The Diamondbacks traded Kelly Johnson to the Blue Jays on Tuesday, getting Aaron Hill and John McDonald in return. Arizona’s motives for the trade are questionable, as the deal could actually hurt their playoff odds.

Eno Sarris covered the deal from the Jays point of view, noting that free-agent-to-be Johnson will likely be used to extract compensatory draft picks this offseason. Johnson is mere percentage points from attaining Type A status — and prior to the trade, he was the highest-ranked non-Type A middle infielder. The Jays employed this tactic last season when it traded for Miguel Olivo on the day before free agency started and allowed him to walk. The Jays again are shrewdly exploiting the compensation system.

Add to that the idea that Johnson is a better player than Hill and the deal makes plenty of sense for Toronto. But does it make any sense for the Diamondbacks, who are in the thick of a divisional race?

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The Blue Jays shipped fan-favorite John McDonald and fan-hated Aaron Hill to the Arizona Diamondbacks for Kelly Johnson. Strangely, even though Hill is the only player with a possible contract currently in place for 2012, this deal opens up many possibilities for the Blue Jays and increases their flexibility.

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Ed. Note: Four people were injured in the copyediting of this article.

One word. Change one word of the trade description, and you might see a world in which the Cardinals got fair value for Colby Rasmus in their trade Wednesday night.

The consensus for the most part is that Alex Anthopoulos pulled a coup when he acquired a young left-handed center fielder with power and speed and a decent glove for his collection of spare parts. A rental starter, a rental backup center fielder, a rental righty reliever, and a young lefty reliever is all that it took to get Rasmus. But then there’s that one word — reliever.

Call Marc Rzepczynski a young lefty starter, and suddenly things might seem a little more even.

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If there was ever a precursor to a trade, this was it, via Matthew Leach and Austin Laymance:

Speaking to KSDK TV-5 in St. Louis, La Russa was largely complimentary of Rasmus until the end of the interview. He spoke of Rasmus’ bright future and said that the club is not shopping Rasmus.

At the end, however, La Russa was asked whether Rasmus is listening and responded tartly.

“Well, he’s listening to somebody,” the manager said.

Asked whether Rasmus is listening to the Cardinals’ coaches, he was more direct.

“No, he doesn’t listen to the Cardinal coaches much now, and that’s why he gets in these funks, in my opinion,” La Russa said. “If he would just stay with [basically] what they teach, he would have … but I actually feel concern for him, because he hears it from so many places, he’s got to be confused.”

Approximately 12 hours after that piece hit MLB.com, the Cardinals sent Colby Rasmus packing to Toronto along with relievers Brian Tallet and Trever Miller and minor league stalwart P.J. Walters for a package centered around Edwin Jackson. The Blue Jays also sent relievers Octavio Dotel and Marc Rzepczynski and center fielder Corey Patterson to St. Louis to complete the deal.

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The talks started last winter, but they didn’t seem serious. Why would the Cardinals consider trading Colby Rasmus? He’s young, he’s cost-controlled, and he’s a center fielder who has some pop. But he clashed with manager Tony LaRussa, and we’ve seen other players depart St. Louis after such spats. Those talks have heated up again in the past month, gaining momentum as the trade deadline approaches. Today it all came to a head. Early this morning word broke that the Blue Jays were set to acquire Edwin Jackson, whom they’d then flip to the Cardinals in a Rasmus deal. A few hours, everything came together as planned.

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Whence we last examined yonder batting orders, we came away with several expected observations (Jose Bautista plays baseball like a video game, the Oakland Athletics do not care much for scoring runs, Rick Ankiel and Ian Desmond are not feared hitters, and so forth) as well as a number of curious findings (the Cubs lead-off combo was tops in the majors, the 7th hitters on AL teams were worse than the 9th hitters, NL managers effectively managed the bottoms of their lineups, and such).

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The Toronto Blue Jays signed shortstop Yunel Escobar (28) to an extension over the weekend. The contract reportedly includes two guaranteed years at $5 million each buying out his last two years of arbitration (2012 and 2013) as well as club options for 2014 and 2015, also at $5 million each. After impressing both at the plate and in the field with the Atlanta Braves during his first three seasons, Escobar had a rough 2010 and was traded to the Blue Jays. He’s recovered quite nicely this season, and it is hard to see how the Blue Jays could lose out in this deal. The only question is why Escobar agreed to it.

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We all know that Jose Bautista is destroying worlds this season: the Bautista (hat tip: Bradley Woodrum) has mashed 20 homeruns and posted a .513 wOBA, accumulated 5 WAR in only 61 games. To put that in some perspective, his .513 wOBA would rank 22nd all-time if the season ended today, and when you adjust for the scoring environment, it’d rank as the fourth best offensive season in major league history (trailing only Babe Ruth and Barry Bonds). He’s having a season for the record books.

In thinking about this recently, I started pondering: how does Bautista’s homerun pace compare with other all-time great seasons? We’re all captivated by a homerun race, and while Bautista isn’t going to break any single-season homerun records, has his homerun pace been as impressive as the rest of his season? And so, I decided to compare his 2011 season against batters that hit 70+ homeruns (Bonds, 2001), 65 homeruns (McGwire, 1999), 60 homeruns (Ruth, 1927), and 54 homeruns (Bautista, 2010). Take a peek:

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Kyle Drabek got his first all-important pitcher win since May 16 last night as the Blue Jays beat the Royals 8-5. Coming off of a disaster start against Cleveland last week, it came as a bit of a relief. However, Drabek (23) was hardly impressive. With three walks and no strikeouts, Drabek arguably pitched worse than Kansas City’s starter, the legendary Vin Mazzaro (three strikeouts, one walk, one home run, and laughable defensive plays by Melky Cabrera, Matt Treanor (Treanor!) and Jeff Francoeur). It’s been a rough season all around for a pitcher some were touting as a potential front-of-the-rotation starter. What should the Jays do about it?

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The following data is current through 5-30-2011.

If you, dear reader, are like me, then you agonize unnecessarily over every lineup on every team in every game. Aaron Rowand leading off?! Yargh! No! Carlos Gomez batting second for the Brewers?! WRONG. Aaron Miles batting anything?! Unforgivable.

Holding egos constant, inefficiency is the greatest enemy of success. With regards to lineups, however, teams can really only lose a handful of runs over the course of full season, but a handful of runs, in real terms, can mean the difference between the division or a boring October. So it’s a dicey proposition. A mismanaged lineup on the Royals team does not mean a whole lot because they will lose the division by several trillion runs. A few lost runs for the Rays, Yankees, or Red Sox, though, can mean the season.
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