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My $0.02 on the M's moves and non-moves.
1) Time to lock Vargas up to a three year $21-24 million dollar type deal. He's got more value to the M's than other teams and provides the team with a reliable rotation fixture for the next few years.
2) I thought the bullpen was a strength moving into this season, and now, yowza, beyond imagining. The M's traded two pieces off of the big league roster and made it immediately better??? I'll take Capps and Pryor over League and Delabar any day. And the fact that they are all under club control for years to come? Yowza.
3) This team is 4 runs under a .500 pythag on the season. And that's with Ichiro, Figgins, Olivo and Ryan taking up a whale of the "veteran" at-bats and the vast majority of the offensive salary spending. We cleared up the Ichiro mess for next year, Figgins will be DFA'd, Olivo is a FA and Ryan should be signed for a few more years at a reasonable salary (he's hitting .261 in july with a .665 OPS, more than good enough with his defense). Moving forward we've got $40+ million in salary room to bring in quality vets without having to pay the deadline deal premium. Good move to stand pat now if the value wasn't there.
4) Thames and Wells make a dream LF platoon. Carp seems to be turning the corner (or finally healthy) with .375/.405/.583 since his most recent call up. Saunders has been great. This team is getting healthy and building confidence (thank-you KC). We are out of this race, this year. The time to make the team better is in the offseason when prices are more reasonable and we have a better grasp of what we have going forward.
In all, I like the moves we made, don't feel bad about the moves we didn't make, and am looking forward to the last 3rd of the season.
- Ben.