The Cubs have just acquired Ryan Freel for Joey Gathright. Freel gives them more infield depth as he can play 3 of 4 infield positions, and can also play a pretty good CF and could play the other 2 outfield positions.
The trade of Gaithright was enabled by the fact that Hoffpauer and Fukodome have played as well as they have. Add in Reed Johnson, and there's a log jam in the outfield, with no where for Gathright to go, and the fact that freel can play the outfield as well, this is really a win for the Cubs.
Freel you may remember played for the Cincinantti Reds for several years as was a real pain for the Cubs as he could play just about any position and is rather fast on the base paths.
Freel has not had a good start to the year this year batting only .133, slugging .133, and an OBP of .350. Freel has been on the DL since April 26th, ailment unknown right now.
Hey, Ryan Freel sounds just like the guy Hendry gave away earlier this year - Mark DeRosa. Well, he sounds like him until you look at his numbers this year along with his current injury. But from the Cubs perspective, he doesn't cost as much so there you go. All DeRosa has done for a floundering Indians team is drive in 21 RBIs (which would lead the Cubs by 4 right now). I already chronicled my opinion of the DeRosa trade in my "Hendry - not good" post so I won't reiterate all of that again here.
ReplyDeleteRegardless, I think this is a pretty good move for the Cubs if not a little late as it seems we could have used Freel while Aramis was out. Did you see Freel's top PA was in 2005 and hasn't topped 500 PAs since 2006. Is he injury prone or not good enough to start for the mighty Reds?