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Beware of Pitfalls as Snakes Look for Pitching

By John Tenney

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According to Jon Morosi of Fox Sports and C. Trent Rosecrans of the Cincinnati Enquirer, the Cincinnati Reds are open to trades of all kinds during the Winter Meetings in San Diego this week, and the Reds have interest in Dbacks OF David Peralta.

Not even Johnny Cueto or Aroldis Chapman are off-limits.

By now, it’s certainly no secret that the Diamondbacks need pitching.

Both reliable starters and solid relievers to bolster a pitching staff that was one of the worst major league baseball has seen in recent years.

Considering that the Reds have recently hired former Diamondbacks Manager Kevin Towers, it seems that there’s a quiet level of interest in trading Johnny Cueto, Matt Latos or even Mike Leake. Alfredo Simon might be the best possibility considering he isn’t a free agent till 2016.

The Diamondbacks are cutting club salary to remain around the 90 million dollar payroll mark, and it might make sense to try to make a deal for Latos or Leake.

Leake, who had an 11-13 with a 3.70 ERA in 2014 for the Reds might be a good choice as he pitched for Arizona State University from 2006 to 2009.

Latos is a veteran who has postseason experience. Last season he went 5-5 with a 3.25 era. However, he only made 16 starts, and his recent history of injuries will limit his value.

Simon went 15-10 with a 3.44 era in 32 starts. He has electric stuff and has a chance to be a big time starter in the future.

Cueto is the Reds ace. He went 20-9 with a 2.25 era, in an N.L. leading 243.2 innings pitched.

Unless the Diamondbacks can sign any one of these pitchers to a multi- year deal, trading away a good utility outfielder like David Peralta, who appeared in 88 games in 2014, seeing 329 at-bats while hitting .289 with 36 RBI’s is simply not worth it seeing that three of the pitchers will be free agents at the end of the 2015 season.

Simply put, the Diamondbacks need to stay away from this trade no matter what Kevin Towers is saying.

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