been rumored to be interested in Matt Hoiliday in recent days. My guess is that the price will be too high and the DeRosa deal was their fallback position. This is just my opinion and I haven’t seen this reported anywhere. In any case, the Cards got the guy the Cubs should have gotten.
I’ve been a fairly consistent supporter of Jim Hendry in the past. I did think that trading DeRosa was a mistake, but I was hopeful that Hendry would correct the mistake by re-acquiring him. Unfortunately, not only did Hendry not re-acquire DeRosa, but his inaction allowed a division rival to get him.
I don’t know what it would have cost the Cubs to acquire DeRosa. If the Cards deal is any indication, it probably would have cost them Sean Marshall or Randy Wells plus another prospect. Would that price have been too high? Maybe, but at least the Cubs would have been all in for this year. I understand the desire to protect prospects, but considering the relatively poor track record the organization has in developing prospects, they would probably be better served going with a “win now” mentality.
