[nfbwatlk] M's got premier prospect from Rangers, who are renting Lee

[Lauren Merryfield]

M's got premier prospect from Rangers, who are renting Lee
By ART THIEL
SPECIAL TO SEATTLEPI.COM

The improbable postponed the inevitable and made for the borderline incredible.

Cliff Lee will be a Yankee, probably by December. But not until he is rented out for three months to a team that is financially bankrupt, which gave up a premier prospect to a team that has been functionally inept. And a division rival, no less.

If/when the Mariners ever get beyond ineptitude to become a contender, July 9, 2010, will be marked as a pivot point, if not the pivot point.

That's the day the franchise finally acquired a young, big bat at a power position, 11 years after opening pitcher-friendly Safeco Field under the false assumption that the big bat at a power spot would be Ken Griffey Jr.

Conversely, unless Texas wins the World Series this year, Rangers fans will look back and say, "What was (team president) Nolan Ryan thinking?"

Playing off the Yankees against the under-the-radar Rangers Friday morning, general manager Jack Zduriencik shrewdly snatched first baseman Justin Smoak, a 23-year-old with 30 home run power and plus-.900 OPS potential.

Smoak may not be ready this season, his first in the majors, but every scouting report on him has a variation on the theme "studhoss." ESPN's Keith Law ranked him before the season as the No. 15 prospect in all baseball, and Baseball Prospectus ranked him a five-star (of five) prospect. The comparisons include Mark Teixeira and Adrian Gonzalez.

Lee, magnificent as he has been, was never going to re-sign with the Mariners in free agency, just as he will never re-sign with the Rangers -- two of the three teams left in baseball who have never made the World Series.

They are loser outfits. Lee is the ultimate winner.

By ability and salary, he belongs with the Yankees. So much so that the Yankees, in town and ready to deal, were geeked Friday to acquire him for top prospects, instead of waiting for winter and the chance to get him for only money during free agency.

Even though the Yankees don't need Lee to get to the playoffs, they didn't want to face him in the postseason again. So they were prepared to deal that rarest of commodities, a young power-hitting catcher by the name of Jesus Montero. Zduriencik leveraged New York's urgency into scaring the Rangers into parting with Smoak, the No. 11 pick in the 2008 draft.

The Mariners also acquired a couple of beefy, young minor league pitchers, 6-foot, 7-inch, 250-pound Blake Beavan and Josh Lueke (6-5, 220), plus second baseman Matt Lawson. They threw in for the Rangers Mark Lowe, the once-promising reliever who had disk surgery on his back and is done for the season.

For Texas, the big-gulp aspect is that Lee will give them 15 starts, and whatever happens in the postseason, then will be gone. Smoak, and perhaps one or two others, will be in Rangers' faces for a long while.

"It's tougher as the buyer to trade in the division," said Rangers GM Jon Daniels Friday, "in regard that these guys are going to be in Seattle for six, 10, 15 years, you never know. You think about that."

As Daniels pointed out, the deal for the Mariners was all about the future, which was the only choice since the 2010 season died around Memorial Day. And despite the upside of the deal, the season isn't done being messed up.

Manager Don Wakamatsu committed to start Smoak Saturday, leaving them with a gaggle of first basemen, including the recently acquired Russell Branyan, Casey Kotchman and part-timers Mike Sweeney and Mike Carp. If Branyan is moved to DH and youngster Michael Saunders remains in left field, Milton Bradley is nowhere (not an unfamiliar position for him, in more ways than one).

Taking the Yankees' deal for Montero would have eased the scrutiny on the return of Branyan, which suddenly looks more foolish than it did a day ago.

Some eating of salary likely will take place (they are already munching on most of Carlos Silva's contract while he pitches for the Cubs). The Mariners may also move others before the trade deadline.

Whatever roster churn takes place, the departure of Lee signals the official write-off of the season by management, thereby catching them up with the more discerning members of the fan base.

As a member of the Rangers, Lee will add another name to the list of ex-M's in All-Star Game Tuesday (Alex Rodriguez, Arthur Rhodes, Matt Thornton), becoming another premier player in the busy baseball cosmos the Mariners cannot afford to keep.

At least Lee didn't go to Miami with LeBron James. But he did help Seattle join Cleveland at the burnt-ticket stub as America's most forlorn pro sports cities. Lee wasn't here long enough to have his own club legacy of a warehouse full of bobbleheads. But he was here long enough to pull a rib muscle -- for the second time in his career -- that cost him the first month of the season.

Rangers fans might think on that one awhile, as well as the fact that the last big deal involving a Mariner star, the free agent signing of Alex Rodriguez in 2001, helped start their knucklehead owner, Tom Hicks, down the road to bankruptcy, where the club is now a ward of the baseball state.

The downer for the Mariners' fans is that they will be unable to relieve their ennui every fifth day by observing Lee, the most fascinating pitcher in Seattle since Randy Johnson.

Until Smoak matures, they have only to cling to Zduriencik's words Friday: "We're trying to accumulate the pieces that will be competitive with any team in baseball."

And hope that Texas doesn't beat them to the World Series

It is necessary to help others, not only in our prayers, but in our daily lives. If we find we cannot help others, the least we can do is to desist from harming them. 
Dalai Lama 
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