Again, nothing substantial on the Johan Santana trade front, however we have gotten a shocking bit of news, that really has no effect at all. According to Hank Steinbrenner the reports that the Yankees have pulled their offer off the table for Santana and are out of the running are incorrect and he adds:
"It's still in the deciding process."..."We're still discussing it. There's still a little talk back and forth."For once I think Hank is probably right, however I don't read into this at all. I think we all know that no matter what Hank or anyone on the Yankees says, they are stil players in this and will give the Twins an offer if/when they find out a deal with another team seems imminent.
"There wasn't an official offer anyway. You can't withdraw something that wasn't there," Steinbrenner said. "There was no official offer on the table at this time."
Now onto the post.
The Mets are currently believed to be the frontrunner's in the Santana trade saga. They have a quite a few prospects that the Twins like, however nobody is sure where the talks are currently at and we can really only speculate.
The Mets really have looked into acquiring multiple pitchers this off-season. Besides Santana, they have been believed to be interested in Erik Bedard, Joe Blanton and Dan Haren. Out of the four pitchers, only Haren has found a new uniform as the Oakland Athletics traded him for a slew of prospects to the Arizona Diamondbacks. And for free agents, they've been linked to Kyle Lohse, Carlos Silva, Livan Hernandez, and Bartolo Colon among others.
It's not for certain what the Orioles are demanding if the Mets wanted Bedard, however knowing Baltimore's owner Peter Angelos, he'd probably demand for the same type of deal the Twins are looking for which would be 3 pitching prospects as well as two young outfielders Carlos Gomez and Fernando Martinez. The Mets haven't been linked to Bedard anytime recently, so I have to speculate that those talks are completely dead.
For the Athletics, I'm not sure what they wanted from the Mets for Haren, however for Joe Blanton, it's rumored that they would want Gomez, as well as Aaron Heilman as well as another pitching prospect. However, knowing Billy Beane's stubbornness, he'll likely want a 4th prospect as well. Now, here is the question I pose, would the Mets rather trade 4-5 prospects for Santana (I personally think that if they include both Martinez & Gomez, they could probably get it done with four) or would they rather trade 3-4 for Blanton?
The A's probably wouldn't require Martinez in a deal for Blanton like the Twins are for Santana, and he won't demand a contract extension somewhere between $20-25 million per season either. However, he is nowhere near the type of pitcher Santana is and even with Blanton, I don't see the Mets the favorites in the National League. With Santana, I do. A 29-year-old two-time Cy Young award winner who'd be your #1 pitcher for at least the next 3-4 years (possibly longer) or the 27-year-old Blanton who probably would be your #3 or #4 pitcher in your rotation as I feel both John Maine & Oliver Perez are better pitchers with higher upsides and Pedro Martinez is still the best pitcher on the team.
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