The Cardinals today have agreed to trade away Colby Rasmus, their young center fielder, who has multiple years of club control left and an .850 OPS season already under his belt at the age of 24, to the Toronto Blue Jays, along with a bunch of other crap nobody wants, in return for a bunch of other crap no one in their right minds would want.
This is, without a doubt, one of the stupidest, most asinine moves I've ever seen a professional sports organization make -- though at this point I honestly think calling anything about this team 'professional' is an enormous stretch. What small shred of respect I still had for the front office just evaporated.
Cards give Colby Rasmus, Brian Tallet, Trever Miller, P.J. Walters.
Cards get Edwin Jackson, Marc Rzepczynski, Octavio Dotel, and Corey Patterson.
Now, you might be tempted to think this is just a big joke. After all, there's no way John Mozeliak would really be foolish enough to deal away his incredibly talented young center fielder for a package of players which features, as its absolute best component, Edwin Jackson. After all, Edwin Jackson is an okay, but not great, starter. He's a free agent after this year. And the rest of the package is just asinine. This is trading away long-term success for the worst kind of short-term fix.
I thought it was stupid when the Cards brought in Ryan Theriot. Now they've gone and one-upped themselves by bringing in one of the few players who could possibly be even more of a paragon of ex-Cubdom in Corey Patterson. Corey Patterson is 31 years old and has compiled a 0.6 WAR this season. He's walked in less than 5% of his plate appearances. You think Tony La Russa couldn't get along with Colby? Just wait until he has to deal with the idiot man-child that is Corey F. Patterson.
Oh, and since Jon Jay is now the anointed one, what happens when his luck-driven batting average comes down, and you're left with a player who walks in just about 6% of his plate appearances, does not hit for power, and plays a marginal center field? Well, I'll tell you what happens. You play him every day, since that's what you wanted, and you wish like hell he was your fourth outfielder again. Oh, and maybe still celebrate because he Plays The Game The Right Way, even though in this case The Right Way means he's smart and gritty and not nearly good enough to start for a first-division team.
I've defended John Mozeliak for a long time, because I've believed from the beginning that his hands were tied by the presence of a Hall of Fame manager given carte blanche to stay as long as he wants. Well, I'm done. John Mozeliak is a terrible GM who makes terrible trades, and I have no problem saying it.
The insane manager needs to go, and the incompetent general manager needs to go right along with him. This organisation is fatally dysfunctional, and I've had my fill of it. This abject stupidity just needs to stop.
So congratulations to everyone involved in this deal. Congratulations to Tony La Russa, who managed to run yet another player out of town but will somehow never be asked to stand accountable for it. Congratulations to John Mozeliak, who made this team marginally better at the back of the rotation and in the bullpen by trading away what should have been a franchise cornerstone, rather than a throwaway. And congratulations to Colby Rasmus, who gets the only half-sincere congrats of the bunch. He'll finally get a chance to play somewhere other than the apparent hellhole that is a St. Louis clubhouse, but is still hauling his lack of confidence, self-esteem, and a stage parent who just won't go away behind him. Brilliant show, all of you.
I would never root for the Cardinals to fail. I've been a fan of this team since I was old enough to understand the sport. So I will never actively hope my team fails. Unfortunately, I don't have to root for them to fail. They seem blindly intent on doing that themselves without any encouragement from outside sources whatsoever. And frankly, it makes me sick.
