the business of baseball - why soriano must be traded

i thought i should write something up on trading soriano - you know, before it actually happens - since it's the hottest story in baseball and directly involves my team, the washington nationals, and their future.

soriano, as you might have heard, is a free agent at the end of the year. if the team doesn't trade him now, and if the team isn't able to re-sign in the offseason, the nats will receive a 1st round draft pick and a "sandwich" pick between the 1st and 2nd rounds from whichever team does sign him in the offseason (or actually, a sandwich pick and a 2nd round pick if a team with a win-loss record in the bottom 15 of 30 teams signs him). draft picks that high are wonderful but they are also wonderfully risky. don't forget that the nats traded hometown favorite brad wilkerson (actually two years of wilk since he won't be a free agent until next offseason and his 2006 salary is $3.9M compared to soriano's $10M), a 4th outfielder, and a minor league arm for soriano. the trade was highly ridiculed at the time as soriano has been a free-swinging slugger who can steal up to this season.

however, soriano did what no one (well, except maybe chris) thought he could do - hit home runs in rfk stadium just as well as any other stadium. on top of that, he's been getting on base (taking more walks instead of free-swinging so much) at a good clip and he's still been stealing like crazy (including numerous steals of 3b which is so fun to watch). if he really focused on steals the rest of the season, the guy could literally get to 50-50 (hr's - stolen bases; only 3 people have ever even done 40-40 - canseco in 1988, bonds in 1996, and a-rod in 1998).

so why not keep him? well, i'm sorry folks, but there's NO way the nats make the playoffs this year. sure, soriano is a treasure to watch every game, but if you can get something for him in a lost season, why not do it? so that's what they need - 2-3 good prospects who are pretty close to the majors and not as risky as two draft picks would be. and you know what? no one says we can't still try to sign soriano in the offseason!!

my nationals farm authority blogmate, brian, convinced me to also post this over there. our other blogmate, john, edited the post a tad and it comes off much more professionally. see if you can find the changes (besides the capitalization that i added).