Hopefully, the First of Many

The Nationals have started their rebuilding efforts with an eight player trade with the Cincinnati Reds. The Nats have acquired outfielder Austin Kearns, second baseman/shortstop Felipe Lopez, and reliever Ryan Wagner. In exchange the Nats gave up reliever Gary Majewski, pitcher Bill Bray, infielder Brendan Harris, minor league pitcher Daryl Thompson, and shortstop Royce Clayton.

The consensus here at NTP is that this is a good deal for the Nats. Nate is happy to see that we got three young players with one of them being a legitimate power outfielder and a possible lead off candidate in Lopez. Dave and I aren't thrilled we gave up Bray and Majewski, especially with Bray being a left handed pitcher who's shown some potential, but time will tell if this was worth it.

Whatever the outcome, this first volley in the Nationals trade war has lived up to expectations. We said we were going to go younger and build for the future and it looks like that's what they're trying to do.

On another note, there's something slightly off putting that our first big trade is with Cincinnati, the last club that Bowden had strong ties to. We hope that Bowdnen isn't being blinded by past opinions when it comes to evaluating talent. Just because you thought a guy was going to be great three years ago doesn't mean that opinion should still hold. Thankfully that doesn't appear to be the case here but it's worth mentioning. That combined with the rumors that other GMs don't like Bowden could be cause for concern.