Yesterday, when word of the Fukudome trade broke, I opined thusly:
Not that I disagree with those sentiments exactly (though I do apologize for the misspelling, Anglophile that I am), but I’d like to expand a bit today. Yes, Fukudome doesn’t make a ton of sense for the Indians considering that he’s left handed. We were all so focused on a right handed outfielder that, to some degree, I poo-pooed the trade yesterday. I think that was a bit of an over-reaction.
So today, we should acknowledge a few things. Let’s do this numerically, so that I don’t lose my train of thought.
1) Kosuke Fukudome is better than Travis Buck.
This is basically what happened yesterday: we added Fukudome and cut Travis Buck (Buck may pass through waivers and stay in the organization—we’ll see). So, if we’re interested in making the team better this year, we need to judge those two against one another. Here are the numbers, both career and 2011:
AVG
OBP
SLG
Career
Buck
0.246
...
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