Yes, in theory, if all the guys we've got can do what you want, then we might be okay. But can they?
When Smoak slumps, we're done. He IS the offense. He's not gonna OPS+ 160 all year in his first full year in the bigs. Pujols did, while being several years younger than Smoak, but I can't see Justin keeping this up. He's gonna come down. If he finishes at 130, 135 I'll be happy, but that's a 20+ point come-down from where he is.
Cust? once somebody starts throwing him stuff in the middle of the plate knowing he can only hit one-sackers, two in the right wind, then I expect his OBP to plummet, which is the ONLY thing keeping him near 100 right now. Cust's OPS is .657. Carl Everett's was .658 when he DHed for us. The 20 point difference n their OPS+ is that Carl's was mostly slugging while Cust's is mostly OBP. Unless we manage to load the bases a lot more, Cust is not gonna push runs across the plate.
Guti...let's see if he can stay in the lineup first before we pencil him in for 90, and his backup isn't at 50.
I'm an Ackley believer, but he's also an assimilator - he comes up, looks bad, learns and then dominates. He's still gotta get up here and look bad for a month.
If I say the rest of the way we get Smoak at 130, Ichiro at 110, Figgins 80, Guti+backup at 80, Ackley at 95, and Cust at 80, that gives us 95 for the group. That means we need the other 3 slots to also net out to 95, or some SERIOUS bench contributions.
I'm not saying it can't be done, I'm saying this group doesn't look like the group to pull that off. Jack doesn't believe so either, which is why Wilson, Ryan, Kennedy, Cust, Bradley, et al were all one-year guys with no long-term commitments.
We're not going to war with this team, we're stopgapping with it while we wait for Smoak and Ackley to arrive.
Thankfully Smoak arrived already. Ackley might have arrived by year-end. And maybe we should gear up for war knowing that at least the 5 guys in the rotation are prepared for one.
But I think it's a longshot that we sharpen the spears and charge the hill, mostly because we have too many guys using toothpicks for weapons in this 2011 lineup.
Unless we get the deadline version of Cliff Lee for the lineup, I guess. I'm not AGAINST going for it, but I'm against trading the resources we need to move long-term with this team for a three-month trade for a long-shot to take the pennant.
Longer term? Maybe. Do you cough up the farm for a year and a half of Andre Ethier? His agent is not Boras, so maybe you can extend him and slap a 130 OPS+ patch on that LF problem we have.
If it's a long-term solution that will ALSO let us go to war this year, I can see us doing it. But not trading pieces just for 3 months of a 2012 FA.
~G
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