What do you make of the Marlins' announcement that they will keep third baseman Mike Lowell for the rest of the season?

 

George Palmer

 

*** George: It is commendable that neither the White Sox nor Marlins are pulling their usual surrender, but as usual, I don't quite grasp what the Marlins are doing. They're 5 1/2 games behind the Phillies in the wild-card race. They were encouraged by pitcher Josh Beckett's successful return Tuesday night. But even if they reached the postseason -- a 20-1 shot, by my estimation -- they still would be in a major financial bind.

 

Five of their players are free agents, including second baseman Luis Castillo. Fifteen of their other players are expected to qualify for salary arbitration. Lowell, shortstop Alex Gonzalez and first baseman Derrek Lee will reach their arbitration maximums as players with five-plus years of service time.

 

Everyone in baseball knows the Marlins are heading for a dismantling; the payroll would skyrocket if owner Jeffrey Loria kept the team intact. Lowell could be replaced by third-base prospect Miguel Cabrera, who currently is playing left field. The Marlins, however, lack an obvious replacement for Castillo. They possibly could acquire one in a trade for Lowell, and return next season with another promising young team.

 

Again, where is this going? Does anyone seriously expect the Marlins to sign Lowell long-term? And why rule out the possibility of making a boffo trade? Royals GM Allard Baird isn't doing that with Carlos Beltran, even though Beltran appears to be in less demand than Lowell, and the Royals, playing in the weak AL Central, probably are in better position to contend than the Marlins.

 

Baird sees no gain in taking Beltran off the market, other than a temporary public-relations boost. And if the right deal arises, he doesn't want to be caught lying to his fans.

Why not put Juan Pierre on the NL All-Star team as a pinch runner?

 

Mike Binder

 

*** Mike: You've got a great point, especially when the idea is to win the game. Pierre leads the league with 38 stolen bases in 48 attempts and sports a respectable .352 on-base percentage. All things considered, though, another masher probably would be more valuable.

What do you make of the Marlins' announcement that they will keep third baseman Mike Lowell for the rest of the season?

 

George Palmer

 

*** George: It is commendable that neither the White Sox nor Marlins are pulling their usual surrender, but as usual, I don't quite grasp what the Marlins are doing. They're 5 1/2 games behind the Phillies in the wild-card race. They were encouraged by pitcher Josh Beckett's successful return Tuesday night. But even if they reached the postseason -- a 20-1 shot, by my estimation -- they still would be in a major financial bind.

 

Five of their players are free agents, including second baseman Luis Castillo. Fifteen of their other players are expected to qualify for salary arbitration. Lowell, shortstop Alex Gonzalez and first baseman Derrek Lee will reach their arbitration maximums as players with five-plus years of service time.

 

Everyone in baseball knows the Marlins are heading for a dismantling; the payroll would skyrocket if owner Jeffrey Loria kept the team intact. Lowell could be replaced by third-base prospect Miguel Cabrera, who currently is playing left field. The Marlins, however, lack an obvious replacement for Castillo. They possibly could acquire one in a trade for Lowell, and return next season with another promising young team.

 

Again, where is this going? Does anyone seriously expect the Marlins to sign Lowell long-term? And why rule out the possibility of making a boffo trade? Royals GM Allard Baird isn't doing that with Carlos Beltran, even though Beltran appears to be in less demand than Lowell, and the Royals, playing in the weak AL Central, probably are in better position to contend than the Marlins.

 

Baird sees no gain in taking Beltran off the market, other than a temporary public-relations boost. And if the right deal arises, he doesn't want to be caught lying to his fans.

We'll be similar to the Blue Jays... Mike Lowell will be our Carlos Delgado, and everyone else will be rookies.

last offseason, if we had smart FO, wed have signed most of them long term, now we are stuck in this pickle. oh well...

aj I agree BUT who would you have signed? Lowell never hit more than 25 HR in a season and never batted above .275. They had Cabrera down in the farm to replace him(something they didn't have when they trade Floyd a viable candidate but Floyd was never a building block for a team). DLee, would you offer him an average of 6-7 million a year? Gonzalez a .250 career guy? Castillo is probable the only guy I would have second thougts about, but again are you going to build your team around a 2B with less than 5 career HR? So really the one-year deal seem like a good idea but no one could image all this guy performing out of there norm. The pitchers have never been consistent to offer a long term deal.

aj I agree BUT who would you have signed? Lowell never hit more than 25 HR in a season and never batted above .275. They had Cabrera down in the farm to replace him(something they didn't have when they trade Floyd a viable candidate but Floyd was never a building block for a team). DLee, would you offer him an average of 6-7 million a year? Gonzalez a .250 career guy? Castillo is probable the only guy I would have second thougts about, but again are you going to build your team around a 2B with less than 5 career HR? So really the one-year deal seem like a good idea but no one could image all this guy performing out of there norm. The pitchers have never been consistent to offer a long term deal.

You also have to consider that the FO wasn't going to make another PW Contract mistake.

I'm starting to side with fish fillet when it comes to signing Lowell long term. Consistency is a word that defines Lowell both offensively and with the glove, but this is his first real breakout season at the age of 29. Unless the FO decides to increase payroll to 65-70 million signing long term makes us the Brewers for the next 4-5 years. I don't think we should trade him this season, but try and see what his value is this off-season and if nothing sparks our interest, settle arbitration with him and shop him at the break. I'm not sure what that will do to his value, but it can't be that far off from what it is now unless he is on the DL. A-Gon and Juan Enc should be locked up for a few years, Luis/Penny/Lee need to be traded...or you could do the same thing with Lee and trade him in the off-season when his value will be the highest because we know he will finish strong....possibly set a career high in HR's...over 28.