Edwin Jackson enjoyed the finest moment of his big league career last night when he no-hit the Rays, which coincidentally came at the same time MASNSports.com's Ben Goessling heard that the Nationals "were exploring a trade" for the righthander. Current Nats' GM Mike Rizzo has plenty of ties to the Diamondbacks, having joined the franchise when they were created in 1998 and serving as their scouting director from 2000-2006.
This year, the 26-year-old Jackson has been unable to replicate the success he enjoyed during in his breakout 2009 season. He's pitched to a 4.63 ERA in 107 innings, striking out 7.1 batters per nine innings while walking 3.8 per nine. The Scott Boras client is owed approximately $2.28MM for the rest of the season, and is under contract for $8.35MM next year.
Rizzo said he has identified starting pitching as the club's biggest need, though we really haven't seen them linked to any specific names until now. Arizona has yet to indicate that a fire sale is coming, but that could change in a heartbeat.
Even though his ERA is up this year, I feel like he’s still improving. He’s finally getting some more strikeouts. I would just be worried about the high pitch counts he seems to rack up much too often. The DBacks are using him like they have no intention of keeping him after this season. Nice work on the no hitter last night though.
I know I’d love to see a pitcher like him in Pittsburgh, but I’m not sure what they can give up for him, and if they can sign him long term. A deal centered around Meek or Hanrahan probably wouldn’t work.
His peripherals and metrics have been steadily improving over the last few years. It remains to be seen if he doesn’t suffer the same second half regression that he did last year.
This would be and interesting move for the Nats. Extremely high upside and if he can fix his control the reward would be great. He tore through the AL last year and would be part of a nice 1-2 combo with himself and Strausburg.
Okay, I don’t get why my comment was deleted, but whatever.
Anyways, do the Nats have any pitching prospects that would be of interest?
They have Storen, although I find it hard to believe they would part with him, but you never know. Also they have young arms like Zimmerman still.
Well, Storen is a reliever, and Zimmermann is still injured. Not a good match, really.
If the D-Backs can get Storen and Zimmermann for Jackson they have to pull the trigger. Storen is going to be a closer in this league and everyone knows the D-Backs need all the help in the pen they can get. Add in Zimmermann and you get a good young pitcher. That being said I doubt the Nats would make that deal.
Yeah…that’s not really what the Nats are thinking about. I doubt they’d even trade Storen OR Zimmermann in a package to get Jackson. Those two are the second and third top young pitchers who they are targeting to be the future of the franchise (Strasburg is #1 of course).
The idea is to get Jackson, who is young, to add TO a staff that would include Strasburg, Zimermann, and have Storen closing.
Drew is the closer of the future, so I would put it at maybe a 2% chance that they would even consider trading him. Zimmermann is a much better possibility of trading but given his injury situation, I doubt they’d trade him either. If it’s young relief they are interested in from the Nats, Brad Meyers is a much more likely trade option. If it’s starters, Tom Milone or maybe Brad Peacock are much more likely to trade than Zimmermann.
If the Diamondback and the Nats are being talked about for this move it’s because the DBacks want to move salary and the Nats can afford to take on salary. Seems to me like the Nats sent some scouts to follow the DBacks for a little while and people are spinning rumors out of thin air. If the DBacks want to part with Jackson’s salary, good for them. I have no idea what they would want from our system that we are willing to part with. The Nats upper minors is basically Norris at catcher, Espinosa at 2B and a bunch of low ceiling pitchers. They have plenty of low ceiling pitchers that the DBacks are willing to pick from that I doubt they would want. Brad Meyers (injured at AA) has good results but has struggled with injury. Milone at AA, Mandel at AAA project as 4/5 starters at best, the type of guys that most organizations have somewhere in their system. Chris Marrero at AA is a diminishing prospect at 1B who plays suspect defense and is struggling to clear .800OPS at Harrisburg. Michael Burgess at high A is a RF prospect that I believe the Nats would be willing to move in any deal as a supplementary piece. He’s a flawed C+/B- prospect who has made minor progress this year but still struggles with strikeouts and is regressing a little bit after being named an all star in the Carolina League for the first half.
Basically what I think is that if the DBacks want either Meyers and another pitcher of their choosing or Meyers plus Marrero or Meyers plus Burgess to unload Jackson’s salary they could have it, but I doubt they’d want it. There are probably other organizations who have greater depth in the upper minors that could give them better prospects than the Nats if they were serious about putting Jackson on the market.
I’m pretty sure he was talking about Storen OR Zimmermann, not Storen AND Zimmermann.
As good as Zimmermann is, I don’t think the Nats would trade him, nor would the Dbacks trade for him without knowledge of how well his recovery is going.
And as for Storen, the Nats wouldn’t trade him. And I doubt the Dbacks would trade for him, because they want starting pitching back, not relievers.
I watched the game. might as well trade the guy while some sucker *might* give up something based on the last few games, but really.. those *8* walks allowed in the early innings were glaring weren’t they? About as impressive a performance as was Matt Young’s 7 walk no hitter he lost back in ’92 for same reason.. Couldn’t find the strike zone..
Watch some contender with a poor GM (see LAD for example) make a move for this guy now based on last couple of games and grossly overpay.
i’m not taking anything away from jackson for throwing a no hitter but i wouldn’t want him. dbacks would be asking too much for him because he has thrown a no hitter and it was the greatest display of being wildly effective. the guy walked 8 batters and hit another. he did not know where hit pitches were going and it really worked out for him.
The dbacks starters are ALL better than their stats show. If they played on a team with anything close to a bullpen they wouldn’t be as extended in games as they have. Jackson had a bad start, but has been pretty dominate the last couple weeks…especially on the road.
The dbacks starters are ALL better than their stats show. If they played on a team with anything close to a bullpen they wouldn’t be as extended in games as they have. Jackson had a bad start, but has been pretty dominate the last couple weeks…especially on the road.
The one-two punch of Strasburg-Jackson would be very interesting. Both are power arms, while the first having complete control while the 2nd being effectively wild. I think it would be really cool as long as the nats dont give up the farm system for him. (also on a side note) i wouldnt put to much into the no hitter as leverage. As great of a accomplishment that it is no matter the team, he did it against Tampa Bay which was alrdy No Hit earlier in the season.
Jackson isn’t exactly wild, though. He just was last night.
o i wasnt saying it as a bad thing, i was actually saying it was good. At times he can get in trouble but to have those 2 kinds of pitching types would be extremely interesting. Being “effectively” wild can sometimes be as good as being in extreme control as was the case last night. sorry for the mis understanding.
I didn’t say you said that.
EJ isn’t wild. He normally has control of his pitches. He just didn’t last night.
No way you get a guy like Storen from them, most likely will be a ready to near ready AA or AAA guy and a couple 2nd tier prospects for Jackson just because the guy got lucky 1 day out of 6 months doesn’t make him God. WOW – Storen – someone drank the Bong Water.
Thank you for the voice of reason. If anyone thinks they can get Jackson for Storen straight up they would be smoking something. The Dbacks would just be happy to get out from under Jackson’s salary since he isn’t anything special and easily replaced. IF they Dbacks get a couple of minor leaguers for Jackson they would be happy.
Like someone said earlier D-back starters are not as bad as their stats show. But because of the BLOWPEN they have had to pitch deeper into games. Had the d-backs anything that resembled a pen their record wouldn’t be what it is today and would be right along with the rest of the league and we would not be talking about trades. However I don’t think Az will be giving him up for next to nothing, I think that they will be adding to the value what they gave up in order to get Jackson.
149. That’s the number of pitches Jackson threw for his milestone. Who was the last guy to be particularly useful after throwing 149 pitches in one start?
Please, I say this as a DBacks fan going back to the draft party before the ballpark was even finished, deal Jackson now. Before his next start. For whatever you can get. Before anyone has a chance to see the damage his achievement has wrought.