Brewing Up Some Trades

2009 Cy Young winner, Zach Greinke, was traded to the Brewers today for a few top prospects

Today sources are reporting the the Milwaukee Brewers have just traded for former Cy Young Award Winner Zach Greinke.

The Kansas City Royals ace would be sent to Milwaukee for the Brewers top prospects in outfielder Lorenzo Cain, shortstop Alcides Escobar, and pitchers Jake Odorizzi and Jeremy Jeffress. The Royals were also supposed to send up their shortstop Yuniesky Betancourt, but that never happened.

Although Greinke did win the 2006 AL Cy Young Award, this season was not his finest. Yes, he did play for the Royals and got no run support but his ERA was 4.17. He posted a 10-14 record in 33 games started. He struck out 181and only walked 55, so at least those stats were consistent.

Greinke joins a pretty solid rotation up in Milwaukee. The Brewers have been known for their pitching when they had aces CC Sabathia and Ben Sheets. Today their ringer was Yovani Gallardo but with the addition of Greinke he will likely be the #2 pitcher. The other pitchers in the rotation are Randy Wolf, Shaun Marcum, and Chris Narveson.

The other teams interested in Greinke were the Yankees, Nationals, and Rangers.

The Yankees claim they would have gotten Greinke if it weren't for his anxiety problems. Greinke was forced to miss the whole 2006 season because of these problems. Playing in the "Big Apple" in front of thousands of heckling new yorkers, the Yankees decided it would not be a great idea to risk signing him.

The Rangers would have gotten Greinke but failed to meet expectations with the Royals on what they would have to give up for him. For the Nationals, they were probably the closest to landing Greinke. The only problem was they would have to give up one of their new pitchers, Jordan Zimmerman along with two other prospects.

Overall in his MLB career, the 28 year old Greinke has a 60-67 record. Put that in a city who competes year in and year out and that maybe is 75-52. Still the facts are facts and it may show that Greinke was a one hit wonder in 2009 (no pun intended).

The Brewers will now likely compete in the NL Central like they did a few years ago. With the reemergence of the Reds and the always good, Cardinals, the Brewers would like to get back to the top of the division. They have they bats in Ryan Braun and Prince Fielder, and now they have the pitching in Zach Greinke and Yovani Gallardo. We will find out in the spring if this trade was worth it for the Brewers.