Goodbye Luis Castillo - Some Thoughts

I have been accepting the conventional wisdom that Luis Castillo would be leaving at the end of this year. That the Twins just couldnt come up with the bucks required to hold onto this great lead off hitter, who went almost one full year without committing an error fielding. That freeing up the salary from Luis Castillo was the only way we could clear enough bucks to hope to hold onto Torii Hunter, and in the future Johann Santana and possibly Joe Nathan, too. Today I started to think about some of these assumptions. This thought process was started by comments made by Johann to the Minneapolis Tribune.

Santana expressed his unhappiness with the Luis Castillo trade. What really caused the unhappiness to boil over to the press was that no further acquisitions were made, just a couple of minor league players who may contribute in the future. It seems to be a trend that Santana may have had enough.

All of this started me thinking about my unhappiness with the Luis Castillo trade and everyones assumption that the Twins wouldnt/couldnt resign him. And a thought popped into to my noggin why not? We resigned the dubious skill (sic) of Rondell White after his 2006 season spent mostly on the DL. When Rondell did play the role for which he was acquired DH his batting average was (and is) appalling. Instead of cutting him loose last winter the Twins, those miserly paymasters, resigned him.

Rondell was only making $2.5 million, so this may explain why the Twins resigned this rather questionable talent. But Rondell has never filled the role for which the Twins picked him up DH. The only time he hits is when hes also playing in the outfield. As an outfielder Rondell plays okay and he does hit, but the Twins have many, many outfielders in waiting, all of them lower in price and all who could be part of the future.

Luis Castillo was only signed through the end of this year. Everyone in the press and the blogs has been saying that the Twins wouldnt be able to resign him. The common wisdom was that Luis Castillo would go for way more money than the Twins could afford. Im questioning this now. The Twins were paying Castillo about $5.7 million for 2007. They have now saved $2 million of that to apply to buying the guys better lunch meat I guess.

Now I know that there is a large difference between $2.5 million and $5.7 million. I also know that there is a really big difference in the contributions past, present and (what could have been the) future of White and Castillo. The Twins could not have known that White would be on the dl again this year. But the Twins did know that White could not fill the needed role of DH and that should have been enough to NOT resign him last winter. There Ive just found half of the money needed to resign Castillo.

So, since we cant afford the skills and bat of Luis Castillo, then by God, we had better not afford Rondell White again this winter!

NutCupSports.com - Fantasy sports commissioner leagues - dynasty, keeper, head-to-head, and survivor. Also news, links, forum, etc

Website - http://www.nutcupsports.com

Blog - http://www.nutcupsports.com/wordpress/index.php

Free Credit Report
I remember when I graduated from college, over 20 years ago, I wanted to buy a car before I started my new job. I had had enough. I refused to be seen any longer riding around in a 1980 Ford Pinto. Some may recall that the Pinto had a slight design defect. Its fuel tank was in the rear where all gas tanks belong, however it was exposed. Lets just s...

2006 Arizona Diamondbacks Preview
2005 Overview:Rebounding from a truly disastrous 111 loss season in 2004, the Arizona Diamondbacks improved their 2005 season record to 77-85 including a final 8-2 record to finish the last 10 games of the year. Led by a balanced offense, the team was able to improve on their 2004 record thanks to the surprise performances supplied by 1st baseman T...

Personal Finance for a Dummy
When it comes to personal finance, some people just dont feel up to the task. They feel overwhelmed by all the options and complexity of high finance. Im here to tell you, personal finance isnt that complex. The basics are pretty simple. I will, however, attack the problem in a different way than you might be expecting. 95% of whats important ...

3 Reasons to Fix Your Credit Report and Wipe Out Bad Credit
Don't Ignore Your Bad Credit - Fix Your Credit Report ASAPIgnorance is certainly not bliss when it comes to your bad credit and your credit score. Ignoring the problem will not make it go away and things can get worse over time. Having bad credit can impact your life as well when you try to rent an apartment, get a loan, mortgage or credit card and...

Helpful Software To Combat Spam
You would think that it is very easy to discuss blocking spam. But still, you find yourself scratching your head and staring at the ceiling everytime you give it a try. Why not make use of tools and certain utilities, which are very easy to use, that can do so well in eliminating unsolicited junk mail from your inbox?You can try using SpamBayes. Sp...

Latino Baseball Players - The Hall of Famers
When you think of Baseball, you may naturally think of Latino professional players. We know that baseball is a major sport played in almost every Latin American country next to futbol. Almost every Dominican kid wishes to be the next Pedro Martinez or Alex Rodriguez. Same in Cuba where Baseball is also their national past time. However, the tru...

Internal Politics at Work Place
Many times we see lot of people leaving their jobs because they found the work place politics affecting their life. Internal politics involving the people at work place are some times bad and avoidable. These politics not only affect the normal working of job, but also may some time cause people to quite their jobs. This results in lose of human re...