Roy Halladay For Cliff Lee: It Could Happen, But Should Phillies Do It?

With the winter meetings over and the Phillies' bench restocked, fans have turned their attention to Ruben Amaro Jr.'s non-attempts to trade for Toronto's Roy Halladay. What was once an exercise in prospect roulette may have taken a turn towards blockbuster.

FOXSport's Ken Rosenthal thinks there is a good possibility the Phils could dangle playoff and World Series stud Cliff Lee as part of a potential Halladay deal. The gist of it being the Phillies trade Lee for a bevy of prospects and then flip some or all of them to Toronto for Halladay. Halladay would get a contract extension in exchange for him waiving his no-trade clause.

Would this make sense though?

Pros

What it may do is keep some of the Phillies' top prospects like Dominic Brown and Kyle Drabek safely off the table and secure a right handed ace to go alongside erstwhile ace Cole Hamels. Halladay is battle-tested against the American League behemoths New York and Boston, and while many will scoff at the Phils' rotation being to lefty-heavy, Halladay would bring a nice balance. Philadelphia may also be able to hold onto a prospect they receive for Lee.

Cons

Does this dramatically improve the Phils? Lee is as much of an ace as Halladay and showed he could be counted on in the post-season. He's a year younger than Halladay as well (31 to 32). Halladay also has an injury history.

Halladay and Lee are both aces, but for my money (which it's not) Doc is the ace of aces. A guy who will take the ball at the start of each game with every intention of getting that ball back from the catcher at the end. He's faced down the big bullies on the block season after season and never blinked. Giving up Lee isn't ideal but if that's what it takes to lock up Halladay it has to be done.