My Final Word on Washburn

So, here we are. There are roughly 16 hours until the trade deadline, and Jarrod Washburn is, as far as we know, still a Mariner. Many of the teams that were being linked to him a few days ago, no longer make much sense.
The Brewers have fallen far enough back in the standings, that it’s unlikely they’d be willing to give up much for a rent-a-player.
The Twins are still a possibility, but I haven’t heard anything about them pursuing him, and although the Yankees seem like the best candidates, they seem to be unwilling to give up anything of value. It would be awesome if we could get someone like Phil Hughes, or Joba Chamberlain in some sort of a deal with them, but that seems all but impossible.
Jack Zduriencik hasn’t given me any reason not to trust him, but at this point I would be happy just to get some decent young talent – preferable pitching talent or middle infielders. Honestly, right now there just aren’t really any names to explore. Our new front office is very good about keeping things like that under wraps – after all, who expected us to trade for Jack Wilson and Ian Snell yesterday?
One thing that I am still confident in, though, is that we still should trade him. With this team no longer in contention (now 8 games back in the west and 6.5 in the wild card), there is virtually no benefit from holding on to him.
There’s absolutely no chance we’re going to offer him arbitration, and I don’t see him signing a one, or even a two year deal. As I’ve repeated over and over, this is going to be his last chance to sign a big, long term contract. If our organization does indeed feel like it would be a good idea to try and sign him, there is no reason why we shouldn’t at least trade him now, and try and sign him in the off season. If for whatever reason trading him now causes him to change his mind about wanting to stay here, at least we’ll have gotten top value for him when we had the chance.
That’s all I’ve got to say about Washburn. Trade him. Trade him now.
The one issue that arises if Wash gets traded, though, is a lack of starting pitching. Without Wash, our rotation probably looks something like this for the rest of the year.
1. Felix
2. Bedard (if he can get healthy)
3. Snell
4. RRS
5. Vargas
Until Bedard gets back, you have several options. You could either call up Doug Fister, call up Morrow (if he’s not traded), or plug in Chris Jakubauskas.
Either way, that’s not a bad rotation. It’s not great, but it’s good enough to continue winning games for the last couple months of the season. We really don’t need Washburn to keep playing well.
I think I’m gonna stop there. This heat is keeping me from thinking straight, and I don’t feel like I have any more coherent thoughts in me tonight. Good luck getting sleep tonight guys, I highly doubt I’ll be able to.
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