Thoughts on Lackey and Halladay

John Lackey is headed to Boston Red Sox for a deal slightly larger than A.J. Burnett's last season. When Jason Bay started to look like he wasn't coming back, they had money to spend. After missing out on Teixeira last year, and now Bay, they have some free cash. This signing may or may not prohibit them from pursuing Matt Holliday.

Roy Halladay was traded to the Phillies, and the trade also pushes Cliff Lee to the Mariners. The Phillies also trade away two of their top three prospects (Kyle Drabek and Michael Taylor), as well as one of their other better ones, to the Phillies, and receive the hard throwing Phillipe Aumont from Seattle.

Does this make the Phillies a better team? Slightly. Halladay is a slightly better pitcher than Lee, and they are going to sign him to a smaller extension than Lee will demand. Halladay is a year older, so that's a slight loss, but the guarantee that they will have Halladay beyond this season is a huge gain for them.

But Michael Taylor and Kyke Drabek are a pretty steep cost. And while Halladay won't want a contract comparable to what he'd get as a free agent after this season, his discounted contract will probably end up around the contract that Cliff Lee would have demanded. So this relative money savings comes at the cost of Michael Taylor, which isn't that great of a price for the Phillies.

And Phillipe Aumont plus some unknown strong, but note elite prospects is a pretty good price for Cliff Lee, or at least comparable to what the Phillies paid for him last July. So the Mariners get a win for him, and they probably have money to sign him for an extension if they so choose. Did the Blue Jays get a fair return for Halladay? Yeah. The Phillies made a bold move here, and have successfully traded 6 of their top 7 prospects since July.

Now this leaves one to wonder, why didn't the Phillies make a similar deal to this back in July? Wouldn't a rotation led by Halladay virtually guarantee them a World Series?

To me, Aumont is the best prospect moved in this deal. I remember seeing him pitch at the World Baseball Classic, and was wowed by how good he was. I like him more than Drabek (although I'm probably in the minority here).

However, a once overrated top-heavy farm system is in danger of being near barren. They have two blue-chippers, and no depth. And the worry about Aumont is that he might be a reliever and not a starter, in which case, his value is a lot lower. On the other hand, he can close instead of Lidge if Lidge falters again.