Goodbye to Nomah

InstantReplay disapproves of the Red Sox trade on Saturday. Nomar Garciaparra and well-regarded prospect Matt Murton hit the road in exchange for second-rate starters Orlando Cabrera and Doug Minkadoodle. Obviously, Nomar was going away long term; no doubt about that. The Red Sox could have chosen to let him walk at season's end, with only a draft pick in exchange. Honestly, I think that would have been better - as long as Nomar was hitting in the .300's and keeping his opinions of the management to himself, the Sox were fine. Alternately, the Sox could have worked a deal to bring in one good player (Matt Clement?) instead of two mid-level ones. The replacement value of Cabrera and Minkqcwghfufi is really not much better than the people who they will take playing time away from: Reese, Bellhorn, Youkilis, Millar. Depth is nice, but you can only put nine men on that lineup card every day.

The last option - and one I still would have been OK with would have been for the Sox to trade Nomar for a half dozen prospects. That would not have done as much as this deal for this season, but it would have shored up a depleted farm system and given us options for future trades. Instead of any of those options, we find ourselves overloaded with light-hitting infielders, plus a new pinch runner (Dave Roberts) who we got by kissing goodbye to Triple-A outfield prospect Henri Stanley.

I'm not saying the Red Sox should give up on this year - it's certainly not out of reach. But they should at least give some thought to the future; we can't keep mortgaging the franchise every year in a mad rush for our elusive world championship, especially when it's not a particularly promising year.