Teams Calling With Interest In Heyward, Justin Upton, Gattis

[Millwood1Hitter]

A two-year re-trenchment isn't an awful idea, even if it isn't the way I'd go. But if Hart trades Upton, Heyward and/or Gattis...he's got to knock those deals out of the park. There's no margin for error here. If the scouting and player evaluation isn't top-notch on the guys we're getting back and we miss on the prospects, we're boned for a long time. Situations where you have three high-quality position players available to trade in an offense-depressed market don't arise very often. We can't afford to botch these deals, if we decide this is the road we want to travel.

And my hesitation is that I don't see much in Hart's recent track record that instills me with confidence he'll come through the way he needs to.

Actually this is how Hart's reputation was built when he first took over the Indians, as a great evaluator and eye for talent.

How about acquiring a young Kenny Lofton for Willie freakin Blair and Ed Taubensee.
How about acquiring the best fielding SS in the game Omar Vizquel for Reggie Jefferson.
How about acquiring Carlos Baegara along with Sandy Alomar for Joe Carter. And then staying ahead of the game and trading Baegara for a young Jeff Kent and dealing Kent later on to fill a need at 3B for Matt Williams. And then trading Matt Williams away for Travis Fryman.
How about locking up young talent like Manny Ramirez, Jim Thome, Kenny Lofton, Charles Nagy before it was common?

Sure he's not perfect, I mean he did trade Brian Giles for Ricardo Rincon but he has a pretty good track record. His biggest downfall was the unability to acquire a top of the rotation starter to matchup against the likes of Maddux, Pedro, Cone, Brown, etc and tried to fill with stopgaps like Hershiser, Martinez, Burba alongside a quality starter in Nagy. But he also did hold onto and tried to develop that ace internally and the timing just wasn't right with high upside guys in Colon and Wright, one of which took a while to reach his potential while the other flamed out early out due to mental problems and injuries.

Hart's tenure in Texas was awful, but let's not fool ourselves, he deserves somewhat of a pass on this as we all know that Mr. Tom Hicks was the one making intermingling and had a large say in or final say in a lot of those decisions. And Hart's protigue (Daniels) once Hicks stepped aside built a winner in Texas and completely raped suspenders in the deal for Teixera.

[MadduxFanII]

Cleveland's a long way away, and the early 90's are so, so long ago. GMs and coaches can lose it, just like players, and I'm going to weigh Hart's most recent performances more than his decision to trade away Eddie Taubensee.

[emk418]

Cleveland is not far away. They might just be a bat away. Kluber, Carrasco, Salazar, Bauer is a nasty rotation.

[jpx7]

Cleveland's a long way away, and the early 90's are so, so long ago. GMs and coaches can lose it, just like players, and I'm going to weigh Hart's most recent performances more than his decision to trade away Eddie Taubensee.

Cleveland is not far away. They might just be a bat away. Kluber, Carrasco, Salazar, Bauer is a nasty rotation.

He's referring to Hart's tenure with Cleveland as GM in the 1990s, not the current Indians squad.

[emk418]

He's referring to Hart's tenure with Cleveland as GM in the 1990s, not the current Indians squad.

My mistake. That's what I get for reading quickly at work

[MadduxFanII]

My mistake. That's what I get for reading quickly at work

Don't worry. Reading is for chumps. I just grunt at the keyboard and scare it into writing for me.

[jpx7]

I just grunt at the keyboard and scare it into writing for me.

Mine's all about the romance.

[Carp]

I can't believe we're sitting on this group of young players and talking about rebuilding.

If we can't resign them (or if they don't to resign), we'll be having to replace the same players 1 yr from now anyways (aside from Gattis).