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A gift for @Kevin_Goldstein.

By Jamey Newberg | Friday, June 22, 2012

The lineup for this Sunday’s Baseball Prospectus event at Rangers Ballpark got a little more awesome yesterday, when Rangers Senior Special Assistant Don Welke said he wanted in on the action, joining Jon Daniels and BP’s Kevin Goldstein, Jason Parks, and Joe Hamrahi for the Q&A portion.

I thought I’d give Kevin a gift to welcome him back to Texas.  (Jason’s a native Texan and Joe’s a Cowboys season ticket holder, so touching down for the weekend is gift enough for them.)  But what do you get for the guy who has it all?

Kevin’s a foodie but a man’s gotta choose his own BBQ sauce.  Cookie bouquets are out, I don’t know if you can buy the whole U2 catalog on iTunes and don’t feel like trying to find out, and I thought about getting him a scoreboard he could watch every April, but the cool models don’t travel well.

So I decided on the ultimate give-up.  And hey, it’s not like I could jump on Twitter and solicit ideas since Kevin reads every tweet by everybody, and as for the thought that I’d get in the car without a specific plan and go hunt for the perfect gift, well, frankly, I don’t have that kind of time.  It would be sort of cliché and unimaginative – maybe even gauche – to give Bill Cosby a college sweatshirt or Jay Leno a car, but Kevin’s getting the obvious, a stack of the things he loves best:

Player comps and trade ideas!

If you’re among the 200-plus who will be at the event on Sunday, corner Kevin with your own – and lots of them!  I mean, when it comes down to it, would Imelda Marcos really cringe at another pair of those cool new barefoot gloves?

Actually, I’m sort of tired of this already and so I’m only going to drop a few comps and a few trade hypotheticals, so now it’s even more important that you back my halfhearted effort with an impressive collective showing of your own.  There’s almost nothing riding on this, but never mind that.

PLAYER COMPS (ceilings, typically; not present):

• Mike Olt/Adrian Beltre (offensively and defensively, other than Olt has more miss in his bat; also, Dontrelle Willis didn’t have to be Vida Blue, and Martin Perez isn’t necessarily going to be Johan Santana)
• Mike Trout/Rickey Henderson
• Howie Kendrick/Michael Young (perhaps more apt, ultimately, than Young/Paul Molitor?)
• Chad Bell/B.J. Ryan (upper half, at least)
• Ronald Guzman/Eric Hosmer (hat tip: Jason Parks)
• Cody Buckel/Robbie Erlin (in reverse)
• Buckel/Roy Oswalt (one promoted yesterday, the other today; some physical/mechanical similarities)
• Mike Adams from the stretch/Nelson Cruz waiting on a pitch (someone else said it before me; can’t remember who)
• Drew Robinson/Ben Zobrist (wishful)
• Every lefthander ever/the next Tom Glavine (wait, dump that)
• Joe Nathan/John C. McGinley

TRADE IDEAS (remember, in most of these hypotheticals, one team says no; in the rest, both teams say no – just a bunch of silly ideas to kick around):

• LHP Martin Perez, RHP Justin Grimm, and CF Julio Borbon to Milwaukee for RHP Zack Greinke (Brewers must get more value than the two compensatory draft picks; other team will get no picks if Greinke leaves this winter; result – finding common ground for an impact starter will be tougher than ever; this one feels like a “both say no” scenario)

• RHP Neftali Feliz and Borbon to Toronto for C Travis d’Arnaud, OF Travis Snider, and RHP Danny Barnes (not until in the winter, once Feliz proves his health; Borbon and Snider will be out of options) 

• RHP Barret Loux and SS Luis Sardinas to San Diego for OF Carlos Quentin (unlikely San Diego makes the necessary qualifying offer in order to get the draft picks for losing Quentin, right?) 

• RHP Roman Mendez to San Diego for C Nick Hundley (winter) 

• OF David Murphy, RHP Wilmer Font, and SS Hanser Alberto to Minnesota for OF Josh Willingham and RHP Jared Burton (Willingham’s $7 million in 2013 and $7 million in 2014 are hefty, but Murphy will likely make more than $5 million next year himself through arbitration) 

• RHP Nick Tepesch, 3B Christian Villanueva, and Borbon to Philadelphia for CF Shane Victorino (the emergence of Craig Gentry probably makes the thought of giving up legitimate prospects for a Victorino rental less appealing) 

• Borbon and LHP Chad Bell to Philadelphia for OF Domonic Brown (Brown will have one option left in 2013)

Again, none of these are going to happen.  Some are really not going to happen.

But you’re welcome, Kevin.  A couple hundred of us are looking super-forward to seeing you this weekend, hopefully most with enough decency to gift you up thoughtfully.  Just trying to set the bar.