Blanton’s league average results have hinged entirely on his low HR rates. He’s basically a right-handed Jarrod Washburn. Get him out of Oakland and watch the HR rate rise, and he won’t look league average anymore.

I’d say Blanton’s a true talent 4.5 FIP guy right now, and Outman’s probably a true talent 4.8 FIP guy.

Interesting that you mention increasing HR rate for Blanton, but not for Outman, who has allowed 3 HR on 61 flies so far.

For Blanton, the HR effect would have been between 2 to 3 HR so far this year (using +20% HR/FB% adjustment going from ~9% to ~11%).

As a fan of neither team, I’m interested to see what happens when he goes to an environment with a DER 22 points lower. That could potentially have a much larger impact than a couple extra homers.

Trading 2 A-ball players (1 a genuine prospect), and a mediocre AA pitcher for 2 years of a decent MLB starter is not even in the same zip code as “franchise crippling”. The Phillies did not give up any of their higher-level top prospects, nor anyone from the big-league club. The Bedard trade, now that’s a crippler.

let’s see. the Dbacks chose a player they all know, who they love for his leadership & mentoring, who knows the NL & their park and is owed about $450,000 vs a player just the manager knows, who has been in the AL all his career, and is owed about $3M

And [h]e wasn’t asking for Max S. What[']s the deal[,] Pelekoudas?

We had a chance to deal Ibanez

let’s see. the Dbacks chose a player they all know, who they love for his leadership & mentoring, who knows the NL & their park and is owed about $450,000 vs a player just the manager knows, who has been in the AL all his career, and is owed about $3M.

I’d like to see Gillick and Bavasi combine powers someday, just to see how much havoc could be created.

Add Ed Wade to that mix and you’d have the New Three Stooges!