Here's one for you. Starting with facts that we can generally assume:
1. The Mets are, at best, one game better with Luis Castillo than they are with Ruben Tejada.
2. The Texas Rangers are "going for it" this year, acquiring Cliff Lee, Bengie Molina, and Jorge Cantu recently.
3. The Rangers all-star second baseman, Ian Kinsler, is out with an injury. And when playing, is very injury prone.
The Mets should flip Castillo to the Rangers. Even if the Rangers didn't give us anything back in return, selling Castillo over there for some salary relief makes a lot of sense.
Kinsler's current replacement is Joaquin Arias, who is probably below replacement level. Castillo could make a valuable addition to the bench down the stretch for a team with World Series aspirations. Most importantly, Castillo is only owed about $2 million the rest of this year and $6 million next year.
The Mets should offer Castillo to the Rangers for $4 million - half of what he's owed. The Rangers improve their team now, get insurance for the stretch run, and improve their bench. The Mets get salary relief without making the team any worse. Do it.
3 comments:
Given the Rangers particular situation with ownership transition and bankruptcy can one expect them to make a trade such as the one you propose?
It's an interesting question. I think that the creditors could be convinced that it would be a net positive move to take on the $2 million due Castillo this year in an effort to make a good playoff push. Beyond that, they could shed him next year. Or they could get the whole contract picked up by the Mets if they returned us a meaningful prospect. There's a lot of interesting moving parts.
Clearly it happened after you wrote your post but now the Rangers have acquired Cristian Guzman which would perhaps quash any interest they may have had in Castillo.
I sure do wonder how a team in their particular situation can make so many acquisitions. Sort of makes me wish the Mets could just declare bankruptcy and put themselves up for sale in perpetuity.
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