One of my favorite books to read to my children is Dr Suess’s Cat In The Hat. It’s a tale of calamity that a certain cat causes inside a house on a rainy day. You spend most of the book grinning and snickering at the boy and the girl’s trouble with the Cat In The Hat. However, the last part of the book brings you back to reality. You might call it a buzzkill. On weather the children should tell their mother about the visit from the “Cat In The Hat”, the last line of the book is “What would you do, if your mother asked you?”
I kind of feel like that with the calamity before the Non-Waiver Trade Deadline on July 31st. Not so much with what the Royals did. Their movements were so minor I don’t even feel the need to address them. However, I was intrigued at what division rivals Cleveland Indians did. Essentially, they went all in, in trying to win this division.
The Indians traded their top two pitching prospects, plus two more minor prospects to Colorado for their ace pitcher in Ubaldo Jimenez. It’s an intriguing move in that Jimenez hasn’t had the best of years this season and the Indians gave up a lot to get him. I’ve changed my thought process twice on weather it was a good trade for the Indains. Jimenez has a friendly contract, but at the same time the Indians have defined their window in which to make a run for a World Series title with a diminished pipeline after that.
Why have I spent two paragraphs writing about the Indains on a Royals website? Because the Royals will have to cross this proverbial bridge at a trade deadline in the future. The farm system will not be able to bring all the pieces to get the Royals to a World Series Title. At some point, when their window is more defined the Royals will have to send some prospects away to get a missing piece. When that time comes the Royals front office will have to answer the question: “What would you do?”
A lot of how we’ll feel about such a trade won’t be known until it actually happens. When it does happen it will solidify this “playoff” window we’ve all been looking for.
It will most certainly mean departing with some of the prospects we like to keep track of. Is Wil Myers, Jake Odorizzi and two others worth legitimate lock down ace starter that will get the Royals into the playoffs? I think so. I don’t think Ubaldo Jimenez is that starter, but he will certainly help the Indains. Now, how long will it be until the Royals can even define their “playoff window”?
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