Danks and Masset headed for the Windy City

Written by Dan in Texas

In a shocking trade today the Texas Rangers sent number one pitching prospect John Danks, highly thought of reliever Nick Masset and Jacob Rasner in exchange for Brandon McCarthy a 23 year old left-handed starter and David Paisano.

Lets not dwell on Danks potential and just take a look at the highly touted Brandon McCarthy.

Here is the scouting report on McCarthy:

Assets: Mixes a two-seamer and a four-seamer in the low-90s with a strong curveball to garner more strikeouts you'd expect from that kind of stuff. Also boasts terrific command.

Flaws: Leaves the ball up a little too often to right-handed hitters and watches the ball fly out of the park. Needs to improve his change-up.

Career potential: Solid mid-rotation starter.

For you stat-heads out there here are his 2006 big league numbers. He threw 84.2 innings for the White Sox year, starting two games and ended up with a 4.68 ERA striking out 69. He gave up 33 walks and 77 hits over those 84.2 innings (1.30 WHIP). His 2006 overall record was 4-7.

Doesn’t exactly knock your socks off, does it?

I have seen McCarthy compared to Jack McDowell and Barry Zito.

One might also think that the Rangers either are not serious about signing Barry Zito or they don’t feel confident that they can sign him. One could argue that the Rangers do feel confident they will land Zito; though the organization would not likely trade their number one prospect after touting him as the future of the organization in order to gain leverage over Scott Boras.

McCarthy figures to join the rotation immediately behind Padilla as either the third or fourth starter. The 6 foot 7 McCarthy was highly thought of in the White Sox organization, so much so that it was rumored that he was the sticking point in a trade for Alfonso Soriano mid season.

Though, if one puts stock in scouting reports, a pitcher who is susceptible to giving up long fly ball to right-handed hitters does not bode well for the Ballpark.

As far as David Paisano, a likely throw in, he is an outfielder that should be years away from big league service. T.R. Sullivan reports:

Paisano, 18, appeared in 52 games for the White Sox's Venezuelan Summer League team in 2006 and batted .338 with no home runs and 17 RBIs. A native of Venezuela, he played with Chicago's Dominican Summer League club in 2005 and hit .272 with three home runs and eight RBI in 49 games.

Bottom line, this isn’t a great trade nor an awful trade at this point in time. It should be clear to all Ranger fans, this trade has “come back to bite us in the ass” written all over it.

On a different subject, I have felt that Daniels taking over the General Manger position and dictating the direction of the club would be a positive thing. Tom Hicks keeping his hands off the organization and limiting his duties to press conferences and signing checks could only help the Rangers.

Unfortunately, it looks like Tom Hicks has taken over the negotiations with Barry Zito and his agent Scott Boras. The New York Post’s Michael Morrissey wrote earlier this week:

…a source told The Post yesterday that Rangers owner Tom Hicks is helming the charge to sign Zito in no uncertain terms.

Earlier this month, the source said, Hicks walked into a meeting and told his front-office people something to the effect of, "I'm taking over this negotiation now."

Let’s face it Ranger fans, regardless if the Rangers sign Zito or he goes elsewhere, the man who outbid himself to sign Alex Rodriquez to a $252 million dollar contract and gave Chan Ho Park a $65 million dollar deal should not come anywhere near a player negotiation for his club’s own good.