hot stove: the what the hell are the marlins doing edtion

I am well aware that most of the folks that read my post are not avid baseball fans. But hey, don't feel bad about that nobody is perfect.

For those of you that don't follow the hot stove season, last week Major League Baseball hosted its annual winter meetings. Every year all the trade rumors and free agent signing crescendo at the winter meetings. This is the week that every baseball fan defines their team's off season success and failure. While I understand the hype and fanfare that leads up to the Winter Meetings, I don't buy the concept that a baseball team's season is dependent the events of last week. That being said it was relativity depressing to watch the Marlins sign Reyes, Bell, and Buehrle while the home team didn't do anything. I guess the good news was that the Phillies and Nats didn't make any head lines either. More good news: Albert and CJ are in the American League West not in Miami too.

Now that I have had some time to digest the three major signings that Miami made I'm not sure that they will be the beast of the east that every one else seems to thinks they will be. If you combine each of the three player's W.A.R. (wins above replacement) the marlins spent $191 MILLION on eleven more wins than they had last year. That puts them at about a .500 team. Of course I'm not counting on Josh Johnson and Hanley Ramiez coming back strong. If they both have the seasons that they are capable of then maybe they could win 90 games and contend for the wild card. I guess we will have to see. 

I'm still waiting on the home team to make their move. Most of the rumors that I have read or heard involve the Braves trading our all star pitcher Jair Jurrjens for an out field bat. I really like that guy and hope that Frank does not make that move. I would rather see one of the young pitching prospects (not Teheran) and Prado for a bat in left. We could also sign one of the non-tenders to a short term deal to add some power to the out field,  Luke Scott comes to mind. 

On the subject of short stop; the Braves have changed their position some what since the beginning of the off season. It looks like we are going to have Tyler Pastornicky  playing short every day. With the Brave's track record of bringing up rookies the last few years (Heyward, Kimbrell, and Freeman) I can't argue with their decision. However, my gut is they may be rushing this kid a little to quickly. 

One more quick point: I really hope that our two non tenders find their way back to Atlanta. Moylan and Conrad are quality players and seemingly good guys. Any one that remembers the 2010 Hanson start against the Reds knows what kind of player Brooks Conrad can be. And if we trade Prado, who is going to back up Chipper? With out Moylan I'm not sure that our pen is deep enough; O'venbrell  was over used last year and I don't see any one to pull the slack like Peter Moylan could if he comes back healthy.