Padres trade for Street

[love_that_reefer]

The Padres found their Heath Bell replacement, acquiring closer Huston Street from the division-rival Rockies for a minor leaguer. MLB.com's Thomas Harding tweeted the agreement, while Danny Knobler, Scott Miller, and Buster Olney contributed to the breaking story. Harding says the Padres will pay most of the $8MM owed to Street.

Street, 28, posted a 3.86 ERA, 8.5 K/9, 1.4 BB/9, 1.54 HR/9, and 34.9% groundball rate in 58 1/3 innings for the Rockies this year, saving 29 games in 33 attempts.

Street is a nice replacement for Bell and if Street improves on his 2011 season, he will be a nice trade chip for the Padres come July next season. I thought the Padres would stick with Gregerson and use their resources more wisely but if they can get a good half season out of Street, it might be worth it. They'll definitely get a better return from what they gave up.

[HollywoodLeo]

lolWut? How do they propose getting a lead to Street?

Anyway, how do you know they'd get a better return when it doesn't even say who the minor leaguer is?

[love_that_reefer]

Because it's a salary dump. Why would the Padres give a good prospect AND eat all the money? That's not how deals like this work.

[HollywoodLeo]

Why would the Giants trade Torres and a very good reliever for Angel Pagan?

Sometimes teams do stupid stuff so I'm waiting until I see who they traded before I make any final judgments on my opinion of the trade.

[love_that_reefer]

The Giants can actually save money on the deal so you don't really have a point. One's a salary dump, the other isn't. Wait all you want, it's not going to be anyone worth a damn. It's just not how salary dumps work.

[HollywoodLeo]

The Giants made a stupid trade that you wouldn't predict. I know this because you said it in the thread title, so you can't say anything is for certain until it's officially announced.

That being said, I agree the odds are highly in favor of the trade piece not being that big of a deal.

[love_that_reefer]

You just love the split hairs

[HollywoodLeo]

After further deliberation with the Padres fan counsel at SOSD I've come to the conclusion that this is actually not a bad deal.

The Padres have to spend money due to the virtual salary floor with the new CBA and there's really nobody worthwhile to spend it on for a team that's not going to compete.

Street is on a one year deal and can land them a good trade in July or draft picks in 2013.

[HollywoodLeo]

As for the earlier discussion, I'm reading that it's for a "player to be named later", for which I officially renounce everything I said regarding whomever the return is.

I thought the initial report was just saying there wasn't word on who it was yet, but if' it's the infamous PTBNL that's pretty much always some fringe mediocre prospect at best.

[love_that_reefer]

Rockies acquired LHP Nick Schmidt from the Padres to complete the Huston Street deal.
Schmidt was a first-round pick of the Padres in 2007 but has posted some pretty underwhelming numbers in his minor league career. He did post a 3.84 ERA over 12 starts for High-A Lake Elsinore in 2011, but note that he was old for the league at 25 (he's now 26). He'll likely be assigned to Double-A Tulsa.

Yeah

[Trendy Bastard]

Has Street not been very good? That doesn't seem like a good return for him..

[love_that_reefer]

The Padres are taking on all but $1 million of Street's contract.