Bullet point updates

Please forgive my lack of posting since Thanksgiving. I've been writing my senior thesis (as a junior, for no good reason) and it's taking a huge chunk of my time. Here are my thoughts on a few things that have been going on in the Majors recently:

Pudge signing: Kinda iffy. I don't mind signing the future Hall of Famer, who is still a huge upgrade over our backups from last year (side note-I wanted the Nats to go after him during Spring Training). I don't mind the $3 mil/year average, since it's not my money. I don't think a 2 year deal was necessary, though. I would have even preferred a $4 mil or maybe even $4.5 mil deal for just one year. While it's not an albatross of a contract like Vernon Wells or Alfonso Soriano, it will still be impossible to move if Pudge totally sucks. Hopefully he won't, and I'm actually pretty excited to see him play.

Bruney trade: The more I look, the less I like. Bruney has only sustained a BB/9 rate of 5 or below for a full season once since 2004. Once. I'm not even upset at what we gave up for him-in all honesty, the Nats have been pretty crappy in the Rule 5 draft outside of Flores and there are not a whole lot of interesting names this year anyways. Maybe we went after him because Bruney is worth a positive value in even years while being awful in odd years. I don't know, but I don't want to see him trotting out of the bullpen in the 8th or 9th inning...ever.

Transactions around the league:

Randy Wolf (signs with MIL, 3 years, ~$30 mil): Money sounds about right, but I would have offered no more than 2 years. A better signing than Jeff Suppan was in 2007, that's for sure.

3 way AZ/DET/NYY deal (Edwin Jackson and Ian Kennedy to AZ, Phil Coke, Daniel Schlereth, Max Scherzer and Austin Jackson to DET and Curtis Granderson to NYY):
Terrible for Arizona, good for Detroit, great for the Yankees.

BAL/TEX deal (Kevin Millwood and $3 mil to BAL, Chris Ray to TEX):

Great move for TEX, allowing them to free up money to sign Rich Harden and still come out ahead financially. Bad move for Baltimore. They will be paying Millwood $9 million when they could have gotten a better pitcher much cheaper.

HOU/FLA deal (Matt Lindstrom to HOU, Robert Bono, Luis Bryan and HOU's Rule 5 pick to FLA):

The prospects heading to Florida aren't really impressive, but are definitely sleepers...and finding a keeper for Lindstrom is a win for them. Not sure why the Astros would want to give up even 2 C prospects plus their rule 5 pick when they could have gotten Bruney for cheaper, though.

Players on my short list for the Nats:

2B Orlando Hudson at 2 years/$14 mil-his value has fluctuated between $9.1 mil and $13.7 mil over the last 4 years. I would go as high as $8.5-9 mil for one year. He doesn't cost a draft pick, so nothing to lose but somebody else's money.

OF Rick Ankiel at 1 year/$2 mil-interesting buy-low candidate. Tons of power and good arm, and another lefty bat in the organization can't hurt.

One of the following SP's at 1 year/$5-$7 mil: Erik Bedard, Justin Duchsherer, Ben Sheets, Jon Garland

One of the following SP's at 1 year/$750k-$3 mil: Livan Hernandez, John Smoltz, Brett Myers,

One of the following SP's at 1 year/$500k-$1 mil: Rich Hill, Shawn Hill, Mark Prior, Noah Lowry

One of the following RP's at 1 year/$4-6 mil: Mike Gonzalez or Kevin Gregg
One of the following RP's at 1 year/$1-2 mil: J.J. Putz, Joe Beimel, Bob Howry, Octavio Dotel

One of the following RP's at 1 year/$500k-$1 mil: Chad Cordero, Eric Gagne

Thoughts?