Padres Strike Gold with Greg Maddux

Who would have guessed that a forty-year-old would be the talk of baseball's winter meetings?

Sure, there are plenty of more youthful storylines in Lake Buena Vista: Barry Zito and Jason Schmidt need to find homes; Andy Pettite might be headed back to the Bronx; J.D. Drew signed with Boston for seventy million undeserved dollars.

But San Diego stole the show—and probably the NL West—by nabbing Greg Maddux on Tuesday.

On its face, the Maddux deal looks like a ten-million-dollar steal for the Padres. Don't believe me? Just ask the Dodgers, Giants, Rockies, and Diamondbacks, who are now officially dreading their first visits to PETCO Park.

Maddux's career number speak for themselves: 333 wins, a .622 winning percentage, a 3.07 ERA, 3,169 strikeouts, 4 Cy Young awards, 16 Gold Gloves, 8 All Star appearances, and one World Series ring. More importantly, the knowledge and expertise he's picked up during a twenty-one-season big league career will be invaluable to young staffmates Jake Peavy, Chris Young, Clayton Hensley, and Tim Stauffer.

And don't think that the old man is over the hill. Maddux has made 25 or more starts every year since 1987. With the Cubs and the Dodgers in 2006, he went 4-1 with a 4.01 ERA against the NL West—and would have had an ever lower ERA if it hadn't been for one rough outing against Arizona. His control, as always, was uncanny—37 walks in 210 innings pitched—and his 6-3 record in LA helped propel the Dodgers into the postseason.

For ten million dollars, the Padres are getting more than just an all-time great; they're getting a stabilizing force, a steady locker room presence they can count on for a quality start every fifth day. He'll win the big game when San Diego needs him to—and he'll keep them in just about every one of his 30-plus appearances.

The Dodgers, on the other hand, are losing a key piece of their 2007 puzzle. As it stands, there's only one NL contender on the West Coast these days...and they just hit pay dirt with a forty-year-old bargain.

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