Improbable Trades That Could Save the 2012 Baseball Season

Maybe I’m not paying enough attention, but doesn’t it seem like the 2012 Major League Baseball season is one of the most boring in history?

Everyone anticipated Bobby Valentine having a meltdown in Boston, or maybe wearing a disguise again but he’s been tame. Even Ubaldo Jimenez almost breaking Tulo’s elbow and the ensuing brawl) failed to be that all that exciting.

We also found out that Fausto Carmona was really Roberto Hernandez in the offseason, C.J. Wilson is still straight edge and lame, A-Rod broke his hand, the Rangers are really good, Ozzie Guillen said something stupid, and Logan Morrison is really obnoxious on Twitter but it’s mildly entertaining when people make fun of him. Even Chipper Jones’s Twitter account that everyone is buzzing about is just him spelling things incorrectly and talking about hunting. And that’s about it so far. Hopefully some moves will happen before the end of Sunday’s non-waiver trade deadline to make me reconsider watching another full game or even an episode of Baseball Tonight.

I do have a few ideas for trades that could save the season. None of the trades I propose make any fiscal or logical sense, or are even possible due to no-trade clauses and certain players being on the disabled list. But if Bud Selig allowed them, we’d have some awesome baseball to watch past August.

Jacoby Ellsbury to the Indians or Braves
It’s kind of fucked up that even though there are a few Native American Major League players, the teams with fully racist names and logos don’t employ them. Both teams’ logos feature laughing Indians, but I don’t know what the fuck is so funny. Calling your team the Indians and not having a tribesman on the team is like N.W.A. being all white people or P!nk writing good songs.

Jacoby is handsome, part-Navajo, and fast enough to catch a running deer. I’d love to see him doing the tomahawk chop after clubbing a home run in Atlanta about as much as I’d enjoy seeing him on the DL for the Tribe, (after all, Cleveland loves oft-injured center fielders, right Grady?). The Red Sox aren’t going to offer him a real contract when he hits free agency, so it makes sense to give fans some ammo when civil rights groups call them racist.

Brian Wilson to the Yankees
Sure, Rafael Soriano is having a brilliant season replacing Mo, and Brian and his shitty beard can’t be traded because he’s on the DL and out for the season after returning to Tijuana, aka getting his second Tommy John surgery, but this is a trade for the people.

The only humans who remotely think Brian’s famous beard is anything but the worst thing in the world are Giants fans. These are the same fans who thought Barry Bonds’s dangly cross earring was cool and that he wasn’t on ’roids. The same fans who enjoy calling one of their players Kung Fu Panda, and yes, the same fans who sip Napa Valley Cabernet while using AT&T Park’s WIFI network as they pretend to watch the game.

If Wilson were traded to the Yankees, it would be the first time I would support the Yankees’ famous rules about facial hair, first put into place by the late George Steinbrenner. No one would ever have to watch a commercial featuring Wilson’s gross beard and hopefully we’d never hear him speak again. The only risk to this trade proposal is that he could wind up with a potentially even more obnoxious mustache.

Derek Jeter to the Red Sox for David Ortiz
The face of the franchise, the captain, a role model, and overpaid. Trading Jeter to Yankees’ rivals is the ultimate way to make baseball interesting and piss everyone off. Both fan bases think they know everything about the sport, and each has irrational attachments to its own players. The Yankees toyed with Jeter when his contract was up because he wasn’t going to sign anywhere else. Jeter lovers got all butthurt that he was “only” going to get $51 million for three more years in pinstripes when no other shortstop was making half that. They would go fucking mental if he showed up in a Red Sox uniform at Yankee Stadium.

The Red Sox are bound to make another bad move at the trade deadline, and what better target than an expensive aging player? Jeter is not yet total dogshit, and Boston could use a shortstop upgrade so that’s one of the few logical parts of this trade. The Red Sox front office has done such a fantastic job of pissing off its fans with classic overthinking—from trading away productive players and saving 20 bucks, to signing Nick Punto for two years for no reason—that a patently idiotic trade for Jeter would ensure the last few Sox apologists would start liking soccer.

Tommy Hanson to the Reds
Why would the Braves trade away their best starting pitcher? Because he’s a ginger, that’s why. It would be a nice gesture to send Tommy and his red beard to the Reds, and it could present some unique branding opportunities and puns for local sports scribes.

Off the top of my head, Redhead Night would be incredible, with the stands packed with flame-haired fans; as an added benefit, it would result in nightmares for every kid in attendance. Tommy could lead Cincinnati to victory by throwing a three-hit shutout and the back page of the paper’s headline would be “Fire in the Hole.”

The Braves know Tommy has a slight tear in his rotator cuff too, so maybe his arm will fall off and they look smart for trading him before he makes a trip to Dr. James Andrews.

Josh Hamilton and Miguel Cabrera to the Brewers
In 2009, Miguel Cabrera bummed everyone out by allegedly beating his wife. He tried to say that the scratches on his face were from his dog—not his wife—attacking him after he allegedly hit her and entered an alcohol abuse program and went sober. Just kidding!

Miggy’s definition of sober is much different than our legal system’s. In 2011, he got a DUI. Cops found him alone in his car drinking scotch and muttering, “I’m going to fucking kill him.” He also resisted arrest and looked like a ridiculous scumbag in his mug shot.

Josh Hamilton has an amazing past with drugs and alcohol, including but not limited to mainlining and hanging out in strip clubs post-sobriety. He had a few beers one offseason and everyone flipped out, but he’s still really good so people need to relax. (That said, he has the circulatory system of a 70-year-old William S. Burroughs and, barring a blood transfusion, will never play more than 130 games in a season again.)

Sending them to join the Brew Crew makes too much sense. I assume Miggy and Josh would try to keep each other sober at first but after a few days with full reign of Miller Park there’s no fucking way these dudes aren’t going to start raging. The Brewers suck this year, so there’ll be plenty of sorrows to drown, and it doesn’t hurt that Milwaukee is a good place to drink yellow beer and cause trouble. The visual of the tribally tatted Christian and the tubby scotch-pounding Venezuelain is straight out of a buddy movie.

Honorable Mention
The Pirates should hire former first base and base-running coach Lynn Jones. Not because he would add anything to their performance, but because he would serve as a great clubhouse good-luck charm. Lynn needed eye surgery after accidentally poking himself in his face, so he could wear an eye patch and boost moral by becoming an actual pirate. He’s already two-thirds of the way there.

@anthonypops