Jon Daniels Trade for Carlos Lee is the Gift That Keeps On Giving

Wanting the big bat now and hoping to keep him longer, the Texas Rangers acquired All-Star slugger Carlos Lee from the Milwaukee Brewers in a six-player deal.  http://sports.espn.go.com/mlb/news/story?id=2532418.  Lee was only with the Rangers for a few months and then cashed in on 6 years for 100 million with the Astros http://sports.espn.go.com/mlb/news/story?id=2674398.  


What that trade brought us was so much more than just a few months of Carlos Lee's big butt...er, uh bat.  It brought us Nelson Cruz along with him which was worth the trade in itself.  But also when Lee left for the big payday, it left us with two compensatory draft picks.  With those picks in the 1st round of the 2007 draft, the Rangers selected Blake Beaven and Julio Borbon.


Fast forward to June of 2010 and when it came time to get another fella named Lee...Seattle needed top-notch minor league prospects.  It just so happened that the Rangers had an abundant amount of those due to deals like the Carlos Lee scenario (they also got Tommy Hunter in the 1st round of that draft as compensation for the loss of Mark DeRosa).  When it came time to get Cliff Lee, the Rangers had to add Blake Beaven to the mix of other prospects to get the deal done.


If you really want to lock up the mind, remember that it was Francisco Cordero that was the big player in the Carlos Lee trade.  We got Cordero in the Juan Gonzalez trade in 1999.  So, in reality, the 1986 Tom Grieve signing of Juan Gonzalez as a skinny kid from the Dominican Republic turned in to Nelson Cruz, Cliff Lee, and Julio Borbon.  I'd say that's payback for Dave Stewart, Ron Darling, Jim Sundberg, Dave Righetti, Adrian Gonzalez, Travis Hafner and even Sammy Sosa.