Been reading around the net for reactions to the Tex trade. As expected, they’re all over the place, depending on whom you ask. One of my favorites was over at USS Mariner, who had this to say about the trade:
A total home run for the Rangers here. Teixeira is a good but not great player, and in return for a year and a half of his services at not-bargain rates, they extracted one of the best young catchers in baseball, a very high upside middle infielder, and reportedly got a couple other players of value. A+ for Jon Daniels. Teixeira won’t help the Braves as much as they think he will, and the upgrade from Salty to T-Rex isn’t worth the price they paid. But John Schuerholz is pretty close to being beyond reproach, so that’s all I’ll say about that.
USSM also had something nice to say about the Lofton trade, too.
Tim McMahon over at the Rangers DMN blog called the trade “OK”, saying
This trade doesn’t make you say “Wow!” like a James Loney-Clayton Kershaw-Andre Ethier deal. But I trust it was the best deal available, and it accomplished the goal of getting at least two (maybe three) players who can be part of the Rangers’ core when they’re ready to contend a few years from now.
David O’Brien of the Atlanta Constitution seems to think this is the best trade since sliced bread, really going head over heels about it with:
It’s the most significant midseason trade for the Braves in 14 years, since they got first baseman Fred McGriff from San Diego on July 18, 1993.
Beerleaguer.com (a Philles blog) called the trade a good move for the Braves, and even had something nice to say about Ron Mahay. They did take a knee jerk reaction regarding return of pitching in this move, though.
Not one, but two, significant acquisitions for the Braves’ playoff run. Everyone knows what Teixeira will bring, but Mahay is a nice veteran complimentary part and typical of the kind of move John Schuerholz has made in the past in that he gets some pitching as a throw-in.
Will Schaffer at Chop-n-Change (a Braves fan blog) called the trade “a horrible deal” with this:
it was a horrible deal because the Braves did not land CJ Wilson or Eric Gagne and as more details have come back I have started questioning this deal even more.
….this is one of those deals that we are going to look back on six years down the road and second-guess everything about it.
Good call on his part wanting CJ Wilson, but he wasn’t going anywhere, and I can’t recall Gagne being part of a trade package anywhere.
More to come from elsewhere I’m sure, but I’m still surprised we haven’t seen an announcement of a press conference from the Rangers about this move. The trade is still not announced on the Rangers or Braves sites in their official press release areas. (It’s 4:40PM CST on Monday as I write this).