Crown Gems: Gil Meche and Other AL Central News

Day 1 of the Winter Meetings has been relatively quiet thus far, but a few minor moves were made in the AL Central and we got wind of some entertaining Gil Meche rumors.

Early this afternoon, Joel Sherman of the NY Post reported that the Mets had interest in Gil Meche.  Dayton Moore has since indicated that Meche is not going to NY for Luis Castillo, and he’s not going to Chicago for Milton Bradley.  Dick Kaegel offered the following on MLB.com this evening:

"No, folks, don’t wait for those deals to happen. Not that Moore would never trade Meche — “We’ll look at things that might make sense,” he said — but these rumors obviously didn’t.  The Royals are well-stocked with second basemen, notably Alberto Callaspo, Chris Getz and Willie Bloomquist.  And there’s no apparent fit for the ill-starred and very expensive Bradley, a report the Cubs quickly discounted anyway."

The Castillo rumors smack of someone throwing something against the wall to see if it sticks.  Kaegel rightly points out that the Royals already have Getz, Callaspo, and Bloomquist capable of playing 2B.  While Luis can still get on base at a good clip there just isn’t room for him in KC, especially at the cost of losing Gil Meche.  Kaegel also missed one big name on the Royals’ 40-man roster who will be in the team’s middle infield mix during 2010:  Mike Aviles.  A trade for a 34- year old 14-year veteran to play second base makes absolutely no sense.  Aside from having four viable options on the current 40-man roster, the Royals have a couple guys in the minors who could potentially hold down the position including Jeff Bianchi and Johnny Giavotella.  Even Irving Falu is a 2010 stop gap option if the team needs to go that deep.  This team has too many holes to address to be worrying about adding another 2B to the roster.

Kaegel’s article also provided the very comforting quotes from Moore:

"“I think it’s important that we build around Zack Greinke and Joakim and Billy Butler, Gordon, [pitcher Luke] Hochevar, Callaspo. That’s not to say that if we get some type of offer on any of our players, we wouldn’t have to look at it and be open-minded,” Moore said."

"“There were certainly a lot of teams trying to acquire Zack Greinke prior to us signing him to a long-term deal, and we’re very optimistic that he would put together a great season. That’s not anticipating a Cy Young season, but players like that are once-in-a-lifetime guys, and if we’re going to win, we need people like that. … We’ve got to build around those guys.”"

It’s been all quiet on the Chicago White Sox front, but some of the other AL Central teams have made a few moves in the last several days.

The Cleveland Indians signed 3B-Brian Buscher, LHP-Mike Gosling, and SS-Luis Rodriguez to minor league contracts.  Catching prospect Carlos Santana has been removed from winter ball after losing almost 10 pounds after a bout with the flu.

The Detroit Tigers signed LHP-Brad Thomas to a minor league contract and also resigned SS-Adam Everett to a one year contract for $1.55 million.  Today they traded LHP-Clay Rapada to the Texas Rangers for a PTBNL and cash.  The Edwin Jackson and Curtis Granderson trade rumors continue to fly.  The Arizona Diamondbacks have emerged as the front runner to acquire Jackson, while the only thing we really learned about Granderson today is that Detroit’s asking price for the services of their CF is “sky-high.”

The Minnesota Twins officially signed Latin American prospect SS-Miguel Angel Sano.  He has decided to go by his father’s last name, and will now be known as Miguel Jean.  In other news from today, RHP-Carl Pavano has decided to accept the Twins’ arbitration offer.

Here’s hoping tomorrow offers some positive Royals related news.  Till then goodnight!

(Wally Fish is Kings of Kauffman’s lead blogger.  Subscribe to his RSS feed and add him on Twitter to follow him daily.)