He did play more than 400 career minor league games at CF, not that it means he's major league capable, but that certainly was his trajectory as he was developing.
If I'm TB, I'd use Sheilds to get a better than Span/Revere can offer.
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I think the Rays trust Jennings to play center. I don't think they trust him to bad leadoff. Tampa Bay got a .314 OBP from the No. 1 spot in the order this year and .304 from the two-hole. You've gotta believe a stat-centric organization like that is going to be heavily targeting affordable high-OBP options to plug into the top of the lineup, particular since it would lessen their reliance on a breakout year from Jennings, who was nothing special this year.
Joe Christensen recently called my suggested Shields for Span-and-Hermsen deal far-fetched. And when I think about it, maybe he's right. But I can see plenty of reasons that the Rays would be extremely interested in acquiring Span.
This is a good point, although Jennings did post a very strong walk rate throughout the minor leagues.
I wonder if the Rays would take a Span-Morneau package where the Twins ate maybe $7m of Morneau's salary. That would be a neutral move payroll-wise.
Again, the bad part for the Twins is that this makes it more likely the Angels re- sign Greinke quickly, meaning the other teams are not waiting for him to decide on their offer, meaning the Twins now have a harder time signing other free agents.
on the other side of the coin, does this mean the Royals are leas likely to compete to sign pitchers now?