Free Agents

Jon Weisman has nice story on Sports Illustrated that I tend to agree with. While Joe Torre is the big story for the media hordes, he is just a side story until the season starts and we see what Ned did during his Winter shopping.

As Ned arrived in Florida for the GM meeting, I've put together a list of the free agents I think Ned might have some interest in. My level of interest is the last column. I'm all for keeping the current team intact, and doing very little tweaking but with Torre in tow with a 3 year deal I expect Ned to be very busy in both the free agent arena and in trade talks. So I'm going to list a few of what would be my preferred options.

Top Priority - find a home for Juan Pierre. Moving him to LF is not a good option, making him your 4th outfielder is a decent option.
Option 1 - Sign Arod, trade LaRoche for some Minnesota pitching and sit back
Option 2 - Sign Arod, trade Furcal for some Cub pitching and sit back
Option 3 - Sign Bonds to play LF, make Juan Pierre his caddy, put Kemp in CF
Sign Wolf, Leiber, or Kenny Rogers for pitching depth for one year
Option 4 - Sign Andruw Jones, make Juan Pierre your 4th outfielder
Sign Wolf, Leiber, or Kenny Rogers for pitching depth for one year
Little things:
Sign Mike Lamb to replace Mark Sweeney. He also would provide some insurance if LaRoche's back flares up or Nomar's health history kicks in.
If the Cubs do not pick up Mark Priors contract I would take a chance on him. This is a case where we might be able to use Joe Torre's reputation and get some players to try Los Angeles who may not have looked our way before.

Any number of relief pitchers can replace Seanez including Seanez himself. I've always liked Riske but with Meloan and Hull I'm not sure that we even need to sign a relief pitcher to replace him. With Saito, Broxton, Proctor, Beimel, Meloan, Hull, DJ Houlton, and Stults on the major league roster and Cory Wade, waiting to help out, we seem to have enough bullpen, without signing anyone. Plus we have Tsao and Hendrickson waiting an arbitration decision, with Brazoban and Kuo coming off the DL.

Realistically I expect none of my options to happen as Ned is stuck with Juan Pierre. At best we sign a CF, move JP to LF and trade Kemp or Etheir for some pitching.