Kansas City Royals: Touching on the Untouchables

Desperate times bring drastic measures.

They could also potentially bring an improved ball club to Kansas City in the future.

The Royals are bad—"flirt with 100 losses" bad—and they need to salvage something from this season.

Recent acquisitions Yuniesky Betancourt and Ryan Freel are insufficient moves given the organization's needs.

There are pieces in place—we have to be better than the Emil Brown batting fourth days—but the Royals need to up their talent at several positions.

In order to do that in an economic manner—the only way to do it with an owner like David Glass—the Royals need to take advantage of other teams' deficiencies through trade deadline deals.

i.e. Trading quick fixes for future prospects.

Many players on squad are, and could be, of interest to other ball clubs, but the Royals need to be willing to trade the "untouchables."

Billy Butler is a highly coveted hitting prospect who is starting to put things together.  While his defense is improved, he would most likely be better received in the American League where he can DH and back-up first base.

The re-emergence of Big Papi makes Boston less desperate for a DH, but the Angels could use a healthy bat, and the Yankees are always interested in a big name hitter.

This is not to suggest that a deal needs to be made for Billy, but he should be available for the right price.

Butler would fetch a few top notch prospects from a club desperate for hitting, and since the Royals have a "first baseman of the future" in Eric Hosmer he is left without a long-term position in Kansas City.

Mark Teahen is not an "untouchable," but he is a team leader and an obvious candidate to be dealt. His versatility and productive bat in a poor lineup has already peaked the interest of many general managers.

The issue here isn't where, but rather for what. 

There will be offers, but Dayton Moore cannot act ineptly like he did in giving up the Royals' No. 3 ranked prospect—Dan Cortes—for Betancourt. 

Betancourt should have been obtainable for much less than that—Seattle's patience had grown thin with him.

Joakim Soria, who is having a down season by his standards, would be an upgrade to the back end of any bullpen.

The closer's role in baseball is a luxury position. If your team is unable to get a lead to the closer, then his value has diminished and your franchise is wasting talent.

The Royals are wasting Soria's abilities by way of poor offensive production.

Why not acquire several high ranking position players (or starting pitchers) and cash in on Soria's outstanding contract, hype, and youth?

Given his aforementioned attributes, Soria would attract some serious talent.

Alex Gordon, Alberto Callaspo, Gil Meche, ANYONE in the bullpen, etc. etc. etc. should all be considered available for the right price.

We should be very receptive toward obtaining prospects as we are not competing this season anyway. 

By utilizing our current players possessing trade value while keeping an eye toward 2010 and beyond, the Royals can begin trotting a consistently competitive team out there for years to come.

They need to consider trading everybody...except for Zack Greinke.