Dodgers Team News

Dodgers News: Team Talked With Astros About Trading Crawford In 2013

[new_royalslider id=”7″] It has been no secret that the Los Angeles Dodgers have had an overcrowded outfield with the emergence of Yasiel Puig last season.

The team had four legitimate, starting outfielders on their roster following the 2013 season and were reported to have been looking for deals for any of them, minus Puig. While the Dodgers may have been shopping them to numerous teams, reports have surfaced of at least one of those teams the Dodgers contacted.



In 10 months of leaked front office talks and reports from the Houston Astros found by Deadspin.com, there was at least mention of one of the three outfielders last November:

11/5/2013
[Stearns] talked with [Dodgers director of baseball contracts] Alex Tamin: LAD is looking to acuire some back end SP depth and up the middle infield depth. They believe they have depth in the pen and would be willing to deal from it (AT mentioned Belisario and Guerra). LAD also has four OF for three spots and would be willing to talk about Crawford.

While it seems the talks never reached more than the mention, it was interesting to see Carl Crawford singled out when Andre Ethier and Matt Kemp were also on the block. The other two players mentioned are no longer with the team anymore, both joining the Chicago White Sox this winter.

The Dodgers tried to alleviate the problem with a rotation of outfielders early in the season before Yasiel Puig claimed right field to his own. Eventually, Kemp took over in center, but promptly lost his job and was moved to left field last month. Crawford then went down with an injury that gave Kemp an everyday job in left and left Ethier splitting time with Scott Van Slyke in center. Since taking over in left, Kemp has turned his season around, while the Ethier/Van Slyke platoon has done well enough in the Dodgers recent hot streak. Crawford’s recovery has taken longer than originally expected after he shared his comments on the outfield situation and vowing to not return until he was 100 percent.

While the idea of shopping the outfielders has continued to float around with the trade deadline nearing, it will be interesting to see what the Dodgers will do, if anything.

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Vincent Samperio

Vince is currently the Associate Editor and Social Media Manager for Dodgers Nation. Hailing from San Pedro, CA and a student at Cal State Long Beach, Vince has previously written for the Daily 49er and LASF Magazine.

3 Comments

  1. A major factor that should be mentioned is that Crawford is from Houston and would be returning home. That is probably the reason Crawford would be targeted over Ethier who they were looking to shop more.

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