Boston Red Sox trade 1B Adam LaRoche and cash to the Atlanta Braves for 1B Casey Kotchman.
This is a trade, that, on the surface, looks ridiculous. Yes, the Sox had just traded for C/1B Victor Martinez, giving them a legitmate bat at C/1B/DH. Given the presence of Kevin Youkilis, David Ortiz, and Jason Varitek already on the roster, the presence of Adam LaRoche (acquired from Pittsburgh 9 days earlier) became beyond superfluous. When word leaked out that the Sox were looking to dump LaRoche after the Martinez trade, it made perfect sense...
...until they got yet another first baseman in exchange.
The party line in Beantown is that Kotchman will be better suited to come off the bench than LaRoche was. Bullsnot. Kotchman does the following things better than LaRoche: play defense and get on base. The problem is, getting on base and playing defense is already the specialty of current infielders Kevin Youkilis and Mike Lowell. If you lift Victor Martinez for defense in the late innings, your best option is to move Youkilis back to first and insert Mike Lowell at 3rd, an option that does not involve Casey Kotchman.
How about pinch hitting in the late innings? Both Kotchman and LaRoche are left-handed, and LaRoche is the more dangerous hitter (his increased power threat cancels out Kotchman's OBP advantage in most pinch hitting situations.
Kotchman is cheaper (~2.8M vs 7M this season for LaRoche), but the Red Sox sent money to the Braves in this deal (presumably enough to cover the difference in salaries for the rest of the year). There doesn't seem to be much rhyme or reason to this deal, so why make it?
WARNING: Full Speculation Mode ahead!
My belief is the Red Sox were trying to swing one more trade. And since they already grabbed some offense, I believe they were chasing Roy Halladay. Part of the reason Toronto was exploring the idea of trading Halladay is because ownership has demanded the front office cut costs. For a team with non-infinite resources like Toronto, Kotchman is a MUCH nicer piece than LaRoche. Not just because of the salary, but unlike LaRoche (who will be a free agent at the end of the season), Kotchman has a couple of more arbitration-elligible years remaining, which makes him cheaper to keep around for a couple more years than LaRoche would be. A package that includes Kotchman looks much nicer to most teams than a package including LaRoche. I believe the LaRoche/Kotchman swap was an effort to put together another deal (I'm guessing for Halladay, because the Sox were continuously linked to him over the last few days) which didn't end up happening for whatever reason. I have no evidence to back this up, but it's the only story that allows this deal to make any kind of sense.
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