We've all heard the Justin Upton noise nonstop, but what about Alex Gordon? Someone brought this up around the trade deadline in a post so please forgive me for not crediting you.

Gordon is arguably a better player/ clubhouse guy, albeit older, not a superstar, and hits a few less HR's, but signed for 4 years at $11 mil AAV and has averaged a .299/.372/.479 and an OPS of .851 the past 2 seasons. They have Will Myers primed to take his place, are in need of pitching and have a rotating hole at 3B. He could possibly be had for less too.

Does a package revolving around Holland, Olt, and prospects wet anyone's whistle? Is that even enough since he's averaged a 6.7 WAR (Baseball Reference) the past 2 seasons?

Would this trade make it easier to swallow an Elvis, Perez, Gentry, Prospect package for Price?

Just food for thought to remind everyone there are other players out there besides Upton and CarGo.

I like Gordon, but I'm not sure they'd be interested in moving him unless return was overwhelming. Myers will most likely be in RF next year if they aren't convinced he's adequate in CF. They are also rolling with Moustakas at 3rd, so not a rotating hole. They'd want pitching, pitching and more pitching as starting pitching is their huge hole where they're top prospects have fizzled. They'd want Harrison plus if I were to guess, with Perez probably part of their ask.

Moustakas IS the hole at 3B and their CF is back as Lorenzo Cain is now healthy. I agree their asking price would probably be Harrison, but the only way he goes is if Price and/or Greinke are here. Personally I only trade Harry if both of them are here. But a Holland/Olt/Prospects (Not Perez or Martin) trade is pretty enticing in my opinion.

Gordon is potentially on his way to being a platoon outfielder as well. Keep that in mind in meeting whatever asking price they may have.

Platoon OF? Where have you seen that and why would the Royals do that? That makes no sense after your first post. If they're going to make him a platoon OF, sign me up for that cheap trade!

I mean more long term. Doesn't hit lefties well. That doesn't mean they see him as that or that they'd sell him cheap as a result, but that is my opinion. I have heard nothing of them platooning him, but I can read split stats.

It makes perfect sense with my first post. I like Gordon and I know the Royals do as well. However, if he doesn't hit lefties well now, do you think that's going to improve at this point?

Alex Gordon 's achilles tendon is he does not have a position to play every day. No way we spend a pitcher much less a Holland, are you crazy? Once FACE is gone then maybe we consider him as a DH if he is still in the league in 5-6 more years when FACE retires and becomes the second coming of Arlington.

Don't get me wrong, Alex and hit but he has always had issues with playing a position.

I don't look at defensive metrics much, so was his gold glove a Jeter/Palmeiro thing? (honest question)

Alex Gordon is legitimately a really good defensive left fielder. Most assists of any outfielder for the last 2 years and good range. I have no idea what you're talking about mmurphf.

@ Brian For all intensive purposes it looks like he's a little better Nelson Cruz in LF. He won that GG mainly bc he has a cannon and had an extremely high amount of assists last year. But he kept that up this year. Can anyone give the defensive metrics of him compared to Hamilton? It sounds like they may be pretty similar.

@ Murph Gordon plays LF. We need a LF. The fact that he's played multiple positions should be a plus in case he does end up as a great utility/DH in a couple years. I wouldn't consider that a knock on him at all. The LH splits are a little scary, but he absolutely kills RH (which most pitchers are RH). If the price is less than Upton/Cargo, then I'd rather have Gordon. Who knows, maybe his high double rate would translate to higher HR's here.

Man, some of you guys are delusional. Platoon outfielder? Doesn't have a position?

He's a WELL above average left fielder; last year his UZR was 14.1, the year before 9.6. He's posted a wRC+ of 141 and 126 the last two years. This is one of the most productive outfielders in baseball. The last two years he's produced 12.8 fWAR.

Wil Myers is coming up to replace Jeff Francoer, not Alex Gordon. They will have one of the most productive 4-corners in baseball over the next four years, with Gordon, Myers, Hosmer and Moustakas.

Billy Butler is the real target we should go after on KC.

@P1

Hamilton's UZR was -12.6 last year. That's NEGATIVE twelve point six.

I could go with Butler, but, as I've mentioned elsewhere, it would be nice if someone could teach him a position. He profiles pretty well as a 1B offensively but needs some serious work on defense.

What would you give for him?

@Andy

I don't want to teach Billy Butler a position. He can't pick it with his glove. My crystal ball scenario of acquiring Butler is contingent on finding a way to dump Michael Young so we can stick BB at DH and leave him there. Dude would kill in our 5-hole.

In another thread, I mentioned that KC needs pitching, which is obvious. A lineup based around their 4 corners, Cain, Salvador Perez, is one hell of a nucleus.

I think a good straight up trade would be Martin Perez (or Perez + Grimm) for Billy Butler (3-years/$28.5M). I can understand the argument that says Perez is too much to give up Butler, but I see that trade working out well for both sides.

@ Eric

I like Butler, but why not keep Perez and sign Ortiz instead? I'm not sure I can justify trading Perez for a DH even though Butler would look damn good in the middle. I think I could warm up to your idea though.

@eric, I guess we can pick this up from the other post. I simply disagree that a prospect pitcher is going to do it for KC for Butler. You can call Perez more than a prospect, but I don't. He has thrown a grand total of 38 innings in the majors, and they were below average innings at that. The Royals are going to want an established pitcher before they will trade a 26 year old who is under control with a team friendly contract.

ESPN says Ortiz is "finalizing" a deal to stay with the Sox. 2 for $25M. I would totally do that if I were the Rangers, maybe even go to $30M to reunite Ortiz with Magadan but it sounds like it's too late.

@P1

It looks like Boston is about to finalize a two-year deal with Ortiz. Pretty sure he's off the table.

@geo

You may very well be right, but Perez isn't just a prospect pitcher. He's very young and controllable for twice as long as Butler is, meaning over the course of Butler's hypothetical time in Texas the Royals would be paying Perez about $1.8M. That's roughly a $27M savings for a guy that plays DH.

Starting pitching is far more valuable (by lightyears) than a DH, particularly when considering the Royals have a pretty strong core of offense, and really no pitching to speak of. The Rangers have a ton of pitching coming up from the minor leagues. Over the course of Perez's next 6 years he'll produce more WAR than Butler occupying the DH spot.

Damn, yep you're right about Ortiz. There goes my original scenario. Would you still do the Upton trade if we did your Butler trade? That would make us extremely RH, but our lineup could be set for years with youth across the board.

@eric

I get you. I guess the best way to put it is that the Royals will never get as much value in a trade for Butler as he is worth to them. That's the problem with trading a DH the caliber of Butler.

I keep Perez. I think he can play the Feldman swing role this coming season and start if he needs to or pitch long relief which is something we need. He could develop and become our number 5 starter and move up from there hopefully.

If we get a sweetheart offer, though, I'm not opposed to trading him, I just want to see what he can do for us.

Adding Grienke to Darvish and then having the three lefthanders of Harrison, Holland and Perez wouldn't be bad to me either. I just really want to continue moving towards pitching, defense and timely hitting, and trading Perez for an okay DH is not that.

@Tim

You don't keep Perez on the ML roster to start 2013 unless he's in the rotation. There are plenty of options to use in the swing role. Perez needs to continue developing, and that's either in the #5 slot in our rotation or down in AAA.

Also, "moving" towards timely hitting isn't something that happens. You don't sign a hitter because he has a high batting average with RISP; those are things that just balance out over the course of a season.

And Billy Butler isn't an "OK" DH. He's the best DH in the American League. And coming off a year with the worst player in baseball playing DH, a good one would be a welcome change.

We need to get over the idea that Perez is a super stud. The Rangers have.

@ Jd21

Perez might not be a "superstud" but you can't write him off because he's still only 21 and this past season was the youngest starting pitcher not just in the bigs but even at AAA-level with RR. You have to take into account he has the equivalent of only 1 season and a bit at AAA-level and he needs more time there. Developmentally he wasn't ready when he was called up last year but we didn't exactly have better options at the #5-spot. Another year at AAA-level and he should get better. He's still a great prospect.

Perez is arguably a top 30-40 prospect in all of baseball. He could immediately become a teams top prospect in an instant with a trade. While I'm not saying don't trade him, his value is still pretty high. Like Kristen said, the guy is still extremely young compared to his counterparts. I think we've been spoiled with how fast Profar came along. Mike Olt is 24. Let me say that again: Mike Olt is 24. Keep in context how young Perez is.

"Alex Gordon 's achilles tendon is he does not have a position to play every day. No way we spend a pitcher much less a Holland, are you crazy? Once FACE is gone then maybe we consider him as a DH"

Come on, this is just dumb. What makes you think Gordon is positionless, or even deficient defensively?

He's exactly the OPPOSITE of that. He was ranked as the top defensive left fielder in all of baseball ...selected as the winner of the same Fielding Bible award that Beltre got for 3B.