If we can add Alfonso Soriano in LF, fine. I'd like him, sure. But why would I trade (what I expect to be shortly) an .800-.850 OPS 1B for an .850ish LF, while giving up a raft of talent and paying more money?
Yes, this Soriano could turn into Juan Gonzalez. Smoak doesn't top out in the low-to-mid .800s with his potential either.
I just don't move Smoak to do this. As I've said, I would go try to get Colby Rasmus with the Pineda + Gutierrez + relievers package if the D-Backs don't want it. That would give us that production from a center fielder, leaving extra offensive slots open for bats at lesser-glove positions.
I'd be happy to add Upton - just not at a Pineda + Smoak + a bunch of others cost. Baker intimates that's just the cost of doing business; getting real-world production immediately costs talent, and if you pay it in prospects, fine.
I'm with you: some players are prospects (Clement, Chavez, Robles) and some are production-in-waiting. Ackley is production-in-waiting. All we have to do is put him to work and even his downside is better than any 2B we could reasonably add another way.
Smoak isn't quite on that level for me yet, but he really did start to impress me in Tacoma and at the end of the season. If he was just Tino Martinez that would still have great value to our next half-decade, and that's not his top-end by any means.
~G
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