Fifteen minutes and counting

I would love to see Blanton for Abreu, Ethier and Double A pitcher. He would be a top 15 pitcher in the N.L. Get it done Colletti.

so, the betemit for proctor deal has been announced, and there will always be pros and cons to every trade. Here they are...

1. Garciaparra is guy that is hard to dislike, but he's over the hill, his power has disappeared, and at his age, there's no assurance he will stay healthy. His best years are light years behind him. Even his defense has become suspect. Time to move on.

2. the next obvious thought is who do you bring in behind this guy? Here's betemit, a 3rd baseman with good power on a team struggling for power, described as raw talent, now gone, leaving the dodgers with what has to be now the weakest bench in all of baseball. Martinez has no business being in baseball, he's horrible, check his stats (only thing going for him is that he's an ex-giant, coletti, etc.) I've said enough about Sorry Seanz. The best bench player is now the guy who should be in the lineup, and that is kemp.

3. When we cut ties with Nomar, we're gonna have to make another trade to get a guy we possibly already had in betemit. Of course, i know the dodgers want to protect their young talent, and i like that, but not when you have GLL (thanks, everyone, for adopting this nickname...!!!, now that's support...!!) sitting your BEST young talent on the bench, kemp, while we play .500 ball, and idly sit by while you're slowly overtaken by weaker teams.

By the way, i don't see the pros. I'm sure there are a couple, but I'm just fed up.

Ultimately, to get the best team on the field, there will have to some unpopular decisions made, and Grady Littleleague does not have the capacity to make decisions that might hurt some feelings.

Something i know, and is backed by stats, is that when the Dodgers hit for power, they win games, just like most teams do. You just sent a bunch of power (10 hr's in a part-time roll) to the yanks, and one of 'your sluggers is being platooned.

GLL is an idiot, plain and simple, and we will lose the division. Heard it here..

we dont need betemit, LaRoche is tearing up AAA and will be up in the next couple of days. Proctor is nice but Blanton is the guy we need,pull the gosh darn trigger Ned!!!!!!!!!!!

I live in NY...it's not so much that the Yanks wanted Betemit as that they wanted to get rid of Proctor, who is disliked by his teamates.

As for Betemit, I figured he was a goner when he stood admiring his 'home run' which turned into him only getting to 1st when the ball hit the center field wall.

Betemit was REALLY a goner when the Dodgers had him at 2nd base the other day. 'Member that?

With as disappointing as the trade deadline was, it wasn't all that bad, when you see the Padres' moves...

Shea Hillenbrand and Milton Bradley on the same team? Now that's chemistry! Morgan Ensberg??? A dream come true!

There is hope for the Dodgers after all!!!

Betemit was a bust in L.A. because he was a head case. All the talent in the world to hit the long ball but mentally challenged when it came to pressure... which likely means he will BOMB out in NY. But I think given another chance to play everyday and in NY's short right field fence it will revive Wilson. I couldn't stand the guy early this season but learned to appreciate his power and what power does for a team. Potential doesn't get you far and that's all Wilson has been for the Dodgers, so trading him is not a bad deal, especially w/ LaRoche tearing up AAA. But trading him to the Yankees for Proctor? Didn't the Dodgers throw Proctor away a few years ago??? We should of just kept Joe Mays or Aaron Sele at the beginning of the year. Hopefully with some GLUE, our pitching will hold and the batters will continue hitting.

blanton sucks. we already have two blantons....bombko and timberrrrrr. if we trade for that choke artist, colleti and frank needs to get choked!

This deal is puzzling...

There is only one other pitcher on the yanks who has pitched more innings AND has a better ERA, and the pitching depleted Yanks gave that up for a bench player????? A guy who's gonna sit on the bench behind a-rod...

Something is way, way up here.....

This has an extremely sneaky feel to it....

I haven't has this sneaky feeling since the same Yankees gave us a snotty, crybaby, whiny guy named Jeff weaver.

You always have to wonder when you get guys from teams who try much harder than you do to win the big one. If the sox or yanks are giving it up, then it would definitely raise an eyebrow or two for me....

The L.A. teams are so media concerned they don't understand how to manage with any type of intergrity. Here we have Russell Martin in a deep slump and yet he's still batting third. This is a second year player and the Dodgers are acting like he's an established ball player.

mike

Jim, KT-

The drawback to the trade is that it weakens an already thin bench. The Dodgers have whoever isn't playing outfield that day... and that's about it if Saenz isn't hitting, at least as far as viable PH's go. Olmedo is a top notch guy from a clubhouse standpoint, but the dude is paid to pinch hit, not be popular, and he hasn't been getting it done. To me, it looks like his bat has slowed down some, making it so fastballs he used to punish are either by him or popped up.

The problem with pinch hitting is that slumps in absolute terms (a 2-20 stretch for example) play out over weeks, maybe months, as opposed to a few games as it would a position player. When a guy is going bad, it seems like he's going bad forever. It's not so much the lack of hits from Saenz that is disturbing (with so few ABs, a series of trips where he hits the ball solidly but to people could easily scuttle his avg,) but the lack of contact. Simply put, he has to be better, especially now that Betemit is gone.

Regarding Proctor (more Mike and Wolf), the Yankees had a replacement for him ready in Joba Chamberlain. But there's no question Proctor wasn't the same guy as he was last year (in part because Joe Torre ran him out about 80 something times in '06). But he's better than who they have (Houlton, Hernandez, Hull, and perhaps a fading Seanez, too), and Wilson Betemit isn't going to bring top shelf talent in return. Basically, they felt like the improved play of LaRoche at AAA made him expendable. Given the state of the staff, another arm had to be brought in. I got the impression talking to Colletti that they wanted to find a couple more, but the price was too high. They'll go ahead and try to fill the needs from within (a guy like Maloan, for example).

I still believe in Betemit's ability to be a solid Major Leaguer, though he might want to ditch hitting from the right side. But with LaRoche, Hu, and Abreu around, he didn't fit in. He didn't really have a full and complete shot at keeping the 3B job (a full season, half season, whatever), but Betemit clearly didn't take advantage of the opportunity he was given.

BK