Just because the Marlins got rid of Carlos Delgado, Josh Beckett, Mike Lowell, Paul Lo Duca and Billy The Marlin is no reason to suspect they have plans to deal their only remaining veteran stars, protests owner Jeffrey Loria. From the Palm Beach Post’s Joe Capozzi.
“I saw Buster Olney talking about it. I looked at the TV and said, ‘What the (heck) are you talking about?’ ” Loria said before Friday’s game. “It’s outrageous. It’s utterly ridiculous. They’re not going anywhere.”
(what the heck?)
Loria acknowledged that during his tenure here, no player has been untouchable.
“It’s never safe to assume anything in this game,” he said, “but if we were going to go do something, we would have done something in the off-season.”
Willis makes $4.35 million, nearly a third of the $14.9 million payroll. Cabrera earns $472,000. Both players are in line for hefty raises next season, when they might make at least $7 million each.
Still, Loria said they’re not going anywhere.
“It’s not even worth talking about,” he said. “Now, if someone called us and said, here’s Albert Pujols and four other guys you might say, ‘Oh we’ll look at that.”
It might be a good idea for Loria to refrain from further comment so as not to continue exposing himself as a complete boob. On pure baseball merit, Pujols straight up for for Willis or Cabrera would be a no-brainer. But even in the incredibly unlikely event a player of Pujols’ caliber was available, does anyone really believe Loria would take on his $11 million salary?
The Marlins will take on the Nationals’ John Patterson — probably thrilled to be facing someone other than the Mets — later today.