It's been an organizational imperative since 2009. I'm not sure what happens first, the team completely bottoms out or ends up saved by an influx of young pitching talent we are supposedly trying to farm.
Rivera was a great 'buy low' candidate. He had put up really great numbers for a season with Montreal but had some trouble finding playing time after that. Not that different of a situation as Bourjos really.
This is the issue here. There is no direction. The Callaspo for Green trade makes sense until we apparently decide we have no use for Green - just like Oakland realized.
I love that people here are calling Bourjos fragile for getting hit by a pitch, while you come here and refer to Freeze's 'back issues,' 'rebuilt ankles' and 'rumors of other issues.'
1. Cardinals trade Kent Bottenfield for oft injured defensive whiz CF from Angels 2. Get about a decade worth of HOF caliber play from Edmonds 3. Trade Edmonds for Freese 4. 2011 World Series 5. Trade Freese for another oft injured defensive whiz CF from Angels 6. The cycle repeats
This team is NOT better with Calhoun starting. This lineup is more efficient with Calhoun in it (a natural corner OFer) than Bourjos, but attempting to take advantage of that efficiency does not mean you trade Bourjos for pennies on the dollar.
It's like winning a new Civic on the Price Is Right so you decide to sell your newish Mercedes for $10k.
I hate to agree. Not sure what his issue is, he seems very bright but these agents and GM's are constantly taking him to the cleaners. Perhaps he has no balls.
Maybe I'm going out on a limb here but next year I think it's reasonable to expect Bourjos to put up a higher WAR than Calhoun, Trumbo, & Freeze, and potentially higher than the two lowest combined (though I won't predict that much).
I like Calhoun but I think we might be giving him a little too much credit for short term performance. His 2013 was great but I'm not sure he is a better player than Bourjos (even though I think he fits the teams needs better than both Peter & Trumbo).