1st off, the Pirates GM is Neal Huntington and has been since Sep. 2007.

More importantly, Harden had nowhere near the trade value that Jason Bay had. No matter how talented a player is if a team can’t count on him actually playing he loses value. Beane sold short on Harden, I’ve argued that from the beginning. Harden was having some health issues and Beane was worried that if he didn’t Sell right then he’d lose any chance of getting a solid return. As it turns out, Harden was healthy and if Beane had been willing to roll the dice he probably could have gotten a better package two weeks later.

The flip side to that is if Harden had hit the DL while on Oakland’s roster, or had even missed a start or two, Beane could forget about making a deal that landed him a big league ready SP like Gallagher. It was a tough call either way.

Now it’s my turn to ask the questions. Why are you cherry picking with the Harden trade vs. Bay? Why not suck it up and use the Blanton deal as your frame of referrence? That’s a trade that is showing instant gratification for the A’s organization. Outman, Spencer and Cardenas are all playing well, so well in fact that Outman and Cardenas have earned promotions.

But no, you’d rather choose to take the easy shot and wail about the Harden trade. I got news for you bub…

I’m back in teeth-kicking mode.

You want to keep playing, bring something better. I’d start with getting the names of the characters right.

Let’s set aside who’s a good vs great hitter and focus on some concrete fact.

Manny only agreed to go the the Dodgers because the deal included the teams waiving the two team controlled options years. Manny is a FA next year, so if you want to get the soon to turn 37 year old hitter all it’ll cost is cold hard cash. Pujols and A-Rod are completely unavailable and the Rockies were demanding a higher price for Holliday then the Pirates set on Bay.

So realistically speaking, Bay was the BEST hitter on the trade market that it made sense for the A’s to pursue.

Having Bay on the team right now would not be a worthless thing because it would add a good hitter to a line-up in desperate need of a good hitter. Hell, the line-up is in desperate need of several good hitters but you’ve got to start somewhere and adding one bat would be a step in the right direction. Plus, you’d still have Bay around next year when (hopefully) some of the younger guys have got their hitting legs under them. You talk about wanting to wait for Cargon to be ready to protect Bay, well how about Bay protecting Cargon? Having an established, quality, professional hitter in the everyday line-up might HELP Cargon’s development.

Mazzaro pitched great in AA, he’s struggling a bit in AAA but that’s not too big a deal. What is a big deal is the A’s have pitching depth and are in desperate need of offense. Mazzaro’s play will not help the A’s offense… trading him might.