Is who I'd like to see the Ms put the money on. He's disgruntled by the way he's been handled and with his playing time, which he feels he needs to recover. This is combined with, it appears, some distaste for changing positions at the same time he's trying to recover from his injury. I don't there is a best course in this one for the Dodgers. A team on the border of contention or below would just put him out there in CF, let him get his moves back and hope the offense comes around enough to offset his currently poor defense. But the Dodgers are both trying to win, and have guys that can play CF much better, so have chosen to screw with him. Is that the right way? Who knows?
What does appear pretty certain is that a team getting him who is willing to treat him as a MLB(tm) Starter and let him get the playing time to work his way back is going to get a pretty good player on offense, and less certain, a flawed, but steadily improving player on defense in the short term, and a pretty good player longer term. And there's a pretty good chance he recovers to be a force again. Discussions of whether he'd be better in a lineup than, say, Justin Smoak or Dustin Ackley appear ludicrous if he gets back to 140+ OPS+. It's the risk that is the thing.
The Ms put a lot of money into a LH #3 hitter, then tried to get a RH #4 at a bargain. It *may* not have worked. But this Ms fan would be delighted if they took another shot at it. If Franklin and prospect arms could get Kemp at 1/2 his contract rate, and McClendon can weave his confidence magic on Matt, it could be a great move. Mac would need to convince him to be a RH Saunders, a Starter who doesn't play *every* day, playing LF and some CF, getting 1-2 days off a week until he's fully back. Then he can try to take the CF job from JJ (and maybe he'll be a JJ fan by then having JJs speed and dynamism ahead of him in the lineup). But treat him like the star he has been and give him every chance.
Battleships were found to be limited as the main offensive force of the Navy, but they still packed a LOT of punch when equipped properly and used properly. I see Kemp as a possible battleship in the Ms task force.
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