Renteria to Braves; Marte to Red Sox

[Fishercat]

BTW, this is a post on one of the Yankee fan sites, it makes the Sox look pretty smart, depending on how close you think Lowell and Renteria really are in value.

So basically, you can sum the 2 trades up as:

#1 infield prospect Hanley Rameriz for Andy Marte, a better infield prospect (same age, Marte produced at AAA while Hanley struggled in AA)

MR Prospect Jesus Delgado for MR Mota

SP prospect Sanchez for Josh Beckett

SS Edgar Renteria for 3B Mike Lowell (and all that money)

Is there any trade on that list (other than Lowell) that you wouldn't make? And is the difference between Renteria (.276 .335 .385 at SS, poor defense) and Lowell (.236 .298 .360 at 3B, good defense) so great to make none of this worth it? Of course, then there's the Loretta for Belli thing.

Impressive for a team with no GM.

[HuskerFan2002]

If this is real (as it seems), Red Sox fans should find this as a terrific deal. While a decent shortstop is lost for 2006, there was a problem with the original 4 year contract.

It also strikes me (in an ego serving way, of course) as a validation of something I have come to believe: Long term contracts can be used to meet short term goals with short term costs. If the Sox want a better than league average shortstop for 2005 via FA, they can't sign a contract that would cover just 2005. In order to get the player, they have to make a commitment to 2008, which is undesirable for all sorts of reasons.

If Renteria/Marte ends up being 1:1 with no added money exchanged, the Sox essentially had their guy for one year, $10M or so: A very nice and attractive outlay with minimal risk. I think in today's player market, a lot of us fans here would be enthusiastic about such contracts. Even if money gets exchanged, all that is done is to push on the ceiling of acceptable near term cost, and the Sox are probably off the hook with risk in 2008.

Back when the Sox put Manny Ramirez on conditional waivers, the organization was expressing a certain latitude with how it viewed near term and long term investment, and that is exhibited in this current trade. A problem will occur when/if other teams adopt such a model, but in the meantime, it seems the Braves are willing to take on the Renteria contract at some level (even if they move it along to somebody else next year). At any rate, it makes whole the contention that 2 year player investments (3 years max) were most desirable, even while doling out longer term contracts in the meantime.

I mean, the Rockies were able to mitigate some of the disaster regarding the Hamilton/Neagle signings, weren't they?

[ATLien]

Damn, I do not like this deal. I think Renteria is going to be great back in the NL. And his age, he is only like 2 years older than Furcal. I'm just pissed about losing Marte. Chipper is almost near retirement and always misses a ton of games every year. Marte has been the best prospect every year in one of the best farm systems.

[Providence A's]

Chipper is only 33; how is he close to retirement? He's only been in the league 12 seasons...he could play for quite a few more years. The only way he is "close" to retirement is if he has horrific injury.

[General]

Chipper aint hanging it up, but I really did want to keep Marte.

[love_that_reefer]

Betemit is still there who is better than Chipper defensively IMO.