It shouldn't be long before teams start making deals, but one of the summer's most intriguing trade candidates isn't going anywhere for now. There are no trade talks in the works involving Roy Oswalt, according to ESPN.com's Buster Olney (via Twitter).
Last week, ESPN.com's Jayson Stark reported increasing pessimism that the Astros will be able to obtain salary relief and prospects for Oswalt. To complicate matters, Oswalt has a no-trade clause, so he would have to accept a deal, even if a team is willing to take on the $27.4MM remaining on his deal. Oswalt has said he'd go "anywhere" he can contend, but the Astros don't appear close to dealing him.
It might be better for the Astros to try and deal him in the coming offseason, Oswalt will be owed less money, and there will probably be a bigger market for him as more teams will consider themselves contenders and try to obtain him. Of course, Oswalt also has to consider that team a contender.
The Astros are silly if they think theyre going to get somebody to eat nearly $30m AND give up the farm.
What a shock! Oswalt can’t be traded with his ENTIRE contract AND get SOLID prospects back too? Drayton must be really ticked off about that one. I’ve only been saying that for about a month now.
Oh yeah its the GM who doesnt want to waste money in case you dont know its the owner who decides whether a club rebuilds or not. And Mclane doesn not want to rebuild so Wade has his hands tied trying to put a decent team with scraps of money that Mclane gives him while trying to rebuild the farm.
In response to the last two of you, I do not put my ideas on blogs so I can get jobs from MLB clubs. It’s a pretty far-fetched idea to think that the clubs are gonna go searching for any new candidates in that manner, even for you. But as for my performance in that capacity if I were given the opportunity, I’m sure I couldn’t do any worse, for how can you do worse than LAST? As for the GM, I believe that part of his job would be to convince the owner what is in the best interest of the team, and to persuade the owner to do that. I am not convinced, however, that management or ownership in Houston, knows what that is. They have not shown the ability to do much of anything, besides bring back their aging stars, again and again and again.
As for not building a good farm system, part of that could be the owner’s unwillingness to pay over slot, and again, the GM needs to convince him that it’s in his best interest to do so. If he does not, he has FAILED as a GM. In addition, there are always those diamonds in the rough, that fall through the cracks to the later rounds. Some organizations are really good at finding them, and some are not. The Astros definitely are not. They can’t seem to find much of anything, even in the first round, even with solid first round picks. So yes, I think I could do a better job than their current GM, but I think there are quite a few people that could as well. I’m just curious though, who’s the bigger idiot, the inept GM or the people that keep supporting him?