Deadwood Was Not an HBO Series: It's Our Minor League System

It's time for a spring garage sale.

Practically every bottle taken from us the Rule 5 draft has been returned for the nickel deposit. Our Columbus-Wilkes Barre pitching staff is so overstuffed that it's a fire hazard. We're bloated, overloaded, and we're getting old, and meanwhile the faithful wonder why our farm doesn't grow position prospects.

Based on Chad the Rad's analysis, (only one worth studying) it's possible that our lone position hope in Scranton would be Austin Jackson in CF. Everybody else is a celebrity contestant on Dancing With the Stars.

Time to clear out the attic.

Folks, this isn't one of those fantasies where you stack 20 Duncans and trade them for Roy Halladay. This is where you give Eric Duncan and Shelley Duncan a fighting chance for a career. They've busted their butts for nearly 10 years, with barely a taste of coffee in their mouths and the contempt of fans who wanted them to be stars. Let them go. Trade them. Free Willy. Elevate a Fortenberry or a Battle, challenge some kid and see what happens. (That's what we did with Austin Jackson, by the way. His numbers weren't that great in Single A two years ago; they just gave him a chance, and he soared.)

We've sent Kei Igawa back to the Anthracite Capital of the World. Why? To punish him? For being overpaid? We're the ones who should be punished for his salary. He was the 2008 Scranton's Pitcher of the Year. Why send him back? We barely tried him as a bullpen option. If one of our starters goes down, Igawa is probably third on the depth chart. What is the point of this? It almost seems as though we fear that he might go to another team, pitch well, and make us look incompetent. Trade him. Let him go. Open the spot. Plant a seed.

And then there's Juan Miranda. The Cuban Igawa. The day we signed Mark Teixiera, he should have gone on the market. They say he can hit, but his glove clanks. Face it: he's not going to play for us. He won't be our DH. We have a team of DH's. The guy had to ride on a boat to get out of Cuba. Must he do likewise to escape the Yankees?

There are others. The catcher, Kevin Cash, will bump PJ Pilittere and Fransisco Cervelli to Trenton. Brett Tomko will take up Horne's pitching time. Dan Geise. Jason Johnson.

OK, you keep a few. The player-coach types. But this is crazy. We've been doing this for 15 years now. It is a system failure. It is like a government bureacracy. It is like GM. High salaried old guys taking up space.

Bundle them up, throw in $50, trade them for Halladay. Arnold Halladay.

As Sting said, "If you love someone, you must set them free."

Mm-mm. Poetry.