Saw this today on a trade rumor site. The source is Ken Rosenthal at Fox. He’s usually pretty reliable. Here goes.
The Rangers and Brewers were close to a trade: Akinori Otsuka to the Brewers for Tony Gwynn Jr. Rosenthal seemed to dislike it, but I think it made sense for the Crew. Regardless, Bill Hall’s injury thwarted the deal as Gwynn will be needed to man center.
Good thing Bill Hall got hurt, as I would have hoped we’d get more than Gwynn Jr for Aki.
Hey, why don’t we trade our good pitchers for some really strong bats? It has worked so well for us in the past. I also heard Gagne’s name for a trade too. Yeah, let’s give up the guy who only has seven blown saves in his career, unlike Henneman (sp?) who had seven a month. How many times have I heard, “All we are going to work on is pitching and defense.” Then we get more bats and no pitching. Sorry for the rant.
I would hope we would only trade Otsuka in a package deal that brings in a starter.