The Red Sox helped ease their logjam of starting pitchers by sending Bronson Arroyo to the Reds in exchange for Wily Mo Pena.
Sounds like JD over at Red Reporter is happy about the deal -- it gives the Reds some much needed pitching. It's not fun to pitch at the Great American Ball Park, but Arroyo could still see his numbers fall from last year with the move to the NL. Arroyo isn't a bad end-game pickup at your NL-only draft at all.
Look for the Reds to move either Tony Womack or Ryan Freel to left field, making the stolen base pool in the NL at least a little deeper. Plus, this opens up more time for Rich Aurilia as a utility guy off the bench.
As for Wily Mo (that's so much more fun to type than just "Pena"), I could see him simply exploding (a la David Ortiz) for the Red Sox within a couple of years. He won't play everyday from the outset as things stand right now (he'll likely get the short end of a platoon with Trot Nixon), but he has a ton of power, and at 24, is still relatively young.
Wily Mo is a guy that was robbed of much needed minor-league experience because of a unique contract the Yankees gave him as a prospect that required him to make the 25-man roster back by 2003 or be placed on waivers. As a result, during the time he should have been refining his game at Triple-A he was sitting on the Reds' bench, and when he finally got a chance to play in 2004 he broke out with 26 dongs in 336 at-bats.
Injuries and inconsistent playing time held him back last year, but once he finally gets a chance to play and continue developing, I could see him exploding for 35-40 homers for at least several years in a row. Maybe not this year, but you never know given Nixon's injury history. He's definitely a high-upside pick up.
Following this trade, though, I'd no longer even use a reserve pick on Juan Gonzalez, who I discussed over the weekend.
What kind of impact do you guys see Arroyo and Wily Mo making this year?