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July is over and we have passed the trading deadline. After a very impressive 17-11 July, we were still 10 games back and had no realistic chance to catch the Twins. We ended up selling 3 parts for future pieces.
Veteran catcher Johnny Edwards lost his job to Jerry Grote, so his salary was dealt for a 25 year old middle reliever who will probably be an 11th-12 pitcher.
Third base platooner Rich Barry was dealt for #141 prospect Greg Minton. Minton was a starter last year and started closing this year in A ball. We are going to put him back in the rotation and see if can develop there.
Finally, we decided to deal Juan Marichal. He is 4th in WAR,so he is having a great season, but he's 33 and our most expensive player. If we can be 11 games back with him, why not get a piece that can help us for 10 years. The market for him wasn't great the week before the deadline. I was going to have to settle for something less than I wanted, but then the Red Sox offered 24 year old starter Bill Lee straight up. He has a ERA+ of 107 and gives us a chance to have a nice group of arms under 28.
Al Bumbry had a great month. Forced into a full time job due to the injury to Mickey Rivers, he improved from a .173 first month to .289 in July. Overall, he has an OPS+ of 112 and actually leads the AL in triples with 9 despite having 190 less plate appearances than the 2nd place player. He's also 19 for 24 in steals and is slugging a robust .402 despite just 1 home run. With him and Rivers in 2 spots, if Morris Nettles develops as he might, we could have 3 players capable of .300 BA and over 40 steals each. 1970's and 80's baseball.
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