We have developing players who need those ABs much more than Adam Kennedy. I can see questioning the release, but sending him to Memphis (if we could even do that) would be folly.

The way I see this is that there truly is no interest in a second baseman who doesn’t get on base and doesn’t hit for power. Kennedy presumably looked around for a chance to find some playing time, failed, and so latched on with the Rays hoping that they’ll squeeze him onto the club somehow.

I don’t anticipate that Kennedy will get a shot with the Rays unless a) two of Zobrist, Bartlett, and Iwamura are injured and b) the Rays decide their minor leaguers (like Reid Brignac) aren’t ready.

to the fan shot posted last night.

Or alternatively – we shopped around a 2B who was clearly unhappy and a potential source of trouble with management, who every other GM in the league thought had a lucky and likely unrepeatable breakout defensive year (+nearly 20 runs as opposed to a career average of <10) and who would therefore be little over a replacement player, and therefore no-one was willing to take even a small part of his contract. The fact that a team like the D’Backs, in desperate need of a serviceable 2B (and even after they picked up Lopez, in need of someone who could play defense in the MI with all their groundball pitchers) wouldn’t trade a non-prospect and pick up, say, $1m of salary to get Kennedy suggests there can’t have been any sort of market for him.

I don’t think dropping him like they did was the smartest move, but we’re not party to the internal workings of the club. If Kennedy was a problem (or rather, Kennedy’s relationship with LaRussa) and the club’s analytical systems/scouting (which, by the way, are likely to be far more refined than anything we’re party to) suggested (as they presumably did – given the lack of any club being interested in trading for him) that Kennedy was readily replaceable by guys like Thurston, Barden etc, AND no trade could be made, there’s a reasonable argument that this move may’ve been addition by subtraction.

Although we don’t tend to put much emphasis on (and indeed often deride the traditional valueing of) things like “clubhouse happiness”, “team chemistry” and “intangibles”, it’s pretty clear that they must play SOME sort of positive role in a team. If the club felt that Kennedy was going to be a detriment on this front, then that quite likely wipes out the ~1WAR he might’ve provided this year, with regression of his defence to something approaching his career mean. We can probably replace that value internally with Barden/Thurston/Skip anyhow, and there’s no real need for Kennedy to be down in AAA, where we have plenty of other guys (Hoffpauir, Greene etc) who might need ABs in the middle infield.

Plus, by dumping kennedy we get to dump the league minimum portion of his salary, which the Rays’ll pay if he makes their team. So at least we get back half a mill that we wouldn’t have had if we’d just DFAed him to Memphis. In the current climate, it looks like that might be nearly enough to snag a Joe Biemel or whoever (if our lefties all suck in ST) or even go out and get Craig Counsell, who’s probably an upgrade over Kennedy anyhow.

I don’t particularly like the move but it’s defensible.

When the guy was down, everybody wanted him shipped to the arctic to be eaten by polar bears (ok, that’s an exaggeration), and now that the home team makes a move to try to get better on the field, no one seems to be appreciative. Premise 1: No one was going to take Kennedy in a trade. Premise 2: The Cardinals already had replacement level players under contract to replace him. Result: With or without Kennedy on the roster, it’s going to cost $4 million. With him, you know pretty much what you’re going to get. With him gone, you’re not getting worse and have the upside of possible improvement. Sheesh, next thing you know I’ll be posting on a thread titled, “Bring Back Spezio!”

PS: Felonius Monk – great name. And an good post, too.

Plus, Kennedy was awfully close to signing here before coming to terms with St. Louis. Doesn’t shock me to see him land here and probably take a reserve role during the season.