JP Finds Another Sucker

While JP Ricciardi has gotten a lot of flak for not trading Roy Halladay after putting his name out there (undeservedly, in my opinion... Halladay was easily the best player available at the deadline, and given that Cleveland gave up Cliff Lee for pennies on the dollar it was pretty clear the market wasn't going to give the Jays anything close to what Halladay was worth) he did do a great job of getting value for Scott Rolen's bloated contract.

And now, apparently, he may have found a way to get out from under another bloated contract, as some idiot GM put in a waiver claim on Alex Rios.

Unlike Halladay, or even Rolen, Rios isn't a player who makes much of a difference. He's hitting a whopping .261/.314/.420 on the season, which is basically fourth outfielder territory. If that line doesn't move drastically over the next seven weeks his OPS and ISO will have dropped for the fourth straight season. He's a good base stealer, and is capable enough defensively playing a good right field and a decent center field, but that skill set isn't worth anything close to the following contract:

$9.7 million in 2010

$12 million in 2011

$12 million in 2012

$12.5 million in 2013

$12.5 million in 2014

$13.5 million in 2015 (club option)

Especially considering the options the Jays have for corner OF spots (notably Travis Snider, who's found his stroke again at Triple-A), Rios needs to be kicked to the curb immediately.

If JP is smart enough to use the opportunity to get that dead weight off the books -- whether he gets any kind of prospect back or not -- he should jump at the chance.

On the other hand if he yanks Rios back off waivers, he should be fired on the spot. There's simply no excuse (beyond JP's ego not letting him admit the Rios contract was a colossal mistake) for such a decision, either in financial or in baseball terms.